“All Americans should have a chance to organize without fear of losing their jobs”
Maine
Corey Day
Working in a small retail store for a big phone company made Corey Day and her coworkers in Brunswick, Maine, “feel like numbers” rather than a valued part of the team.
So when a CWA organizer stopped by in 2005 to talk with them about joining the union, they eagerly listened and took home materials. “We were so ready for change, so ready for somebody to stick up for us,” Day said.
For far too many American workers, this is where the story turns ugly: Workers decide they want a union and the company does everything it can to stop them — captive-audience meetings where managers denounce the union, mailboxes full of anti-union propaganda, threats to close a store or plant.
In 25 percent of all organizing drivers, employers illegally fire union activists. But Cingular, which was AT&T Wireless when Day started in 2003 and is now AT&T Mobility, had an agreement with CWA to stay neutral in organizing drives and to recognize the union when a majority of workers sign cards seeking representation.
Day said all five or six workers in her then-Cingular store signed cards and before they knew it, “We were part of Local 1400.”
With the union, “We got more job security, and, even though we had health care before, now we had health care that was one-third as costly,” Day said. “And we started getting two raises a year instead of just a dime -- at least that’s what it felt like -- once a year.”
Day said all Americans who want a union should have a chance to organize as she did, without management interference and fear of losing their jobs. She doesn’t understand why so many businesses are so opposed to the Employee Free Choice Act -- after all, AT&T Mobility has continued to honor the neutrality and majority sign-up agreement with CWA, and it’s the biggest wireless company in the United States.
“If we don’t run, they don’t run,” Day said of the employee-management relationship. “We’re the ones on the front line working with customers. If we feel we’re valued and respected, we’re going to work that much harder to make the business a success.”