Lamont To Amazon: Let ​‘Em Pee

“Amazon workers are so scared of retribution they are scared to be here, and that’s no way to go through life.”

Here was an energized Monday morning press conference convened at Teamsters Local 443 headquarters at 200 Wallace St.

There, union brass were joined by Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz and Gov. Ned Lamont urging support for Senate Bill 1254, the governor’s warehouse workers protection bill now making its way through the state legislature.

In advanced technology-surveilled warehouse settings, where workers’ productivity is timed down to the second, workers often ​“have to choose between their job and bathroom breaks,” said Bysiewicz.

If passed by the legislature and signed into law, SB1254 would set rules around workplace quotas for warehouse employees, including guidelines about how quotas are measured, and security in regards to meal and bathroom breaks not being held against workers’ productivity.

The proposed legislation would apply to warehouse distribution centers with 250 or more employees at one site or 1,000 or more cumulatively statewide.

Click here to read a summary of the bill.

Rocco Calo, the secretary/treasurer of Teamster Local 1150 in Stratford, presided over Monday’s presser — and made the remark at the top of this story. He said that currently only five states have such bills that address this rapidly growing issue among the nation’s some 2 million warehouse workers. Those states are California, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, and Washington.

“We’ll be the sixth state to pass it [a warehouse workers protection act],” he declared, to enthusiastic applause.

In facilities that sometimes span football fields in length and where a walk from a work station to a loo can take ten or 15 minutes, the pressures are such that workplace injuries are far higher than in other warehouse settings, the speakers attested.

“Amazon’s warehouses are obsessed with speed and surveillance,” said Patrick Leonard, the Teamsters’ lead organizer among Amazon workers (although the bill is not restricted to that company alone).

“People have been fired for taking time to relieve themselves. At its core, Amazon’s business model is based on treating workers as disposable cogs in a machine.”

Critics of the bill, meanwhile, have dismissed the proposal as redundant and counterproductive.

“First, bathroom breaks and meal time standards are already in law. These should be enforced, as they have been recently and companies have been fined for failing to follow them,” wrote Paul Amarone, the Connecticut Business and Industry Association’s public policy associate and advocacy manager, in testimony submitted to the state legislature. 

“Federal and state laws provide an appropriate variety of protections for employees that ensure their interests and safety are protected,” he continued. ​“Adding a unique layer of restrictions on employers will inevitably reduce employers’ competition in the market and encourages excess litigation.” 

An Amazon spokesperson, August Green, told the Independent that the online retail giant does not require employees to meet specific productivity speeds or targets, but instead assesses performance based on reasonable expectations.

He also said that employees can take short breaks throughout their shift if they need them to meet with a manager or HR, use the restroom, or grab a drink of water. However, if they’re caught, say, sleeping in the breakroom, then they will receive feedback.

The effort to make a bill like this law has been going on for several years, with the first one being introduced by New Haven State Sen. and President Pro Tem Martin Looney. Two or three versions are percolating their way through the legislative offices in Hartford.

So why this bill at this time? Lamont was asked by an audience member.

“We’ve visited Amazon sites. Some are 66 football fields big, and vehicles racing around.” (That is, this is not like your father’s warehouse.)

“We’ve got to keep up with how workers’ conditions are changing, and we’re certainly not going to get any help on this from Washington. And if the corporations aren’t doing it, then we [government at the state level] should do it,” he concluded.

Another questioner asked Bysiewicz how the governor’s bill differed from the others making their way through the legislature.

“This bill is humane and makes common sense,” she said. ​“It emphasizes [protections for] bathroom and meal breaks.”

A third questioner wanted to know what might be the bill’s impact on the off-again-on-again efforts to unionize Amazon workers.

“We’re still building a movement there,” replied Leonard. ​“And many are unaware even what a union is, and that they have rights. We’re still educating workers.”

“Amazon workers are afraid of retribution,” added Calo. If the state passes a bill, those folks won’t have to be as scared and, yes, it will be easier to organize.

“We’re going to look at all these bills and at the end of the day, we’ll pass one,” Calo said. ​“They’ll know we’re there for them.”

Lamont, who was wearing a UConn cap in celebration of Sunday’s game — where the UConn women’s basketball team, led by their star Paige Bueckers, became 2025 national champions — had prefaced his remarks recalling the excitement of the win and the moving, emotional embrace of Bueckers and UConn coach Geno Auriemma after the game.

He jokingly asked Calo if he and (Amazon’s) Jeff Bezos might ever have a hug like that?

“No,” said Calo. And, then, after a pause, re-negotiated his response: ​“It’s possible.”