{"id":19861,"date":"2015-04-21T09:55:41","date_gmt":"2015-04-21T13:55:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ufcw.org\/?p=19861"},"modified":"2020-08-24T19:11:08","modified_gmt":"2020-08-24T19:11:08","slug":"following-retaliatory-closures-walmart-workers-take-legal-action","status":"publish","type":"press_releases","link":"https:\/\/www.ufcw.org\/press-releases\/following-retaliatory-closures-walmart-workers-take-legal-action\/","title":{"rendered":"Following Retaliatory Closures, Walmart Workers Take Legal Action"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><em>Supported by elected officials, clergy and community members, group files for injunctive relief with the National Labor Relations Board on behalf of workers<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><em>Local school board launches resolution calls on Walmart to consider economic impact to local community, transfer and reinstate workers<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ufcw.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/11174655_1092389480778107_6579073321344252761_o.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-19862\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ufcw.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/11174655_1092389480778107_6579073321344252761_o.jpg\" alt=\"11174655_1092389480778107_6579073321344252761_o\" width=\"239\" height=\"239\" \/><\/a>NATIONWIDE \u2014Yesterday\u00a0Pico Rivera Walmart workers with <a href=\"http:\/\/makingchangeatwalmart.org\/2015\/04\/20\/following-retaliatory-closures-walmart-workers-take-legal-action\/forrespect.org\">OUR Walmart<\/a> filed a charge with the National Labor Relations Board in response to Walmart\u2019s retaliatory store closings. Last week, Walmart abruptly closed 5 Walmart stores in four states due to an alleged national plumbing emergency. However, city officials point out that the company has obtained no permits to begin repairs in any of these locations. Walmart has failed to offer any evidence of a plumbing emergency that would require the immediate closing of five stores. Among the five stores was the Pico Rivera, California Walmart Supercenter, which has been the hotbed for worker action. The store is also of symbolic important to the low-wage worker movement, as it sparked the Walmart and fast food strikes when it was the first store to go on strike in October of 2012. Workers from the store also held the first large sit-down strike and participated in civil disobedience in the weeks prior to last Black Friday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a new low, even for Walmart,\u201d said Venanzi Luna, an eight-year Walmart worker and long-time OUR Walmart member. \u201cIt\u2019s just so heartless to put thousands of your employees out of a job with no clear explanation on just a few hours\u2019 notice. We know that Walmart is scared of all we have accomplished as members of OUR Walmart so they\u2019re targeting us. Through OUR Walmart, we\u2019re going to keep fighting back until the company gives us our jobs back. It\u2019s unfortunate that Walmart has chosen to hurt the lives of so many people, just to try to conceal their real motives of silencing workers just like they\u2019ve always done.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Workers are asking the National Labor Relations Board to see injunctive relief under section 10j of the National Labor Relations Act. They are calling on the National Labor Relations Board to compel Walmart to rehire all of the workers who were terminated in all five stores and reinstate them to their own stores or transfer them without loss of pay until they can be reinstated to their stores. A 10j injunction is designed to allow the court to act quickly to remedy such extreme violations without the long delay which is anticipated for NLRB proceedings.<\/p>\n<p>As <a href=\"http:\/\/makingchangeatwalmart.org\/files\/2015\/04\/Pico-Filing.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the filing notes<\/a>, this is not the first time Walmart has taken dramatic action to quell worker action. In June of 2014, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2014\/06\/28\/business\/international\/walmart-illegally-closed-union-store-court-says.html?_r=0\">Canadian Supreme Court ruled that Walmart had violated labor law<\/a> when it closed the Jonqui\u00e9re, Quebec Walmart store. The workers in that store had voted to join a union, becoming the first unionized store in North America just before it closed. In 2000, butchers in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/al-norman\/walmarts-meat-wars-with-u_b_91757.html\">Jacksonville, Texas Walmart<\/a> voted to join UFCW Local 540. Two weeks later, Walmart closed its 180 meat departments in stores nationwide and switched to prepackaged case ready meat only. More recently, Walmart fired and disciplined more than 70 workers who participated in strikes in June 2013. An Administrative Law Judge of the NLRB has <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/SB10001424052702303985504579206412630293566\">found merit to claims against Walmart<\/a> and additional claims are currently being prosecuted by the General Counsel of the NLRB against Walmart.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWalmart\u2019s choice to close one of the most vocal stores in the fight for $15 and full time is a clear and direct assault on all workers\u2019 rights,\u201d said Jobs With Justice Executive Director Sarita Gupta. \u201cAs a country, we cannot sit back quietly as our nation\u2019s largest private employer is allowed to lay off thousands of people in an attempt to silence them from speaking out for better wages, hours and respect on the job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Community members and elected officials have also come out in support of Walmart workers. The El Rancho Unified School District, in which the Pico Rivera store is located, will vote on a resolution in support of the laid off Pico Rivera Walmart workers. The resolution \u201ccalls on Walmart to consider the economic hardship their decision has caused for their 530 Associates from the Pico Rivera store and their families and commit to transfer all of the Associates to surrounding Walmart stores before new people are hired to fill positions in those stores\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Other community members also attended yesterday&#8217;s\u00a0press conference to call attention to the impact of Walmart\u2019s actions on their neighborhoods, congregations and communities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is a scandal against all that is righteous, though it is unfortunately not surprising, that Walmart, the economic Pharaoh who cannot see workers as people but only as expense lines, has again decreed unemployment and poverty and suffering on 530 workers here, and similar numbers in four other stores,\u201d said local Rabbi Aryeh Cohen. \u201cIn November, I joined other clergy and community leaders and workers in an act of civil disobedience to support the brave workers who sat down and struck in order to stand up with dignity. We then demanded $15 an hour and access to full employment. Today our demands have not changed. However, we also demand that Pharaoh rehire all 530 workers, give them priority before hiring other workers for less pay, and support the fired workers beyond the mandated 60 days.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Workers promised that they would continue to fight the company\u2019s retaliatory closures with bold action until the company meets their calls for reinstatement, transfer with equal pay and compensation in the interim and finally, the opportunity to return to their stores when they reopen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAllowing Walmart to get away with such a blatant attack on the rights of workers\u2019 in our community would open the door for any employer to simply develop \u2018plumbing issues\u2019 whenever workers stood up for change in their workplace,\u201d said SEIU 721 Chief of Staff Gilda Valdez. \u201cWe need to send a message to Walmart and all employers that in our community, the rights of working people must be respected. That\u2019s why we\u2019ll continue to stand with Walmart workers as they fight to get back to work and for change at the world\u2019s largest private employer.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Supported by elected officials, clergy and community members, group files for injunctive relief with the National Labor Relations Board on behalf of workers Local school board launches resolution calls on Walmart to consider economic impact to local community, transfer and reinstate workers NATIONWIDE \u2014Yesterday\u00a0Pico Rivera Walmart workers with OUR Walmart filed a charge with the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":218,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7,13,15,17],"tags":[96],"class_list":["post-19861","press_releases","type-press_releases","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-industries","category-press-releases","category-retail","category-stewards","tag-community"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Following Retaliatory Closures, Walmart Workers Take Legal Action - The United Food &amp; 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