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Security workers at Los Angeles International Airport, unhappy with their wages and tired of waiting for Mayor Richard Riordan to persuade their employers to grant a pay hike, have begun union organizing, and they say their employers already are threatening to retaliate.
About 450 airport workers submitted a petition this week announcing their intention to form a union and complaining about their treatment. "The work we do keeps the airport safe and running--but for all our hard work we receive poverty wages, unaffordable benefits, unfair policies and little if any respect on the job," the petition says.
In a letter to Argenbright Security Inc.--which provides security services for United, Delta and other airlines--a union organizer complained that workers have been warned that their activities could cost them their jobs.
"Employees have been told in the presence of a union organizer that Delta is a nonunion company and that, if the organizing persists, Argenbright could lose its contract with Delta," wrote Mike Garcia, president of the local chapter of the Service Employees International Union.
The union organizing at LAX, which kicked off in earnest this week, represents...