Pressure put on building owners

Members of SEIU Local 26, which represents 85 percent of janitors employed by commercial cleaning subcontractors in the metro area, have been working without a contract since the new year began. Talks stalled Dec. 29, when the Minneapolis-St. Paul Commercial Contractors Association made further negotiations contingent upon the janitors giving up their health-care proposal.  

On Saturday, members voted to authorize a strike if necessary.

Javier Morillo-Alicea, Local 26 president, said companies like Wells Fargo, Target and United Properties have the clout to push their cleaning subcontractors toward a settlement with the janitors, but are instead “hiding behind our employers and pleading poverty.”

Property owners may plead poverty, but a report issued yesterday by Local 26 paints a much different, much healthier picture of the local market for corporate real estate.

“Janitors Outlook” shows that the five largest office buildings downtown Minneapolis saved, as a direct result of property-tax reform passed in 2001, $16 million last year.

Janitor Bryant Thomas made an appeal for building owners to get involved at a state Capitol news conference. Union Advocate photo

The change to Minnesota’s property-tax codes in 2001 shifted tax burdens from building owners to homeowners. In 1997, the report claims, 56 percent of property taxes collected in Minneapolis came from corporate real estate, while residential homeowners paid 32 percent of property taxes. By contrast, just 35 percent of property taxes collected this year will come from corporate real estate and 55 percent from homeowners.

Such a fundamental shift in property-tax burdens, Morillo-Alicea argued, puts the onus on companies that own property in the Twin Cities to contribute to the health of their community.

“It’s time for our state to say those who benefit from that which Minnesota has given to them must also give back to Minnesota,” he said. “We think it is right to call on them to stand up for good wages and good benefits.”

The market for corporate real estate here may be booming, but the janitors who work in those buildings, according to “Janitors Outlook,” are hurting.

When their wages are adjusted for inflation, full-time janitors earned less in 2006 than in 1976, and part-time janitors have seen a 22 percent decline in their wages over the same time period.

Health insurance, meanwhile, is unaffordable for most janitors and their families.

At the press conference, Rev. Grant Stevensen of ISAIAH, a faith-based, social-justice organization, stood before a chart with 2,100 squares – one for each member of Local 26 eligible for family health coverage through their employers. Only 14 of the squares were filled in with black ink, representing the total number of members who have opted into the often-expensive coverage programs.

“This chart represents a serious moral problem,” Stevensen said. “Who is it that we’re going to ask to step up to the plate and start making incremental changes? … We need to ask the owners of the buildings.”

Michael Moore edits the St. Paul Union Advocate, the official publication of the St. Paul Trades & Labor Assembly.

For more information
A PDF file of the report "Janitors Outlook: Twin Cities Property Market Services Report," can be found on the Local 26 website:
http://www.seiu26.org/docUploads/2007%20Janitors%20Outlook%20Report.pdf