Published: August 21, 2010

Hundreds of cleaners, maintenance workers and landscapers at the University of Miami are set to meet Saturday morning to consider allowing their union to call a a strike against the company contracted by the university to provide these service. The current contract with UNICCO services, reached after a bitter strike 4 years ago, is about to expire.

The workers are represented by SEIU, the Service Employees International Union, and if they agree, union bargainers would be granted the power to call a strike if they feel contract talks stall.

The union said workers are asking for wage increases and better benefits, while Boston-based UNICCO has responded with proposals for freezes and wages and benefits such as health care.

Nearly 400 people who work on the University campus, but not directly for the University, are affected.

A battle over wages and how the workers to determine if they wanted to be unionized led to a weeks-long strike in May, 2006, with agreements on how workers would pick a union.

Under the terms of Agreement, the janitors and the company agreed to use an impartial arbitrator to determine if a majority of the workers want to be represented by the union. More than 60 percent of the workers agreed, choosing SEIU as their union.

This is the first contract negotiated since the 2006 strike, which included mass rallies on US1 near the campus as well as sit-ins and a hunger strike.

Even after the University of Miami intervened to require pay increases and health insurance for workers under their contract with UNICCO, many strikers continued to protest over the issue of union representation.

The current contract issues is based on economic and benefit complaints.