Sacramento, Calif. – As janitors put down their brooms and pick up picket signs across California, State Senators and Assembly members are calling on property owners, businesses and government entities to support decent wages and family health care for the state’s janitors now. More than 16,000 janitors across California are working under expired contracts.
SCR 102 (Kehoe) “Justice for Janitors” passed through the Assembly Labor committee today, May 14, after approval of the State Senate on May 8.
“Hard-working janitors contribute to the economy of our state by keeping offices, government buildings and research centers clean and open for business,” said Senator Christine Kehoe (D- San Diego), “Cleaning contractors and their clients need to step up and ensure good wages and family healthcare for the janitors and their families now.”
Bay Area / Silicon Valley
Janitors in the Bay Area and Silicon Valley are planning to rally outside Cisco Systems, Inc. Thursday morning at 9:00 AM in San Jose. Bay Area/Silicon Valley janitors are set to take a strike authorization vote on Saturday, May 17.
More than 6,000 janitors from Oakland to San Jose work hard keeping offices and campuses clean for some of the world’s leading high-tech and bio-tech corporations like Cisco and Intel, but they earn wages so low they struggle to survive. Santa Clara County is among the top five most expensive places to live and yet janitors here are currently earning some of the lowest wages in the entire country among unionized janitors. The median salary for Santa Clara County is the highest for any region in the country, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“Working in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area for everyone should be beneficial for everyone including, janitors and their families as well as the engineers,” said Assemblymember Sandré R. Swanson (D- Oakland), Chair of the Assembly Labor Committee. “High-tech and bio-tech leaders have an opportunity here to improve living conditions for thousands of hard-working janitors by agreeing to decent wages and family healthcare now.”
Orange County
More than 1,000 janitors are set to demonstrate in Costa Mesa tomorrow, May 15 as contract negotiations continue. More than 2,000 Orange County janitors earn under $350 a week and struggle to survive in the nation’s fourth most expensive place to live. Orange County janitors would have to pay up to 89% of their current income for a one-bedroom apartment, according to the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development. The Orange County contract expired April 30.
Los Angeles
On Monday, May 12, janitors in Los Angeles announced a tentative agreement on a four-year pact with family healthcare that will raise janitors’ average wages more than $1,000 every year to reach nearly $30,000 by 2012. The news came after round-the-clock negotiations facilitated by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, who called for a cooling-off period Thursday, May 8, one day after the janitors’ union voted to conduct an unfair labor practice strike and staged walk outs in more than 40 buildings across Los Angeles County.
San Diego
Negotiations for San Diego janitors are scheduled to resume on Friday, May 16. More than 2,000 San Diego janitors aim to negotiate one contract for the entire San Diego region with higher wages and access to family healthcare.
Janitors in San Diego are earning the lowest wages among unionized janitors in the nation. Even though commercial office rents are above $32 per square foot in San Diego – higher than Orange and Los Angeles county rates – some janitors here earn as little as $8.15 an hour and most have no access to health care for themselves or their families. The contract covering 250 downtown janitors expired April 30 while the contract covering more than 1,750 suburban janitors’ is set to expire May 31.
Sacramento
Janitors in the state’s capitol earn less than $340 a week and most have no access to healthcare for themselves or their families. More than 1,500 janitors in Sacramento, working in commercial real estate and government buildings, are under a contract that expires May 31.
Building owners and cleaning contractors are largely the same across the counties.
COMMUNITIES PAYING THE PRICE FOR POVERTY CONDITIONS AMONG JANITORS
In April, California state legislators called on the state’s top corporations who benefit from the janitor’s work to take responsibility for good jobs for the sake of entire communities as they released a report, “The High Cost of Low Wage Service Jobs: How Communities Pay the Price for Poverty Conditions Among Janitors.”