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Gallo workers toss out UFW
After 125-95 vote, union accuses company contractors of unfair influence
Published: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 at 3:43 a.m.
Last Modified: Monday, June 25, 2007 at 9:00 p.m.
Gallo vineyard workers Monday voted to oust the United Farm Workers union, reversing the historic 1994 vote that gave the UFW its toehold in Sonoma County's wine industry.
In preliminary results, 125 Gallo workers voted to decertify the UFW and 95 voted to retain the union, said Fred Capuyan, regional director of the state Agricultural Labor Relations Board, which oversaw the election.
If upheld, the vote would mark the latest blow to the UFW's efforts to expand its influence on the North Coast. In 2003, about 110 workers at Sonoma Cutrer Vineyards removed the union after just one year. And earlier this year, Charles Krug in Napa fired its unionized workers, a move the UFW has challenged.
In Sonoma County, the UFW still represents hundreds of workers at Balletto Vineyards and Saralee and Richard Kunde's Russian River vineyards.
Monday's outcome thrilled workers who said they give more to the union than they get in return, while UFW officials accused Gallo's labor contractors of unfairly influencing the vote.
"There's a lot of bells ringing inside my heart," said Roberto Parra, the vineyard worker and former union official who organized a petition drive that forced the vote. "I'm so happy."
Efren Barajas, a UFW vice president who attended the vote at Gallo's sprawling Frei Ranch in the Dry Creek Valley, said he doesn't understand why workers who supported the union during contract negotiations just last month would turn their back on it now.
"It's not making sense to me," Barajas said. "They are really missing a pretty good deal."
The approximately 300 UFW workers who farm Gallo's 3,200 acres of vineyards in Sonoma County are due for 3 percent pay increases in September and another 3 percent in March. By then, starting wages will range from $9.25 to $9.54 an hour, depending on the type of work.
Barajas said that pay is very good for the industry, and he thinks many workers didn't fully understand what they were voting on.
"They should really look at that contract that they have the opportunity to work with," Barajas said. "It's one of the best contracts I think a group of (vineyard) workers can have."
But the way that contract was renegotiated appears to have damaged the union's credibility with its own workers.
Santos Cortez, 22, said he never voted on the contract extension, which pushed the contract through 2011.
"When they negotiated a contract again in May they didn't tell any of us," Cortez said. "They made us sign cards in English saying that we supported the union, and that was that."
Cortez, who immigrated to the United States from El Salvador four years ago, doesn't work directly for Gallo, but for Viramontes Vineyard Management. The company, which is owned by Arturo and Fidelina Viramontes, is one of four labor contractors that provide up to 220 workers to augment Gallo's 80 full-time vineyard workers.
Fidelina Viramontes said she treats her workers well, provides them with health insurance, and teaches them how to work quickly and safely in the vineyard.
The workers, many of whom are from the Central Valley, don't want to get involved in union organizing and resent the union's taking 2 percent of their salary without much to show for it, she said.
"When they see their checks, they don't like it. I see their faces," Viramontes said. "They just want to work and get home. That's it."
Many of the workers had stories about how the union never lived up to its promises.
In one instance, a union representative was supposed to meet with one of Viramontes' crews, but never showed up, workers said. Other workers heard stories about how the union promised a $10,000 death benefit, but when a worker drowned, his family was never paid.
Instead of making a case for how the union would help them, some said union representatives resorted to scare tactics, visiting their homes over the weekend and pressuring them on how to vote.
"When they went to our homes they would say, 'It took years to construct the twin towers in New York, and it only took one idiot to destroy them. Is that what you want to see happen here?' " said Jorge Concepcion, 23, who moved to Sonoma County from Mexico three years ago.
That backhanded reference was to Parra, an irrigation specialist at Gallo who supported the UFW in 1994 when it won its first vote in the North Coast's wine industry.
At the time, union officials claimed years of discrimination, favoritism, skimpy wage increases, seniority violations and disrespectful treatment led workers to seek the help of the union.
But Parra soon became disenchanted and began speaking out against what he saw as deception and strong-arm tactics by the union.
Parra spearheaded the 2003 drive that led to a high-stakes vote that was never counted because of legal challenges by the UFW. The union successfully argued that Gallo had improperly influenced the election by allowing labor contractors to circulate fliers against the union.
After a long legal tussle over the vote and a bitter nationwide boycott of Gallo wines, the two sides struck a new 2½-year contract in 2005. The contract was recently extended through 2011.
But Parra said the union succeeded in negotiating those contracts only by lying, blackmailing workers and taking advantage of workers who can't read or write.
"While I am here, the union will never come back," Parra said.
The union said Parra has a personal vendetta he's pursuing regardless of its impact on his fellow workers. A local UFW organizer, Casimiro Alvarez, said Parra takes advantage of ill-informed workers by confusing and manipulating them to turn against the union.
The outcome of the vote remains uncertain. Twelve votes were challenged and left uncounted in the preliminary tally. Those disputed votes would not be enough to reverse the outcome of the election, which requires a simple majority to remove the union.
But the union challenged the vote on procedural grounds last week, claiming ALRB rules don't allow such a vote given the newly renegotiated contract.
Michael Lee, general counsel for the ALRB, said the union could continue to pursue that objection with the board.
But the UFW's Barajas said the union is more likely to challenge what he says was interference by Gallo's labor contractors.
Though he declined to specify the offenses, Barajas said he arrived at the site before the 6:30 a.m. vote and saw inappropriate conduct meant to sway the election against the UFW.
"That's when we had the opportunity to see that a good chunk of the vote was controlled by the labor contractors," Barajas said.
You can reach Staff Writer Kevin McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.mccallum@pressdemocrat.com and Staff Writer Angelica Marin at 521-5241 or angelica.marin@pressdemocrat.com.
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