BY ARIA SELIGMANN
Kali’s Cries, part 2
Labor, feminism issues erupt in local bookstore.
Last week, we reported on the labor dis-
putes occurring at Mother Kali’s. This is the
final part of that story, but the dispute con-
tinues.
W
hen Mother Kali’s most recently
unemployed staff started working
at the store and decided to union-
ize, they contacted former manager Tova
Stabin and her staff.
But Stabin and her staff had begged the
new staff not to take their jobs. “We thought it
would send a message to the board that we
were replaceable,” says Stabin. “We told
them we were pursuing the board still to ne-
gotiate with us and that if they did that, it
would be in direct conflict with getting our is-
sues addressed.”
Yet Teri Ciacchi, who came down from
Seattle to manage the store, Cheryl
RiversHailey, who stayed during the transi-
tion and Sandra Pasman, who’d come on just
as Stabin and her staff were leaving, say they
hoped unionizing would help that staff, too.
But Stabin says that’s impossible.
“Unionizing protected their jobs, not ours,”
she says.
Ciacchi had lived in Eugene before mov-
ing to Seattle. She had run Baba Yaga’s
women’s coffeeshop and was highly active in
the local community. When she found out
Mother Kali’s was hiring a new manager, she
was excited.
Ciacchi knew the situation “was a little
odd” and received information about disputes
after she accepted the manager position and
before she physically moved.
“But I had given my word to the board I
would take the job. And because I was arro-
gant and thought maybe the past staff didn’t
know enough, I thought I had enough skill
to turn the retail situation around,
enough managerial, conflict resolution
and mediation skills to see the per-
spective of both sides and help
reach some peaceful situation. I
thought, ‘I can take it on’ and my
friends were telling me ‘you
don’t want to.’”
Ciacchi left Mother Kali’s in
September ’03, wanting to turn
her salary back to the store as it
was struggling financially and
because she wasn’t happy. “I
wish I had known Tova and the
others well enough to trust them,”
she says. “I feel like I owe them the
biggest fucking apology. I had taken
their jobs.”
As for Mother Kali’s struggles,
Ciacchi saw the board and staff as a micro-
cosm where the “old school dykes, very sep-
aratist, very ’70s,” were at odds with younger
progressive women who embraced issues of
transgenderism — Why did you have to be a
biologically born woman with a womb to
serve on the board?; cultural appropriation —
why were a bunch of middle class, white
women operating a business under the name
of a Hindu goddess, anyway?; and labor.
“Those issues just kept getting over-
looked as if they were not important but they
were important enough to keep younger peo-
ple from getting involved and being a part of
Mother Kali’s,” says Ciacchi.
Could the store survive financially with-
out young women’s support? Ironplow says
many of the loyal customers are middle-aged
women who are more established and some
have money.
But the fallout from the Stabin debacle
was beyond the generation gap. Because two
former staffers had close ties with the UO’s
Women’s Studies Department, some profes-
sors felt they could no longer support the
store until its labor issues were resolved.
They quit ordering textbooks. So did many
others in different departments.
Textbook sales are two-thirds of Mother
Kali’s business.
Over the past year, the store has had to
have fund-raisers to stay afloat. Fall and win-
ter coursebook orders were down, and it
would have closed if not for the landlord for-
giving two month’s rent.
By the end of last year, the newest incar-
nation of the board, under president Kathleen
Kendrick, needed to make some quick deci-
sions to keep the store open. The board began
researching how other bookstores like
Mother Kali’s operated. According to
Kendrick, the model of one full-time man-
ager and one part-time employee seemed to
work successfully.
That’s what the board decided would
work for Mother Kali’s. Then in January, to
save money fast, three weeks before staff re-
ceived letters of termination, the board froze
health benefits.
understood how the health benefits worked.”
As of last week, the board told the most
recently terminated employees it will pay
their accrued benefits, when the store can af-
ford to.
Tiffany Haggmark, who stood on stage
protesting Mother Kali’s labor actions at Sam
Bond’s Feb. 4 union concert, is now out of the
union and volunteering in the store.
‘I wish I had known Tova and the others well enough to
trust them. I feel like I owe them the biggest fucking apology.’
—Teri Ciacchi
Health benefits at Mother Kali’s accrue at
the rate of $1 per each hour worked. The
money can be used at the employee’s discre-
tion, to pay a dentist’s bill or for an hour’s
massage, and is given to an employee only
when she asks for it.
The board says “it’s understood” that ben-
efits are only available if the store can afford
to pay them, but no one has yet revealed a
written document regarding this policy.
Kendrick says, “We acted compassion-
ately.”
When asked if she thought the board acted
compassionately in freezing benefits, she
hesitates slightly then says, “Yes.”
Ironplow says, “I don’t think the board
Why were a bunch of middle class, white women operating
a business under the name of a Hindu goddess, anyway?
“The board told us we will get our bene-
fits in the future and I trust that we will,” she
says. “If money is an issue, I’ll help the store
get money and maybe that’s a way to get our
benefits.”
Besides, she adds, nobody else at the store
knows how to do what she’s doing.
Still, many are looking to the board to re-
solve the dispute with the former staff, even
though none of the current board members
were involved then.
Former board member Ellen Rifkin says
the community participated in creating the
current situation at Mother Kali’s. “We pre-
ferred to speak of personality conflicts and
not of rights, responsibilities, power and pro-
cedures. No one even entertained the possi-
bility that in letting go of a manager and three
out of four staff members, the board might
have made a major personnel decision that
was actually contrary to the best interests of
Mother Kali’s, both as an inclusive commu-
nity space and as a business whose sales had
been improving until that point in a difficult
economic environment.”
She adds, “the staff has never received
restitution for their losses or even a fair
hearing by any of the subsequent
boards, though such a review has been
requested countless times in the past
16 months.”
ew
CORRECTIONS/
CLARIFICATIONS
f r o m p a r t 1
‘We acted compassionately’
—Mother Kali’s Board
President Kathleen Kendrick
Lorraine Ironplow and Barb
Ryan say the former staff was
“never fired,” but sent a letter
stating: So please understand
that if you walk off the job again,
we will fill your position(s) imme-
diately. If you decide that you do
not wish to work for Mother Kali’s
any longer, then please drop off
your keys and anything else that
belongs to the store that same day.
That being said, we hope that you
will stay and work with us in a posi-
tive and productive manner.
Ironplow says she never “called
her own meeting” to coincide with
the staff community meeting, but
that a community member asked
“that we listen to some staff proposals
instead of their having their meeting.”
The current board did not give
current past staff final letters of ter-
mination on Jan. 29, but merely
asked for their keys.
If you wish to add comment on
this story, please write a 250-word-
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editor@eugeneweekly.com
FEBRUARY 26, 2003 9