Union protests possible cuts with blood drive

you’ve probably seen employee unions out and about picketting in protest. today one union claims their employees are being treated unfairly by smith's groceries-- and they're doing it with a blood drive. cristina rodda is live from san pedro and central to explain, cristina? the blood drive is just wrapping up-- but it got the point across for the united food and commercial workers union. they're protesting a spike in the cost of health benefits for smith's store employees. "nat" most of these folks giving blood on a saturday afternoon are smith's employees. "one of the ways we can positively affect our community is to give our blood there are a lot of us that are healthy because we have good health benefits. smith's cashier annette ayers took care of her 6 kids' health for 25 years with her smith's health insurance she pays 350 dollars for her deductible — she says smith's wants to raise it to 9-hundred. on average smith's employees make ten dollars an hour "now if they want to slash somebody on top that won't hurt my feelings but that's not how they want to do the cuts they want to cut from the bottom up." the union president says 13- hundred smith's employees are being asked to pay more. he says smith's wants employees to pay double their deductible, pay more in co-pays and pay money weekly to the benefit plan. that's our goal, is to reach a fair deal. the employees are glad smith's is reporting that their profits are up that sales are up and th e employees are very happy about that but they don't understand why they should have to settle and take less when the company is doing better during the economy. marsha gilford a spokesperson for smith's says the proposal is fair. she says they are in talks with the union over the proposal. live from san pedro and central cristina rodda eyewitness news four. we asked smith's parent company-- kroger-- last month-- for specifics on its newest proposal to the union. kroger wouldn't comment-- but did say it increase...

Channel: ClipSyndicate Video Length: 0s Date Found: Sun, Aug 22 2010 1:16 AM Category: News Date Produced: Sat, Aug 21 2010 8:35 PM View Count: 0