Janitors accept new contract, ending 3-week-old strike

LOS ANGELES - Striking janitors voted Monday to accept a new three-year contract giving them significant wage and benefit gains and newfound political clout.

By an 88 percent margin, janitors voted for a pact that gives those who work in downtown office buildings a 70-cent-an-hour raise in the first year, plus a one-time bonus of $500. Hourly wages will rise by 60 cents in each of the next two years.

Janitors in outlying areas, such as Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, will receive a 30-cent-an-hour increase in the first year plus a $500 bonus, and 60-cent-an-hour increases in the second and third year. They also won five days of sick leave, which will be phased in over three years.

Janitors will return to work on Tuesday, ending a three-week strike that began March 31.

Workers also won important guarantees, including a clause protecting wages and benefits if building owners employ new cleaning contractors and a provision stating that workers must make at least 30-cents-an-hour above the state or federal minimum wage at all times.

Union leaders praised the agreement, even though it fell short of their original goal of $1-an-hour increases in all three years.

''It met our primary goal of lifting our members out of poverty,'' a jubilant Mike Garcia, president of the Service Employees International Union Local 1877 told cheering janitors at union headquarters.

Union officials sought to place the strike in a larger context, saying it gives janitors nationwide and other union members in Los Angeles new hope for future contract negotiations.

''We have reinvented labor's most powerful weapon - the strike,'' Garcia said.

SEIU locals in Chicago and San Diego are on strike and contracts in Oakland, Calif., and Silicon Valley, Cleveland, Ohio and Seattle will expire within the next few months. National union officials have kept a close watch on the Los Angeles strike, which employed strategies such as bypassing cleaning contractors - who negotiate the contract - and appealing directly to building owners.

Strikers were also able to rally important political and community support, including Mayor Richard Riordan and Roman Catholic Cardinal Roger Mahony.

The tactics worked, as evidenced by the presence during voting of Rob Maguire of Maguire Partners, a major downtown building owner. Maguire intervened in the contract talks, hosting discussions between building owners and janitors and pressuring contractors to settle.

''It was important to fix the inequities in the janitors' wages and I think that has been accomplished,'' Maguire told the throng of red-shirted janitors. ''You do a terrific job in our buildings and you deserve to be supported.''

Miguel Contreras, executive secretary of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, told workers their example was watched carefully by teachers, truck drivers and other union workers in Southern California.

''In the next four months, 300,000 people will be at the bargaining table,'' he said. ''They were all looking at your strike to set the tone for their negotiations. We are so proud of the striking janitors. You showed what it was to fight for dignity, to fight for respect.''