LTC 201-2005 City Interactions With The Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
CITY OF MIAMI BEACH
Office of the City Manager
Letter to Commission No. 201-2005
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From:
Mayor David Dermer and Date: July 29, 2005
Members of the City Commission
Jorge M. Gonzalez ~. LV~.
City Manager ! 0
CITY INTERACT NS WITH THE SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL
UNION (SEIU)
To:
Subject:
The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is a national labor organization with
approximately 1.8 million members that has been making efforts to increase its membership
in South Florida and in particular in the City of Miami Beach. SEIU has identified the City of
Miami Beach as a key opportunity to increase their membership within the condominium
worker environment in our City.
Part of the organization strategy of SEIU has been to conduct protest marches or
demonstrations in proximity to non-unionized condominium dwellings. On Miami Beach
most of the activity of SEIU has been adjacent to the Sunset Harbor condominiums on
Sunset Harbor Drive (Purdy Avenue). A number of demonstrations/protest marches have
been held at the Sunset Harbor condominiums with 15 to date requiring a response from
Code Compliance. Demonstration/protest marches have also been held at 4925 and 5225
Collins Avenue and on the beach walk from 21 st Street to 15th Street. The
demonstrations/protest marches are still being conducted.
At each of the demonstrations/protest marches, SEIU has chosen to use signs,
chanting/shouting and a variety of artificial noise makers to communicate their message.
In most of the demonstrations/protest marches, both the Police Department and the Code
Compliance Department have had some advance notice and when possible have tried to
work cooperatively with the members of SEI U to advise the Union of the appropriate right-of-
way parameters. In all instances, the City's response has been to help assure the right of
the Union to demonstrate/protest and communicate a message.
At all of the SEI U demonstrations/protest marches, noise as a result of shouting and use of
bullhorns and artificial noise makers has been problematic to some degree. In initial
activities when noise volumes became unnecessarily loud at the demonstrations/protest
march site, SEIU members were generally cooperative and reduced the volume consistent
with the City's parameters enforced as part of the Miami-Dade County Noise Ordinance 21-
28. As time passed, the intensity ofthe noise at the SEIU events increased and the level of
cooperation decreased. As a result, Code Compliance was left with no alternative but to
issue violations of the Noise Ordinance to members of SEIU.
To date, thirty three (33) violations for noise have been issued to various SEIU members as
a result of noise generated at one of their events.
Several meetings and conversations with SEIU representatives and their attorneys have
been conducted during this entire process so as to avoid confrontation and to clearly
establish the expectations of the City in addressing SEIU activity. In all cases, the City has
stressed the desire to assure the ability of SEIU to demonstrate and/or protest. The City
has also stressed that said demonstrations/protests must fall within the parameters of the
Noise Ordinance and not constitute unnecessarily loud noise in the locale in which the event
is being conducted.
c: Robert C. Middaugh, Assistant City Manager
Vivian Guzman, Director of Neighborhood Services
James Mazer, Director of Code Compliance
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