Those Who Rely on Services Feel Impact of Strike

Like many of the men and women who lined up Monday outside Department of Public Social Services offices in Los Angeles County, Thamar Moore was hungry.

The 31-year-old engineer said his unemployment benefits had run out, his family’s refrigerator was empty and he feared that striking county employees might interfere with his chances to obtain general relief.

“It looks like I’ll go hungry until they decide they want to go back to work,” said a frustrated Moore as he stood in front of the social services office near Grand Avenue and Adams Boulevard. “They’re happy, they got their paycheck. But what am I supposed to do?”

Francine Kindell, a striking eligibility worker, overheard him. Their ensuing conversation captured much of the sentiment of the day, before a tentative agreement in the county labor dispute was reached Monday evening.

“We’re happy?” Kindell repeated incredulously. “We wouldn’t be out here if we were happy, brother.”

Moore: “What about us common people?”

Kindell: “We’re just common people, too.”

Moore: “But we’re out on the street with nothing and we come here for you to help us.”

Kindell: “We’re only two steps away from that welfare line ourselves.”

And so on. Amid a chorus of honking horns and piercing whistles, welfare recipients and thousands of striking social workers waged a rhetorical battle for their piece of the county’s pie.

Some clients offered support, volunteering to grab a picket sign or shouting an occasional “Right on!”

“They work hard,” said Linda Graham, 30, who was seeking benefits at the Grand Avenue office. “Give it to them.”

But many welfare recipients, some of whom were turned away after long waits in the hot sun, viewed the strikers as a pampered class who were making demands that the less-fortunate could only dream about.

“They should just fire them all,” said Renel Conner, 39, a laid-off railroad worker who stood at the end of a long line outside the Echo Park office. “Hire somebody who’s going to do the job.”

Blanca Gardona, 21, seeking medical aid for her sick 1-year-old daughter, was among those whose hopes were dashed.

“I called Friday and they told me to come today and now they tell me to come back Wednesday,” she said. “It’s an emergency and they’re turning me away.”

Strikers, mindful that their absence might have created a temporary hardship for some desperate people, were hopeful that the welfare recipients would understand that their fates are somewhat intertwined.

“The eligibility workers see firsthand the misery these people have to live in, brought on by economic policies based on greed,” James Johnson, a union organizer, said in front of the Grand Avenue office. “They would love to be inside helping these folks, but they have to take a stand.”

Xenia Williams, an eligibility worker there, paused from her back-and-forth march in front of the doors.

“We are the sacrificial lambs for the system,” she said. “We are simply overworked.”

Then she returned to the circle, as her fellow strikers clanked aluminum cans and chanted: “They say cut back. We say fight back.”