OF LOVE B uilding a labor movement in Phoenix is no easy task. Arizona’s conservative wing is openly hostile to unions. And the state has laws in place that weaken organized labor. Over the past year, though, the labor move- ment in Phoenix has seen some major wins. Last fall, airport workers at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport went on a 10-day strike, scoring a new contract after years of bargaining. In June, a former budtender at Curaleaf’s dispensary in Gilbert won her job back after arguing in court that the cannabis giant fired her for organizing. And employees at Starbucks locations across the Valley joined unions — becoming some of the first unions at the coffee- house chain in the country. To commemorate Labor Day, Phoenix New Times spoke with union leaders and rank-and-file workers — from teachers to dispensary staff — about the victories and strug- gles of the past year, and the labor movement in Arizona. Marisol Garcia: ‘Almost Every Room I Enter, I’m the Only Woman of Color’ There is a moment from a historic teachers’ walkout in 2018 that Marisol Garcia, the newly elected president of the Arizona Education Association, will never forget. She was leaving Diamondback Stadium just after sunrise on the first day of the walkout, leading the march to the Arizona State Capitol. That morning, Garcia recalled, she did not know that #RedForEd would become a movement, drawing participa- tion from tens of thousands of teachers across the state, demanding better funding for . She remembers feeling as she walked that the stakes were immensely high. People could get fired. People could lose their benefits. “And it’s all on our shoulders,” she said. It was not until she arrived at the statehouse, and watched the crowd fill in, that she realized the scale of the protest. At that time, Garcia said, #RedForEd was seemingly unstoppable. “It was so pure,” she said. At the end of August, when she met with New Times, Garcia sat at her desk, wearing her usual scarlet blouse, the color of the movement. Photos of the protest, of the vast crowds of red, filled the AEA’s offices. Four years — and a pandemic — later, though, Garcia admitted that the state of things is different. “Yes, there was a small victory,” she said. “But it also came with backlash. Like, tremendous backlash. And then we got hit with COVID-19. And it became triage.” The union’s focus, Sheenae Shannon Marisol Garcia sits in her office at AEA headquarters in downtown Phoenix. she said, rightly turned to safety measures for teachers and students in 2020. That, in turn, inspired more backlash, from those opposed to masks in schools and other safety policies. Now, following years in AEA’s senior leadership as a board member and then vice president, Garcia has taken the helm. She hopes to bring a “totally different paradigm for how we’re going to fight back” to Arizona’s teachers union. If anyone has the chops to do so, it would be Garcia. She is a self-described “education kid.” Both her parents worked in the field. She spent a decade after college as a field organizer for political candidates in California before she, as she put it, “joined the family business.” Now 49, she has spent most of her career in public education. “I was like, I’m done with politics. I don’t want to orga- nize anymore. I just want to close my door and teach >> p 16 15 phoenixnewtimes.com | CONTENTS | FEEDBACK | OPINION | NEWS | FEATURE | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | FILM | CAFE | MUSIC | PHOENIX NEW TIMES SEPT 8TH–SEPT 14TH, 2022
