On Friday July 29th former Pizza Time workers met with a new franchise owner to resolve the 5 month dispute. Talks went extremely well. Both sides helped create a dialogue and expressed interest in working together. We hope this continues and that the pizza workers will be back to work soon. Thank you Olympia for your support.
One Day Only
Thursday, July 28th: Buy Pizza Time Pizza to Support the Workers!!!
One Day Only
We are asking community members to buy a Pizza Time Pizza Thursday
July 28th to show the owners that the community would support Pizza
Time if they became socially responsible. Please call (360) 956-9020
to order a pizza on Thursday only.
**** Tell Pizza Time you are ordering a Pizza because you support the
workers and want them rehired with protection for their rights in
writing.****
If you don’t live in Olympia, call them and tell them you would order a pizza if you were in the area. We need your support more than ever at this critical time as negotiations officially begin. This is a one
Day only event.
For more information and updates visit http://olympiaworkers.org
In the past few days the owners of Pizza Time have agreed to meet with the Pizza Time workers to discuss reinstatement, and to negotiate a written agreement to protect basic worker's rights. The picket line has been suspended as a show of good faith and to show the owners that we can work together. We hope to begin negotiations this week, and we need help from everyone who supports our cause. We look forward to working with the new owners. More details will come soon.
More progress was made today on the picket line. Everyone's support is helping. We are hoping the owners and workers can come to agreement soon.
All OWA supporters are invited to the picket line at 4th and Jefferson in downtown Olympia. Rain or shine. We are making progress. Only two Pizzas were sold today that we are aware of. Our community strength inspires us more. Keep it up Olympia!
Stay Tuned for Pizza Time Strike updates. Meet Pizza Time Workers at 4th and Jefferson from 12 noon until 10pm.
Dear Friends and Supporters of the Olympia Pizza Time Strikers,
Our struggle is not over. Olympia Pizza Time is set to reopen July 20th under new ownership. The new owners refuse to meet with the striking workers. The striking workers are asking the new owners to recognize the Olympia Workers Association to begin union negotiations. On July 14th, the Olympia Pizza Time strike will enter the 5th month and community support is needed to send a clear message to the new owners.
Pizza Time workers have been forced to make another stand for workers’ rights and decent work conditions. We will maintain a picket line in front of Pizza Time until our union is recognized. We urge the community of Olympia to stand in support of worker’s rights and buy their pizza elsewhere until Pizza Time becomes a socially responsible business.
Join the movement for better working conditions tomorrow Wed. at 12 noon on the corner of 4th Ave. and Jefferson.
Pizza Workers in Olympia Continue Strike
In February of 2005, all nine Pizza Time workers in Olympia WA and their manager Alex Wentz went on strike to take a stand against racism and to stand up for their rights as workers. Shane Bloking, a previous manager at Pizza Time, bought into the business and immediately fired two competent employees. Shane has a history of uttering racist comments and it came to no surprise when Abara, the store’s only African-American employee, was the first to be fired Shane’s second day. Shane started to replace the workers with his incompetent brother and his friends.
Instead of watching our co-workers get fired for no good reason one-by-one, we held a meeting at Alex’s house that night. The remaining workers didn’t want to work at Pizza Time under these conditions. We chose to take a stand on Feb 11th. We drafted a list of basic demands that night that had to be unconditionally met or we would stop making and delivering pizza and go on strike. The demands were:
1) Abara and John get their jobs back Jeff Bloking (the owner’s brother) has to go.
2) No workers are fired without Just Cause and without warning
3) No more racial slurs
4) A friendly, clean and safe work environment
5) Standardized breaks
6) Respect our right to unionize
The next day all the workers rode down to the shop in the bright orange pizza van. We gave each other high fives the whole way down to the shop. Shane arrived at work over 7 hours late and found his entire staff waiting for him, except for Jesus who was out on delivery. Once he walked through the door we confronted him with our list of demands.
Shane cut us off after demand #1 and said his brother was staying. Alex, who read the demands continued to the end of the list. Shane chuckled with his brother and refused to consider the workers’ pleas for fairness. All the workers looked at each other and walked out the door. Immediately out side the shop Shane threatened to fire us, and pleaded with us to return to work. We stopped listening to Shane’s threats and picked up picket signs expressing our outrage over his ownership practices.
All the workers had a fair amount of adrenaline in their veins at this point. Every worker stopped working at Pizza Time that day and the strike began.
After seven days of picketing, community support had brought Pizza Time’s business to a trickle. The owners realized that they would not be able to operate the business successfully without meeting the workers’ demands. Rather than establish fair working conditions, they chose to punish the workers and shut the place down. The striking workers vowed that they would continue their struggle until Pizza Time became socially responsible.
In July, five months after the struggle began, new owners took over the Olympia Pizza Time franchise. The workers hoped the new owners would be reasonable and meet with them to resolve the situation. The new owners refused to meet with the workers and denied any responsibility. They want to pretend the struggle never happened and they do not need to establish fair working conditions. We believe that we are justified and that the community in Olympia supports us in our struggle. We will continue our stand until fair working conditions are established.
For more information or to send us letters of support visit our website at http://olympiaworkers.org. If you are in the Olympia area, please join us on the picket line at 4th and Jefferson in downtown Olympia.
With love for justice and solidarity,
The Pizza Time Workers
Greetings from the Olympia Workers Association!
If you would like to recieve updates directly from the Olympia Workers Association, go to
http://lists.riseup.net/www/info/olympiaworkers and subscribe to our
e-mail list.
First of all: there will be a demonstration tommorrow in front of the
Ramada Inn Governor House from 4-7 PM, during the Lakefair parade. Secondly, labor struggles at Pizza time in Olympia are heating back up.
Click Read More----->
from UNITE-HERE Local 8:
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Come and join us on the sidewalks near the...
Ramada Inn Governor House in Olympia
621 S Capitol Way
Saturday, July 16th between 4pm and 7pm during the
Grand Capital Lakefair Parade (starts at 5pm)
We want to let everybody know what is going on inside the Ramada Inn
Governor House.
Sandra Miller told us in a short conversation in front of the hotel
yesterday that she loves her food and beverage workers, and that she is
paying good wages to her employees.
In an e-mail Sandra Miller sent out to state legislators recently, she
revealed that she pays her hard working dishwashers $7.35/hour. A good
livable wage?? And she did not really show a lot of love for her food and
beverage workers when she laid them all off last week.
Don’t let her get away with this! Show your support for the workers!
See you on Saturday,
Stefan Moritz
Union Organizer, Unite Here Local 8
Office: (206) 728-2326, Ext. 24
Fax: (206) 728-9772
E-mail: stefan@herelocal8.org
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We need to show managers like Sandra Miller that Olympia will not tolerate
this type of Union busting. The Ramada Inn food and beverage workers have
all been laid off to punish them for being in a union and to avoid
providing health care for the workers. There will be thousands of people
in the streets tommorrow and we should all be there to support the
workers.
In other news...
The Pizza Time Workers on Strike are preparing to make another stand for
workers rights. Olympia Pizza Time is set to reopen any day under new
ownership (word on the street is the 20th). The new owners refuse to meet
with striking workers. The striking workers are asking the new owners to
meet with the Olympia Workers Association to negotiate for decent working
conditions. On July 12th, the Olympia Pizza Time strike entered its 5th
month. Community Support is needed to send a clear message to the new
owners!
Once the store opens the Olympia Workers Association will maintain a
community presence in front of Pizza Time until the owners agree to
respect workers' rights. We urge the community of Olympia to stand in
support of workers' rights and buy their pizza elsewhere until Pizza Time
becomes a socially responsible business.
We'll send out more info once the store opens, but stay tuned. Support of
the whole community is needed to convince the owners that Olympia business
owners need to treat their employees rights. In addition to boycotting
Pizza Time, we need people on the sidewalk with us. Be on alert for new
developments and the opening of the store.
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OWA organizers meet every Monday at 6:00 at the office, in the garage
behind the Catholic Worker / Bread & Roses house at 1320 8th Ave SE, on
the east side (8th and Boundary). General Membership meetings are held
the first Monday of each month. Anyone is encouraged to come meet with us
every Monday, but especially the next General Membership meeting on
Monday, August 1st. The monthly meetings are intended to be the monthly
assembly of the Olympia labor movement, so everyone is encouraged to
attend, to coordinate worker action throughout Olympia.
For more information, visit our website at www.olympiaworkers.org, send us
an e-mail at olympiaworkers@riseup.net, and don't forget to subscribe to
the e-mail list by visiting
http://lists.riseup.net/www/info/olympiaworkers.
Thanks and see you on the streets!
-Sean
c/o The Olympia Workers Association
