Despite being kept at a distance by security guards and Minneapolis police, union organizers Wednesday called on Target shareholders to question the ?excessive? compensation? being paid to corporate executives and to seek ?proper treatment of Target?s greatest asset ? its workers.?

A half-dozen organizers from United Food and Commercial Workers Local 789 distributed leaflets outside Target?s annual shareholders meeting at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. They contrasted the $19.2 million that Target paid CEO Bob Ulrich last year with store employees whose pay, benefits and hours are being cut.

?The motto of fun, fast and friendly at Target has turned into a culture of lean, mean and not much in between for the workers,? the leaflet said. It urged shareholders to support workers? organizing efforts and to guarantee them a living wage and affordable health care.

Instead, workers are telling the union that, at some Twin Cities stores, hourly wages are being cut, workers are losing access to health insurance and other benefits, and schedules are being shifted to avoid premium pay, which itself is being cut in half, said Bernie Hesse, organizing director for Local 789.

Meanwhile, Ulrich?s compensation increased 19 percent last year. ?Target is a successful company,? Hesse wrote in the leaflet. ?It is a homegrown asset and something that Minnesotans can point to with pride. We want Target to succeed and prosper, but not at the expense of its workers.?

Executives refuse to take questions from shareholders
Hesse said Local 789?s initial organizing forays into Target stores are definitely catching corporate attention. He said workers told him that Ulrich twice visited the store in Hudson, Wis., this month to talk with workers. Target also made sure Local 789 could not disrupt the annual shareholders meeting. Museum security and Minneapolis police outnumbered organizers and kicked them off the property, even though the museum is publicly funded by the State of Minnesota and by Hennepin County taxpayers.

Organizers were restricted to the sidewalk near the street, cutting them off from direct access to most of the shareholders attending. Inside the meeting, Ulrich and other executives refused to answer any questions from shareholders.

Bernie Hesse, organizing director for UFCW Local 789, and Danny Schwartzman, who will be a senior at Macalester College, distribute leaflets outside Target's annual shareholders meeting at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Union Advocate photo