Workers at Alle Kosher Meat Plant Reject Union in Contested Vote (company misrepresents Obama )

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.forward.com/articles/14635/

By Nathaniel Popper
Wed. Nov 26, 2008


Workers took a picture of banners that were put up inside the Alle Processing kosher meat facility before a union vote.

Obama never said "Unions are a bad deal for workers today"

Workers at one of the nation’s largest kosher meat producers have voted against joining a union, though the union that led the drive is contesting the vote and accusing the company of foul play.

The November 13 vote at the Alle Processing factory in Queens came amid widespread scrutiny of labor conditions in the kosher meat industry. In May, what had been the nation’s largest kosher meat producer, Agriprocessors, was the subject of an immigration raid. A union had unsuccessfully tried to organize the workers at Agriprocessors’ Iowa slaughterhouse.

The union that led that drive in Iowa, the United Food and Commercial Workers, began a campaign at Alle’s factory in Queens soon after the Iowa raid. In unofficial results, 200 workers voted against joining the union, 113 voted for it and 53 votes were challenged.

The union quickly filed an objection, lodging 31 separate complaints about the way the company behaved prior to the vote. It alleges that Alle broke the law by bribing workers, sending supervisors to vote multiple times and threatening “reprisals from immigration authorities if employees voted for the union.”

“It’s the highest number of objections I have ever had with regard to a union election,” said Dave Young, a regional organizing director for UFCW Local 342, which organized the campaign.

Mottel Bergman, an executive at Alle, told the Forward that he would not comment. “We don’t give interviews,” he said.

FULL story at link.

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