Democratic senators announced Wednesday that a deal has been reached to prevent Senate cafeteria workers from losing their jobs, just days after they said they received notice from their employer that they were being laid off.
The announcement came during a rally led by workers, union representatives and several lawmakers, from Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) to Reps. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Adriano Espaillat (DN.Y.) and others.
Attendees marched with banners in the mud about a block from the U.S. Capitol after workers said they were notified by Restaurant Associates, which employs Senate dining room contract employees, that they would be laid off. .
The Hill has reached out to the company for comment.
Senators and workers said dozens would be affected by the layoffs, which they told The Hill would take effect next week.
said a company spokesman Business Insider that the layoff announcement came after the funds it received during the pandemic that helped cover employee salaries “had been depleted and the number of people we have been serving is a small fraction of what it was” .
The Capitol had been closed to the public for about two years in response to the pandemic and only recently entered a phased reopening process that officials say will last several months.
According to role callthe funds had previously been appropriated by the Architect of the Capitol under a comprehensive COVID-19 relief package enacted in 2020.
Workers and representatives of their union, Unite Here Local 23, were pushing for senators to provide more protection dollars for employees who would be laid off after previous funding ran out, while also fighting for better wages and job security. .
“I’m here trying to get our senators to notice us and hopefully pass this budget that we need so we can keep our jobs and not have to file for unemployment,” Anthony Thomas, janitor and dishwasher who works in the building of Dirksen Senate Offices. he said at Wednesday’s rally.
“I have four kids… so I’ve been working here trying to make ends meet and for them to just pull the chair out of where you’re sitting and have your position and everything, it’s really crazy,” Thomas, who earns $15.30 per hour, he told The Hill.
Elizabeth Price, a baker who said she was also going to be fired, told The Hill she was surprised to see senators take turns rallying attendees with a megaphone on the lawn and join her picket line.
“In fact, I was surprised that the turnout was so large. I didn’t think it was going to turn out like this,” Price said.
Last week, Brown led 17 lawmakers in a lyrics Senate Democratic and Republican leaders asking for funding to support the continued employment of Senate cafeteria workers and asking that it be attached to a COVID-19 supplemental package still in the works in Congress.
Leaders had set their sights on speedily passing the bipartisan package, but those efforts hit a snag amid Republican opposition stemming from a dispute over an immigration policy enacted under the Trump administration.
However, under the agreement announced Wednesday, a congressional source said an arrangement has been worked out that will allow additional funds previously allocated to the Architect of the Capitol to be used to help prevent layoffs.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who chairs the Senate Rules Committee, said lawmakers will also continue to work with Restaurant Associates when the Capitol reopens “just to make sure we’re tracking this every month.”
“Who’s back? What’s going on? How many businesses do we have so we can maintain real accountability here?” Klobuchar continued, before emphasizing the need for the Capitol to fully reopen “to increase the number of people that they can enter.
He also urged more staff and members to “put your money where your mouth is” and shop at the cafeteria.
“They have to make sure they don’t go and order sushi three blocks away or 15 blocks away. They have to order things right here,” she said to applause and cheers from the audience.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), who also spoke at the rally, told The Hill that he is confident the campus is “going to be back up and running at full strength very soon.”
“It doesn’t make any sense for these workers to be laid off right now, as this place is just getting back up and running,” he said. “But there is also the question of them getting a fair collective agreement.”
United Here Local 23 said ahead of this week’s protest that workers are fighting for better wages, affordable health care, pensions and job security. According to the union, only 18 percent of workers “are enrolled in health insurance through the company because it is too expensive at their current pay scale.”
Reference-thehill.com