Stadium workers union plans protest at Winter Classic

Facing stalled contract negotiations, Unite Here is gearing up to stage a demonstration at hockey's big day.

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Stadium workers union plans protest at Winter Classic

POSTED: Friday, December 30, 2011, 4:05 PM

Hockey fans won't be the only ones heading to South Philly on Monday for the Winter Classic. Unite Here Local 274 — which represents some 1,500 Aramark employees at Citizens Bank Park who were without a contract for the better part of the 2011 baseball season — will also be there, and they're calling in the cavalry.

A few hundred union (and possibly Occupy) demonstrators will be at the first-base gate Monday afternoon. They'll bring Spiral Q puppets, surprise giveaways for fans and a clear message for Aramark, which last met with the union in October, according to organizer Rosslyn Wuchinich. "We're hoping to let Aramark and the teams, the fans and the NHL know that while we're celebrating this huge sporting event, there's a really serious issue of worker justice at Citizens Bank Park," she says. "There are a number of ballparks where Aramark does pay better and have a more just situation for the workers, and we're striving for that. This has been a place where Aramark has been very successful, and we just want the workers to be able to share more in that success."

According to Unite Here, ballpark workers currently make an average of $10.90 per hour. They're seeking a 50-cent hourly raise retroactive to the beginning of the season; a three-year contract; better takes for commissioned workers; and more flexible scheduling for employees who, since 2010, have been disallowed by Aramark from earning overtime by working a full homestand. (That change in policy followed a class action lawsuit by workers regarding overtime pay, according to Wuchinich.) "Ballpark work is sort of feast or famine," she says, "so workers really depend on those periods when there's a lot of work."

Aramark had last offered a five-year contract and lesser pay raises, and had sought to reduce the number of workers elegible for health insurance by about two thirds.

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