STRIKE VOTE

Workers at NYC Market Reach Deal to End Work Stoppage With Help From AOC

Essential workers at the Hunts Point Produce Market in the Bronx negotiated a 70-cent-per-hour wage increase for the first year.

After a nearly week-long strike, workers at the Hunts Point Produce Market have reached a three-year agreement with management that will end the work stoppage. Around 60 percent of the produce sold in the New York City area enters through the Hunts Point Produce Market, and workers at the Bronx market managed to negotiate a minimum 70-cents-per-hour wage increase for the next year and more in subsequent years, The City reported. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and other lawmakers had visited the striking employees on the picket line, drawing attention to their cause.

Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Ritchie Torres, and eight other congressional Democrats who represent parts of New York City asked for the National Labor Relations Board and the Department of Labor to begin a probe into the contract situation at the market earlier this week, the New York Daily News reported. Six workers have died from coronavirus since the start of the pandemic and hundreds more have tested positive at the massive wholesale produce market.