Upcoming Press Conference: This Time Workers Give ESPN A Week’s Notice
ESPN Zone workers along with fellow low-wage workers across the Inner Harbor will be at ESPN Zone — Wednesday, June 30, 2010 at 11 AM — to put Disney-owned ESPN Zone on notice for human rights violations, including violating the WARN Act, shutting their doors without giving workers the legal 60 days notice prior to closure. Workers are demanding to be treated with dignity and will call on ESPN Zone to meet face-to-face with workers to resolve this gross abuse or workers human rights. On Wednesday, workers will set a seven day deadline for the ESPN Zone to respond, during which time, in good faith, workers will not pursue legal action.
What: Press Conference putting ESPN Zone on Notice
When: Wednesday, June 30, 2010 at 11 AM
Where: ESPN Zone at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor
After years of being unaccountable for paying poverty wages, stealing workers’ wages, putting workers on probation for being sick, and a denying basic worker dignity, Baltimore’s ESPN Zone decided to close its doors on hundreds of workers.
To add insult to injury, the ESPN Zone planned to shut the restaurant down without providing workers any notice! The plan was to have workers show up as scheduled to find the restaurant doors locked for good. The plan failed. Well, sort of. News of the shut-down leaked to the media, giving more than 160 workers less than a week’s heads-up that they would be out of a job.
“They were just there to make money off of us. We were the backbone. We made the ESPN how it was and how they got rid of us is real bad and I know they know that. Don’t try to sugarcoat it. We are human beings how are we going to live now?”, said Leonard Gray, a cook at the ESPN Zone of over 6 years. Workers have had their utilities cut off, have been forced to take their kids out of childcare and look for work with kids in hand, drop out of school, and move homes.
On Wednesday, low-wage workers at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor will be coming together not only to put the ESPN Zone on notice, but to expose the human cost of Poverty Zone development and the need for Inner Harbor developers to ensure basic human rights standards for all low-wage workers at the Inner Harbor. Shawn Greene, an ESPN worker of 9 years explained, “I know it wasn’t Cordish that personally treated ESPN workers they way they did, but they knew about it. Whoever they’ve got in their building, they should make sure they are going to treat their employees fairly. They’ve got to be held to that standard too.”
Join us in calling on the ESPN Zone to finally be on the side of justice and come to the table with workers to resolve these human rights abuses. Following the press conference, we will engage consumers at the Harbor highlighting the human rights violations at the ESPN Zone and throughout the Inner Harbor.
