BY KAREN RAY
WATSONVILLE, California - The California Agricultural Labor
Relations Board (ALRB) is holding a runoff representation vote
by farm workers at Coastal Berry, the largest strawberry
grower in the country. The voting is scheduled for June 3 at
the company's Oxnard farm and June 4 at Watsonville-area
ranches. The first round of voting took place May 25-26.
The announcement came after a tense five days, as totals showed the United Farm Workers (UFW) union trailing the pro- company outfit Coastal Berry of California Farm Worker Committee. There were 60 challenged ballots that would determine whether there would be a runoff or if the Coastal Berry Farm Worker Committee would take the election. The ALRB final total was 589 votes for the UFW, 670 for the Committee, and 83 for no union.
A majority would have been 675 votes. Farm workers from Coastal Berry met at the UFW headquarters here in the evening June 1 to map out how to get out the vote for the June 3-4 election. Following the meeting about two dozen workers organized to go into the surrounding community, going door-to- door to talk to workers about the UFW.
"We will continue the fight for the union at Coastal Berry," explained Rubén Nieto, a Coastal Berry worker who came to the union offices here.
UFW president Arturo Rodríguez told a telephone news conference May 27, "We knew we were fighting one of the strongest companies in the industry. We are not at all surprised and don't anticipate this being over." He described the history of intimidation by the company and the pro-company outfit.
On the day of the voting at the Oxnard farm, in Ventura County, an unsigned leaflet was handed out listing more than 90 names of farm workers it said were the only ones who signed for the UFW. The leaflet, which was in broken Spanish, warned, "We ranchers from Oxnard have been watching this for many months. We know who has been supporting the UFW. We have many years of dealing with the UFW and have seen how they destroy companies. You receive good pay and good benefits without the union, without dues out of your pockets, don't let the UFW ruin your company Coastal Berry."
The vote at the Oxnard ranch, one of the three locations where voting took place, was 309 for the UFW, 230 for the Coastal Berry Farm Workers Committee, and 37 for no union. Workers at the ranches in Watsonville and Salinas voted 268 for the UFW, 416 for the Committee, and 42 for no union.
Rodríguez said the Oxnard ranch just started this year, so that the workers had not been subjected to the three-year antiunion campaign as the workers in Watsonville and Salinas had been. The season is winding down at Oxnard and many of the workers have now left to work the cherry crops, which means they will not be voting in the runoff.
UFW supporter Isabel Rendon, who was injured last July when company thugs toppled a stack of boxes on her, accused supporters of the pro-company Committee of pressuring workers. "Before we voted, they were saying that those who don't vote for the Committee, or who vote for the UFW, could take their strawberry carts and leave."
While the farm workers met to map out the next couple of days' work, supporters from the Watsonville community also met to plan a press conference for June 3. The National Strawberry Commission for Workers Rights has 162 individuals and organizations, including area union locals, churches, and elected officials signed on in Santa Cruz and Monterey counties.
UFW organizing drive at Coastal Berry
The UFW began its organizing effort at Coastal Berry in
1996. The states $600 million strawberry industry employs
about 20,000 workers. The UFW holds one contract with a
strawberry grower, a small organic farm that employs about 50
workers. In 1996 strawberry growers and the antiunion Pro
Workers Committee, which is now defunct, held a 5,000-person
march in Salinas. The UFW won a suit in May exposing this and
other pro-company outfits as funded by the Western Growers
Association.
As the UFW was collecting cards for a union election in July 1998, foreman and supervisory company thugs staged a riot in the Coastal Berry fields near Watsonville. A large antiunion mob attacked UFW supporters and seriously injured three workers.
In the following few weeks, the anti-UFW foreman went crew to crew forcing pickers to sign petitions for a union election of the just-formed Coastal Berry Farm Workers Committee. Pickers who didn't sign were threatened with violence and losing their jobs. The president of this so-called union is José Fernández, a foreman who was eventually fired for the July 1998 attack on the farm workers.
On July 23, 1998, the ALRB conducted an election at Coastal Berry. The UFW objected and boycotted the election calling it a "sham." The Coastal Berry Farm Workers Committee won the election by 113 votes. In November 1998 an ALRB administrative judge invalidated the election based on the fact that workers in Oxnard were not notified of the vote. This was upheld by the ALRB. On May 21 the UFW turned in union authorization cards signed by more than half of the workers at Coastal Berry.
Since the start of the picking season here the UFW has been preparing for this vote. On April 18, the UFW held a successful march of 600 in Salinas in a show of support for the union. As a result of the organizing efforts over the last three years, farm workers in the strawberry industry have seen a modest raise in wages. At Coastal Berry workers receive between $7.00 and $8.50 an hour and now receive some medical benefits and a pension.
Final election results should be known late on June 4.