Dominican University answers United Here’s call for Dining Service Workers to be paid during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A Virtual Rally for Laid Off University Workers was held on April 7th by the Local 1, an affiliate of United Here, a labor union that represents 300,000 workers across Canada and the United States.
The details of the virtual rally called on Northwestern, Loyola, DePaul and Dominican University to work with the workers’ employers to ensure their payment during the pandemic.
The virtual rally was joined by Dan Abraham, organizing director at Local 1, Toni Jones, the union leader and cook who worked at Dining Services for 23 years, Father Larry Dowling from St. Agatha Catholic Church in Chicago, and Carlos Benitez, a junior and president of Undocumented & Immigration Allyance (UIA) at Dominican University.
The community leaders and student leader expressed their support for payments for subcontracted workers.
Donna Carroll, president of Dominican University, said the refund of Room and Board is connected with the payment for dining hall workers.
“Quest and the Food service is supported by Room and Board cost for students, substantially supported by residency costs” President Carroll said. “And in closing the resident hall, we have promised to reimburse our students, proportionally with the cost of Room and Board. So we will be returning to students half a semester of Room and Board cost and a portion of those cost or those dollars would be the dollars that we would typically be paying Quest for its food service management”.
Dining Hall furloughed workers are not paid. However, Babish said Dining Services workers can apply to CARES program to receive financial help. The fund has since been distributed to workers who applied for financial assistance through Human Resources.
Quest Food Management Services created a GoFundMe page titled “Quest Food Management Employee Care Fund” on March 28. As of April 17, the fundraisers have raised $35,954 of the $40,000 goal. Dominican University alone contributed the highest amount of $10,000. According to Babish, the donation from Dominican University will benefit specifically Dining Services team at Dominican University.
“That [$10,000 Dominican University contribution] was donated to our CARES Fund and through Dominican. But that money was specifically dedicated to the Dominican Team. So that money comes from Dominican to Quest for the support of the Dining Services staff went to the Dining Services staff” Babish said.
According to a statement released by Dominican University, the university said they “empathize deeply” with the workers and noted the financial challenges experienced by the university. The statement also mentions the importance of the federal stimulus fund (CARES Act), which has since been approved.
“While the university is not in the financial position to be able to absorb salaries of Quest’s furloughed staff, we are making a donation to the Quest Care Fund GoFundMe campaign for furloughed workers, and we invite and challenge others to join us” said Dominican University in the online statement.
Dominican University received $3,025,781 million from the U.S. Department of Education. Dominican Star co-editor Thomas Gibbons reported on the fund. Read the detail of his article here.
Currently, there are three Dining Hall workers working half-time. Their work hours were reduced from 7.5 hours to 4 hours. Dining Services now open for an hour on weekdays and has online forms for remaining residents to place meal orders.
Babish said Quest Food Management has taken the precautionary measures to counter the pandemic.
“Everybody’s wearing masks, everybody has to sanitize, making sure we are using different cleaning products specifically designed for this” Babish said. “Cleaning handles, deep cleaning sanitizing, making sure the food is being served by just our staff and nobody is touching anything. People are staying behind glass, our staff is serving all of the food, nobody’s serving the food for them”.
Babish said the CEO of Quest Food Management is not taking his salary to help the workers who are furloughed. Quest Food Management also set up food pantries for the Dining Services workers.
Vi Nedd-Jackson, a Dining Services Employee who was furloughed, said her faith has helped her to cope during this time.
“I could allow fear to overtake or I could allow loneliness to take in” Nedd-Jackson said. “So what [do] I do? I build myself up. I use the word of God. So, I will have some preaching, I will have some positive inspirational messages… I also listen to inspirational preaching from ministers. I also read the Bible. And these are the things that help me, that fill my life, that build me up”.
Nedd-Jackson has since received the eight week pay from Dominican University and she was able to access meals from Quest food banks.