The CIW is today spear-heading the Taco
Bell boycott. But before we launched the national boycott in April of
2001, we had been organizing locally for many years in an effort to
modernize labor relations in Florida's fields, improve wages and working
conditions for our members, and eliminate modern-day slavery.
To learn more about the history of the
Coalition, you can go to the CIW site
where you'll find all the non-Taco Bell info on the Coalition from 1995
to 2001, including past CIW campaigns, Press Archives, Photo Galleries,
and more!
1997 General Strike
Immokalee, Florida
Or, you can simply click on some of
the links here below to go directly to the pages from the CIW site that
interest you... just remember to hit the back button on your browser
to return to the boycott site!:
The day began with CIW members and Tampa/St.
Pete area allies gathering at the Taco Bell on the corner
of 5th Ave N and 34th St, a restaurant we've made a virtual
home away from home over the past year and a half...
... but the protest really
took off once the KWRU New Freedom Bus Tour pulled up and
joined in! Together we filled the streets on both sides
of the corner restaurant with chanting people, colorful
signs, flyers, and music.
The signs included some powerful posters
provided by the bus riders, like this one above, "Poverty
is a human rights violation".
Finally, it was time to move on to downtown
St. Pete, where, before the march began, members of KWRU,
CIW, the Brazilian Landless Peasants Movement (MST), and
members of a people's organization from Central America
did a local cable show on the bus tour and on the impact
of free trade here in the US and throughout the hemisphere.
Then it was on to City Hall and the march
through downtown St. Pete.
The sign says it all...
Thanks to the Tampa Bay
Action Group (TBAG) for organizing a powerful event...
And, again, these signs
are what the march was all about: the rigth to health care,
the right to housing, and the right to food.
