The workers, members of United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 789, voted in the union last year but the company so far has refused to recognize the election or enter into contract negotiations.

One skirmish on the plant floor is called by the workers the "War of the Stickers." In response to a majority of workers in the kill department deciding to wear a union sticker on their hard hats, the company asked workers to place a sticker with the company logo on their helmets.

The war was started by a worker from the kill department, José Flores, who began distributing stickers to kill-floor workers following his return after the company suspended him for one month. Flores had been accused early in March of a safety violation in the plant. However, the company never produced any evidence. "I never did what the company accused me of," Flores told the Workers' Voice, the in-plant newspaper of the union. "The only reason the company suspended me is because I support the union," he said.

Flores has worked in the kill department for three years and is a member of the union's communications committee. In response to this company attack, 30 workers went up to the office in support of Flores, who is known as a strong defender of the union. The mobilization of workers was the largest in-plant action since the sit-down strike last June when workers gathered in the company cafeteria and refused to work until the company met with workers' representatives and agreed to improve some conditions in the plant. The seven-hour sit-down strike began a union organizing drive.

The mobilization of workers at the office was organized by Enrique and Obdulia Flores. "Before the kill-floor workers went downstairs to change in the morning I was at the entrance door telling them that we had to go up to the office," said Enrique Flores. Thirty workers went to the office, but the plant manager, Esteban Cortinas, was not in his office for the day, so it was decided to return the following day. Fifteen workers formed a delegation to talk with Cortinas the next day.

At first, the company tried not to rehire José Flores, but finally relented under the pressure of the workers. The issue of the Workers' Voice that featured information on the fight to defend Flores was well received by workers in the plant.

Another skirmish took place in mid-April after the company placed an experienced worker in the kill department on a job for which he had not received training. He could not keep up with the job because of his lack of training and the line speed. The worker raised the situation with fellow union members and within minutes a delegation of 40 workers marched up to the office of the plant manager to demand the worker be returned to his previous job. While the worker went into the office and spoke with Cortinas, union leader Enrique Flores told the 40 workers that no one would go back to the kill floor until the worker came out of the plant manager's office. There was an overflow of workers in the hallway because of the small size of the available space.

Workers in both the boning and kill departments also went into action around the company's lack of consideration of a doctor's restrictions placed on an injured worker. A worker in the kill department, Pancho Bazan, stabbed his hand with his knife because of the speedup and the brutal pace of work in the plant. After reporting his injury to the company, he was told to drive himself to the doctor. "The following day," Bazan said, "My supervisor called me at home. The doctor's instructions restricted me from working on a knife job for 10 days. However, the supervisor told me to present myself for work. He said if I didn't, I would be fired. When I presented myself for work I was put back on the knife job."

Bazan's case was featured in a new issue of Workers' Voice. The newsletter was passed out by supporters on Thursday morning April 26. Within an hour of the start of his shift, plant manager Cortinas was personally driving Bazan to the medical clinic. The doctor found that the hand has a massive infection. Word of this has spread around the plant, reinforcing for many the importance of the union in defending workers from company attacks.

Bobbilyn Negrón is a meat packer and a member of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 789 in South St. Paul. Tom Fiske also contributed to this article.  
 
 
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