Chants, shouts, and a cacophony of horns and whistles greeted New York State Senator Jessica Ramos as she stepped up to a makeshift stage in front of the Empire State Building on Saturday, Mar. 1.
“I want to tell you that I could hear you when I was riding the subway here, coming to see you,” she told the large crowd of Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) Local 79 members assembled along half of Manhattan’s West 34th Street for a rally. “I’m a big believer in laborers and in all workers in need. I’m a big believer in everything you’re doing here.”
Hundreds of LIUNA construction workers and general laborers had come out to rally in front of one of Manhattan’s most iconic buildings. The union workers were positioned in an area adjacent to the street to avoid obstructing passage for pedestrians and tourists visiting the landmark building, but anyone walking along the sidewalk could see the hundreds of union members and their 25 large-scale Scabby the Rat inflatables.
The demonstration was organized to call out the buildings’ owners, Empire State Realty Trust (ESRT) because LIUNA is concerned that ESRT has continued to hire construction and demolition firms that fail to pay wages at the standard rates for New York City building laborers and does not provide union health and safety protections for their workers.
The union also has documentation indicating that contractors hired by ESRT have been involved in various allegations of misconduct, such as worker intimidation, wage disputes, fraudulent safety training certifications, claims of construction kickbacks and bribery, unsafe working conditions, improper disposal of construction debris, and safety violations resulting in worker fatalities.
“We will not stand for worker exploitation, not at the Empire State Building and not at any of [ESRT’s] other portfolio buildings, and we are going to be out here every single day until they hear us loud and proud that New York City is a union town,” Oona Adams, Local 79’s director of organizing told the AmNews.
Karen Juanita Carrillo photos
Talks between Local 79 and ESRT came to a halt a few weeks ago. “Empire State Realty Trust employs a union labor workforce at its buildings, which includes the Empire State Building,” ESRT said in a statement sent to the Amsterdam News. “Local 79’s protest was triggered by a small subcontract from a general contractor who was awarded work in the Empire State Building. ESRT competitively bids projects to a select group of quality general contractors and allows those contractors to subcontract work as needed.”
The company added that the “Empire State Building Observatory — recently named No. 1 Attraction in the World by Tripadvisor travelers — remains open and is fully operational.”
Local 79’s Adams said union members will continue their protest in front of the Empire State Building until this issue is settled. Members have been protesting in front of the building every day since the beginning of January.
“(The) Laborers Union fight(s) for all workers and fight(s) for every construction site to be safe,” Ramos told union members at the rally. “We are a town of protection for our workers, of living wages, of fighting against wage theft, of making sure that every worker returns home safely at the end of the night. Every night!
“We are in front of the Empire State Building — the icon of New York City and New York State. We are the Empire State because of the Empire State Building. It was built by a union and there is no business for a scab to be working on this building.”