Borgers strike hits day 5

NORWALK — The weather is cold, but the passion is still hot on the picket line at Borgers USA. The strike against the company hit day five Monday with still no answers, according to strikers on the picket line. Strikers went out at 12:01 a.m. Thursday and are closing on their first full week. Tents have popped up and there are fire pits to keep the strikers warm. "It's cold as hell and the weather is not cooperating ... if this not a definition of determination I don't know what is," one striker said. Are the strikers making and progress? "We're hoping so," said Doug Warren, secretary-treasurer of the Chicago and Midwest Regional Joint Board of Workers United (CMRJB). "I think we will know quite a bit more toward the middle of the week. "We have a lot of tentacles out there. We want them to recognize the union. We asked for that and they refused." Warren said there are between 200 and 220 workers in the plant. "I started Nov. 17, 2014," one striker said. "I spent two months in Germany training. We started assembling machinery in January (2015). He said they started hiring workers in June or July of 2015. What are the conditions five years in? "It's way worse," one worker said. "There have been over 1,000 people gone through the doors since I have been here ... they treat everybody like crap. "They stared people at $13 an hour as a general laborer when I started. Five years-plus later they are still at $13 an hour starting out." One worker said jobs are being eliminated so people have to do more. "They keep taking people away and people away," the worker said. "Taking three jobs and making them one ... and not paying you any more. There are people in there who have not had any form of a raise in four years ... four years and your only compensation is 'thanks for doing a good job.'" Strikers said "slightly under half of the workers" went out. "There were a lot of people who signed cards who said they would be out here with us and crossed the line," one worker said. "A lot of bitterness. If everybody who had signed cards would have joined us this would be over and done with right now." The main issues are pay and benefits. "Borgers management changes policies whenever they don't suit them", said Bryan Eastman, a material handler at the plant, "I love what I do, but the pay scale is all over the place and the insurance has gotten worse. "That's why we are fighting for a union. We need a voice out there." A spokesman at Borgers said the company would not comment on the strike.