By Joseph Piette
Published Dec 11, 2010 10:45 AM
PHILADELPHIA Led by the 3-year-old daughter of a laid-off longshore worker whose sign read \”Del Monte ruined my Christmas,\” more than 400 dockworkers and community and labor allies marched in the busy noontime streets around City Hall here on Nov. 22. They were protesting the layoffs of more than 200 members of the International Longshoremen’s Association Local 1291 due to the decision by Fresh Del Monte Products to dock its incoming ships at a below-union-wage pier in Gloucester City, N.J.
2007 Photo of the Delaware River, taken at Proprietors Park in Gloucester City looking towards Holts Cargo Pier and the Walt Whitman Bridge
(photo credit CNBNews.net)
The workers also entered and took over a Wawa supermarket, dramatizing the union’s call for a boycott of Del Monte, a major supplier of fresh fruit to supermarket chains around the U.S. Wawa is a major seller of Del Monte fruit in the Delaware Valley area. Fresh Del Monte Produce is not affiliated with Del Monte Foods Co., which sells packaged food products.
Support actions on the National Day of Action also took place as far away as Galveston, Texas, and Coral Gables, Fla. Denver City Councilmember Paul Lopez met a union delegation outside city hall in 28-degree weather and stated: \”It’s a cold day and a cold night, but this is an action of solidarity. We are here because what Del Monte is doing is undermining the fundamental pillars of the work force in America. They are taking us back to the 1920s.\” (ilwu46.com, Dec. 4)
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