Why Amazon Moving Into Oxnard Will Actually Destroy More Jobs Than It Creates.
In preparation for this piece, as soon as I knew I was going to write it, I simply went to google and searched “Oxnard Amazon Fulfillment Center”. To no surprise the top search was from the VC Star the “local” newspaper. (VC Star is a subsidiary of the E.W. Scripps Company located in Cleveland Ohio and it’s valued somewhere around $1.5 Billon USD) Also to no surprise, the article parroted the claim that an Amazon Fulfillment Center in Oxnard would “bring 1,500 jobs.”
This claim was also made in this Facebook video, where Ex-Mayor of Oxnard Tim Flynn says it’s “Exciting to see Amazon come to build and hire in Oxnard”. Both Council Member Bert Perello and failed Mayoral Candidate Carmen Ramirez both directly say the facility will create “1,500 jobs.” To top it all off the final speaker in the video, Oxnard College President DR. Luis Sanchez says, “we are excited to prepare our students and the community for great career opportunities with Amazon”. The video is frankly Amazon propaganda head to toe, filled with the likes of City Council Members, Chamber of Commerce CEO goons, and even a school president.
Despite the dubiousness of this video the claim itself seems like something to rejoice in. 1,500 good paying jobs with benefits moving into our city, as Carmen Ramirez also says in the video, this “could not have come at a better time for our city given the pandemic and the economic turndown”. However, even though our community is in need of strong union jobs with good benefits and protections amongst a pandemic and economic collapse, Amazon will not be providing that. No in fact the reality, much like that Facebook video, is absolutely terrible and downright garbage.
Amazon Facilities Are Ground Zero for Labor Violations, Union Busting, and General Negligence Toward Its Employees Well Being.
In building a case for why 1,500 Amazon jobs would be a detriment rather than a boon to Oxnard and its working peoples, I immediately thought of the recent case of Poushawn Brown. Poushawn was a 38 year old single mother to a 12 year old daughter while she was working at Amazon. Poushawn, who had worked as both a driver and as a stocker in a fulfillment center in the past, suddenly died at her home. No letter was sent to her from Amazon. Not a single call was made to their family. Even worse, Poushawn for several months prior to her death had been Covid-19 testing fellow employees even though she was not a licensed doctor or nurse. She also complained to Amazon’s HR department about Amazon’s unsafe and unsanitary conditions, ranging from lack of mask provisions, improper cleaning of facilities, and even allowing workers who had thrown up on the shift to continue working.
Poushawn Brown is just one story, but her story is not at all atypical for an Amazon Employee. Her story highlights all the ways in which Amazon is willing to neglect its workers safety, rights, and concerns, and shows it is quite literally willing to kill them.
While Poushawn’s Story is one that clearly demonstrates the lengths Amazon is willing to go in violating its workers rights, I would also like to bring up the recent case and events surrounding the unionization efforts of Amazon Workers at the Bessemer Alabama Fulfillment Center. Given Amazon’s abhorrent treatment of its workers, it is in the workers best interest to come together and unionize so that someone can fight for their protections and benefits. This is just what the workers of the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Bessemer decided to do. Simply come together so that they may have a higher quality of life, something the multi trillion dollar company could easily afford. They’ve been met with nothing but hostility, propagandizing, and gaslighting from the company.
Amazon has done everything in its power to crack down on these workers and prevent them from unionizing. They’ve forced them into anti-union meetings, texted them daily anti-union propaganda, and even hired young minimum wage workers to come in and sport anti-union work wear. Amazon even went as far as going to the city/county so that they could change the traffic lights outside the facility to turn green more often so as to prevent organizers from speaking to fellow employees like in the picture above. Doing this is not only directly attacks the workers organizing efforts, but also on multiple occasions has caused car accidents as well.
All this happening in Bessemer is not a phenomenon either. Amazon has been union busting and going after its workers in various ways across the country, and we shouldn’t expect any different when it comes to Oxnard.
In recent memory Amazon has done things such as literally hire the Pinkerton Company to spy on its workers and collect information on them, set up secret programs to surveil its employees Facebook groups, and even hired an intelligence analyst (aka some ex-CIA/NSA criminal) to “track labor organizing threats”. All these are clear steps from the company to suppress worker rights and allow the unimpeded exploitation of Amazon’s workers.
Amazon Is Already Wreaking Havoc on Oxnard’s Workers.
Oxnard does not even have to wait for an Amazon Fulfillment Center to be built to start oppressing workers. On February 4th, 75 workers at the future site walked off because one of the companies hired to construct the facility, Building Zone Industries, hired out of state non-union workers so that they could be paid less and the union workers in the area could be disposed of. Amazon has already shown the people of Oxnard from the get-go that it will do anything within its power to destroy the quality jobs we already have here and replace them with low pay, zero benefit, highly exploitable ones.
We as a Community Must Reject Amazon
I’ve already mentioned former Mayor Tim Flynn’s jovial attitude toward the idea of an Amazon Fulfillment Center moving into Oxnard. He however was not the only one and for those that were paying attention, all the Oxnard Mayoral Candidates had statements coming out in support of further cooperation with Amazon in building this facility, including current Mayor John Zaragoza. So what does this say? Perhaps something you the reader already know or already feel an inkling of. Our elected officials don’t represent us. Not only do they not represent us, the working families of Oxnard, but they overwhelmingly represent corporate power and corporate interests as well. Our City Council, Our Schools, and more are completely captured and controlled by a small handful of wealthy capitalists and corporations.
Corporations like Amazon that come into our community, lobby Our Politicians, buy off Our Schools, and destroy 75 Acres of farmland in a historic farming community so that a concrete hell house can be built where unspeakable labor violations and worker suppression happens daily. The only way to fight Amazon is to organize the workers of Oxnard as happened on February 4th when the 75 construction workers walked off the job. We must exert our power as workers and show that we are the ones who make this city run. That is the work to be done. If anything, I hope this piece not only motivates action towards that, but also dispels the myth that an Amazon Fulfillment Center in Oxnard would provide quality jobs for the community.
Jeffrey Preston Jorgensen (Bezos) eating an iguana
