What follows is a brief description of the meeting from Matt, one of the students who attended. For info on the rally, visit www.towsonactiongroup.org.


Matt, Tanza, Travis, Zai, Rod Ryon, and Sam Collins took part in a meeting with Jeff Sutton (Not sure if that is his correct name) who is the person who deals with all outcontracting here on campus. The meeting started off with us giving our rundown on who we are. We gave a brief history of a living wage, talked about the living wage here in baltimre, and presented some figures and case studies. We then went on to talk about the workers and the conditions that they exist in. Then our "demands" were given. The "demands" were of such: (1)Based on the 2001 Poverty Gidelines provided by the US Department of Health and Human Services for here in Baltimore, we are asking for a living wage to be set at $8.50/hr up to $10.00/hr depending upon hours worked per week, and weeks worked per year. (2) We are also asking that in that base pay of $8.50/hr for health care benifits to be included. If health care benifits are not included, we would like the pay to be fluctuated to include the cost of helth care and still keep it at a living wage standard. (3) We are asking a scale of seniority be set from the base pay of $8.50/hr depending upon how long an individual has been employeed here. (4) We are asking to see a commitment put forward by the administration to look into the idea of living wage, and show us that progress is being made to find a way to succed such a venture. The meeting started off with obvious unconcerne by ?Jeff Sutton?. By way of his speaking manor, he was talking down to the idea of manual labor jobs making them seem unimportant and miniscual. From the beginging he discussed how contracts work, he talked about construction alot. He then proceeded to tell us that once a contract is out there, it cannot be changed. He told us that this was something they could look into and perhaps put into the next contract and have people bid on it. We came back with rebuttles, constantly focusing on the community, the towson area, and the workers. We discussed the relationship we have gathered with the workers, how they care about the job they do, how they have great pride in the work they do. He used almost every come back we had talked about. He said it was a union/Aramark issue.He pointed fingers in every which direction except himself. He stood strong to the fact that he could do nothing about it, and that he made no decisions pertaining to things. Yet when we asked him who would be changing the contract and negotiating it, he said himself. He used excuses such as, well what if armark loses the contract when the next bid comes up, and they say well we have been paying this living wgae this whole time, it would obligate us (towson university) to stay with them. By the end of the meeting, his total attitude had changed. He had turned around on the contract statement and said that yes, a contract can be changed at any time. He then spoke to us as "equals" and was beginging to give us pointers. He gave us names of who to talk to next. He said that we did not have to convince people that these workers were making dirt cheap wages. He said people realize this, but alot of people see it as the market price for their labor. He also said that they cant just raise the pay for the housekeepers, because then the grounds crew would want it, and the chartwells people would want it. Our response, "Ya , and?" He said that if Towson University was to do a campus wide living wage increase then the other school sin the area would see that, and be forced or pressured to do one themselves. Our response, "ya, and?" I dont think he ever really connected on the fact that his crys of sympathy for these billion dollar industries loseing money against a person living in poverty were meaning absolutly nothing to us. He asked us to produce numbers. What does aramark spend? How will towson get the money to pay for a pay increase? He gave us pointers of were to go in the future, who to talk to, how to present stuff, how to go about things. I believe we left with alot of unneeded work put upon ourselves for example, he wants us to get the numbers and create an actual figure of how much the increase would be, where the money would come from at towson univeristy, how much of a tuition increase would be needed, things like that. He is senidng us a copy of the contract between aramark and TU, its a fucking huge contract though, 4 different books. He also told us to write to aramark and ask for their numbers. He gave us forms and things that he does when goign through contracts and told us how to look at them. His attitude at the begining of the meeting: Very authoitarian, stern, joking, not really careing about what we say. Attitude at the end of the meeting: Voice fluxuating, hands shaking, not too sure of himself anymore, doing work for us, not able to come back with anymore excuses. All in all, I think we won this one. We need to now take the next step, raise your sites and aim them at the new vp of financial services, bang, we got him. So I imagine that is where we are going next. In the way of how to do these numbers, I got no clue, how about
you?

Matt Warfield