ATLANTA–The currents against Amazon’s harsh labor conditions are roaring across the country and the storm has landed in the heart of the South in Atlanta, GA. On July 31 a rally of community organizers in support of workers at ATL6, an Amazon Warehouse in East Point, came together just south of the Georgia capital city to raise demands for workplace safety and security for Amazon workers.
The list of demands ranged from higher pay and safer working conditions to security against car break-ins while employees work. Holding signs printed with slogans such as “Work Shouldn’t Hurt” the ATL6 workers came to the megaphone one by one to tell of their workplace issues, and how they came together in a united fight for respect on the job.
Accompanied by organizers from the Union of Southern Service Workers, the International Brotherhood Teamsters, and United 4 Respect, the Amazon workers communicated their willingness to fight with chants and speeches against the billion-dollar corporation.
One of those workers was Ron Sewell, known as Mr. Ron on the worksite. Standing on the sidewalk in front of the warehouse, Mr. Ron explained the hardships he has had to put up with at ATL6, and more importantly how he helped organize his coworkers around these issues.
When Mr. Ron first started working at Amazon, heat was a major problem for him and other workers. Collectively they decided to act and Mr. Ron filed an OSHA complaint against the warehouse, successfully signing 125 coworkers onto the complaint.
After OSHA visited the warehouse, the heat issue was resolved, no longer forcing employees to endure extreme temperatures just to be able to pay their bills.
Not the only one
Mr. Ron, however, is not the only one at ATL6 who braved the hot July temperatures to turn up the pressure on Amazon. Standing beside him was Betty Kates, another employee of the second richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos.
Kates reported that she and her coworkers are forced to endure “captive audience meetings” in their workplace. These meetings, according to the National Labor Relations Board General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, are “inconsistent with the NLRA,” the National Labor Relation Act.
While retaliation against organizing is illegal, Kates made it clear that “Amazon has responded with intimidation tactics instead of real solutions” when confronted with demands for change.
One of the last Amazon associates to speak at the rally on the hot July afternoon was Joan Morris. Humbly sitting on a cooler as she spoke, Morris’ words and story educated the crowd on how the brutal conditions inside ATL6 impact disabled workers.
Morris spoke into the megaphone, informing coworkers and community supporters she had osteoarthritis, a disease that slowly wears away at the cartilage between joints.
Amazon refused to provide any accommodations for Morris, forcing a coworker to buy her a floor mat with funds out of their own pocket.
Morris reported that Amazon refused to reimburse both her and her coworker for the floor mat. While floor mats are available in some parts of the warehouse, according to Kates, half of ATL6 is still without any accommodations for disabled workers.
As the rally wound down, organizers hugged each other goodbye before loading up into the shuttle van to depart for the off-site parking lot. However, an obstacle arose quickly that prevented the organizers from leaving: the East Point Police Department. The van, driven by organizers holding signs and water bottles, was forbidden from leaving the protest, because according to the police, they were obstructing traffic.
While the police wrote a $1,000 ticket to the van driver, Kates made sure to run up to every reporter on sight. “Make sure you write down that the police are here just to harass us!” she hammered into the journalists snapping photos and taking notes.
Kates noted that ATL6 workers deal with frequent break-ins of their cars in the warehouse parking lot, with no help or security provided from Amazon to prevent these thefts. Making sure everyone in the van was alright, Kates remarked, “We have never seen them here before to stop the break ins,” in reference to the three police cars.
After the initial hold up, the police eventually allowed the van to proceed to drop off the organizers and workers at the off-site. It was 1:30 p.m., time for the shift change at ATL6, and the workers put down the megaphones and strolled past the black chain link fence to start their day’s work.
While workers do not intend to hold a union vote at this moment, the goal is to build solidarity and community in order to possibly hold a union election down the road. With Amazon workers organizing in states such as New York, North Carolina and Minnesota, workers’ efforts at ATL6 show that the South has something to say when it comes to organizing Amazon workers.
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