Republic Waste strike spreads from Midwest to 5 Calif. cities

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Nothing getting dumped here today at the
Ox Mountain Landfill in Half Moon Bay, Calif.

Teamster solidarity is bringing the Republic Waste/Allied Services strike to five California cities today as picketing continues at the Youngstown Carbon Limestone landfill. Teamsters are honoring picket lines in the Bay area cities of Daly City, Half Moon Bay, Fremont, Fairfield and Pacifica.

Today is the 45th anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, assassination. He was supporting a sanitation workers' strike in Memphis when he was gunned down. Republic <="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HN4jda9p7wo">sanitation workers are refusing to go back to the way things were then. Today, Republic sanitation workers carrying "I Am A Man on Strike" signs.

Cynthia Lewis's husband is a Memphis sanitation worker. She posted her heartfelt support on the Republic Teamsters Facebook page:

I'm glad you guys are standing up. It's time for you all to fight Republic back. My husband works in the Memphis,TN location and they treat them like the trash they pick up. They use them up and throw them out. I'm tired of how my husband as well as the other people who work for Republic are being treated. Hopefully they will go on strike as well. It is time to stand up and fight back and make Republic RESPECT you guys. They send my husband and his co-workers out in trucks that are not fit to even be on the road. In the summer they are sent out in the hot heat with no air conditioner in the trucks and on top of that, one of the trucks blow heat inside the truck from the engine. My heart aches at times when my husband comes home so tired and drained out that he dont even have the strength to even do anything with our kids. Just hearing how they are being treated hurts to the core. I know some people would say give up and just find another job then, but I want Republic and he wants them to just stand up and do whats right by their employees!!!! Maybe the Memphis workers will join you soon!!!!! At least I hope so....maybe some of the men will stand up again and stop worrying about Republic because they are not worried about them!!!!!!

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This striking landfill worker from Youngstown, Ohio,
 raised a picket line at this Republic/Allied facility
 in Fremont, Calif. this morning. Thanks to all
 our Teamster brothers and sisters for honoring these lines!

Our Teamster brothers are exercising their legal right to strike because the company changed working conditions without bargaining and refuses to negotiate in good faith.

Trash tycoon Bill Gates owns about 26 percent of Republic. He is trying to burnish his greedy billionaire image by giving money to improve sanitation overseas. In a remarkable display of anti-Americanism, he is doing nothing to improve Republic's <="http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2013/03/29/odor-problems-elsewhere-for-owners-of-bridgeton-landfill/" style="background-color: white; color: #336699; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16.890625px; text-align: center;">horrendous environmental record in the U.S. That includes a burning, exploding, radioactive landfill near St. Louis that threatens the health and safety of the people who live and work near the facility. 

Valerie Dearing adds this to the Republic Teamsters Facebook page:

...the toxic factor @ the Carbon Limestone Landfill is very dangerous. Emitting from the fracking well is toxic ground ozone visably blowing downwind towards Lowellville. and the flaring from the fracking well is emitting dangerous gasses too. The waste being brought in from Ohio and other states contains toxins and radiation.

Republic Teamsters have also struck in sympathy in Evansville, Ind., Urbana, Ill., Elyria, Ohio, and a Republic commercial recycling facility in Youngstown. Photos of trash piling up in these cities can be seen here. Republic hired scabs to do the Teamsters work, but that didn't go well. Tere Heller Eaglen posted this from Champaign/Urbana on the Republic Teamsters <="https://www.facebook.com/RepublicServicesTeamsters?ref=ts&fref=ts">Facebook page: 

Trash is piling up everywhere and the scabs are tearing up the trucks and taking out street signs, etc. in their feeble attempt to do the job our guys do every day !!!

And check out this video of a scab's dangerous maneuvers <="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=449698858450351&set=o.203143199790433&type=2&theater">here.

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The first photo is in from today's strike in Fairfield, Calif.