09/04/07 At Laborfest, workers tell of LaHacienda woes - Workers' Rights Center

The Capital Times :: METRO :: C1

Tuesday, September 4, 2007
By PAT SCHNEIDER The Capital Times

The three men said they worked long, hard hours - 60 or more a week - washing dishes and cooking at a south side Madison restaurant where the atmosphere was tainted with intimidation.

Jose Pioquinto, 20, Gustavo Roque, 20, and Francisco Garcia, 25, all Mexican immigrants, are three of five former employees of La Hacienda restaurant whose owner is suing them to stifle their claims that they were not paid wages they are owed. The three appeared Monday at LaborFest, Dane County's annual celebration of organized labor, and told about their experiences at La Hacienda, 515 S. Park St.

"We worked a lot with very little pay," said Garcia, who worked as a cook at the restaurant for more than five years.

Beth Geglia, an intern at the Workers' Rights Center, interpreted the workers' remarks from Spanish for The Capital Times.

Restaurant owner David Herrera's attorney, Victor Arellano, did not respond to requests today for a response to the three men's comments - in particular to Pioquinto's that he was paid in cash - but Arellano has said previously that the underlying claim of unpaid wages is false and that Herrera has signed documents from the workers to prove it. Herrera filed a lawsuit in Dane County Circuit Court on Aug. 24 - after the former workers began to picket his restaurant and called for a boycott - asking the judge to declare that no wages are owed.

Garcia said Monday that he worked 60 to 62 hours a week and was paid a flat salary of $398 weekly.

He added that when he or others complained about the workload, Herrera said "if we don't like the work we can leave."

"We had to work very fast," said Pioquinto, who worked at the restaurant as a dishwasher for seven months.

"There was someone looking over us - 'rapido, rapido,' " he said. "If we didn't do things fast enough, they said they would fire us. We couldn't even have a glass of water" while working.

"They always would scold us and swear at us - 'motherf--," Pioquinto said.

Pioquinto said he was paid $350 a week in cash.

Herrera, Pioquinto said, "told me not to tell anybody I was paid in cash."

He added that he filled out a time sheet only twice in the time he worked there.

The other men said they routinely were made to sign out at 3 a.m., when the restaurant closes, but had to stay to do clean-up work that could take as long as three hours.

The men said they got a half-hour break during their work shifts, and were allowed to eat only what Herrera permitted, often eggs.

"We want him to pay us what he owes us," said Roque, who worked as cook for more than two years.

That Herrera routinely forced workers to sign out before they finished working is one of the primary claims against the business brought by the workers to the U.S. Department of Labor, with the assistance from the Workers' Rights Center in Madison, a program of the Interfaith Coalition for Worker Justice of South Central Wisconsin.

Workers' advocates say Herrera has long exploited immigrant workers, but Arellano says the advocates are using the workers.

The dramatic action of staging a boycott complete with pickets was taken, said Patrick Hickey, Workers' Rights Center director, because Herrera's labor law violations are egregious even for the restaurant business, where such infractions are rampant.

"We've been hearing about violations there for years. We're hoping to get the owner to permanently change his ways," Hickey said Monday.

COUNTERCHARGES

Herrera was ordered last year to pay $38,249 in back wages after a Department of Labor investigation that found he violated overtime pay standards for salaried cooks, busboys and dishwashers. He also failed to keep accurate records of hours worked by employees, the department found.

Garcia received some back pay as a result of that decision, but he said it was not all he was owed.

Arellano has said the earlier judgment was only a matter of failing to keep proper records and that all wages were paid. As for the current picketing and boycott, he says the Workers' Rights Center is exploiting the workers.

"The workers are being used to promote this organization," Arellano said Friday in an interview.

Arellano said his client runs one of the few restaurants in the area where Hispanics are allowed to work as waiters, not just kitchen help.

"By picketing the restaurant, a lot of these waiters are not getting any tips," he said. "It's so incredibly damaging to workers they claim to represent."

He faulted the Workers' Rights Center for launching a boycott before the workers even filed a complaint with any regulatory agency.

"We have records; they signed them," Arellano said. "Then these claims come from nowhere demanding pay or 'we won't stop harassing you.' "

When the boycott was launched, Hickey said the time records the restaurant has were inaccurate because workers were forced to sign off before they were finished working.

He expressed frustration at the inability of the formal complaint process to get Herrera to change his practices.

The Department of Labor investigation has been reopened, however.

Hickey and Arellano each said the other side has wriggled out of proposed mediation sessions.

Meanwhile, the picketing became heated enough last week that police were called.

Arellano said Hickey "ripped" cables from speakers playing music at the restaurant's outdoor patio, but Hickey said he merely turned around a speaker positioned to blast music at the demonstrators.

"We are not going to be subjected to extortion, confrontation and physical threats," Arellano said.

Hickey said the boycott has been effective in keeping customers from the restaurant. "It's a question of how much he's willing or able to lose," he said.

pschneider@madison.com