The lobbyist and spin doctors against the working American have launched all sorts of anti-union websites, one of their newest is using the "stop unions" phrase. So here's a nice little spot on Blogger where I can test some nice widgets for my own site Joe's Union Review
It's that time of year, holiday time. Lots of parties will take place over the next several weeks, so how about looking for union made spirits for those parties?
This was a bad year for those that tend to grapes to make wine in California. Five known heat related deaths including an 17 year old girl that was expecting. After reading about her, I switched to only UFW approved wines.
UFW's own Black Eagle was served at the Democratic Convention with great pride.
The United Farm Workers has launched BlackEagleWines.com selling wine produced under UFW contract by farm workers who have decent wages, health care and a pension. The proceeds support the UFW's organizing.
WINE Chateau Ste. Michelle Columbia Crest Saddle Mountain Farron Ridge North Star Snoqualmie St. Supery Dollarhide Ranch Scheid Vineyards Inc. Balletto Charles Krug C.K. Mondavi C.R. Cellars
So, this holiday season, support the efforts of the United Farm Workers and ensure that farm workers have health care and pensions and are treated fairly. They work hard and should be able to raise families on the wages they earn.
You can help the California farm workers get to Sacramento by donating for their bus trip to California. This comes from fellow labor communicatorTomP over at DailyKos.
Six California farm workers have died since May from what appears to be heat related causes. The latest one was Maria De Jesus Alvarez, 63, mother of nine, who died early this month. The first one to die was 17-year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez, who died in May. Marie was about a month pregnant when she died, and likely did not ever know she was pregnant. The state fined the labor contractor $262,700 for failing to follow heat illness prevention regulations at the time Jimenez was stricken, but that won't bring her back. And the deaths have continued at an accelerated pace since then.
You can help to end this tragedy. This Monday, August 18, more than 800 farm workers from throughout California want to go to Sacramento to lobby the Legislature on a key bill that will help them help themeselves. They want the chance to tell the Governor and their elected officials to support AB 2386, "Secret Ballot Elections for Farmworkers," which has moved out of the assembly and which will be voted on that afternoon in the state senate.
I have been writing for months on the deaths of farm workers in California from the heat. Six farm workers deaths are being or have been investigated because of heat-related causes since May.
This brings to 15 the number of farm workers whose death have been investigated as heat-related since Governor Schwarzenegger took office.
You can learn more details of this continuing tragedy in these diaries:
As UFW President Arturo S. Rodriguez said at the funeral of 17-year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez:
How much is the life of a farm worker worth? Is it less than the life of any other human being?
The state has fined the labor contractor for whom Maria Isabel worked:
Atwater-based Merced Farm Labor, the contractor investigated in the death of Lodi teen Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez last spring, was fined $262,700 by the state [in July] for failure to follow heat illness prevention regulations at the time Jimenez was stricken.
Jimenez, a 17-year-old pregnant farm laborer, collapsed May 14 in a Farmington vineyard operated by West Coast Grape Farming and died two days later. Her death from heatstroke was ruled an occupational death by the San Joaquin County coroner.
In honor of Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez, the march from Lodi, CA to Sacramento State Capitol, June 4, 2008:
Since then, five more farm workers have died from what appears to be heat-related causes.
August 2, 2008: Maria de Jesus Alvarez.
July 31, 2008: Jorge Herrera.
July 9, 2008: Ramiro Carrillo Rodriguez.
July 9, 2008: Abdon Felix Garcia.
June 20, 2008: Jose Macrena Hernandez.
Farm worker dies in Santa Maria, California. Television news report on the death of Jose Macrena Hernandez:
These deaths make it clear the state does not have the capacity to protect farm workers. With all the budget cuts and other issues in California now, the state, even if well intentioned, simply has not been able to protect these workers. So they must protect themselves.
We can make a difference and it will not take much.
The vital legislation that Speaker Emeritus Nunez has introduced--and the workers want to go to Sacramento and lobby for--protects farm workers' right to a secret ballot election and will make it easier for farm workers to organize and enforce the laws that the state cannot enforce.
If you can't attend please make a donation to help the United Farm Workers rent 14 buses, additional vans, plus pay for food and other supplies which will cost in excess of $31,770 for the day.
There is nothing more powerful than hearing a farm worker story face-to-face, especially to lawmakers.
Doroteo Jimenez, grape worker and uncle of 17-year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez who died in May explains why she must go to Sacremento.
I want to go to Sacramento and speak to the legislators.
My niece Maria Isabel died because growers treat us like tools instead of like people. I spoke up and I was unjustly fired. This needs to change now. I don't want to see other families suffer like our family has. This bill can change farm workers' lives for the better.
Please help us.
Margarita Hernandez, grape worker knows that that there must be changes in the workplace:
The reason for me to go to Sacramento is because I want changes in the working conditions at my job and the other companies. In the place where I work, Sun Pacific, we don't have shade and the drinking water is without ice until 9 am—though they know that by that hour it is already hot.
There have been people have felt sick from the heat and the company people always ask if they feel bad because of something they ate...
I feel there is no respect for the farm worker, even though many farm workers have died. The companies don't change their treatment towards the farm workers. That is why I am going to Sacramento. I have the hope that one day, we will be treated better.
Just to rent the buses and vans needed, will cost $26,570 and that does not cover the food and other supplies needed.
The UNF hopes that internet supporters would contribute $5,510 towards this expense. This will cover the transportation costs of 140 workers at $39.36 per worker. Let's show them that Daily Kos can do it and more!
Can you make sure Doroteo, Margarita and others get seats on the bus?
When the union is strong, growers and labor contractors follow the California heat regulations, and lives can be saved. This bill is key to growing the union and, literally, saving lives.
Where farm workers are protected by union contracts, the laws are honored.
And when growers know it is easier for farm workers to organize and bring in the union, employers are much more careful about obeying the law because they don’t want to give the union an advantage.
So the answer, sisters and brothers, is self-help—making it easier for farm workers to organize so the laws on the books are the laws in the fields. Then more important human beings like Maria Isabel won’t have to die.
If you can't attend please make a donation to help the United Farm Workers rent 14 buses, additional vans, plus pay for food and other supplies which will cost in excess of $31,770 for the day.
Yesterday we mourned, Today we act, Tomorrow we will gain justice.
“If you take her to a clinic,” the foreman said, “don’t say she was working [for the contractor]. Say she became sick because she was jogging to get exercise. Since she’s underage, it will create big problems for us.”
I got wind of this story from TrueBlueMajority at DailyKos from (5/29/08):
Pregnant farmworker dies due to safety violations Funeral services were held yesterday in California for Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez. Vasquez Jimenez was a 17 year old woman working for a contracting company called Merced Farm Labor, and she died of overheating because rules about access to water, water breaks, and shade were ignored. Newspaper reports indicate her body temperature exceeded 108 degrees. She may not have known she was two months pregnant; her pregnancy was discovered as part of the investigation into her death.
Republicans and conservatives who claim to be "pro-life" while acting as though undocumented farmworkers are disposable people pushes all my righteous anger buttons. I predict we won't see any outrage from the "pro-life" community about the unnecessary death of this young woman and her unborn child.
When Vasquez Jimenez collapsed, she had been on the job three days, pruning vines for $8 an hour in a vineyard owned by West Coast Grape Farming.
During eight hours of work beginning at 6 a.m. in heat that topped 95 degrees, Bautista said that workers were given only one water break, at 10:30 a.m. And the water was a 10-minute walk away – too far, he said, to keep up with the crew and avoid being scolded.
Vasquez Jimenez collapsed at 3:30 p.m., Bautista said, and for at least five minutes, the foreman did nothing but stare at the couple while Bautista cradled her.
Bautista said the foreman told him to place the teenager in the back seat of a van, which was hot inside, and put a wet cloth on her.
Later, Bautista said, the foreman told a driver to take the pair to a store to buy rubbing alcohol and apply it to see if it would revive Vasquez Jimenez. When that failed, the driver took the couple to a clinic in Lodi, Bautista said, where her body temperature had reached more than 108 degrees.
"The foreman told me to say that she wasn't working for a contractor, that she got sick while exercising," Bautista said in Spanish. "He said she was underage, and it would cause a lot of problems."
Bautista and family members said that clinic staff rushed the girl to a hospital, where she was revived several times before finally succumbing two days later without ever regaining consciousness. Doctors later discovered she was two months pregnant.
the United Farm Workers website in memorializing her quotes from a speech by Cesar Chavez from 34 years ago when he reflected on whether these deaths are deliberate:
"They are deliberate," Cesar said, "in the sense that they are the direct result of a farm labor system that treats workers like agricultural implements and not as human beings. These accidents happen because employers and labor contractors treat us as if we were not important human beings."
But farm workers "are important human beings," Cesar continued...
They are important because they are from us. We cherish them. We love them. We will miss them.
They are important because of the love they gave to their husbands, their children, their wives, their parents—all those who were close to them and who needed them.
They are important because of the work they do. They are not implements to be used and discarded. They are human beings who sweat and sacrifice to bring food to the tables of millions...of people throughout the world.
They are important because God made them, gave them life, and cares for them in life and death.
How many more will it take for OSHA to do the right thing, for the states to enforce the law, for everyone to understand that the grapes on the table or in your juice or wine may be at the price of a human life or two? Isn't that price too high to pay? It is, it's too high, way too high.
I figure if you have been reading my stories in succession, you may notice a recent theme, there are less and less jobs for American citizens, and the trade off is slavery. Corporate American and the politicians are allowing everything that American workers, our original immigrants fought so valiantly for. It seems the only ones fighting for justice are unions and social activist. Which brings me to the next article about Glen Beck from CNN, who wrote a fantastic piece entitled "Commentary: Slavery alive and well in U.S." (5/28/08) which brings up a lot of items discussed on this blog, including "Illegal immigrants aren't employees, they're corporate slaves" and that "fines should be much higher on employers that hire illegal workers"
Farm labor organizers say they have discovered more than 100 migrant fruit pickers living in a Central Valley cherry orchard where they have been sleeping outdoors and bathing in drainage ditches.
The American worker and all jobs here are being attacked, the writing is on the wall people, it is the fight that must be taken seriously by everyone. It's not just industrial jobs, its the jobs that are still here, the meat cutting, construction, programming, nursing, everything.
