City Council Members Brad Lander (D-Park Slope, Kensington, Windsor Terrace) Rafael Espinal (D-Cypress Hills, Bushwick, Oceanhill-Brownsville, East New York) and Mark Treyger (D-Coney Island, Bensonhurst) rallied today in support of the Fair Work Week legislative package, a package of bills that would regulate fast food and retail industry employment practices.
But the New York State Restaurant Association (NYSRA), representing more than 20,000 eating and drinking establishments, said while the measures are well-intentioned, the lawmakers don’t have the proper understanding of the industry to impose such regulations, including punitive fines, and will wind up doing more harm than help.
The Brooklyn lawmakers stood united among a sea of 32BJ Workers Union members and advocates to show support for the legislative package aimed at enhancing basic employment rights and worker-related issues facing fast food and retail workers in the city.
The legislative package includes a bill creating a system for fast food employees to make contributions from their salaries to not-for-profits of their choice via payroll deductions, which in layman’s terms means money to 32BJ and the ability to take dues out of their paychecks to unionize.
It also includes a bill banning the use of “on-call scheduling,”and a bill banning “clopenings” or the practice of a worker closing up shop to then re-open it the following day among other industry related reforms.
Lander proposed two of the bills, Intro 1395-A, that would require fast food employers to offer available shifts to existing employees first before new hires, and Intro 1396-A, that would require fast food employers to provide employees with an estimate of their work schedule 14 days in advance, including any changes to their schedules.
“It’s an expensive city and you can’t put your life together if you don’t have a stable schedule and you don’t have a chance to get more hours to get to a full-time job. You just can’t do it. We have tens of thousands of people who can’t live stable lives because abuse of scheduling practices,” said Lander.
Espinal was quick to point out that he was a victim of unfair employer practices when he was a teenager as a former McDonald’s employee.
“As a former McDonald’s employee, I remember those days, when the manager would come up to me and tell me “your closing tonight and we need you again tomorrow morning.” That was hard. That was hard for a teenaged young man and that is hard for working families and working parents. It is not fair that they have to go through those conditions,” said Espinal.
Brooklyn, according to The Center for Urban Future (CUF), saw a 2.3 percent increase in the number of chain stores from 2015 to 2016, with a 21 percent share of the national retail locations in the city. The majority of national chain stores are located in Brooklyn Heights and the Flatlands, which include Dunkin Donuts, Chipotle, Starbucks, CVS, Popeyes and Domino’s Pizza among other well known chains.
Treyger, a former teacher and union member, highlighted the injustices faced by fast food and retail workers by comparing their workplace rights to that of President Trump’s eating habits.
“Let’s break it down for people. We aren’t fighting for luxury salaries, we aren’t fighting for multi-million dollar stock options. We are fighting for a fair schedule, we are fighting for basic human respect and dignity. Just like President Trump expects to have two scoops of ice cream, a worker deserves to expect a fair work week,” said Treyger.
But NYSRA New York City Regional Director Kevin Dugan said that although the legislative package is well intended, it will hurt those that it has set out to help.
“Flexibility is a key selling point to many of those who work in the quick-service industry. This package takes away that flexibility. These bills would mandate that restaurants rigidly schedule their employees with 14 days of inflexibility. At first glance this might seem beneficial to the employee, however countless employees rely on their ability to pick up extra shifts when needed. This flexibility often results in greater take home pay. While this legislation doesn’t exclusively prohibit this, it does impose onerous fines on restaurant owners who are looking to accommodate this employee’s request,” said Dugan in recent testimony before the city council on the issue.
“While we don’t believe a scheduling mandate is necessary or beneficial to the industry, if the Council does pass a mandate, a scheduling timeline of seven days would make much more sense for all parties involved. This would help the employees looking for certainty in their schedules, while also allowing other employees to seek flexibility, and would protect the small business owner against a situation where an employee is suddenly forced to deal with someone leaving the business and not being able to change the schedule for two weeks. While an owner may be able to survive a few days of being short-staffed, going two weeks without calling in a replacement is simply untenable,” he added.
Dugan also noted that while these franchises are big corporations, franchise owners are small businesses. It’s easy to lump these restaurants in with the big corporations they’re associated with but these owners are almost always local businesswomen and men who employ individuals who live in their community, he said.
“As an industry we fully understand that the targets of some bills are things that should be addressed. For example, we do not endorse business practices such as “clopening” or “on-call scheduling” and support practical regulations restricting such practices. However, we do ask that if certain employees would like the opportunity to earn overtime pay and volunteer to take on some of these shifts that they be allowed to do so,” Dugan said.
The package of bills is expected to pass at the stated City Council meeting today, and Mayor Bill de Blasio is reportedly in favor of the measures.
