BY STEPHEN BLOODWORTH
NEW ORLEANS - Some 7,000 workers took to the streets
here July 19 to demand their right to organize, join, and be
represented by labor unions in this southern port city.
Hundreds of workers wearing blue "Justice for Avondale Workers" T-shirts and hundreds more carrying placards reading "Stop Public Money for Private Profit; Hotel Workers Yes, Developers No!" composed two of the largest contingents in the spirited demonstration. A large group of American Federation of Teachers members, in town for their annual convention, poured out of their meeting to join the marching unionists as well.
Pilots Agree member Rodney Johnson, who was fired from his job two days before his union struck the river barge companies April 3 and is now a worker in the Avondale shipyards, said, "I came to support all of us: pilots, teachers, Avondale, and hotel workers. We have to stick together."
Union recognition is the key issue for more than 3,500 shipyard workers. Avondale Industries Inc., which designs, builds, and overhauls both commercial and military ships, is the largest private industrial employer in the state. In 1993, in response to the low pay, unsafe working conditions, and numerous other grievances, workers filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to be represented by the New Orleans Metal Trades Council. The company challenged the union's victory in the election, but in April of 1997 the NLRB overruled Avondale's objections, certifying the union by a vote of 1,950 to 1,632.
To this day, the company refuses to negotiate with the union and has waged an ongoing campaign of harassment against union activists. After 22 years at Avondale, Edwin Brown said, "I was fired trying to form a union. They claimed I parked in the wrong parking space. When I objected to this, they charged me with insubordination and using obscene language. Avondale won't recognize the union we voted to have over five years ago." In February, a judge found that Avondale had violated labor law 100 times and ordered the company to reinstate 28 workers and rescind disciplinary action on another 15.
Also marching in force were hundreds of convention center and hotel workers. A hotel housekeeper in New Orleans, a city with one of the most expensive and profitable hotel markets in the country, makes on the average $5.48 an hour. The Hospitality, Hotel and Restaurants Organizing Council (HOTROC) is campaigning for union recognition of these workers.
The fight for better wages was also a prevalent theme on placards, banners, buttons, and stickers. Latrice Dillon, a 17-year-old high school student marching with a contingent of city workers, said, "I came to see that my parents and friends get a pay raise." Young workers and high school and college students made up a sizable portion of the marchers.
Scores of other union locals were at the protest. Kirk Barnes, an electrician at the city's convention center and a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 130, commented, "Business can always come up with a way to justify their profits.... [But] you have to come up with all kinds of reasons to justify why you need a raise, benefits or health insurance. Who wants to work 40 hours or more a week and barely make it while they have such enormous salaries?"
Stephen Bloodworth is a rail worker in Birmingham, Alabama.