A for-profit daycare continued its war against pro-union workers this week as it fired two more employees. So far, according to union sources, the company has fired 10 employees since an Aug. 2 vote in favor of certifying a union at daycare facilities owned by Preschool of America.
The Aug. 2 vote was certified by the National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency that oversees union elections. Federal labor law prohibits firing, harassing or threatening workers who vote for or are engaged in union activities.
The action by the company angered many parents who send their children to the daycare. According to a union statement, 56 parents or guardians of the Upper West Side location at 101 West End Avenue have signed a petition calling on management to “cease and desist reprimanding, harassing and terminating” employees who seek union representation.
Still the firing continued. The latest employees fired were two popular Head Teachers, Diana DeLeon, at the Lexington Avenue location and Wendy Puello from the Upper West Side location. According to a union spokesperson, Puello had testified at a hearing of the NLRB Region 2 in Manhattan for the right to vote for the union as a Head Teacher.
The NLRB rejected the company's claim that Head Teachers were supervisors and could not vote. Puello was fired after her public statements to the NLRB in favor of the union.
DeLeon gave an interview to the New York Daily News describing how the company had fired pro-union employees. DeLeon herself was subsequently let go after the article was published on Sunday, August 22.
In a letter from the company to parents, obtained by Political Affairs from a parent of a child at the company's Lexington Avenue daycare, Preschool of America Chief Executive Director Joanna Fan accused DeLeon of lying about the company's policy of firing pro-union workers. Though she failed to adequately explain how the firing came directly after DeLeon publicly expressed her support for the union.
Fan's letter to parents also touted the company's benefits and blamed "misunderstandings" about the mass firings on the pro-union employees.
Employees who supported unionization said extended work hours and low pay, as low as $10 per hour, drove their demand for union protections.
According to the parent who sent the letter to Political Affairs, the contents of the company's letter to parents is "true only in the minimal sense" and most "laugh at the 'lies' in the letter."
The NLRB has scheduled a union recognition election for September 7th.
Mabel Everett, president of Day Care Employees Local 205, District Council 1707, said that she was "extremely proud of the young women who are enduring this terror from their employer because they are fighting for their right to organize a union in their shop and desire to have a fair and equitable contract."
"It is sad that this employer disrespects these employees and federal law to repress wages and benefits,” she pointed out.
Raglan George, Jr., executive director of AFSCME DC 1707, explained, “Parents have a right to be concerned about the continuity of education for their children and have demonstrated their concern about these young workers who have chosen a profession that should be honored and not smeared because they want to support their families with dignity.”
New York City Councilmember Gale A. Brewer (pictured above) joined the teachers and supporters on the picket line.
Labor law experts and union advocates say situations like this happen everyday in the U.S. and show why labor law reform is needed. Corporations like this one regularly violate federal labor laws across the country because enforcement has been intermittent and punishments are typically mild.
The reason for this was documented in a 2009 report from Human Rights Watch (HRW). That internationally organization found that "[s]anctions for illegal conduct are too feeble to adequately discourage employer law breaking" or "sufficiently disuasive to deter violations."
Union supporters say that passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill pending in Congress, would provide important remedies to this ongoing problem. By imposing stiffer penalties on companies that flout labor laws, speeding up the certification process, and providing workers with a choice about how to vote for the union, the law would give workers stronger workplace protections.
The HRW report concurred, saying the "Employee Free Choice Act ... would remedy many of these deficiencies and create a more level playing field for U.S. workers."
See our earlier coverage of this story here.
Photo courtesy of AFSCME DC 1707
