The workers did not go out during the Sunday game. The Red Sox will only play another home game on June 27, but Fenway will organize the Irish singer Hozier on June 23 and 24 in two nights.
“If there is a strike here, it will be a big disturbance,” said Carlos Aramayo, President of Unite Here Local 26, who represents the Fenway workers at the press conference. “And if the management does not wake up and actually find out how to negotiate, there will be a strike in the Fenway Park.”
In a explanation of Chris Collom, A spokesman for Aramark said that the company intended to continue working with the union to form a settlement that works for everyone.
“In the event of a strike, we have emergency plans to ensure that the services are not interrupted,” said Collom.
The decision to approve a strike takes place after months of stable negotiations between the Fenway workers and Aramark. The workers who include beer sellers, servers and souvenir sellers are mainly concerned about wages and the automation of certain services in the baseball stadium, which reduces the number of shifts that are available to employees.
Aramayo said in Fenway that a beer costs 10.75 US dollars, while the same drink at Miami Marlin's stage costs at 5.14 US dollars. However, a cashier in Fenway earns $ 18.52 an hour, while an employee of Miami Marlins earns 21.25 US dollars an hour.
Other speakers from the press conference talked about the automation of some positions in Fenway. Natalie Greening, a beer seller who started in the high school in Fenway, said her job was being replaced by a computer.
After the pandemic, Greening said that the company began to introduce automated checkout machines that serve alcohol people who are not properly shielded. Automation leads to fewer shifts for employees who need the Income, she said.
“When a computer takes our jobs away, he takes income that goes back to the community,” she said. “I am a resident of Boston. I lived my whole life here. I want to keep this job.”
Aramayo said that management was “nothing more than disrespectful” and refused to get to the table with fair suggestions that workers can negotiate.
Charbel Salameh, a Fenway beer seller for 28 years, said when he started the job for the first time, the workers were known to their first names. Now he said In Fenway, the workers are “just one number”.
“It is America's most popular baseball stadium, but it would not be America's most popular baseball stadium if these guys were not loved behind me,” said Salameh. “You put in the summer, we entered weekends. We worked. We did everything we have ever asked.”
The employee's contract started in December and the two parties did not make an agreement. In addition to higher wages and limits of automation, employees ask for an increased tip for senior employees and the planning that the service respects.
“We don't try to really go on the strike. We don't want ourselves, but we cannot pay ourselves and the family of everyone else because someone wants to win,” said Ramon Suarez, a warehouse worker. “It's time for changes.”
Marcela Rodrigues can be reached at marcela.rodrigues@globe.com.