Workers lead campaign for justice

The maintenance workers at Bromley Heath, Boston’s largest public housing development, are taking their campaign for contract justice and fairness for the residents to the streets of Boston in a mass day of solidarity scheduled for Saturday, April 16.

Bromley Heath maintenance workers.

The workers, members of SEIU Firemen and Oilers, Local 3, are seeking fair increases in wages and benefits for their families and improvements in the contract in order to end management’s unjust and discriminatory practices that endanger the workers’ health and safety.

They are also demanding fairness for the over 1,500 tenants who, like other public housing residents throughout the country, face deteriorating, dismal conditions as a result of massive federal housing cuts and decades of city neglect.

Organized by the recently formed Bromley Heath Workers Rank and File Committee and co-sponsored by their union, the solidarity day is designed to put a spotlight on their issues, build solidarity for their contract struggle and lay the basis for a city-wide campaign against public housing cuts.

The activity has been endorsed by a broad array of community, labor and political activists, including Boston City Councilors Chuck Turner and Felix Arroyo, the Greater Boston Labor Council, Boston School Bus Union, International Action Center, New England Human Rights for Haiti, Women’s Fight Back Network and the Bolivarian Circle. The day of solidarity will start with a rally at 11:00 a.m. at Heath and Bickford streets, followed by a march through the community led by a mobile sound and stage truck. It will end with a union-sponsored barbecue for the community in a park at Bromley Heath.

Workers fight for contract justice

After over two years of negotiations, the Tenant Management Corporation (TMC) continues to refuse to agree to the workers’ demands for a new contract. Bromley Heath (BH) is one of Boston’s largest housing developments and one of its poorest as a result of decades of racist neglect. All the tenants are people of color.

Only 30 workers, also Black and Latino, maintain the buildings and grounds and repair and refurbish the apartments and common areas. They are highly skilled professionals—painters, carpenters, laborers and custodians—who are paid outrageously below industry standards and much less than what their counterparts in the building trades unions get.

This is racism, pure and simple.

They serve the community under the worst conditions: understaffed, overworked and lacking adequate resources. TMC illegally and unjustly directs them to perform hazardous duties—such as cleaning up human waste, blood products and medical syringes—without proper training or protective gear. They work under a management regime that is characterized by unjust discipline, unfair promotions, arbitrary actions regarding vacation and sick time, denial of seniority and other union rights, and obstruction of the grievance procedure.

The workers say that TMC runs a “temporary worker” hiring scam, firing and rehiring when the probationary period expires, to circumvent the recognition section of the contract. This violates the rights of the workers and the union.

Support for community control

A unique feature of this struggle is the issue of the TMC. Bromley Heath is the only tenant-managed housing development in Boston and one of the few throughout the country. The community won this vital concession in 1967 as a result of years of hard-fought battles.

The Bromley Heath workers stand 100 percent in support of this important gain for community control. In fact, when the TMC was the target of a racist attack recently and was removed by the Boston Housing Authority, the Bromley Heath workers added their support to the community’s successful campaign for its restoration.

It is therefore ironic and regrettable that the TMC is now playing a part in the unjust treatment of the workers. In fact, since the organizing began for the day of solidarity, management has embarked on an ugly cam paign of retaliation against the workers and their leaders. There has been a wave of unjust discipline, written warnings, threatened suspensions and terminations.

“Temporary” workers pictured on a leaflet and poster say they have been threatened. Harassment by management, they say, has escalated, particularly from two of the white supervisors, one of whom is a former prison guard.

Justice for workers and residents

The struggle of the workers for economic justice, dignity and respect is one with the community’s struggle for justice. The workers have deep roots in the community. Some have grown up in the development and have family, friends and loved ones living there now. Members of the Rank and File Committee have strong bonds with the residents.

They constantly struggle against management’s order to “just finish the job quick” in order to guarantee that quality repairs are done. They host workshops to train tenants in home repair and aid other tenants’ rights and community endeavors. The workers’ contract demands will concretely improve conditions for the residents.

The Rank and File Committee has made the struggle for economic justice for BH tenants and public housing generally a key element of their campaign. They are calling for a fightback against Bush’s federal cuts in housing.

Boston’s public housing has been a victim of cutbacks from Washington administrations, Democratic and Republican alike. Now, things are slated to get even worse. “If the changes sought by the administration take effect, they will result in one of the biggest cuts since Wash ing ton first began subsidizing housing: as much as $480 million, or 14 percent, of the $3.4 billion federal budget for day-to-day operations, including labor, maintenance, insurance and utilities, at the nation’s 3,100 housing authorities.” (“U.S. Plans New, Deep Cuts in Housing Aid,” New York Times, April 8)

At a time when Bush and the war-makers are spending billions on criminal wars of conquest, public housing must be included as a domestic casualty of war. What the Pentagon spends in one week on the wars against Iraq and Afghanistan would provide more than the funds necessary to bring every public housing unit in Boston up to code.

Rank and File Committee is key

The BH Rank and File Committee was formed only one month ago. In that short time they have revitalized their union and waged an impressive campaign for justice for the workers and tenants at BH.

They have issued leaflets and held near-daily forums in the maintenance lunchroom. They have expanded their steering committee to include all the constituencies within the local.

Local 3 staff members now meet daily with the committee and are filing grievances and unfair labor practice charges that address the workers’ concerns. Local 3 has now formally added the committee’s leaders to the negotiating committee. The union played a key role when a delegation of seven leaders of the Rank and File Committee attended an April 5 meeting of the Greater Boston Labor Council that resulted in a unanimous resolution of support for their struggle and the day of solidarity. It sent out a mailing the next day to all affiliates, urging members to attend.

The committee has met many difficult and complex challenges while building the struggle for public housing rights and contract justice from the TMC while defending community control against racist forces in the city. Their mobilization for the demon stration is progressing at a fever pitch.

Workers are going door to door, leafleting supermarkets and subway stations and postering everywhere. A Latina teacher at a neighborhood school told one worker that she was so moved by the campaign that she is organizing everyone she knows to attend the day of solidarity. BH committee leaders have given weekly updates at International Action Center mobilizer meetings, where solidarity support is being organized.

The day of solidarity is just the first step in the workers’ campaign for justice. They are determined to fight until victory is won. Messages of support and solidarity can be sent to Bromley Heath Workers Rank and File Committee, P.O. Box 413, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130.

Traynham and Kirschbaum are steward and chief steward, respectively, with USWA 8751, Boston school bus drivers’ union.