Follow-Up: Orange County Supervisors to Weigh Teamsters Proposals Friday as Landfills Reopen and Picketing Pauses
The Board of Supervisors of Orange County, California, will take the next step this week in the strike by county waste and public works employees. According to City News Service, the board will hold a special closed-door meeting on Friday, October 23, to consider new labor-contract proposals from Teamsters Joint Council 42 that were provided through a mediator.
The Teamsters local representing Orange County waste and public works employees went on strike last week; GSM reported on October 15 that 465 county employees had joined an unfair-labor-practice strike affecting services including roads and trash collection.
Board Chairman Doug Chaffee told City News Service on Wednesday that the two sides have a side arrangement to reopen the county landfills in the meantime. The strike is on hiatus from picketing, so waste haulers can use the county's three landfills without crossing a picket line, easing pressure on the temporary sites haulers use to store trash. “Now that we have the landfills open the trash companies storing trash are now able to access that,” Chaffee said. “That's supposed to be good all week. But I don't know what happens if we say no to all their stuff on Friday. We're hoping we now can have reasonable conversations instead of strikes going forward.” The mediator has met separately with representatives from both sides.
County and union officials also traded accusations this week over picketing tactics. The county filed a complaint with the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) alleging picketers formed “human chains,” blocked traffic and falsely told customers the landfills were closed; Chaffee said the county has pictures and statements from waste-hauling drivers. Teamsters officials countered that the allegations are untrue, accused county officials of violating labor law themselves, said PERB is investigating the union's complaint, and said the union would file additional charges accusing officials of bad-faith bargaining and illegal threats against striking employees. Teamsters officials did not immediately respond to messages for comment on Wednesday.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：橙县三处县属垃圾填埋场之一 Frank R. Bowerman Landfill 入口。照片：Fluffy89502 摄，CC BY-SA 4.0，经维基共享资源。 / Photo: Entrance to the Frank R. Bowerman Landfill, one of Orange County's three county landfills. Photo by Fluffy89502, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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