Service workers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) Medical Center, La Jolla wore matching green T-shirts Monday as they gathered on Thornton Hospital’s lawn, creating an assemblage of cooks, housekeepers, security officers and others making up the Local 3299.
The American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) started a weeklong strike at 5 a.m. Monday, July 14, in an effort to boost wages and improve working conditions by picketing outside UC hospitals despite a court order.
“It’s important to know that 97 percent of the service workers qualify for public assistance,” said junior surgical technician Jessica Agost, a member of 3299 Patient Care Workers who was showing support for her striking service workers. “The talks are not making any movement at all. They just want a decent wage, but they make $10 an hour.”
The university charges employees $81 a month to park in La Jolla, Agost said.
“A lot of times, they have to decide whether to park or to put food on their tables,” she said.
Norman Smith worked more than four years at UCSD Medical Center in housekeeping. Smith said that when Local 3299 decided to strike, management told the workers that they would lose their jobs if they joined in the picket lines.
“They told us if we came out we’d be losing our jobs, or get suspended,” Smith said. “If people don’t come to work today, they’ll get fired ” even with a doctor’s excuse.”
Smith and Celene Perez, Local 3299 lead organizer, said other workers were called at home or sent e-mails.
“Workers have been intimidated and threatened, saying they were going to get arrested,” Perez said. “They are trying to discourage patient-care workers from coming out in support of the service workers.”
Although service workers decided to strike, patient workers ” also represented by Local 3299 ” are still in contract negotiations. But some workers decided to picket with their union mates.
“Everybody wants to be at work. This is the last resort,” Agost said. “I’m using my First Amendment right, and other people have chosen randomly to honor the picket line or not.”
According to Agost, about three-quarters of UCSD Medical Center’s service workers decided to picket, compared with one-quarter that decided to work.
Although workers statewide decided to picket, Nancy Stringer, public information officer at UCSD’s Thornton Hospital, condemned the strike.
“This was an unauthorized strike,” Stringer said. “We’re disappointed in the workers.”
UC filed a complaint against the union, saying it “failed to specify the exact dates of the planned five-day strike.”
According to Perez, a court order told the union it must give notice of a strike for the safety of the patients, which she said it did.
“The temporary restraining order says we have to give advanced notice. We feel we have “¦ We gave the court 60-hour notice Thursday,” Perez said.
“UC made a generous offer,” Stringer said, adding that the union declined it and decided to strike. “We want everyone to know that no patient care is affected.”
Stringer said she could not address the threats that workers said they received. But university staff members are working with the president’s office regarding punishment of specific picketing workers, she added.
“We’re working with the office of the president on a case-by-case basis,” Stringer said.
Brendan Kremer, administrative director of the UCSD Medical Center, said the hospital’s most important concern is for the patients and that care is not affected.
Strike organizers said that community members across the state were donating groceries and food assistance to the striking workers.