TUESDAY, APRIL 26, 2005

Local union to confront Duke at shareholder meeting
By Tracy Donhardt
IBJ Reporter

Following a year of rebuffed attempts to discuss working conditions of janitors who work for contracting firms hired by Duke Realty, representatives of the Service Employees International Union Local 3 plan to deliver their concerns in person at Duke's annual shareholder meeting tomorrow afternoon.

Employees who work for contracting firms hired by Duke are paid between $5.50 and $7 an hour and receive no health benefits, said Paul Price, a union spokesman. Union standards for janitorial workers are about $9 an hour.

The union would like to bring current non-union janitors into the union, but short of that, non-union workers could benefit from the union's efforts to convince Duke to improve their contractor relationships, Price said.

More than 100 area labor, political and religious leaders are expected to join union officials and present concerns over pay and health benefits, Price said.

"We've been trying to reach out to Duke for over a year," Price said.

Letters and calls addressing their concerns to Duke over the past year by union officials have gone unanswered, Price said.

A Duke spokesman said the company would not comment until after the union's concerns are brought to tomorrow's meeting.

While Duke does not pay or provide benefits to the union workers, the commercial real estate developer hires contractors that do.

"So they have the ability to set responsible contractor standards for the market," Price said. "They tell contractors where, how and when to clean. They can certainly tell them how much to pay and to offer benefits."

Union officials say they are not asking Duke to stick their necks out alone. But they say that because Duke claims a large segment of the local commercial building market, it has the ability to make a difference for the 8,000 union members who perform janitorial services in Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania and Detroit. Duke has about 3 million square feet of office space in Indianapolis.

Duke's annual meeting is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. at the Indianapolis Marriott North Hotel on River Crossing Parkway.

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