Elizabeth Brennan

Ontario, Calif – The Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) issued new citations to Amazon for failing to keep warehouse workers safe. 

The citations were issued after OSHA carried out an unprecedented group of coordinated inspections at Amazon warehouses and found overwhelming evidence of work processes that subject workers to serious hazards and injuries. The new citations cover facilities in Castleton, NY, Aurora, CO, and Nampa, ID. Jan. 17 OSHA cited Amazon for violations at facilities in Waukegan, IL, New Windsor, NY, and Deltona, FL. 

“The OSHA citations confirm what we know: Amazon’s push for speed comes at the expense of our safety and health,” said Rex Evans, who works at KSBD, the Amazon air hub in San Bernardino and is a member of the worker organizing committee known as Inland Empire Amazon Workers United. 

“Injuries are disturbingly common in the warehouse – I’ve lost count of how many of my coworkers have missed time or been placed on work restrictions because of an injury.  For me, I work outside at the air facility so that means that associates stand in front of aircraft with running engines and we regularly inhale jet fuel. The planes are large and I have seen associates come within a hair of getting hit by a wing. It’s dangerous. 

“Amazon can immediately make meaningful changes inside the warehouse to keep my coworkers safe. They must slow the pace of work and ensure our rate is at a safe speed. They must not retaliate and fire people for speaking up about safety issues and they must ensure warehouse workers have adequate time for rest and bathroom breaks.”

DOJ ALSO INVESTIGATING AMAZON 

The unprecedented OSHA citations come as the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York announced that it is also investigating whether Amazon misled and potentially defrauded creditors about labor compliance and the rate of injury inside its warehouses.  

The U.S. Attorney is specifically investigating possible misrepresentations by Amazon to its lenders regarding Amazon’s safety problems under the 1989 Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act. 

Background on the OSHA Investigation from the Strategic Organizing Center

For over two years, the U.S. Department of Labor’s OSHA and its sister agency in Washington State have been investigating Amazon worker complaints of serious job hazards from abusive workloads. They issued violations for workload hazards in Washington in 2021 and 2022, and ordered prompt “abatement” of those violations – even during Amazon’s interminable appeals of those violations.

These violations have found that the illegal dangers not only involve lifting and moving heavy packages causing high risks of serious injuries – but also that the very speed of the work itself, combined with the company’s strict discipline system, “[put] pressure … on workers to maintain that pace without adequate recovery time to reduce the risk of MSDs. There is a direct connection between Amazon’s employee monitoring and discipline systems and workplace [injuries].” 

Federal OSHA has now found similar violations in which Amazon’s equipment, production operations (including Amazon’s own robots) and HR systems together combine to create extraordinary risks of serious injuries. These include the kinds of severely disabling back and shoulder injuries that can prevent workers from ever again doing the manual work which delivers the orders to American consumers every day.

OSHA also found in 2022 that Amazon’s workload hazards were “Willful” violations – a rare determination in OSHA investigations anywhere in any industry.

While Federal and state OSHA agencies have been doing safety inspections at Amazon for far longer, their recent inspections of abusive workloads – launched on a coordinated basis nationally – are unprecedented in OSHA’s 50-year history.

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Media Contact: media@warehouseworkers.org

About the WWRC

The Warehouse Worker Resource Center is a nonprofit, 501(c)(3), organization founded in 2011 dedicated to improving working conditions in the warehouse industry in Southern California. We focus on education, advocacy and action to change poor working conditions in the largest warehousing hub in the country.

Recent Storms Demonstrate Urgency for Worker Protections

LOS ANGELES – As storms continue to batter California creating precarious employment for California workers, dozens of immigrant and worker rights advocates and state legislators joined together to launch the 2023 Safety Net for All campaign to secure unemployment benefits for excluded immigrant workers in California. 

State Senator Maria Elena Durazo, Assemblymember Miguel Santiago, immigrant rights leaders, and community members gathered in Downtown Los Angeles Friday to call for the passage of SB 227, the Safety Net for All Workers Act, introduced Jan. 19 by Sen. Durazo. The Coalition also called on state officials to include funding for the program in the state budget. SB 227 would create the first-ever Excluded Worker Program in California. 

As punishing storms wreak havoc across the state, workers – especially those who will rebuild homes, cities and critical infrastructure and those in precarious employment positions – are unable to work or earn a consistent living. Yet, many California workers do not have access to unemployment benefits solely due to their immigration status. The new legislation will provide temporary wage replacement for undocumented workers who have lost their jobs. 

“Every day, undocumented immigrants contribute to California’s economic prosperity in agriculture, construction, clothing and other industries. California is set to be the world’s fourth-largest economy in large part thanks to immigrant labor, yet immigrants continue to be shut out from California’s economic success due to unjust exclusions from the safety net. That is why I am authoring SB 227, the Safety Net for All Workers Act. California must include a life-saving unemployment benefits program for these workers,” said Senator María Elena Durazo.

Sen. Durazo introduced SB 227 along with two coauthors, Assemblymembers Miguel Santiago and Wendy Carrillo. The program would provide unemployed workers who are ineligible for regular unemployment insurance due to their immigration status with $300 per week for up to 20 weeks. Last year, the Legislature passed AB 2847, a similar piece of legislation that also would have created an excluded worker program, but it was vetoed by Gov. Newsom. 

“Immigrant workers are critical to rebuilding California after the storms of this winter and immigrant workers are vital to securing and strengthening our infrastructure as the climate continues to warm and change,” said Veronica Alvarado, deputy director of the Warehouse Worker Resource Center. 

Emelia Guzman, a farmworker and member of Centro Binacional para el Desarrollo Indígena Oaxaqueño, said: “Right now due to the rains, I am not able to go to work and I wonder where will I be getting the money to buy food and to pay rent? As farmworkers, our job is to feed the whole state. It is time that we receive real support from politicians, with actions not just words.” 

Undocumented immigrants contribute $3.7 billion annually in state and local taxes. Taxes on the wages of undocumented workers contribute an estimated $485 million to the UI system in California each year. A companion budget proposal to SB 227 is also being championed by the Coalition to fund the program. The $356 million investment would provide excluded immigrant workers the economic security similar to other workers in California.

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Media Contacts:

Carlos Amador, Safety Net for All Coalition, carlos.amador@safetynetforall.org
Maria Juur, LA Worker Center Network
Elizabeth Brennan, Warehouse Worker Resource Center, media@warehouseworkers.org

About Safety Net for All Coalition

The Safety Net for All Coalition is composed of over 120 organizations from across California. The Coalition works to expand safety net programs for excluded immigrant workers, like the unemployment benefits program.  Find us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – This morning, speakers who are part of the Athena coalition testified before the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections in a hearing to examine the unsafe and untenable conditions warehouse workers face:

• Sheheryar Kaoosji, Executive Director, Warehouse Worker Resource Center

• Eric Frumin, Director of Health and Safety, Strategic Organizing Center

• Janeth Caicedo, Make The Road NJ Member and Sister of Edilberto Caicedo, a warehouse worker who died on the job

“A core issue of warehousing is pace of work. Workers are pushed to move as quickly as possible in these workplaces, in order to keep up with the rapid pace of delivery necessary to keep the supply chain thin and running smoothly. Amazon has accelerated these forces, moving workers rapidly through their facilities in order to keep up with the rapid pace of their operations. Amazon’s intention is not to store products, but rather to keep them moving and flowing through their systems, in order to have as thin and quick a supply chain as possible. This is the state of the art–what the rest of the industry aims to match,” stated Sheheryar Kaoosji, executive director of the Warehouse Worker Resource Center.

He continued, “When you order a product to arrive in 24 or 48 hours, there is no magic robot or process that makes that happen. The product moves fast because people run. People move quickly and get injured,”

This hearing was organized in response to the ongoing demands of Amazon workers, and after the deaths of three Amazon workers in New Jersey. In September 2022, the Athena coalition led over 30 civil society and worker organizations to ask Congress to conduct a hearing to investigate Amazon’s warehouse safety crisis.

“Amazon distinguishes itself by using high tech to injure its workers more than other employers do in two ways: First, they push workers harder than other employers using algorithms. Second, they use robots to make their jobs even more dangerous. Injury rates in their robotic facilities are higher than in others.” stated Eric Frumin, Director of Health and Safety at the Strategic Organizing Center.

He continued, “Andy Jassy could issue a directive this afternoon to stop firing workers whose bodies require a break from the pressure. Nothing is preventing him from doing so.”

We are glad the Subcommittee and the public had an opportunity to hear about the ongoing safety crisis at Amazon. Specifically, we heard from speakers’ testimony that:

• The crisis is a direct result of Amazon’s punitive management practices that use constant surveillance and threat of termination to push workers to the breaking point; the company’s use of retaliation and union busting that prevents workers from advocating for safer conditions; and the high-turnover model that prioritizes profit over safety, even during natural disasters and extreme weather.

• These unsafe conditions are preventable. Because major employers like Amazon are unwilling to put people before profits, members of Congress have the responsibility to pass laws, like legislators in California did, to prevent ongoing injuries and deaths.

• Amazon’s model is a threat to workers everywhere. As the second largest private employer in the country, Amazon and its labor practices have an outsized impact on our economy, and sets precedent in the retail, warehousing, and logistics sectors.

“On August 19, 2019, I received a call that my brother Edilberto was at the hospital with a very, very dangerous injury in his brain. He died four days later. It was a drastic change in my life, in my family’s life, and nothing, nothing has been the same again. My mom, who is 93 years old, still feels that he will come one day to tell her what happened,” stated Janeth Caicedo, Make the Road NJ member and sister of Edilberto Caicedo, a warehouse worker who died on the job.

She continued, “I think the accident was the company’s fault. The company didn’t follow OSHA regulations. There was no interest in keeping a safe workplace at all. The company was accepting contract after contract and piling people inside the warehouse without maintaining any type of safety protocol. The equipment was also unsafe. The company didn’t keep up the machines and didn’t provide adequate training. These conditions would end up killing my brother.”

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In the heart of America’s Supply Chain, Amazon Warehouse Workers are Demanding Higher Pay, Safe Working Conditions

San Bernardino, Calif. — Amazon warehouse workers are on strike to protest Amazon’s unfair labor practices and retaliation in response to worker demands for better, safer jobs with fair wages and an end to threats and intimidation. 

Workers walked off the job mid-shift Friday and will hold a rally and picket line in front of their facility, KSBD, the massive Amazon air hub in San Bernardino. 

Inland Empire Amazon Workers United are demanding a $5/hour increase in pay, safe working conditions and an end to retaliation. The strike comes during “Prime Week,” when workers must process extra volume for Amazon’s major sales event. 

“Workers at KSBD and across the country are standing up for what we deserve. We have been targeted, threatened, and intimidated by Amazon managers and Amazon consultants and today we are on strike,” said Rex Evans, who works at KSBD. “Amazon has the resources and the power to improve the quality of jobs of the people who make them profitable, but they choose to spend millions on consultants instead of warehouse workers.”

At the end of 2021 workers were told with limited notice that the warehouse would be closed two additional days without pay,  meaning workers would have no pay for a total of four days around the holidays. This closure caused financial hardship for many people working at KSBD, many of whom live paycheck to paycheck. That catalyzed a group of workers to start organizing: 

• At the beginning of 2022, workers delivered a petition around the surprise closure to management and eventually won a policy change. 
• In July at the start of Amazon’s “Prime Week,” workers delivered a petition signed by more than 800 employees at KSBD demanding a wage increase of $5/hour. Dozens of workers confronted management about workers’ difficulty making ends meet on Amazon pay, especially as the cost of living skyrockets. 
• Aug. 15, more than 150 workers walked off the job after Amazon ignored their demands. 
• In August and September more than 100 workers confronted management about safety measures during an historic heat wave. 
• In September, Amazon announced it would raise wages by just $1 at KSBD. In response,  workers gave Amazon a deadline of Oct. 10 to respond to their demands. 
• On Oct. 11 workers announced they will go on strike to protest Amazon’s unfair labor practices and shameful response to their demands on Oct. 14. 

“Amazon is bringing in outside consultants and managers who have tried to undermine what we are doing,” said Alfonso Rodriguez, who works at KSBD. “We are awake and we want to fix what is going on in this building. We want to make Amazon a better and safer place to work.”

The facility, also known as KSBD, is a critical leg in the Amazon logistics network and is one of only a few “air hubs” nationwide. 

The facility opened in March 2021 amidst community concern and opposition around job quality and air pollution. A 2018 study found that even before this facility opened, Amazon’s flights into and out of airports in Riverside and San Bernardino counties released an estimated 620,000 metric tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. The two counties also have the worst ozone pollution in the US, largely due to the warehousing industry.

Amazon promised quality jobs, but has failed to deliver. Since the opening, workers have organized in response to low pay, illness-inducing heat, and brutal working conditions. In addition to a new rest area, workers have also won an increase in pay for night shifts.

The warehouse is located at the former Norton Air Force Base. Amazon currently operates 14 flights a day in and out of the 24-hour facility. Amazon has said its goal is to operate 26 flights a day. The number of workers at the warehouse fluctuates, currently about 1,300 but more than 1,800 in peak season, demonstrating the lack of stability in these Amazon jobs.

The Inland Empire Amazon Workers United is supported by the Warehouse Worker Resource Center and many community-based organizations in the Inland Empire including Inland Congregations United for Change, Teamsters Local 1932, Inland Empire Labor Council, Sierra Club San Gorgonio and the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice. 

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Media Contact: media@warehouseworkers.org

About the WWRC

The Warehouse Worker Resource Center is a nonprofit, 501(c)(3), organization founded in 2011 dedicated to improving working conditions in the warehouse industry in Southern California. We focus on education, advocacy and action to change poor working conditions in the largest warehousing hub in the country.