Sconza Candy worker in Oakdale objects to union requirement

A Sconza Candy employee has filed federal unfair-labor charges against the company and a labor union, saying both lied by telling her she had to join the union and pay full dues.

Athena Manning of Modesto was suspended without pay for a week in June for refusing the demands of Sconza and San Leandro-based Bakers Union Local 125 that she join the union, according to her complaint. It was filed Wednesday with the National Labor Relations Board by attorneys with the National Right to Work Foundation based in Virginia.

California does not have so-called right-to-work rules giving people the choice of whether to join a labor group, but they do “have the right to refrain from formal union membership and paying for union-boss politics and many other activities,” reads a foundation notice.

Ron Sconza, president, chief executive officer and part-owner of the Oakdale company, on Friday said he had not received the complaint. He called Manning “a lovely gal” who works in the packaging department. “I said ‘Good morning’ to her not more than an hour ago,” he said.

Of the charges, Sconza said, “We have a union-security clause that is lawful and consistent with a company that employs people in a non-right-to-work state.”

The Modesto Bee was unable to reach a union representative for comment.

Anthony Riedel of the National Right to Work Foundation said the group represents more than 200 workers in similar cases throughout the United States, with “a good number” originating in California. He said it is “common for workers to charge that union officials have kept them in the dark about their rights.”

Mark Mix, foundation president, said in a release that Sconza and the union “actively misled and then punished this worker for exercising her rights, all in order to collect more forced-dues cash for the union bosses’ coffers.”

Sconza spoke highly of the company’s 175 workers. “I believe our relationship with them is demonstrated by the fact that our company has grown since we moved here (six years ago) and more than doubled in size,” he said.

This story was originally published November 7, 2014 at 2:48 PM with the headline "Sconza Candy worker in Oakdale objects to union requirement."