Teamsters Local 320, which represents workers on campus including dining workers, held a forum on April 25 in St. Paul. Photo by Amie Stager.
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Zara Brown says that the University of Minnesota fired her on April 19 for supposed poor performance. But Brown and her union, Teamsters Local 320, argue she has been unfairly disciplined since receiving surgery in the summer of 2024 for a non-work-related ankle sprain.
At a forum hosted by Local 320 on April 25 on the St. Paul campus, Brown said that management denied her accommodations, such as an anti-fatigue mat and a stool. “I’ve worked other food service jobs and was treated not great, but nowhere near as bad as Chartwells,” she said, referring to the company that contracts with the University to manage her and her coworkers. “I was in so much pain.”
Although the dining workers are public employees, they are managed by a private company. In 2022, the university began a 10-year, $15 million contract with Chartwells, which provides food services at around 300 campuses across the United States. Three members of Local 320 who work in University of Minnesota dining spoke to a crowd of about 40 people on the St. Paul campus. The forum included university regents, faculty members, and members of AFSCME 3800, which represents clerical workers on campus. It also included organizers with UNITE HERE Local 17, which represents food service and hospitality workers in Minnesota, and organizers with Restaurant Opportunities Center of Minnesota, a worker center focused on organizing in the restaurant industry. Local 320 alleges a range of abuses against workers from management, including union busting, harassment, and physical abuse.
According to Local 320 business agent Jackson Kerr, there has been an “explosive” increase in harassment, discipline, suspensions, and terminations of dining workers since Chartwells took over in 2022. The university’s own data shows a 96% increase in disciplinary actions from the years 2022 to 2024, as well as a 64.3% increase in the number of employees who have been disciplined. Additionally, women make up around 40% of the workforce but receive more than 50% of the suspensions and terminations, with women of color receiving higher rates of discipline. Kerr said that management is “disciplining workers out the door” and that these actions are union-busting tactics.
“We can say with confidence that Chartwells has engaged in discriminatory conduct,” Kerr said at the forum. “The university does know about this. This is not a secret. There has been little to no action.”
The union has filed grievances against management, but Kerr said the grievance system has not been effective for workers. “The labor relations system here is broken,” he said at the forum.
According to the Minnesota Daily, an independent student newspaper, Kerr has said management has called the university police on him four times. A University Services memo dated February 2023 that mentions Kerr by name guides supervisors to contact the University of Minnesota Police Department if a union representative refuses to leave “unauthorized spaces,” like dining kitchens.
When asked for comment, the University of Minnesota told Workday Magazine, “The University maintains strict access controls for restricted spaces on campus—such as kitchens, select research laboratories, and residence halls—to protect the safety of both employees and students. Reports of unauthorized access to these spaces are investigated and handled by the University of Minnesota Police Department.”
James Dixon has worked at the St. Paul Student Center food hall for seven years. “When Chartwells took over, everything went downhill,” he said at the forum. Dixon then described allegations of Chartwells management’s physical and verbal abuse toward him.
One incident allegedly involved a manager who has since been terminated. “One day we was in the kitchen and I was fixing lunch and he started hitting on me and kicking on me, talking about, ‘Why are you here? Don’t nobody like you,’” said Dixon. “One of my coworkers came in and seen it and [the director] turned around and walked away.”
According to the union, the manager was terminated after the union raised the issue with university’s human resources department, and Chartwells took statements from both Dixon and the coworker who witnessed it.
Local 320’s contract with the university that began in 2022 expires on June 30, and negotiations for the next contract began in March. The union is demanding an immediate pause to all disciplines, suspensions, and terminations of Teamster-represented employees; an immediate investigation into the conduct of Chartwells, University Services, and Contract Administration; reinstatement or settlements for terminated employees; and inclusion of more summer work positions and language around anti-harassment and job postings. The dining workers have a history of voting to authorize strikes in order to reach agreements with the university.
Workday Magazine asked the University of Minnesota for a response to all of the allegations in this article. A University spokesperson sent the following statement: “The University of Minnesota is currently in negotiations with Teamsters. We are committed to negotiating in good faith with the unions that represent our employees.”
“The Office of Human Resources at the University of Minnesota takes workplace allegations very seriously,” the University continued. “We value our employees and strive to create a positive workplace that is welcoming, inclusive, and respectful. We have processes in place to address these types of concerns, including easy access to reporting and conducting investigations. Due to privacy laws, the University cannot comment on specific employee situations.”
Chartwells, which did not respond to a request for comment, is owned by Compass Group, a multinational food service and hospitality company headquartered in the United Kingdom that operates in 30 countries across education, healthcare, and sports sectors. Chartwells is not the first contractor to come under scrutiny: University students’ concerns about the former management provided by Aramark led to the new contract with Chartwells.
For some workers, the alleged mistreatment piles on top of personal hardship. In addition to the harassment and abuse he said he has faced, Dixon said he was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer last year. “I’m still fighting for my life and my job.”