Photo credit: USDA On January 23, after a tense, week-long strike led by Teamsters Local 202, 1,400 employees of New York City’s massive Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market reached an agreement with management that includes the biggest raise ever won by Local 202’s bargaining unit. The victory was the latest in a series of actions by the Teamsters, as the pandemic has ignited long-simmering labor disputes at food-distribution centers across the country. “I think the pandemic has raised the concerns of workers,” said Daniel Kane Jr., president of Local 202, in an interview with Ag Insider. “Workers in general, have been losing ground in America but I think the pandemic has brung many of these issues to light. Workers are now saying that if we don’t fight now, when will we?”
By Seth Galinsky February 8, 2021
Teamsters Joint Council 16More than 1,000 Teamsters union members at New York’s Hunts Point Produce Market vote overwhelmingly to approve new contract Jan. 23, after one-week strike won wage increase.
NEW YORK “I couldn’t be happier,” Marco Gonzalez told the
Militant Jan. 23. “When you beat the owners it’s a victory. And my co-workers saw that we accomplish something when we stick together.” He was referring to the gains won in their one-week strike by 1,400 members of Teamsters Local 202 at the Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market here in the Bronx.
Workers went on strike Jan. 17 after the bosses’ association, representing 30 companies at the wholesale market, one of the largest in the world, refused to increase its offer of a measly 32-cents-an-hour raise in the first year, and similar raises in the final two years of a three-year contract.
Amir Khafagy for Documented
Unionized workers at the Hunts Point Produce Market left the job in a dispute over wages and health care. On Saturday, they finally won a 70-cent-per-hour raise.
Amongst the industrial landscape of Hunts Point, warehouse worker Cheick Oumar A. Barry took refuge from the crippling winter air as he huddled over the amber flames of a campfire. Exhausted and cold, his spirit was not depleted. He said he was willing to endure the bitter cold another week.
Pictured above: outside the Hunts Point produce market.
This article was originally published by Documented, a nonprofit news organization that covers New York’s immigrants and the policies that affect their lives. Follow them on Facebook and Twitter, or sign up for their newsletter.
A Strike That Essential Workers at Hunts Point Produce Market Won
Unionized workers at the Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market began a strike after management refused to raise their wages. On Saturday, they announced they had won an 70 cent-per-hour raise
Amongst the industrial landscape of Hunts Point, warehouse worker Cheick Oumar A. Barry took refuge from the crippling winter air as he huddled over the amber flames of a campfire. Exhausted and cold, his spirit was not depleted. He said he was willing to endure the bitter cold another week.
“This is nothing. Even if it’s raining or snowing, we will be here until we win.”
Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market in the Bronx is America’s largest wholesale fresh produce market, and its workers went on strike this week, for the first time in 35 years. Those workers, paid between $18 and $21 per hour on average, which works out to about $40,000 a year, would like an additional $1.60 per hour in pay $1 of it in salary, the rest in health benefits.