Taco Bell Truth Tour Coming to SF

Beginning on February, 28, 2002, a caravan of migrant workers, college students and activists will embark on a fifteen-city, cross-country bus tour to raise awareness about the National Taco Bell Boycott and the sweatshop conditions faced by migrant farmworkers in America’s fields. Tour highlights will include a major convergence in Los Angeles, California, on March 10 and at Taco Bell corporate headquarters in Irvine, CA, on March 11. The tour follows months of protests at Taco Bell restaurants across the country, with nearly 200 actions in states including Alabama, Tennessee, Florida, Wisconsin, Arizona, California, Texas, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Oklahoma.

The tour is coming to San Francisco on Friday, March 8th.
Contact: Micah Clatterburgh, enigmicah@altavista.com;
David Solnit, Art and Revolution – dsolnit@yahoo.com
Jessica, Mexico Solidarity Network -jess@mexicosolidarity.org
Event time and location:
4:30pm Gather at 24th Street and Mission St.
5:30 march to Taco Bell at 16th/Mission
6:00 Rally at 16th and Mission TB
7:00pm Hip-hop Benefit concert and dinner 225 Potrero Avenue

In each city along the route of the "Taco Bell Truth Tour", the farmworkers will be welcomed by community activists and will participate in teach-ins, demonstrations in front of local Taco Bells, and major community rallies. The tour, and in particular the LA and Irvine actions, will be the first major public actions to cast light on the multi-billion dollar fast food industry’s ties to the sweatshop-like conditions faced by farmworkers in America’s fields.

"The tomatoes Taco Bell buys for its tacos are produced in what can only be described as sweatshop conditions," said Lucas Benitez of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, one of the tour’s organizers. "Twenty years of picking at sub-poverty wages, no right to overtime pay, no right to organize or join a union, no health insurance, no sick leave, no paid holidays or vacation, and no pension is a national disgrace. We as farmworkers are tired of subsidizing Taco Bell's profits with our poverty."

"Recently we read in ‘Nation’s Restaurant News’ that the major fast-food chains are getting together to draft requirements for their meat suppliers that set guidelines for the humane treatment of farm animals," added Romeo Ramirez, also of the CIW. "If Taco Bell and other fast-food giants can require their suppliers to treat their farm animals humanely, they should certainly be able to understand our call for humane working conditions as farmworkers."Dates for the cross-country "Taco Bell Truth Tour":

February 28: Tour Kick-Off in Tampa, FL
March 1: Atlanta, GA
March 3: Chicago, IL
March 4: Madison, WI
March 6: Denver, CO
March 7: Salt Lake City, UT
March 8: San Francisco, CA
March 9: Fresno, CA
March 10: Los Angeles, California
March 11: Irvine, California, TACO BELL HEADQUARTERS
March 12: Flagstaff, AZ
March 13: Albuquerque, NM
March 14: Oklahoma City, OK
March 15: Little Rock, TN
March 16: Memphis, TN
March 17: Immokalee, FL

HISTORY: Since 1997, tomato pickers in Immokalee, Florida’s largest farmworker community, have been organizing for the right to join in talks with the state’s corporate tomato growers to find ways to improve farm labor conditions and raise the crop picking piece rate. Despite signature drives, several community-wide work stoppages, a 230-mile march across South Florida, and a 30-day hunger strike by six members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) -- ultimately ended by the intervention of former President Jimmy Carter -- the growers continue to refuse to meet with farm worker representatives and the picking piece rate, despite an industry-wide raise following strikes and the hunger strike in 1997 and 1998, remains nearly unchanged from pre-1980 levels.

When workers discovered that Taco Bell is a major buyer of the tomatoes they pick, they informed company executives in January, 2000 of the deplorable wages and working conditions in Florida’s fields and requested a meeting to discuss possible solutions. To date, despite numerous pleas from workers and growing public pressure, Taco Bell has refused to meet with CIW representatives.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers is a community based worker organization located in Immokalee, Florida, the heart of the state’s $500 million tomato industry. Florida is the largest producer of fresh tomatoes in the United States. Members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers are largely Latino, Indigenous, and Haitian farmworkers, organizing for better wages and working conditions in Florida’s fields. CIW leaders have been recognized nationally for their efforts by, among others, the US Catholic Bishops Conference, Rolling Stone Magazine, and the National Organization for Women.