Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Local 73 , an organization that represents building and food service workers, rallied on Friday at noon to gather support for their part of current negotiations with the University on worker compensation.

The rally featured various other unions and groups across campus to show solidarity with one another.

This follows the recent vote to strike finalized days before the University was officially notified on Sept. 1. The verdict of this vote to be announced at 5 p.m. today will decide whether or not the union will strike indefinitely, possibly starting Sept. 15.

Chants of  “What do we want?” “Contracts!” and “Whose university?” “Our university!” could be heard throughout the south side of the Illini Union. 

On Monday, union negotiators met with the University. However, SEIU Senior Field Organizer and Assistant Director for the State-Municipal-Schools Division Ricky Baldwin said the University “came with nothing,” expecting the union to come to the University’s terms.

The rally featured Stephanie Fortado, labor and employee steward of Non-Tenure Faculty Coalition (NTFC), Local 6546  representing nontenured faculty who just recently finished negotiations with the University.

Fortado warned against the University’s tendency to come “unprepared” to the negotiation table, as well as being generally “disconnected from the reality of our members.”

She referenced the late reverend Martin Luther King’s infamous speech: “All labor is dignity,” she said.

“They sell t-shirts that say ‘learning and labor’; they must have forgotten the ‘labor,’” Fortado said. 

A representative from the Graduate Employees Union Organization spoke to the crowd, listing grievances about how the SEIU contract was violated last spring when they were asked to remove the encampment tents, as well as when a worker in the past faced abuse from a higher-up that had to be petitioned for. 

Next was Elizabeth Hartke from the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Local 698, representing public workers such as laboratory mechanics, animal caretakers, medical technicians and library specialists, who said the University has been unable to attract new staff when workers leave “because their wages are so bad.”

Student body President Rudy LaFave made an appearance to show solidarity on behalf of undergraduate students. 

LaFave boasted his upbringing in a union-strong home, “understand(ing) firsthand what the difference a union can make in a household of learning.”

“As a representative of the entire student body, I urge this administration to give the workers a chance at a livable wage.”

An anonymous representative for Students for Justice in Palestine spoke in solidarity with SEIU, connecting the workers’ struggle with the University’s continued investment in arms manufacturers. 

Companies such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Caterpillar have been at the center of student protests across the country calling to divest university investments. The millions that go to these companies, as well as the nearly $1 million afforded to President Killeen’s salary, “should have been used to pay our workers,” they said.

In light of this year’s record-breaking 9,008 freshman enrollment rate, SEIU Chapter 119 President and building worker Melody Decker said this has been an even larger strain on the labor force on campus than last year’s record of 8,325.

“They have overbooked this school by thousands and this affects us,” she said. “People work between two or three venues to serve these children.”

Gus Wood from the Campus Faculty Association delivered a speech continuing the theme of a united struggle with subjugated people of the world.

“Our purpose here today is to diagnose our discomfort, our anger, our abuse,” Wood said. “That discomfort is the devaluing of our labor.”

Because the nature of the job is not being held in as high of regard, Wood said, their demands are not respected. He reiterated the regular responsibilities building workers face, such as cleaning up blood and bodily fluids, finding miscarried fetuses and coming across dead bodies.

“If it works to the building service workers, if it happens to all of us … the devaluing of our work represses our voices,” Wood said.

Because of the University’s unwillingness to concede, Wood said the union is no longer asking but demanding. “Look at world history. Collective protest gets the goods,” he said.

Referencing the famed anti-colonial French writer Franz Fanon, Wood quoted ‘“You can no longer breathe,’ as Franz Fanon said. ‘It is an impossible situation.’” 

Recently, student workers on campus saw a $1 raise to $15.50 due to wage compression. “They somehow forgot about wage compression for us,” Baldwin said.

During the last SEIU strike in 2013, management employees who were not represented by the union and student workers were told to take over leftover duties. This includes trash cleanup, bathroom maintenance and food preparation. 

“Sometimes when I was a college student, I didn’t think about the building service and food service work that goes into everything — I just didn’t think about it,” Baldwin said. “It was part of the wallpaper, the background, the stuff you don’t notice.”

According to Baldwin, if they are to strike, the University has prepared people in office work represented by another union not certified to cook or accommodate different food allergies. “That’s not safe for anybody.”

“Be confident, that’s the message today — not as an individual, but as a collective,” Wood said.

UPDATE: As of Friday evening, the union has voted to reject the University’s proposal.

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