Urban Fare Members ratify union proposals; negotiations begin June 23

UFCW 1518 members employed at Urban Fare stores in Vancouver have voted 92% in favor of the package of proposals the Union Negotiating Committee intends to table with Overwaitea Food Group when negotiations get underway.

Negotiations are scheduled to begin Wednesday, June 23rd.

UFCW 1518 represents members at the Overwaitea-owned Urban Fare locations in Yaletown, Coal Harbour, and Alberni Street. During this past spring, Shop Stewards and activists from all three stores attended a bargaining conference to begin formulating their 2010 bargaining agenda. The proposals brought forward by Urban Fare members in the stores were discussed, debated, and voted on at the conference, and the culmination of that work is the package approved by the Urban Fare membership today.

The Yaletown store’s collective agreement expired at the end of March, and while the other two stores are in an essentially identical contract, those contracts do not expire until 2015. However, it has been agreed that changes negotiated at the Yaletown store will be applied in the Coal Harbour and Alberni St. stores as well.

The membership at Urban Fare has high expectations for this year’s negotiations after seeing the gains their fellow workers at other Overwaitea Food Group stores have made since 2008.

The Union Negotiating Committee is Jason Buckle and Nash Huntley of Urban Fare Yaletown, Bev Bednarz and Alli Brown of Urban Fare Coal Harbour, Colin Russell and Shelley Stieler of Alberni St. Urban Fare, with alternate Carrol Ann Thomas of Urban Fare Yaletown. The Union Committee is assisted by James Raposo (Director of Negotiations, UFCW 1518), and Monica Staff (Director, Member Services, UFCW 1518).