Contract workers at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport are allegedly facing “rampant wage theft,” and they are calling on the city and state to investigate the issue.
O’Hare workers and SEIU* Local 1 officials discussed the wage theft allegations Wednesday morning and announced filings of wage theft complaints with the Illinois Labor Department and Chicago Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection.
The charges include 60 Chicago minimum wage ordinance violations and 20 Illinois Labor Department violations, according to the union.
At issue are security officers, baggage handlers, cabin cleaners, wheelchair attendants and other workers who are employed by O’Hare contractors, including Universal Security, Prospect Airport Services, and Scrub, Inc. The union recently conducted a wage theft survey of about 300 contracted O’Hare workers, finding that they collectively lost $1 million in wages last year.
Progress Illinois breaks down Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s 2016 budget address and rounds up reaction to his fiscal proposals, including a nearly $600 million property tax hike to cover police and fire pensions and school construction costs.
We are deeply disturbed about recent reports
that suggest that the Chicago Transit Authority will end its ex-offender
rail car employment program.
African Americans are
disproportionately represented in Illinois’ prison population. More
often than not, these ex-offenders return to their home communities
after serving their sentences in prison. They return to communities
that have higher than average rates of unemployment and underemployment
caused by a chronic shortage of living wage jobs. Moreover, even
non-violent ex-offenders face statutory bars to employment and
government benefits that serve as perverse incentives for criminal behavior.
Workers at the Hudson News bookstore at both Midway and O’Hare
International airports say the company is not treating its North and
South Side employees equally, and they want the Chicago City Council to
investigate the issue.
Ald. Howard Brookins (21st), one of the
airport workers’ advocates, introduced a non-binding resolution at
Wednesday’s city council meeting that calls on the Aviation Committee to
hold a hearing about the compensation system and personnel practices
the company uses at both locations.
Hudson Midway workers receive
an average hourly wage of $8.92, while Hudson O’Hare employees are paid
an average of $10.05 per hour, Brookins’ resolution reads. Hudson News
workers at O’Hare earn an average of $1.13 more an hour than their
counterparts at Midway, according to the hospitality union Unite Here
Local 1, which represents the Hudson News workers at O’Hare and Midway.
“Why,
if you do the same work at the same company in the same city, do you
get paid less money?” Brookins said at a Wednesday morning news
conference.
Contract workers at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport are allegedly facing “rampant wage theft,” and they are calling on the city and state to investigate the issue.
To the Editor:
Workers at the Hudson News bookstore at both Midway and O’Hare
International airports say the company is not treating its North and
South Side employees equally, and they want the Chicago City Council to
investigate the issue.