Evelyn and Gabriel swung open the door to the McDonald’s.
This location looked just like any other McDonald’s that everyone in the country was familiar with: the blinding white lights from the ceiling, the brown wooden circular booths, the electronic menu screen prominently displayed right above the front desk, and of course a big sign saying “McDonald’s” with the classic golden arches “M” on the wall.
As Evelyn took in the bright red-and-yellow colors of the walls inside, she remembered her high school days, how she used to spend hours studying in the McDonald’s by her childhood apartment. It had been a place of focus for her, as the grayness of her apartment had represented stagnation. In fact, the grayness of her neighborhood– an old, industrial section of the city, literally called “Cobblestone Alley”– had always frustrated her, and so during her late teenage years, she had found refuge in the one bright place in her neighborhood, symbolically representing her existential yearning to take on bigger and more exciting things in life.
But that was old history now. She had to focus on what she was here for– the meeting with the union organizer. Right, she thought, and forced her attention onto her companion. “Let’s sit down,” she suggested to Gabriel.
And so they sat down in one of the leather booths near the back of the store. “Do you want me to get you anything?” she asked Gabriel.
“Yea, how about a fish filet?” he said.
“Okay, and I’ll get an apple turnover too.”
She got up, ordered the items at the front desk, filled up her giant styrofoam cup with Sprite at the soda machine, and waited near the soda machine for her order. A few minutes later, a worker in an apron called “Order #53!” and handed her her tray with the food.
After sitting down with Gabriel again, they began eating– Gabriel his fish sandwich, and Evelyn her apple turnover. As Evelyn was taking the last sip of Sprite from her tall cup, she suddenly noticed a man a few feet away walking towards her and Gabriel.
“Hi. What are your names?” he asked.
“Uhh, Gabriel,” Gabriel responded.
“I’m Evelyn,” Evelyn answered.
“Okay,” he said, and took a seat next to Evelyn.
“Ricardo?” Gabriel asked, but the man didn’t answer.
“So, can you explain to me how the process works,” Gabriel asked, in a flat tone of voice.
“Okay. So first, you’re going to need more than just yourself. How big is your workplace?”
“The wind farm, it’s like fifty or so people. But I only really talk to twenty of them,” Gabriel said.
“Find at least 4 or 5 other coworkers who you think will have enough time, and ask them to form an organizing committee with you,” the man said.
“I think I can do that,” Gabriel said.
“Okay, next steps. You’re gonna need the organizing committee, including yourself, to meet at least once a week. At the meetings, each person is gonna discuss what they’ve discovered, which workers they’ve talked to, how those workers felt about joining the union, and tasks of each organizer in the committee for the following week,” the man continued in a matter-of-fact tone.
With no words from Gabriel, the man continued: “Each committee member should be talking with at least ten or so workers every week. Ideally, the same ten workers every week, so that they can build a long-term relationship of trust with those same ten workers. You should be asking the ten workers assigned to you how they feel about joining a union, what their major complaints about the job are, etcetera.”
“At a certain point, you and the other committee members will realize that the majority of the workers at the workplace are in strong favor of joining the union. At this point, you need to ask me or another organizer from my union to give you an appropriate number of authorization cards.”
“From there, you will sit down with your coworkers, one by one, tell them about the authorization cards, and ask them to sign one with their name. A lot of workers get scared they’ll be punished, so be sure to tell them that the company will not have access to these authorization cards. Only the union and possibly the NLRB will have the ability to know who specifically signed authorization cards.”
“Okay, so once you have given authorization cards to all or as many of the workers at your company as possible, you give them all to us.”
“Here comes the important part: your workplace’s organizing committee needs to convince my union to sign a form that allows you guys to conditionally affiliate with the union. Key word: conditionally. If you don’t get that to happen, then when your workplace joins CCWU, the top CCWU leaders will be able to tell your workplace to not strike, to not demand more… your workplace would essentially become subject to whatever the top CCWU leaders want to fight for, which is very very little.”
Gabriel was still jotting down notes with a pen on some sticky notes, so the man waited for him to finish. When he had put his pen on the table, he said, “That sounds like a real mindfuck.”
The man nodded with a little smile, agreeing.
“Anyways. You up-to-speed with your notes, by the way?”
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“Yes,” Gabriel responded.
“Okay, good,” the man said, then took a big breath. “Okay, sometime while you are getting our union to officially approve your workplace’s conditional affiliation with it, my union will be sending the authorization cards to the NLRB. The NLRB will count those cards, and if more than a certain threshold percentage of workers at your company have signed on, then the NLRB will move on to the next step. The threshold varies across different industries, but for most construction workplaces, at least the workplace I’m at, it was 50%.”
“The next step the NLRB will take is to hold an election at your workplace. Make sure you tell all the workers when the election day will be, where the ballots will be, and convince the unsure ones to actually vote.”
“If more than 50% of the workers vote ‘yes’, then your workplace will be officially recognized as part of our union. Congrats,” he said, in his normal voice with just the slightest hint of enthusiasm.
“That’s a… long process. Definitely will take a long time. What happens if the supervisor figures out we’re organizing?” Gabriel asked.
“That is a tough one. It really depends on what stage you’re at with organizing. If you’ve already gotten most of the workers on board with joining the union when the supervisor finds out, chances are the supervisor won’t do that much. I mean, maybe that’s an understatement. The supervisor will yell and harass you, and they will intentionally show up during breaks to discourage you from talking about organizing. But if you’ve already gotten the majority of the workers supporting joining the union by that point, then chances are you’re already meeting with workers outside of the workday. So if management is trying to stop you from talking about it during break times, then you could just keep talking about it with the workers at those meetings outside of the workday.”
“Now, if they catch onto it during an early stage of organizing– say, when you’ve only talked to a handful of workers– that can be trickier to deal with. If I were you in that situation, I would try to find times and environments where the supervisor isn’t usually there– say, when you’re installing a device with a few co-workers. Or during breaks on days when the supervisor is gone for the day,” the man finished.
“What if people don’t want to take on the responsibilities of being part of a union?” Evelyn asked.
“Yea, okay, well– you can explain to them that the union is the only way to win improvements in their workplace conditions, so with the union they could win a shorter workday for example. You should bring up examples of tangible benefits the CCWU has gained for our workplaces, like down in San Francisco.”
“What are those benefits? I’ve heard of a few things y’all won, but I’m not sure.” Gabriel asked.
“A lot, actually. We got paid sick leave. We got the 15-hour work day down to a 10-hour workday! What else, what else… Ooo, safety was a big one. We got them to guarantee guardrails and safety nets when workers are working at heights higher than 5 feet… previously we were only provided harnesses, and that was it– we also won free safety training provided to train workers in everything, including how to properly turn off electrical machines before working on them. Before that, the company just had rudimentary general training given to all construction workers before they were hired.”
“But the fight to get those concessions was a helluva lot of work. But when you’re talking to your coworkers, make sure to emphasize that it is possible, and it has been done before, and quite recently, too,” the man explained.
“Hmmmmm, okay,” Gabriel said.
“What about greenhouse farmworkers?” Evelyn asked.
“Excuse me?” the man said, his brows raised.
“I don’t work at the construction company. I’m actually a worker at a hydroponics company. We grow crops in water in a controlled environment– there’s no soil at all. ‘FreshRoots’ is the name,” Evelyn explained.
The man moved his gaze from Evelyn to the far end of the McDonald’s, where the front counter where people order was. He shut his eyes for a few seconds, deep in thought, as if thinking about how to respond. Then, he turned back to Evelyn, and said: “Interesting. Well, I imagine the process for unionizing is similar for that. But first, you gotta check to see if there’s an existing union in your industry. Is there?” he asked.
“Uhhh… I don’t think so. Hydroponics is sorta a new industry, and there’s not many companies or workers in it,” Evelyn responded.
“Okay. If you really want to unionize then you should find that out, ASAP,” the man said passionately.
“I think there’s probably some general farm workers' unions. So I’ll probably contact them to see if they would allow a hydroponics workplace to join them,” Evelyn said.
“Okay, good,” the man said.
[ Optionally, Evelyn can ask more questions to the experienced CCWU organizer man.
Or Gabriel can ask more questions to the CCWU organizer man.
]
“Any other questions from both you guys?” the man asked.
Evelyn said “No, that’s all,” and Gabriel nodded his head to signal ‘no’.
“You sure? I can stay for longer.”
“No, I think I’m good. You already explained the whole process in detail. I’m sure I’ll want some advice in the future, though, like when something comes up while I’m organizing,” Evelyn said.
The man gave a small smile at Evelyn to acknowledge her response, and then he turned to Gabriel.
“Same goes for me,” Gabriel said.
“Okay, well, just send me a message online when you have some questions or want some advice.”
“Sounds good,” Gabriel said.
Evelyn and Gabriel exchanged glances with each other. Evelyn mouthed Ready? to Gabriel, who subtly nodded his head slightly up and down to signal ‘yes’. With this confirmation from Gabriel, Evelyn put her backpack on her right shoulder, turned to the man and said, “Alright, I think we have to go. It’s a long drive back home.”
Seeing that Evelyn was trying to get out, the man got up from the booth to let her get out. “Okay. Well it was good talking with you guys. This is important work, remember that,” he said. Then he promptly finished with “Have a good night.”
“Good night!” Evelyn exclaimed, and then she joined Gabriel who at this point was already at the exit for the McDonald’s.
Outside on the sidewalk, the night was a crisp black, with very little artificial lights polluting the sky. It truly was a new experience for Evelyn, seeing as she had never seen this type of sky, because she had never been to a remote, rural area.
Pretty soon, Gabriel’s car chirped, which served as a sober reminder to Evelyn that she had to get going– she couldn’t stop to gaze in awe at the sheer quantity of stars, or try to find all the constellations either. So, she hopped in the passenger seat, and checked her phone.
Eleven seventeen! No wonder I feel so sleepy, she thought. Then, as Gabriel drove the car on the highway, she allowed herself to drift asleep.
…
“Evelyn,” Gabriel said, rather loudly.
Her eyes bolted open, and for a few seconds she was a bit confused, still in a semi-sleeping state.
“We’re at your apartment,” he explained.
Evelyn looked to her right, and indeed, before her was her apartment building, the usual dark-gray rectangle with identical rows of windows lining up from bottom to top.
“Oh, okay,” she said. “Sorry, I was sleeping.” She quickly grabbed her backpack from the back seat and opened the passenger door.
After she stepped out on the curb, she kneeled down and leaned forward, bringing her head closer to the window of the car. “Thank you for driving, Gabriel,” she said.
“No problem. Thanks for coming with me. It was motivating to have someone else passionate about this type of thing too,” he said.
“Oh thanks,” she said.
Not sure what else to say, Evelyn looked down at the ground.
“Goodnight,” Gabriel said.
“Goodnight,” Evelyn replied.
With that, Gabriel drove his car out of the parking lot. Evelyn walked to the apartment building entrance, swiped her government ID card, and entered through the familiar automatic doors into the lobby. She walked up the stairs, entered her apartment, and collapsed on her bed, genuinely exhausted from the day.