September 28, 2021

Carpenters and other construction workers are required to drive to job sites with vehicles loaded with tools, harnesses, and other equipment required for the job, but often have to pay $100 or more a week for parking.

Shamefully, the contractors, who make billions of dollars in profits off the backs of workers, have refused to cover this cost in bargaining with the Northwest Carpenters Union. We stand with the rank-and-file carpenters in their courageous strike action, and unwaveringly support all of their strike demands: fully-paid parking, fully-funded benefits, family-supporting wages, improved protections against harassment in the workplace, and a 3-year contract to be united with all the other trades unions. The carpenters are not only on strike for their concrete demands, they are on strike for all of us in the working class.

We also urge the Seattle City Council to stand with union carpenters and all construction workers whose labor builds our city, and demand that Councilmembers urgently support Councilmember Kshama Sawant’s legislation to require that construction contractors pay 100 percent of all parking costs for all construction workers on Seattle job sites, beginning immediately. Such a pay-for-parking requirement for contractors would be no different from the City requiring employers to meet other employment standards, like minimum wage, paid sick and safe time, secure scheduling, and the Commuter Benefits Ordinance.