NEWS ANALYSIS: Church-labor coalition forms in mushroom organizing effort

c. 1998 Religion News Service UNDATED _ More than two years after the largest mushroom producer in the Southeastern United States fired 85 of its 600-plus workers for demonstrating to form a union, the battle between Quincy Farms and its workers continues unabated. The company _ located outside Quincy, Fla., some 30 miles west of […]

c. 1998 Religion News Service

UNDATED _ More than two years after the largest mushroom producer in the Southeastern United States fired 85 of its 600-plus workers for demonstrating to form a union, the battle between Quincy Farms and its workers continues unabated.

The company _ located outside Quincy, Fla., some 30 miles west of Tallahassee _ by its words and deeds shows no intention of allowing workers to vote on union representation.


And while a reinvigorated church-labor coalition is giving the striking workers increased support and visibility, the outcome of the struggle remains uncertain.

The union, with national support from a number of religious denominations, and the National Farm Worker Ministry, a 75-year-old, 40-member ecumenical organization, says it will continue to apply pressure.

The Quincy situation is complicated because agricultural workers _ called by the seven Florida Roman Catholic bishops”the poorest and most economically and politically underrepresented working people in the country and state”_ are excluded from the National Labor Relations Act, the basic law governing labor-management issues because the law excludes agricultural workers.

Thus, the Quincy workers cannot petition the National Labor Relations Board to mandate an election. They have to use, as United Farm Workers founder Cesar Chavez did in the famous California grape campaigns in the 1960s and 1970s, economic and public opinion tools to force a vote.

The re-energized United Farm Workers (UFW), in an organizing effort that draws both from the Chavez and Martin Luther King Jr. civil rights traditions, is determined to stay the course until the Quincy workers are allowed to decide for themselves whether or not they want a union.

Its effort in Quincy, which may be the precursor to further attempts to unionize Florida’s 50,000 citrus workers, has a special dimension that could ultimately provide an edge in the organizing effort because it does not fit the stereotype of farmworkers as overwhelmingly Hispanic.

Indeed, the workforce at Quincy Farms is half African-American, 39 percent Hispanic, and 11 percent white. Gadsden County, where Quincy Farms is located, is about 65 percent African-American and 5 percent Hispanic.


Black workers felt initially _ and Quincy Farms is said by organizers to have encouraged the feeling _ that the union cared only about the Spanish-speaking workers. “At first, the faces we saw in the paper and marching were Latino,”said the Rev. Tony Hansberry, pastor of the Arnett Chapel AME Church.”But we began to hear blacks also complaining about treatment at Quincy Farms.”Then the UFW added Melody Johnson, an African-American, to its organizers. She tapped into the larger community,”he added.”By the time we at Arnett hosted Joseph Lowery and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference demonstration on behalf of the workers last June _ more than 2,000 people marching down main street in perhaps the largest demonstration ever here _ the faces were black, brown and white.” The most engaged Quincy congregation has been St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church. The first UFW office was in a building the church owns and it has hundreds of Spanish-speaking members whose numbers rise and fall with the migratory waves.

Many workers or their families attend the church and its former pastor was a major supporter of the UFW. He had to leave unexpectedly about a year ago and, according to Sister Maria Rincom, the church has been less directly involved ever since.”We still care,”she said,”but we have so many people who are recent immigrants and do not understand their legal rights that the public voice is quieter.” During the past two years, a variety of organizations have offered to mediate the dispute. As recently as March 9, Doug Jamerson, Florida secretary of labor, issued a statement saying,”It is in the best interest of everyone involved, including the community and the state of Florida, to sit down at the table to give reasonable compromise one last chance.” Rick Lazzarini, president of Quincy Farms, has refused all such offers.”The overwhelming majority of our workers is not interested in union representation,”Lazzarini said in a telephone interview, adding that the organizers would not accept defeat when it comes.”We are good responsible employers,”he said.” In a written statement, Quincy Farms blamed”outside agitators”for fomenting discontent.

The UFW has received support from a large number of religious and secular voices and, following the classic pattern of the ’60s and ’70s grape and lettuce campaigns, has called for a boycott of Quincy Farms'”Prime”label in four supermarket chains in the region.

Such efforts always go slowly.

But efforts on the legal front have shown promise, according to union supporters. The UFW has won twice in the courts to lift an injunction against demonstrating outside the plant and to have 42 of the fired workers declared eligible for unemployment. The company argued that they had left voluntarily and were not entitled to compensation.

Rob Williams of Florida Legal Services has filed a suit in state court demanding reinstatement of the remaining 60 _ 23 are already back at work _ of the fired workers with two years back pay.”I think we have a good chance,”he said.

Roberta”Bert”Perry, UFWM staff director for the Southeast, looks at the turmoil and potential headaches for Quincy Farms and asks,”If he is so sure the union will lose, why won’t (Quincy Farm president) Lazzarini let the workers vote? That’s the question.” DEA END HOWELL


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