Food-safety program funds anti-union lobby

Restaurant workers might be surprised to have to pay $15 for an online class on safe food practices before they get their first paycheck, but that relatively rude awakening is made worse when some realize the money for the “ServSafe” program goes to the National Restaurant Association, which bought ServSafe in 2016.

 

The business group for years has spent countless hours and millions of dollars against worker issues ranging from raising the minimum wage to unionization.

 

Now, however, an effort by a worker-advocacy group is trying to offer a neutral option: a food-safety program owned by restaurant workers. “Just.Safe.Food.,” a cooperative created by the One Fair Wage, a national organization based on Massachusetts, is being promoted as not only cheaper ($10), but free from the conflict of unwittingly funding efforts to curb wages, oppose health-care expansion and fight organizing.

 

“The National Restaurant Association was founded to suppress service workers’ wages. But … most people didn’t know — the National Restaurant Association is stealing from its low-wage workers in order to fund that anti-worker lobbying,” said, One Fair Wage President Saru Jayaraman. “Restaurants like Applebee’s and Olive Garden make millions of dollars by paying restaurant workers a federal sub-minimum wage of just $2.13 an hour. The fact that they fund lobbying efforts to kill laws raising wages by charging workers for food-safety training is beyond outrageous.”

 

The ServSafe program used to be run by a charity, the National Registry of Food Safety Professionals, loosely tied to the restaurant association. But in 2016, the association bought the operation and made it into an indirect fundraising vehicle. After that, state restaurant associations in Illinois, California, Florida and Texas successfully lobbied for changes expanding food-safety training from restaurant managers to all “food “handlers,” from cooks and bartenders to waiters and even those who bus tables.

 

“Food handler training is required in Illinois [but] not ServSafe specifically,” One Fair Wage Director of Policy & Communications Alex Morash told the Labor Paper. “Most employers use ServSafe – it has a monopoly presence.”

 

Nationally, more than 3 million workers have taken such training, generating millions to the restaurant industry’s lobbying. The National Restaurant Association’s spending on politics and lobbying more than doubled in recent years, according to tax filings analyzed by the New York Times, contributing to politicians from both major parties,  conservative think tanks, and state restaurant associations. In 2022 alone, it spent $2.1 million on lobbying, according to federal data analyzed by the Center for Responsive Politics.

“I’m sitting up here working hard, paying this money so that I can work this job, so I can provide for my family,” said Mysheka Ronquillo, 40, a Carl’s Jr. and school cafeteria cook and a labor organizer in California, speaking to the New York Times. “And I’m giving y’all money so y’all can go against me?”

 

Participating in Jan. 25 protests outside restaurant association offices in Illinois, Maryland, Michigan and New York, One Fair Wage seems part of a resistance, in the streets and in kitchens, in labor halls and the halls of government. One Fair Wage is urging elected officials to pass laws repealing mandatory worker contributions to ServSafe, and is asking state attorneys general and the IRS to investigate whether the National Restaurant Association violated laws by mixing training and lobbying funds.

Nationally, there are headwinds to such reforms. One Fair Wage reported that federal data show that the National Restaurant Association made about $2 million in direct campaign contributions to the current Congress; 11 Democrats and 39 Republicans in the Senate and 42 Democrats and 125 Republicans in the House.

“Any elected official who claims to care about workers should immediately reject National Restaurant Association lobbying money, and return those stolen funds to the workers fighting to raise wages for all Americans,” Jayaraman said. “Across the country, the American people think wages are too low – and want a raise. It’s time politicians stop listening to the owners of major restaurant chains, and start listening to the American people.”

(House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries [D-N.Y.] pledged to give away any contributions his campaign received from the restaurant lobby).

Meanwhile, Morash said, One Fair Wage is in the process of getting national accreditation for Just.Safe.Food., designed to educate workers on safe food storage, handling and preparation. After it’s approved – in three-to-six months, he said – it will be up to the employers or the workers to use it, depending on their state.

“In Illinois, “there is a discussion among legislators about requiring employers to pay for this training rather than workers,” he said.