Business
Teamsters union members poised to hold largest lone employer strike in US history over heat protection measures
Sun 23 Jul 2023 at 1pm BST
As a UPS delivery driver in Dallas, Texas, Seth Pacic is well acquainted with the dangers of extreme heat. After a long day at work in record-breaking temperatures in the summer of 2011, he found himself dry and unsteady in the parking lot and was only able to drive home after an hour and a half in the air-conditioned office.
“It was one of the worst feelings I’ve ever had in my life,” he said. “I didn’t feel like I’d fully recovered for a couple of weeks.”
For some, the heat had even more serious consequences. Last June, Pacic’s friend and colleague suffered heat stroke while driving home from work; he’s still recovering, Pacic said. That same summer, 24-year-old UPS driver Esteban Chavez collapsed and died in California as temperatures soared to over 90C. His family filed a wrongful death lawsuit and later settled with UPS. And the year before, Jose Cruz Rodriguez Jr., 23, died of heat stroke while driving a UPS truck in Waco, Texas.
It’s a common problem. At least 143 UPS employees were hospitalized for heat injuries between 2015 and 2022, according to the company’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration records obtained by the Washington Post. As the climate crisis drives up temperatures, the problem could get worse.
At the state level, only California, Oregon and Washington require heat breaks for all field workers, and during a record-breaking heatwave last month, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott removed the ability for municipalities to mandate water and shade breaks for workers.
This summer, amid record-breaking heat across the US, Pacic and some 340,000 other unionized UPS workers have made heat a central issue in their ongoing contract negotiations with their employer.
On June 16, the 340,000 members of the UPS Teamsters union said they were willing to stand by it if their demands for improved working conditions — including heat protection — weren’t included in UPS’s new five-year contract one One of the largest single employer strikes in US history began on August 1st.
UPS drivers hold a rally outside a UPS facility in Los Angeles on July 19. Photo: Mike Blake/Portal
This week UPS agreed to resume negotiations with the Teamsters after negotiations broke down earlier in the month.
Last month, the union scored a major victory when the company tentatively agreed to fit air conditioning to all new vans in its 94,000-vehicle fleet from 2024, and also to fit new heat shields and fans.
The win shows how workers’ organizations can be a key vehicle for climate justice, said Mijin Cha, a professor of urban and environmental policy at Occidental College, who studies labor and climate issues.
“We are witnessing a fundamental transformation of what we mean by ‘safety at work,'” said Cha. “In extreme heat, any kind of outdoor work is dangerous… and hopefully the more workers organize, the better they can stay safe.”
Driving for UPS is a tough job any time of year, said Matt Totenger, who works in Brooklyn, New York. On a typical day, he makes up to 150 stops to deliver hundreds of packages, often traveling long distances and climbing multiple flights of stairs while carrying large items like mattresses.
In the summer it becomes even more difficult. Temperatures in the back of the truck can exceed 54.4°C (130°F) because the dark brown steel radiates heat “like an oven,” he said. Because the loads aren’t always well organized, workers have to rummage through stacks of crates that can weigh up to 150 pounds each.
“There are days when you get out of the truck in the 80s and it feels like you’ve gotten into blissful, perfect temperatures, but the reality is you just escaped hell,” said Totenger, who helped organize a rally outside the UPS warehouse on Foster Avenue in Brooklyn last summer calling on the company to provide air-conditioned trucks.
Jim Mayer, a UPS spokesman, said the company has taken steps to protect workers from the heat this summer, including distributing cooling sleeves and hats and installing fans in some of its delivery vehicles.
“The health and safety of our employees is our top priority,” he said.
He also said staff will be asked to stop their work if they feel the effects of the heat.
“Our policy is simple: stop work, see your manager, and if in doubt, call 911,” he said.
Totenger said workers are feeling the pressure to act quickly. UPS measures efficiency using surveillance cameras and sensors in the trucks, and uses a computer program to calculate how long a route should take.
Juley Fulcher, a workplace health and safety advocate at the nonprofit Public Citizen, said surveillance could also make workers uncomfortable using the toilet and drinking less water.
“When you add dehydration to heat stress, it can make you sick very, very quickly,” she said.
Not only UPS employees suffer from the heat. A Texas United States Postal Service driver died last month from exposure to heat in triple-digit temperatures.
Dozens of striking Amazon drivers in California are also currently demanding better heat protection.
“The back of the truck is basically hell,” said Rajpal Singh, a striking Amazon delivery worker in Palmdale, California. “I was back to actually seeing pimples and feeling like I was going to pass out.”
(Eileen Hards, an Amazon spokeswoman, said the striking workers work for a third-party company called Battle Tested Strategies, with which Amazon canceled its contract last month; the workers said the company only canceled the contract after they formed a union, prompting demonstrations of solidarity by Teamsters across the country.)
With UPS being such a large employer, new official heat protection measures could result in changes across the logistics sector.
“Amazon workers, FedEx workers, and Postal workers all face similar issues,” he said. “I’m proud of Teamsters who started the pioneering work.”
New UPS contract language on heat could inspire other workers to push for climate-related safeguards in their contracts. However, the preliminary agreement will not come into effect until a definitive contractual agreement is signed.
Even if that happens, the language will leave a lot to be desired, according to Seth Pacic, the Dallas-based UPS courier. UPS agreed to install air conditioning in every car purchased after January 1, 2024, and to ship new vehicles to the hottest parts of the country first. But it could be years before all delivery drivers have access to air-conditioned trucks, he said.
“I think by then we’ll still see workers dying,” Pacic said.
Before a final agreement is reached, the UPS union is calling for other safeguards such as wage increases, the elimination of a two-tier employment system and an end to managerial harassment. These guards could provide additional protection from the heat, Pacic said.
Workers who are free from harassment are more likely to take breaks. And higher wages could prevent workers from taking on second jobs that could increase their heat stress and help them afford equipment like UV cooling sleeves, ice packs, coolers and expensive electrolyte drinks.
Experts say these regulations are all the more necessary given the lack of strong government heat protection measures.
Biden’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration announced in 2021 that it would publish a heat standard to protect workers from high temperatures, but Juley Fulcher, the safety advocate, said it could take years to complete – and that the agency has not introduced an interim heat standard.
Actions like Texas Gov. Abbott campaigning to clean up water and shadow breaches showed what workers are facing, said Cha, a professor of urban and environmental policy.
“It is part of a larger war against workers. Given the dominance of capital in our system, any kind of concession to workers is seen as a loss — even something as simple and necessary as watersheds,” she said. “The only challenge for capital is labor…so the more workers that can organize, the better.”
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