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GREENBURGH, N.Y. -- Verizon filed an injunction against picketers of the Communication Workers of America, one of the unions supporting the strike that started Sunday and mobilized 45,000 Verizon employees from Rhode Island to Virginia.
The injunction, filed Thursday in the New York Supreme Court, is an attempt to restrict the picketing activities such as the one taking place daily in front of Verizon wireless store in Hartsdale.
Among other parameters, the injunction sets the distance picketers should remain from Verizon facilities, limits the numbers of picketers according to the number of employees at Verizon worksites, and determines that picketers should not engage in violence or vandalism.
One of the two objectives of the injunction is to ensure that services delivery does not suffer due to pickets, said John Bonomo, Verizon’s director of media relations for New York. The other is to guarantee people’s safety.
“We want to make sure no one gets hurt in this kind of situation,” he said, mentioning, as example, cases where picketers placed themselves in front of vehicles.
On Thursday, a Verizon courier delivered a copy of the injunction to the police stations of Elmsford and Greenburgh.
Greenburgh Chief of Police Joseph DeCarlo, however, said that the injunction will have little effect on the police actions.
“We will go by the law,” he said, but added that the company did well in keep the police informed and that so far pickets in the area have been peaceful.
The Communication Workers of America, on its side, released a statement calling the injunction “a shameless attempt to shut down our picket lines.”
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