Jacob Bell
New Member
WHEAT RIDGE – Workers at seven Fort Collins medical-marijuana centers joined ranks Monday morning with the state's largest labor union in an effort to further legitimize and protect the medicinal-cannabis industry.
Union organizers said an "overwhelmingly" large majority of the Fort Collins workers voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, making Colorado the second state in the nation, after California, where some medical-marijuana workers have formally unionized.
"Medicinal cannabis is a commercial-production-for-human-consumption industry, and UFCW is the commercial-production-for-human-consumption union," said Dan Rush, the UFCW international director of Medical Cannabis and Hemp Industry Division.
"Our medicinal-cannabis members have just as much dignity and sincerity as our members in the grocery, meat, dairy, food-processing and agricultural industries," he said.
Though the employees of the seven union shops represent a small fraction of the hundreds of dispensary and grow operations operating in the state, organizers said they hoped it would lead to a union movement in the business.
But Mike Kollarits of the medical-marijuana dispensary owners group Cannabis Business Alliance said they didn't see the need for unionization in an industry still in its infancy.
"We don't have a stance that is anti-union," he said. "It's just premature for us to jump into all that red tape. Unionizing before we have the ability to write payroll checks to our employees would be putting the cart before the horse."
Rush called the medicinal-cannabis movement the "last American-made, middle-class industry," and, in addition to employee protection, he plans to push for nutritional labels for marijuana products.
Steve Ackerman, from Fort Collins-based Organic Alternatives and one of the new UFCW members, said medicinal cannabis has provided a vital boon to his community's economy, with 20 businesses employing some 200 people.
He estimated that the state-regulated and -taxed medicinal-marijuana industry generated revenues in excess of $8 million last year in Fort Collins. The city's voters will decide next month whether to ban dispensaries, and the UFCW is funding the campaign to oppose the ban.
"We are fighting a campaign of fear and disinformation waged by a small group of people who want to impose their moral agenda on our business and our community," Ackerman said. "But this war comes at the expense of patients who need access to this medicine."
News Hawk- Jacob Ebel 420 MAGAZINE
Source: denverpost.com
Author: Weston Gentry
Contact: Contact Us
Copyright: The Denver Post
Website: Workers at 7 Fort Collins pot shops vote to unionize
Union organizers said an "overwhelmingly" large majority of the Fort Collins workers voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, making Colorado the second state in the nation, after California, where some medical-marijuana workers have formally unionized.
"Medicinal cannabis is a commercial-production-for-human-consumption industry, and UFCW is the commercial-production-for-human-consumption union," said Dan Rush, the UFCW international director of Medical Cannabis and Hemp Industry Division.
"Our medicinal-cannabis members have just as much dignity and sincerity as our members in the grocery, meat, dairy, food-processing and agricultural industries," he said.
Though the employees of the seven union shops represent a small fraction of the hundreds of dispensary and grow operations operating in the state, organizers said they hoped it would lead to a union movement in the business.
But Mike Kollarits of the medical-marijuana dispensary owners group Cannabis Business Alliance said they didn't see the need for unionization in an industry still in its infancy.
"We don't have a stance that is anti-union," he said. "It's just premature for us to jump into all that red tape. Unionizing before we have the ability to write payroll checks to our employees would be putting the cart before the horse."
Rush called the medicinal-cannabis movement the "last American-made, middle-class industry," and, in addition to employee protection, he plans to push for nutritional labels for marijuana products.
Steve Ackerman, from Fort Collins-based Organic Alternatives and one of the new UFCW members, said medicinal cannabis has provided a vital boon to his community's economy, with 20 businesses employing some 200 people.
He estimated that the state-regulated and -taxed medicinal-marijuana industry generated revenues in excess of $8 million last year in Fort Collins. The city's voters will decide next month whether to ban dispensaries, and the UFCW is funding the campaign to oppose the ban.
"We are fighting a campaign of fear and disinformation waged by a small group of people who want to impose their moral agenda on our business and our community," Ackerman said. "But this war comes at the expense of patients who need access to this medicine."
News Hawk- Jacob Ebel 420 MAGAZINE
Source: denverpost.com
Author: Weston Gentry
Contact: Contact Us
Copyright: The Denver Post
Website: Workers at 7 Fort Collins pot shops vote to unionize
