PRINTER'S NO. 3780
No. 706 Session of 2004
INTRODUCED BY BUTKOVITZ, BELFANTI, EACHUS, GOODMAN AND
BIANCUCCI, APRIL 15, 2004
REFERRED TO COMMITTEE ON LABOR RELATIONS, APRIL 15, 2004
A RESOLUTION
1 Calling for a fair process for Waste Management, Inc., employees
2 in eastern Pennsylvania to choose a union.
3 WHEREAS, The employees of Waste Management, Inc., of eastern
4 Pennsylvania do a job which is essential to the health and well-
5 being of the community; and
6 WHEREAS, Those employees are hard-working members of the
7 communities they serve and are raising families in eastern
8 Pennsylvania; and
9 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc., employees found themselves
10 with diminishing take-home pay due to the company shifting
11 health care insurance costs to them; and
12 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc., imposed a family-unfriendly
13 discipline and attendance system called the points system; and
14 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc., employees engaged in
15 collective activities addressing the aforementioned grievances,
16 which is their right under the law; and
17 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc.'s, response was to make the
1 points system twice as family-unfriendly; and
2 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc., began a campaign of fear in
3 the workplace, conducting captive audience meetings where
4 employees are forced to listen to antiunion speeches and threats
5 of wage, benefit and job loss; and
6 WHEREAS, A Waste Management, Inc., official told the
7 employees, many of whom are military veterans, that their rights
8 ended at the company gate; and
9 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc., has begun to selectively
10 construct cases for termination against those employees who seek
11 to organize a union; and
12 WHEREAS, The right to organize a union is a legal right
13 which, like the right to vote and the right to free speech,
14 should never have to be exercised in fear; and
15 WHEREAS, These tactics on the part of Waste Management, Inc.,
16 have succeeded in creating an atmosphere of fear in the
17 workplace, poisoning the conditions necessary for a fair
18 election; and
19 WHEREAS, Much of the funding for Waste Management, Inc.'s,
20 vicious and sophisticated campaign to deny its employees their
21 right to organize a union comes from public contracts financed
22 by local taxes; and
23 WHEREAS, Waste Management, Inc.'s, employees are taxpayers
24 and are in effect financing the tactics being used against them
25 by the company; and
26 WHEREAS, Equitable labor relations in this industry are
27 necessary to the efficient and safe removal and disposal of
28 refuse, a function vital to the health of our communities; and
29 WHEREAS, The situation can only be remedied if Waste
30 Management, Inc., would agree to a fair process for employees to
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1 express their desire to organize a union; and
2 WHEREAS, A number of fair processes are available, including
3 a card check/neutrality agreement calling for an end to
4 intimidation of employees and the creation of a safe atmosphere
5 for employees to exercise their rights; therefore be it
6 RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives call upon Waste
7 Management, Inc., of eastern Pennsylvania to agree to a fair
8 process and neutral atmosphere where its employees can freely
9 exercise their rights under the law to determine whether they
10 want to work under a union.
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