By Doug Cunningham
As the White House Summit on Working families got underway Tuesday at the Omni Hotel in Washington, hundreds of working moms and grandmothers rallied and held a strike at the National Zoo. They work for contractors paid by the federal government – over 50 profitable companies that operate at landmark buildings like the Pentagon, the Smithsonian Museums, the Ronald Reagan Building and the National Zoo. The workers are urging President Obama to go beyond his executive order raising pay four the contracted workers to at least $10.10 an hour. In a letter to Obama and Labor Secretary Tom Perez the working motherland grandmothers called on them to require contractors to bargain with the workers collectively over wages and all terms of employment. Yesenia Vega was one of the striking moms.
[Yesenia Vega]: “I went to the strike because I want to ask for me because $10.10 is not enough for me to support my family here, and because I would like to have the benefits because we don’t have vacation paid or day off pay.”
If Obama required federal contractors to collectively bargain with their workers, the workers say it would let the whole country know that the President of the United States truly believes in collective bargaining, that workers deserve a seat at the bargaining table in order to improve their wages, benefits and working conditions.
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