Candice, who works at Macy’s and is a UFCW 21 member, took the microphone and spoke to the crowd gathered in front of Starbucks.
“We need set schedules, we need better hours,” she said. “So we can live a productive life.”
Ilana, a Working Washington leader who works for Starbucks, talked about the need for secure scheduling.
On 4/14 we raised the alarm on poverty wages, workers rights, and the attempts of big business lobbyists to try and turn back the clock on the progress we’ve already made.
Workers took center stage.
Seattle University adjunct, contingent faculty, and community supporters went on a one day hunger fast to protest Seattle University refusing to count union votes.
Starbucks baristas led a march through downtown Seattle spreading the word about the their unpredictable and unsafe schedules and called for change.
Janitors with SEIU Local 6 called out the unsafe working conditions they face in many downtown corporate buildings.
Community members called out an executive at Wells Fargo who has been raising money for the Freedom Foundation, an extreme right-wing group which opposes the minimum wage, attacks unions, and otherwise tries to block workers rights.
We were across the state too.
Workers were out collecting signatures to get a statewide minimum wage of $13.50 on the ballot. People from Federal Way to Seattle to Yakima were out connecting with the community and getting them signatures.
At the end of the day we gathered in front of the Starbucks on the corner of First and Yesler and heard from workers about secure scheduling and unfair labor practices.
Ilana, a Working Washington leader who works for Starbucks, took the mic, and brought down the house.
“I’ve been working on and off for Starbucks for about a decade now. We are living paycheck to paycheck a lot of us, and we can’t even know what that paycheck is going to be.
So what we are doing today is we want the city of Seattle to pass an initiative that will require schedules to be posted at least two weeks in advance for all of us low-wage workers: baristas, grocery store clerks, fast food, everybody.
We want to have access to that schedule, we want to stop having to come into work and then go home and then come back two hours later. We want 11 hours between our shifts so that we can sleep, so we can eat, so we can be the human beings that we all actually are. We are asking to be treated with human dignity.”