PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The National Labor Relations Board has set Jan. 27 as the date for workers at the Whole Foods store in Fairmount to vote on joining the United Food and Commercial Workers union. It would be the first Whole Foods in the country to unionize.
Ed Dupree has worked at the Whole Foods on Spring Garden Street for eight years. He’s seen a difference before and after it became an Amazon subsidiary.
“They got rid of part-time health care, they cut the labor budget. You don’t really feel like people are looking out for you,” he said. “It’s been a very hostile environment.”
Dupree and several other employees organized the effort to join the grocery workers union, UFCW. They had hoped for a union election this month but are pleased at least to have a date.
The company agreed to lock in the list of who can vote — meaning it can’t suddenly hire a lot of anti-union workers before the election — and agreed not to add the local board to the Amazon-SpaceX lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the National Labor Relations Board, after the NLRB accused it of violating workers’ rights.
The date, however, does fall after the inauguration of Donald Trump, who weakened several worker protections during his first term.