Salinas, Calif.—When the Salinas City Council takes up a measure at its Tuesday session officially commending D’Arrigo Bros. President John D’Arrigo, Central Coast vegetable workers will do something you don’t often witness: singling out their employer for praise. Workers are crediting D’Arrigo for recent significant union contract wage and benefit gains that have meaningfully changed their and their families’ lives.
Attending the council meeting will be John D’Arrigo, vegetable workers from Salinas-based D’Arrigo Bros., United Farm Workers President Emeritus Arturo S. Rodriguez, union National Vice President Lauro Barajas and UFW organizers.
The resolution cites D’Arrigo—one of the nation’s largest vegetable producers with 1,500 workers, most on the Central Coast—for re-negotiating his company’s UFW contract last year. The new agreement provides major wage and benefit hikes, including covering 100 percent of the $624 per month per employee costs of complete family medical, dental and vision coverage as well as six paid holidays a year and other improvements.
The re-negotiated contract and cooperative relationship between union, workers and employer also benefit the company by helping it achieve a competitive advantage by continuing to attract and maintain a better compensated, more experienced and professional work force with higher morale and productivity as well as better quality produce for consumers.
Who: Grower John D’Arrigo, D’Arrigo vegetable workers, former UFW President Arturo Rodriguez, union National Vice President Lauro Barajas, UFW organizers.
What: Salinas City Council meeting where council members take up a measure commending John D’Arrigo while workers praise their employer for a recently re-negotiated union contact that meaningfully improves their lives.
When: 4 p.m., Tuesday, April 30, 2019.
Where: Salinas City Council Rotunda, 200 Lincoln Ave., Salinas 93902.
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