Sam Gurwitt Photo
The Hamden Stop & Shop.
As Americans across the country this weekend celebrate 244 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Stop & Shop workers will mourn a different milestone: the end of their extra Covid-19 pay.
Since the pandemic began in March, the grocery chain has paid its workers in New England, New York, and New Jersey an extra 10 percent on top of their normal paychecks. As the nation grappled with the pandemic, people began to realize that the low-wage workers Americans tend to overlook were risking their lives to put food on their tables and to drive the buses they rely on to get to work.
To reflect the danger workers risk by simply showing up to work, Stop & Shop tacked the extra pay onto their paychecks. Other grocery stores did the same. ShopRite, for instance, paid its workers an extra $2 an hour, according to United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 371 Interim President Ronald Petronella.
The extra 10 percent is now scheduled to end July 4, effective July 5. Unions across the Northeast are trying to pressure the company to extend it.
“It’s very much appreciated by all the employees that Stop & Shop realizes that we’re on the front lines like everyone else,” said Joe Renaldi, assistant grocery manager at the Hamden store. Renaldi (pictured) is also the shop steward for UFCW Local 919, which represents most Stop & Shop workers in Connecticut, along with Local 371. “We’re dealing with the public every day face to face not knowing if the person next to you has it.”
While he praised the company for having given the pay in the first place, he said it’s not time yet to take it away. “We’re still there wearing masks, being real careful, sanitizing, and it’s not over yet,” he said.
The leadership of the union that represents him is lobbying the company to extend the pay. Local 919 has circulated a petition demanding that the company continue the 10 percent. As of Thursday afternoon, it had 1,706 signatures.
(Update: On Friday the company announced it will not extend the pay.)
“All the local unions that deal with this company feel that the members deserve it,” said Local 919 President Mark Espinosa. “We’re pleased that the company put it in place and that the company kept it in place as long as it did… Until this thing goes away, until the CDC and government officials tell us that it’s an all clear, our position is that if the company is still going to have safety protocols in place, it’s not fair to have members work without acknowledging that they’re still putting themselves at risk.”
So far, Espinosa said, about 100 Local 919 members have tested positive for the coronavirus, and two have died.
The extra pay began in March. In May, the company announced that the pay would be extended through July 4. According to a company spokesperson, Stop & Shop is one of the last food retailers to continue hazard pay, or “appreciation pay,” as the company calls it.
“Appreciation pay was created to show our thanks for the exceptionally hard work that associates put forth in extraordinary circumstances,” Stop & Shop spokesperson Maura O’Brien wrote in an email to the Independent. “Stop & Shop saw levels of foot traffic and demand that were unprecedented, and associates worked long hours to keep our shelves stocked and to service our customers. As states we serve reopen more fully and the supply chain strengthens, we are beginning to transition back to pre-COVID levels of customer traffic and demand. We remain committed to taking significant steps to continue to keep our associates and customers safe.”
The company added a flexible leave program and an additional two weeks of paid sick leave during the pandemic, O’Brien wrote. Those benefits will continue after July 4, she said.
ShopRite, the other major grocery store in Hamden, is continuing its hazard pay past July 4, though it is reducing it to $1 an hour, Petronella said. Karen O’Shea, a spokesperson for the grocery chain, said the “emergency premium pay” would be discontinued on Aug. 2.
Local 919, 371, and the other local unions that represent Stop & Shop workers have wielded significant power in the past. Last year, workers across the chain went on strike for 11 days and won a favorable contract.
Espinosa after last year’s strike.
But in this instance, the unions don’t have as much power. As Espinosa put it, “none of us had the crystal ball to put Covid in our union contracts.”
Nothing in the contract compels the company to continue the hazard pay until the end of the pandemic. So, the union’s main tool in this particular fight is to appeal to the company’s sense of “common good,” Espinoza said.
Petronella, Espinosa’s counterpart at Local 371, said taking away hazard pay can be tough for workers. “When you take it away, it’s very painful,” he said. “And the risk is still there, in the stores.”
Renaldi pointed out that many Stop & Shop workers are married and have kids, and their spouses have been laid off. That means they’re now supporting a whole family with just one paycheck while they risk infection.
Patricia Valdez, the Local 919 shop steward at the Whalley Avenue store in New Haven, said she has been using her hazard pay to pay medical bills from last year, when she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She said she’s one of four workers she knows of in the building who have compromised immune systems.
The numbers are rising, and employees are still wearing masks and taking precautions to keep themselves and customers safe. “We feel we’re still at risk,” she said.
But despite the unions’ best efforts, the company has not budged.
“They’re big on calling them heroes and essential workers,” said Local 919 Business Rep. Jorge Cabrera of the company and its workers, “but when it comes to actually treating them like that, it takes a fight.”
This is a cruel and unjust way to treat these workers.
They got 10% to risk their lives and they did their jobs!
This virus is very much with us. Turn on the news Stop & Shop.
Just because the virus is raging out of control in another state, doesn't mean we are still in the middle of this.
Lamont said that other States are "creaping up on us" because their numbers of infections are rising. He mentioned Ohio.
Experts say that we are in this for 3 years and so far, it's only been five months.
What are these workers supposed to do?
Working is a big risk for anyone today, but these are people who are there because they really, really, really need the money.
Stop and Shop - give them what they deserve!
And, stop making these honest working people BEG for a doing a dangerous job! That is deplorable and disgusting!
I urge everyone to stop shopping at Stop & Shop until they pay these workers 20% a hour over the wages they normally get.
I will not shop there.