Chipotle faces union-busting charge from former Augusta employee
A former Chipotle Mexican Grill worker has filed an unfair labor practices charge with federal officials, claiming the fast-food chain has blacklisted her from future employment for attempting to organize workers at the Augusta franchise. The claim comes just weeks after the Augusta store was shuttered under circumstances that employees say amount to union busting.
Brandi McNease was a lead union organizer who worked at the chain’s Augusta branch, at 1 Stephen King Drive. She claims that when the store closed, a regional manager told her that she was eligible for reemployment at another location, according to an Aug. 4 complaint filed with the National Labor Relations Board.
Employees at the location, who were in the midst of forming their union, Chipotle United, as the store was permanently closing, say they weren’t transferred or offered an opportunity to apply for jobs at nearby locations. Last week, several former employees attempted to apply for open positions advertised at a Chipotle Mexican Grill roughly 30 miles away from their prior location, in Auburn.
“When the Augusta workers discovered that Chipotle was hiring, they immediately sought to apply online,” according to a news release issued by the Maine AFL-CIO and the attorney representing Chipotle United. “But when they attempted to do so, they discovered that Chipotle had locked them out from using their email addresses that the company already had on file.”
McNease then says she applied for an open position at the Auburn location using an alternate email address and was “promptly scheduled for an interview the following day.” But she soon received a call from that store’s manager canceling the interview because of McNease’s alleged “attendance problems” at the Augusta location in addition to not realizing that the union leader had been “part of that group.”
“I never was counseled, let alone disciplined, for any attendance issues,” McNease said in a statement, pointing out that the regional manager had told her she was eligible for reemployment.
Chipotle Mexican Grill did not respond to inquiries Tuesday from Mainebiz about why the company didn’t offer jobs elsewhere to those workers or whether it intends to fight the allegation.
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