This story outlines the extreme working conditions these laborers deal with everyday. Since the virus outbreak their jobs have become more dangerous and busier. Unfair labor practice charges have been filed over working conditions and issues over safety equipment.
Gravediggers Speak Out About Horrifying Conditions
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/z...wish-cemetery?
Gravediggers Speak Out About Horrifying Conditions
In April, 13 gravediggers at Beth Israel, a Jewish cemetery in a working class New Jersey township across the street from one of the state’s largest malls, buried roughly 300 bodies—many of them presumed by workers to be victims of COVID-19.
In a typical month, the crew at Beth Israel Cemetery digs between 50 and 100 graves. During the peak of the coronavirus outbreak in New Jersey and neighboring New York City, where the virus tore through many Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods with ties to Beth Israel, the gravediggers took to the fields at the earliest hours of daylight to pour foundation, lay out wood, dig trenches, set up funerals, carry caskets, and fill graves with backhoes. Gravediggers say they often worked ten-and-a-half-hour shifts, and have not gotten hazard pay and only sporadic bathroom and lunch breaks, according to Teamsters Local 469, the gravediggers' union.
In a typical month, the crew at Beth Israel Cemetery digs between 50 and 100 graves. During the peak of the coronavirus outbreak in New Jersey and neighboring New York City, where the virus tore through many Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods with ties to Beth Israel, the gravediggers took to the fields at the earliest hours of daylight to pour foundation, lay out wood, dig trenches, set up funerals, carry caskets, and fill graves with backhoes. Gravediggers say they often worked ten-and-a-half-hour shifts, and have not gotten hazard pay and only sporadic bathroom and lunch breaks, according to Teamsters Local 469, the gravediggers' union.
The gravediggers at Beth Israel are unionized with Teamsters Local 469, but have yet to sign a collective bargaining contract, and have in recent months filed two unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and a 56-page Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) complaint against StoneMor. According to NLRB complaints reviewed by Motherboard, the workers have had some of their work subcontracted out to workers who earn even less, which they say is illegal.
According to Teamsters Local 469, Beth Israel's lowest paid gravediggers, many who are Latinx, earn less than $15 an hour. Less than a mile down the road, at Mount Lebanon Cemetery, where workers unionized more than 30 years ago, gravediggers make at least $24.62 an hour, according to the union official. Gravediggers at Beth Israel are well aware of the pay disparity.
According to Teamsters Local 469, Beth Israel's lowest paid gravediggers, many who are Latinx, earn less than $15 an hour. Less than a mile down the road, at Mount Lebanon Cemetery, where workers unionized more than 30 years ago, gravediggers make at least $24.62 an hour, according to the union official. Gravediggers at Beth Israel are well aware of the pay disparity.
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