The food industry is taking a handful of West Coast cities to court over recently approved local measures requiring large supermarket chains to pay frontline workers more money to work among the public amid a mortal pandemic.
Legal battles take place while some municipalities seek to intervene after the “compensation” for many grocery workers has lapsed, even when they continue to face risks at work. At least 134 grocery workers died of COVID-19, and more than 28,700 were exposed to a positive case, according to the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
The new Seattle law requiring $ 4 an hour increases for employees of major supermarket chains has the Northwest Grocery Association and the Washington Food Industry Association fighting the city in court. Federal lawsuits filed this week say the law interrupts collective bargaining between supermarket chains and unions and highlights big companies, according to The Seattle Times.
“Unfortunately, the council’s unprecedented decree, its unilateral action and unwillingness to work with the food industry left us with no option but to file a lawsuit against the city,” said Tammie Hetrick, WFIA president and CEO, in a statement regarding the law that passed last week and went into effect on Wednesday. The law applies to grocers with more than 500 employees in total and remains in effect as long as the public health crisis continues.
A spokesman for Seattle city attorney Pete Holmes, Dan Nolte, said: “We will absolutely defend the city’s right to see food workers receive the hazard pay they rightly deserve.”
Similar struggles are also taking place in California, where the California Grocers Association is also active on the legal front.
The state trade group filed federal lawsuits against the cities of Oakland and Montebello after both passed decrees determining an extra five dollars an hour for workers at major supermarket chains. It is also challenging a $ 4 an hour wage increase for employees of major supermarket chains in Long Beach, California, and threatening to take action against Los Angeles as it also moves forward with its own hazard pay bill.
Trader Joe’s responded to recent events by temporarily increase wages at $ 4 an hour for its workers across the country, but canceling its traditional mid-year increases.
Kroger took a different and even more controversial approach, saying that close two stores in Long Beach after the city passed a $ 4 an hour wage increase to employees of major supermarket chains. Kroger, the country’s largest supermarket company, also warned that more closings could occur.
The survey found that frontline employees face an increased risk of exposure to coronavirus at work. These workers are also more likely to be black, Hispanic or Native American, populations that have experienced higher rates of COVID-19.
—The Associated Press contributed to this report.