Milwaukee, WI – Teamsters across the country are beginning to schedule parking lot rallies ahead of the national contract negotiations, but Wisconsin Teamsters Local 344 are taking it one step further. Local 344 has created their own “Pay up” shirts for local members to wear every Friday in solidarity. The idea for these shirts came from a steward and rank-and-file member out of 344’s Oshkosh barn, Lori Jensen.

Members of the Local 344 volunteer organizing committee (VOC) have joined with local business agents to help hand out shirts and encourage union members to remain diligent and informed as negotiations progress. Many members already began wearing their shirts, starting last Friday, April 14.

“It was really cool to see my coworkers wearing the ‘Pay up’ shirts at work. UPS doesn't stand a chance against us when we're united,” said Rory Donovan, a part-time package handler and steward out of the Elm Grove hub.

Local 344 has been incredibly successful in collecting pledge cards as well, having collected over 2000 cards out of the 50,000 collected on a national level.

“It’s a wonderful thing, seeing so much excitement! It’s been a grueling past couple years, especially for the 22.4s, and underpaid part timers. These shirts, simple enough as they are, have given us all hope and something to rally behind. The shirts are hard to miss,” said Ethan Costello, a package car driver out of Elm Grove and rank-and-file leader with the VOC. “And so when you see one of us wearing it, and then another, and another, that’s when a person can comprehend the larger fight ahead and that whether we’re a driver, part-timer or 22.4 driver, we all have a common enemy and a common enemy and goal: UPS, and to get all that we deserve, respectively.”

Costello continued, “Already, I’ve heard that a brother was hassled by our center manager, even though he was within his right to wear it at that time. So not only have these shirts given us hope, but they also make management shake in their boots to see so many of us strutting around, proud, while wearing them.”

Local 344 Teamsters are ready for the battle ahead, with more solidarity actions to come.

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