106 Strikers

A. Eligibility Households with striking members shall be ineligible to participate in the Food Assistance Program unless the household was eligible for benefits the day prior to the strike and is otherwise eligible at the time of application. However, such a household shall not receive an increased allotment as the result of a decrease in the income of the striking member(s) of the household. B. Lockouts If the union and the company disagree as to whether the work stoppage is a strike or lockout, the county department must ask the State Desk, FSD, who will obtain a determination from the Food and Nutrition Service. The sole fact that a struck company has applied for bankruptcy under Chapter 11 does not mean that the striker provisions no longer apply. C. Definition of a Striker For food assistance purposes, a striker shall be anyone involved in a strike or concerted stoppage of work by employees (including a stoppage by reason of the expiration of a collective- bargaining agreement) and any concerted slowdown or other concerted interruption of operations by employees. 1. Striker provisions apply to employees who participate in sympathy and support strikes. 2. All nonworking members of the bargaining unit which is on strike are strikers even if they are not members of the union and regardless of whether they are afraid to cross a picket line. 3. If a person gets another job while on strike but he/she does not resign from the struck company then the striker provisions continue to apply. 4. If the union calls off the strike and tells the strikers to go back to work and they do not, the strike provisions apply until they return to work or are fired or quit. 5. Striker provisions do not apply to self-employed persons such as independent long- distance truckers. The following individuals shall not be deemed to be strikers although they meet the above definition: Any employee affected by a lockout. Any individual who goes on strike but who is exempt from work registration, as noted in Section 701, the day prior to the strike, other than those exempt solely on the grounds that they are employed. D. Examples of Non-strikers 1. An employee whose workplace is closed by an employer in order to resist demands of employees. 2. An employee unable to work as a result of striking employees (e.g., truck drivers who are not working because striking newspaper pressmen prevent newspapers from being printed). a) An employee who is not a member of the bargaining unit and who is not participating in a sympathy or support strike but claim he/she is afraid to cross the picket line. b) The county department should primarily rely on the household’s allegations of fear. The county department may also use general knowledge of incidence of violence in past or present strikes to determine if a risk of personal injury or death exists. 3. A striker who cannot return to work as the employer/company has hired replacements. The fact that a company may offer these former employees other jobs would not affect their status as non-strikers. They must be able to return to the same jobs they left when the strike began in order to continue to be considered strikers. 4. Striker provisions no longer apply if: a) The company fires the employee while they are on strike. b) An employee officially resigns from his job while he is on strike. c) The company hires permanent replacements for the strikers. d) The company will not allow the strikers to return to their old jobs but offers them different ones. e) An employee was locked out by the company the day before the strike. f) The company lays off, furloughs, or otherwise notifies employees who are not part of the bargaining unit that no jobs are available because of the strike. g) A person was laid off when the strike began. E. Prestrike Eligibility Prestrike eligibility shall be determined by considering the day prior to the strike as the day of application and assuming the strike did not occur. 1. Eligibility at the time of application shall be determined by comparing the striking member’s income before the strike (as calculated above) to the striker’s current income and adding the higher of the two to the current income of non-striking members during the month of application. 2. To determine benefits and eligibility for households subject to the net income eligibility standard), deduction shall be calculated for the month of application as for any other household. Whether the striker’s prestrike earnings are used or his current income is used, the earnings deduction shall be allowed if appropriate. 3. Strikers whose households are eligible to participate shall be subject to the work registration requirements in Section 700 unless exempt in Section 701 the day of application.