Activists link Vt. to sweatshops

Preventative bill awaits Douglas' signature

April 15, 2008  Rutland-Herald

By Daniel Barlow, Vermont Press Bureau

MONTPELIER — At least three companies that contract with the state of Vermont for clothes and other materials are linked to overseas sweatshops, according to human rights advocates.

Several U.S. companies that recently supplied the state with shoes, boots, uniforms and other work-related clothes have some of their materials made in factories where there are reports of forced overtime, poor ventilation, union busting and even death, activists said.

"It does appear that the state of Vermont contracts with companies that are linked to sweatshops," said Martin Cohn of Brattleboro, the owner of a public relations firm that conducted the research. "That means our taxpayer dollars are going to subsidize overseas sweatshops."

A bill promoted by a group of Brattleboro high school students that would prohibit the state from purchasing clothes from such companies has passed both legislative chambers and is scheduled to be signed into law by Gov. James Douglas.

Robin Orr, the director of internal services at the Vermont Department of Buildings and General Services, said the state never considered if its contractors are linked to sweatshops, but said she is taking this information seriously.

"If these allegations turn out to be true, we will not be contracting with these companies again in the future," she said Monday.

Once the sweatshop bill is signed into law, all contractors with Vermont will be required to show assurances that the materials don't have questionable origins. Orr said the state plans to put that into practice as soon as possible.

Cohn and members of SweatFree Communities, a nationwide organization that works with local communities and states to end taxpayer support for sweatshops, developed the information on questionable state contractors.

The most serious allegation in the research is focused on Bob Barker Co., a North Carolina business that supplies corrections uniforms. The company has been linked to a Bangladesh factory that caught fire in February 2006, killing 300 workers, apparently mostly teenage girls.

Forced overtime, seven-day work weeks, low wages and physical abuse have also been reported at that factory, according to anti-sweatshop groups. The company has denied any link to the Bangladesh factory.

Other contractors that activists consider questionable are Rocky Brands, Inc., which supplies boots and shoes, and Longhorn Screen Printing, which sells shirts for transportation agency workers.

Activists have linked Rocky Brands to alleged sweatshops in China, Mexico and Honduras, including one factory where thousands of workers went on strike in January claiming that the factory owners had embezzled their paychecks for the last six years.

"A lot of these companies try to deny that they are linked to sweatshops," said Liana Foxvog, the national organizer for SweatFree, who helped with the research into Vermont's contractors. "They really go out of their way not to take responsibility."

It is left up to local communities — towns, cities and states — to push for changes in how workers who make many of the clothes and other items enjoyed by Americans are manufactured, Foxvog said.

"It's the communities and the states that are making a difference now," she said.

Members of the Child Labor Education and Action project, a group formed in partnership with Brattleboro Union High School and the School for International Training, pushed the upcoming changes to the state's purchasing code of conduct through the Vermont Legislature this year.

Vermont would become the seventh state to enact such a law, following in the footsteps of Maine, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Illinois and California.

Contact Daniel Barlow at daniel.barlow@rutlandherald.com.

[Corrections/Clarifications: The research was conducted by SweatFree Communities, not by Martin Cohn. The Mexico and Honduras production facilities referenced produce for Dickies, a licensed brand of Rocky Brands. The facility producing for Rocky Brands where thousands of workers went on strike is located in China.]