Editor"s Note: The ILWU (International Longshore and Warehouse Union) has chosen Nov. 21st as the International Day of Action for nine countries in an attempt to gain support for the organization of a union for the workers of Blue Diamond Almonds. The ILWU plans to send its delegates to S. Korea, which is one of the major importers of products from Blue Diamond Almonds.Following is the background of anti-union activities of Blue Diamond Almonds provided by ILWU and a news article published in Sacramento Business journal.

BACKGROUND ON BLUE DIAMOND GROWERS, ITS WORKERS AND ITS ANTI-UNION CAMPAIGN

How Blue Diamond plays with the truth and the law

1) Claiming the ILWU was ¨picketing for recognition,〃 Blue Diamond filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board April 28 asking for an expedited representation election. The ILWU calls this an attempt to short-circuit workers… rights based on a distortion of the facts.

What really happened? Workers from Blue Diamond and their community supporters rallied in front of the plant for about two hours April 15. They carried signs that said, ¨Respect for hard work is all we ask,〃 and tried to deliver a letter to management that named the members of their organizing committee and reminded the company to respect their rights under Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act. (See below for more on Section 7.)

What is ¨recognition〃 A ¨demand for recognition〃 has a specific meaning under labor law. When a union ¨demands recognition,〃 it formally tells the company that has the support of a majority of workers and demands that the company recognize it as their representative for contract negotiations (collective bargaining).

How did Blue Diamond bend the facts? The ILWU had not yet claimed majority support. It hadn…t even passed out any flyers in the plant. The union made no mention of recognition in the signs, the press materials for the April 15, or the letter the workers tried to deliver and it had had no other communication with the company.

Blue Diamond…s April 28 election petition alleged that pickets were present at its facility. There weren…t any. There hadn…t been any presence since the two-hour rally April 15.

What provision of labor law did Blue Diamond invoke? The company cited section 8(b)7(c) of the National Labor Relations Act. This is one of the anti-labor amendments to the Act added by the 1959 Landrum-Griffin law. Since the NLRA was passed in 1935, business groups and their political allies have sought to weaken workers… ability to organize by taking tools out of their hands. For example, the 1948 Taft-Hartley Act outlawed sit-down strikes of the type used so successfully by auto workers in the late 1930s, as well as secondary boycotts.

When is free choice --not? If the NLRB grants Blue Diamond…s petition for an election, the company will be free to continue carpet-bombing the workers with anti-union propaganda and it will not even be required to give the union a complete and updated list of workers.

The workers should decide whether and when they want a union election. The organizing committee at Blue Diamond has been engaged in a long-term process of educating themselves and their co-workers about unions and their rights under labor law. The company…s petition could truncate this process and caps a six-month campaign to turn the workers against the union.

2) Blue Diamond fired a union supporter with 35 years in the plant and a near-spotless record.

BDG fired Ivo Camilo, an outspoken union supporter, on April 21. Blue Diamond claims that Camilo, who has had a virtually spotless record during his 35 years at the Sacramento plant, intentionally violated company policy by handling almonds with a hand that was bleeding from a tiny cut sustained on the job. Camilo emphatically denied the charges. At first he did not realize he had a cut, he said, and as soon as he was made aware of it he put pressure on it with one of his fingers and left his work area to cover the cut with a bandage and a plastic glove.

Blue Diamond has threatened, interrogated and badgered workers about their desire to join a union. The ILWU believes much of this activity to be illegal under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).

Section 7 of the NLRA protects workers… rights to organize and join unions: ¨Employees shall have the right to self-organization, to form, join or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.〃
Section 8(a)(1) of the NLRA bars employer conduct that deprives workers of their right to organize: ¨It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer to interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in Section 7.〃

This prohibited conduct includes threats, surveillance, harassment, intimidation and coercive interrogation regarding employees… union support or activity, as well as discrimination against union supporters.

Most employers, like Blue Diamond, violate the spirit as well as the letter of the law when workers try to organize:
92% of employers force employees to attend mandatory anti-union presentations
78% of employers force employees to attend one-on-one anti-union meetings with managers
75% of employers that hire consultants to fight organizing
*51% of employers threaten to close the plant if workers opt for union representation
* 25% employers fire at least one worker for union activity during an organizing campaign
* these activities are illegal under the NLRA

(Sources: US Trade Deficit Review Commission, Uneasy Terrain: The Impact of Capital Mobility on Workers, Wages and Union Organizing, by Kate Bronfenbrenner, 9/6/2000; Unfair Advantage: Workers… Freedom of Association in the United States Under International Human Rights Standards, Human Rights Watch, 2000.)

Blue Diamond leads a flourishing almond market

Blue Diamond Growers (BDG) operates the world…s largest almond processing plant. Structured as a cooperative, it counts about 3,800 of California…s 6,000 almond growers among its members.

California produces 80 percent of the world…s almonds, and BDG processes about one-third of California…s crop. California almond growers export 70 percent of their nuts and sell the rest in the U.S.

For the past three years, California growers have harvested more than a billion pounds of nuts each year, according to the state Almond BoardXand prices have climbed right along with production. Almonds sold for more than $3.00 per pound in November 2004 for the first time since 1995. Blue Diamond…s returns to its growers broke records in 2003. (For more information on the state of the industry, see the Almond Board Web site, www.almondboard.com, or Blue Diamond…s own site at www.bluediamond.com/news/index.cfm. This links to the speeches Blue Diamond CEO Doug Youngdahl and Board Chair Howard Isom made at BDG…s annual meeting in November 2004.)

Blue Diamond plays a key role in Sacrament

The Sacramento City Council considered the plant important enough to grant BDG $21 million in economic aid to dissuade it from relocating in 1995. In return, the company promised to keep at least 700 full-time jobs in Sacramento until 2010, to spend at least $30 million modernizing its facility and to remain a SMUD customer until at least 2005.

Workers at Blue Diamond have not flourished

BDG now employs about 700 hourly workers, far fewer than the nearly 1,600 it had in 1990 or the 1,170 it employed in 2002. Around half of these workers are Latino. Some 10 percent come from the Punjab region of Pakistan and India, 10 percent come from other Asian backgrounds, 10 percent are African American and 20 percent are white. Nearly half are women.

The sorter/packers, the largest and lowest-paid group of workers at Blue

Diamond, have seen raises of only $2 per hour since 1990, going from $8.25 to $10.25. Other large groups of workers have fared just a little better. Forklift drivers have gotten raises totaling $2.25 per hour, quality control inspectors have seen $2.33 per hour and blancher/dryer operators, $2.41.
At the same time, BDG has been passing off an increasing share of health care premiums to workers. Family insurance now costs around $420 per month.
Blue Diamond has required that workers log at least 1500 hours per year to be eligible for paid time off, including vacation, sick leave, holiday and bereavement pay. Even if they…ve given more than 30 years to the company, many people never pile up enough hours in one year to qualify for benefits, because much of the work at the plant is seasonal.

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Blue Diamond defends labor actions


Blue Diamond Growers has responded to a complaint against it by the National Labor Relations Board by issuing a press release that described the almond growers cooperative"s action as appropriate and as taken after thorough investigation.

The NLRB complaint against Blue Diamond levels charges that include intimidation of union organizers, based on accusations made by the International Longshore & Warehouse Union.

The union has accused the Sacramento-based cooperative of firing union sympathizers and threatening employees that unionization could lead to lost pensions and the closure of the factory at 17th and C streets.

"We investigated the charge," said Tim Peck, assistant to the regional director for the National Labor Relations Board in San Francisco. "We found reasonable cause to believe Blue Diamond had done some of the activities it was accused of doing."

"Although Blue Diamond does not publicly discuss specific employee issues, its position regarding these unfair practice allegations is clear," read the co-op"s press release, issued Blue Diamond spokeswoman Susan Brauner. "Blue Diamond thoroughly investigates and documents any situation that may involve discipline or termination before taking action.

"In this situation, numerous employees were interviewed regarding each incident. These interviews provided key information that was used to make a determination of what action was appropriate.

"The termination, discipline and coaching incidents described in the unfair labor practice allegations were thoroughly investigated and the action taken by Blue Diamond was appropriate based on the severity of the employee"s action," the press release read.

The NLRB has scheduled a hearing Dec. 5 in Sacramento before an administrative law judge. Blue Diamond has been directed to file a response to the complaint by Nov. 10.

The Oct. 27 complaint alleges 28 legal violations involving 14 supervisors, managers and lead employees. The NLRB had asked Blue Diamond to remedy the alleged violations and Blue Diamond refused, Peck said.

The NLRB, he said, asked Blue Diamond to reinstate employees at the seniority level they had before they were fired, pay back those employees" lost income and post a statement notifying employees the company wouldn"t repeat the alleged violations.

The San Francisco NLRB office has issued about two to six complaints per month over the last several months, Peck said. "A lot of them settle before we actually begin the litigation."

The union planned to visit Blue Diamond customers in eight cities, asking them to encourage Blue Diamond to respect its workers" rights to unionize, according to a union press release.

Blue Diamond employs more than 700 people at the Sacramento plant. In September 2004 Blue Diamond workers launched one of the largest union-organizing efforts in Sacramento in years. Workers said they wanted higher wages and better job security. The ILWU lost a 1990 campaign at Blue Diamond.

In 1996 the almond cooperative received a $16.5 million incentive package from the city of Sacramento in exchange for agreeing to keep at least 700 full-time employees at the Sacramento plant through 2011. (Sacramento Business Journal 11-01-05)