Farm workers picket big Visalia nursery demanding job security in new UFW contract

L.E. Cooke Inc. will employ about 250 nursery workers by the mid-December. But roughly 70% of them labor without a union seniority system that guarantees their job security. 

Dozens of Cooke workers will protest the grower’s rejection of seniority protections on Tuesday by picketing their company’s office east of Visalia two days after their United Farm Workers contract expired on Dec. 2.

Cooke’s permanent employees have union security. But it refuses to grant the same rights to seasonal workers, who make up the great majority of the work force. Workers at the nursery that grows shade and fruit trees complain about favoritism, including UFW supporters being laid off and not recalled. A seniority system based upon employees’ length of service with the company is the only fair solution, they say.

Farm workers at Cooke voted to be represented by the UFW in a 1997 secret-ballot union election supervised by the state farm labor board. The first UFW contract was signed in 1997. Cooke workers are pressing the grower for their third union agreement.

 
Who:           Dozens of nursery workers at L.E. Cooke Inc.
 
What:          Picketing company headquarters demanding seniority protections that would 
                    mean job security for seasonal workers.
 
When:         12 noon, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2001.
 
Where:        L.E. Cooke Inc. offices, 26333 Rd. 140, about five miles east of Visalia.
                    (From Fresno, Hwy. 99 south; east on Hwy. 198 to Visalia; exit Lovers Lane south; 
                    turns into Rd. 140.) 

 
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