Grower asked worker to swear on rosary that he didn’t back UFW
Judge finds Tracy asparagus grower illegally threatened, interrogated and laid off pro-union workers
A state administrative judge has ruled that Tracy-based asparagus grower Arnaudo Bros. interrogated, threatened, and laid off workers for supporting the United Farm Workers, and created an impression of surveillance of worker activity. The judge ordered that four workers who are union leaders at the ranch be offered “immediate reinstatement” to their former (or similar) jobs and be paid “all wage losses and other economic losses they have suffered as a result of the [company’s] discrimination against them.” Arnuado’s 200 farm workers—mostly of Mexican, Filipino and Cambodian descent—also produce canning tomatoes and alfalfa in Lodi, Stockton, Patterson and Manteca in addition to the main location in Tracy.
ALRB Administrative Law Judge Thomas Sobel issued his 41-page decision on Dec. 30, after hearing sworn testimony during a two-day hearing in Tracy last October. Among excerpts from the judge’s findings are that a company foreman “conveyed threats to [workers living in ranch housing] and the impression that their union activities were being watched, that [farm owner Leo] Arnaudo interrogated [worker Noe] Martinez about his continued support for the union and that he asked [worker Rigoberto] Ochoa to swear on his rosary that he no longer supported the union.” To view Judge Sobel’s full decision, see: http://www.ufw.org/pdf/20141230BDecisionoftheALJArnaudo.pdf
A San Joaquin County Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction in 2013 against Arnaudo Bros., ordering the company to abstain from threatening and interrogating worker leaders, including Martinez, after the court found that Arnaudo unlawfully questioned him over his union involvement. A neutral state mediator hammered out a union contract between the UFW and the company in November 2014. The ALRB board approved the mediator’s decision, but ordered the parties to bargain over wage rates in the last year of the contract.
– end –