UFW faces second vineyard threat
Third of workers at Kunde-owned fields near Russian River petition for vote to decertify union
Published: Friday, July 20, 2007 at 3:42 a.m.
Last Modified: Thursday, July 19, 2007 at 9:00 p.m.
Three weeks after a group of Gallo vineyard workers voted to oust the United Farm Workers union, workers at another Sonoma County vineyard have asked for a vote on whether the UFW should continue to represent them.
More than a third of the 40 workers who tend the 500 acres of Russian River vineyards owned by Richard and Saralee Kunde have petitioned the state Agricultural Labor Relations Board for a vote to decertify the union.
"They haven't done anything for us in the past four years," said Ernesto Paniagua, a 38-year-old worker from Michoacan, Mexico, who signed the petition to oust the union. "They haven't raised our wages. They've done nothing."
The board's staff will investigate the petition. If one-third of the workers on the company's most recent payroll signed, a vote will be held next Thursday, said Freddie Capuyan, head of the Salinas office of the ALRB.
Capuyan received the petition Thursday morning from Victorino Velaz-quez, a longtime worker at Richard's Grove and Saralee's Vineyard Inc.
The exact number of workers who signed the petition is confidential, but based on the estimate of 40 workers in the petition, enough signatures were submitted to merit a vote, Capuyan said.
Christine Margetts, finance manager for the vineyard, said there were currently 49 workers on the payroll. She said the company is not involved in the process beyond supporting the workers' right to decide whether they should be represented by a union.
"This is their union, and they get to do what they want," Margetts said.
Casimiro Alvarez, regional director of the UFW on the North Coast, said he was dealing with an "emergency" Thursday afternoon and did not have time to comment.
The union has represented workers at the vineyard since 2002, signing a three-year contract at the end of 2005.
The company farms 16 varieties of wine grapes for some of Sonoma County's signature wineries, including Clos du Bois, Arrowood Vineyards, J Vineyards & Winery, and Williams Selyem.
Saralee Kunde could not be reached for comment yesterday but has previously said the contract she signed with the union did not provide any pay or benefits beyond what the workers were already receiving.
Several workers contacted at the company's vineyards on Slusser Road in Windsor on Thursday afternoon said they don't see any benefit for the 2 percent of their salary they pay to the union.
Many said they had never met anyone from the union.
"We all come to suffer and work like dogs so that these guys can just come and take our wages," said Paniagua, shaking his head as he stood with other workers under the shade of an oak tree.
Ramon Cornejo, 54, laughed and wiped his brow with a red bandana as he talked about never having met a union official in the two years he's worked at the vineyard.
"If they leave, it really won't affect us," Cornejo said. "Here no one protects us, not the union, not anyone. Here we look out for ourselves."
The petition comes on the heels of the June 25 vote by E&J Gallo's 300 vineyard workers in Sonoma County, represented by the UFW since 1994.
Preliminary results showed 125 Gallo workers voted to decertify the UFW, versus 95 who voted to retain it. The UFW is appealing that vote, saying Gallo unfairly influenced the petition by allowing an anti-union worker to campaign on company time.
The UFW won a similar challenge against a 2003 vote at Gallo, which a state board concluded was unfairly influenced by the involvement of Gallo's private labor contractors.
If the union is ousted from both Gallo and Saralee's Vineyards, it would represent a major setback to the UFW's aspirations in Sonoma County. Only about 20 workers at Balletto Vineyards in Santa Rosa would remain unionized.
In Napa, the union continues to represent workers at St. Supery Winery and Vista Vineyard Management, in St. Helena. Charles Krug Winery fired its union workers earlier this year, a move the UFW is challenging.
You can reach Staff Writer
Kevin McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.mccallum@pressdemocrat.com.
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