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Five Week Old Janitors Strike Heads Back to Negotiations

Posted byHoumanitarian

(Hollie O’Connor, Texas Tribune)
Alice McAfee has worked as a janitor for nearly 30 years. She has seen a lot of changes in the industry, she says, but not for the better. Her work has become harder, her hours have been cut and her wages have not kept up with inflation.

McAfee has joined more than 400 other Houston janitorial workers in protests over their working conditions. They are asking for a wage increase, from $8.35 an hour to $10 an hour, to be implemented over a three-year period. Many janitors have participated in marches and have held sit-downs in the lobbies of the buildings they clean, in acts of civil disobedience that have resulted in several arrests.

McAfee said the widening pay disparity between her and the people whose offices she cleans is unfair. “Who should be ashamed is the big CEOs,” McAfee said. “They have to remember that what’s on the bottom holds them up.”

This is the fifth week of striking and protests by members of the Service Employees International Union against their employers, including ISS Facility Services, GCA Services, ABM Janitorial Services, United Building Maintenance and Pritchard Industries. Employees with these companies clean the downtown high rises for some of Houston’s wealthiest businesses, including JPMorgan Chase, ExxonMobil and Wells Fargo. The cleaning companies contract with building owners to provide services.

The SEIU and the five companies will begin their latest round of negotiations Wednesday. Paloma Martinez, an SEIU spokeswoman, said that talks last Thursday and Friday were productive but did not result in an agreement.

Martinez said the same contractors are paying janitors better wages in different cities. In Detroit, the rate is $11.17 an hour, and in Chicago, it’s $15.45 an hour. She said Houston’s low wages mean that janitors can’t get by without government aid, putting a burden on taxpayers.

“Houston is the strongest economy in the nation on paper, but in reality, it isn’t,” Martinez said. “We are subsidizing the corporations, and that’s bad for our social safety net, and for the taxpayers.”

Tim Reilly, the lawyer representing ISS Facility Services, GCA Services and ABM Janitorial Services, said in a written statement that the janitors are given paid vacation and health benefits, despite the fact that most of the positions are part time. He said the janitors are asking for too much money in too short a period of time, especially because they received a raise earlier this year.
(Read the full story at the Texas Tribune)

RELATED COVERAGE:
Janitors Make Final Plea For Higher Wages (KUHF Public Radio)
Houston Janitors Fight for Fair Pay in Economic Boom (Marketplace Radio)

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