Janitors protest, seek hazard pay for Safeway jobs
Dozens of janitors who work at Safeway stores protested Thursday in Palo Alto, advocating for hazard pay as they continue to risk exposure to the coronavirus by showing up to work.
Unlike hourly employees at the grocer who received a temporary “appreciation” pay increase of $2 per hour from midMarch to midJune, and a onetime bonus, janitors say they were left out of the equation because they are contract workers. Many say their job is dangerous and merits a raise amid the pandemic’s economic uncertainties.
Deemed essential businesses, grocery stores
have remained open during the pandemic, and workers risk getting sick even as stores take measures to protect employees and customers.
Milpitas resident Antonio Roque was at the protest outside a Palo Alto store late Thursday morning. He has worked as a Safeway janitor for more than 10 years, including the past three years at a Fremont store on Argonaut Way. He earns $16.20 an hour and wants the extra $2 per hour that other workers at Safeway received.
“The $2 is not going to help us from dying from COVID,” Roque said through a Spanish translator prior to the demonstration. “But we do feel we deserve this because we’re putting our lives on the line. The little bump will help alleviate some of our hardships.”
Roque, who helped organize the protest and is a member of Service Employees International UnionUnited Service Workers West — which represents 45,000 service workers including janitors, security workers and airport service workers in California — said janitors have been asking for the benefit since March.
The temporary benefit, dubbed “hero pay” by grocers, was implemented March 15 as shelterinplace orders began and people rushed to grocery stores to stock up. The benefit expired after a few months. A handful of U.S. senators sent a letter in July urging grocers to reinstate hazard pay since many “employees remain at great risk of exposure to the virus due to the nature of their jobs.”
Approximately 93 grocery store workers have died across the country, according to the United Food and Commercial Workers, a union that represents them.
More than 60 Bay Area Safeway workers protested outside a Palo Alto store, a union spokesman said.
Responding to a question as to whether janitors were included in the appreciation pay increases, Safeway spokeswoman Wendy Gutshall said by email: “Janitors are not company employees.”
Most of the protesting janitors are employed by King Janitorial Equipment Services, a Southern California company. It is contracted to service 198 Northern California Safeway stores.
“These are unprecedented and difficult times for both employers and employees,” Javier Brito, coowner of King Janitorial, said in an email. “Nevertheless, we are confident that a quick and equitable resolution will be reached by the parties.”
Roque works until 10 a.m six days a week taking out trash and cleaning floors, bathrooms, doors and other surfaces that come into contact with shoppers. Each shift just before dawn, he prepares to deal with meeting other employees who begin to arrive and customers who invariably ask him questions.
He’s most concerned about the eight people he lives with, saying he puts them at risk every time he goes home.
Safeway is “not valuing us as essential workers. We’re standing up for ourselves and we just want support for this,” Roque said.
Asked whether Safeway plans to reinstate its pay increase to employees, Gutshall said: “We are deeply grateful for how our frontline associates served their neighbors in an extreme time of need. Not only did they ensure everyone had access to essential goods, they enacted numerous proactive measures to protect the health and safety of everyone walking into the store. As much of the country lifted its restrictions and businesses reopened their doors, we thanked associates with an additional reward payment following the final extension of the $2perhour appreciation pay through June 13.”
In April, a coronavirus outbreak at a Safeway distribution center in Tracy sickened dozens of the facility’s 1,700 workers. The Tracy hub serves Safeway stores from Bakersfield to the Oregon border, as well as parts of Nevada.