Wal-Mart sues union over protests at Fla. stores

9:26 AM Protests, stores, union, WalMart No Comments

Reuters – 4 days

Wal-Mart Stores Inc has sued a major grocery workers union and others who have protested at its Florida stores, the latest salvo in its legal fight to stop "disruptive" rallies in and around its stores by groups seeking better pay and working conditions.

Wal-Mart does not have union-represented workers in its U.S. stores. Nevertheless, it has long faced opposition from various labor groups including the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), and from a small but vocal group of current and former employees backed by the union and known as OUR Walmart.

The lawsuit filed on Friday in Orange County, Florida state court seeks "to help protect our customers and associates from further disruptive tactics associated with their continued, illegal trespassing," Walmart spokesman Dan Fogleman said.

Defendants, however, charged that the world's biggest retailer is trying to muzzle its critics.

"This is another attempt on Wal-Mart's behalf of ... silencing their employees and also the communities that support them," Denise Diaz, executive director of Central Florida Jobs With Justice Corp and a defendant named in the suit, said before reviewing the documents.

"Rather than creating good jobs with steady hours and affordable healthcare, Walmart's pattern is to focus its energies on infringing on our freedom of speech," the Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart), also a defendant, said in a statement.

Other defendants include the 1.3 million-member UFCW and the individuals Angela Williamson, Alex Rivera, and Alan Hanson.

The UFCW was not immediately able to comment on the lawsuit.

Wal-Mart alleged that the defendants violated Florida law through coordinated, statewide acts of trespass in several Walmart stores over the last eight months. It has asked the court for a legal ruling that would prevent future trespassing.

In the lawsuit Wal-Mart cited an example where a group of protesters projected a video promoting OUR Walmart on the side of a store in Orlando and passing out literature inside that store in July, 2012.

It alleged that a group of UFCW demonstrators returned to that same store on October 30, 2012 and "confronted the store manager and handed him a rotten pumpkin painted in support of OUR Walmart. The group left the store only after the manager warned that he had called the police."

Wal-Mart filed an unfair labor practice charge against the UFCW in November, asking the National Labor Relations Board to halt what the retailer said were unlawful attempts to disrupt its business in several states including protests that were planned for Black Friday, the busy shopping day right after Thanksgiving. In January, labor groups said that they would stop much of their picketing against the chain, while still trying to push the company to improve working conditions.

The case is Wal-Mart Stores Inc v. United Food and Commercial Workers International Union et al, 9th Judicial Circuit Court of Florida, Orange County, No. 2013-CA-004293.

Reporting by Jessica Wohl in Chicago and Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles.

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'This has destroyed us': Protests cripple Greece

10:12 PM cripple, destroyed, Greece, Protests No Comments

 ATHENS, Greece — With no warning, a few dozen students blocked a major avenue in central Athens, marching slowly up the middle of the street to make sure motorists couldn't get through. Tempers frayed, horns honked.

A driver revved his engine, swerved suddenly and charged up the sidewalk, narrowly missing a woman who jumped out of the way in alarm.

The scene during a student demonstration this week reflected the increasing irritation and despair felt by many Greeks, weighed down by a financial crisis that has led to repeated strikes and demonstrations as the government desperately tries to avoid a default.

"It's a catastrophe. This has destroyed us," said Nikos Trovas, who runs a parking garage just off Syntagma, the large square outside Parliament that has become the focus of protests. "The roads shut every day. So we just sit around here with the employees, looking at each other with no work to do."

It is a curse for those who live or commute to the center of the Greek capital, once a vibrant showcase of what many hoped was a dawn of economic prosperity.

As the chanted slogans faded and the last shreds of stinging tear gas wafted away Wednesday after a demonstration during a civil servants' strike, business owners took stock of the damage to their operations — and wondered how much longer they could keep going.

'Long-term' consequences
Trovas said his monthly turnover was down 40 percent compared to last year — when the financial crisis had already begun to bite in Greece. The main problem, he said, was that demonstrations were often marred by clashes between rock-throwing youths and riot police.

"The consequences are long term. When people see the violence they're afraid to come into the city center with their cars," he said.

The Greeks whose livelihoods lie downtown don't know who to blame: the government, which says there is no option but to cut spending and raise taxes to secure international loans, or the protesters, who can't stand their leaders.

Stores and coffee shops hastily roll down steel shutters — installed over the last few years after repeated riots saw storefronts smashed again and again — for every large demonstration.

"You lose euro1,000 ($1,300) a day on a strike or demonstration day. We soldier on without hope," said Constantinos, opening the doors of his coffee shop just off Syntagma Square after the main demonstration. He asked that his surname not be used out of concern that his cafe could be targeted.

And it's not just motorists who are avoiding the center. In the popular shopping district behind Syntagma, more and more shops now stand vacant, "to let" signs plastered across their windows.

"For 200 days out of 365, we can't work," said clothes shop owner Georgia Brezati, whose store stands near the popular tourist area of Plaka. "The center shuts down all the time, and nobody's doing anything about it. I can't be taxed for 365 days a year but only work for 100."

'Neighborhood of devils'
As shops and restaurants stand vacant, Brezati said she has seen a steady decline in the area she has worked in for the past 30 years.

"There's terrible insecurity. And we have a huge problem near Syntagma now. A place that used to be known as the 'neighborhood of angels' has turned into the 'neighborhood of devils," she said, noting the general decline of the area, with petty criminals, beggars, homeless people and drug addicts increasingly apparent as businesses shut down.

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Customers are scarce. Brezati sat at a table outside her shop slowly sipping a small coffee as passers-by glanced at the leather jackets and fur coats in her storefront, but didn't stop in.

"Our clients don't come to buy any more," she said. "They come to sell their furs and leather coats, because they need the money to pay their electricity and water bills."

Since May 2010, Greece has been dependent on a euro110 billion ($146 billion) international bailout from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund to remain solvent and the government has struggled to meet the conditions of the rescue funds.

Several rounds of spending cuts and tax hikes have cut deep into the incomes of average Greeks as the country struggles through its third year of recession, with the economy projected to contract 5.5 percent of gross domestic product this year.

Unemployment has spiraled to above 16 percent, with the young most severely affected.

European leaders agreed in July on a second euro109 billion ($145 billion) bailout as it became increasingly clear that the measures weren't working as well as had been expected.

But now the Socialist government and international creditors are disputing the details of that bailout.

And each quarterly review of the country's reforms — required for Greece to get the next installment of bailout loans — invariably comes with yet more austerity measures. Many blame the government for failing to tackle the problems effectively.

"This government doesn't work," said Brezati. "It's like they sold us a fur and we found out it was a fake."

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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