La Mesa coffee shop workers walk out of work after month without pay

Thursday mornings at Public Square Coffee House in La mesa are supposed to be peak time.

But it’s been a week-and-a-half since Alex Lopez and his coworkers walked out because they weren’t getting paid.

“Out of almost, I think $5,000 of wages that I’m owed, I’ve only gotten, like $420,” he said. “My car decided to break down this month so now I have to pay that, and, I mean, financially, I’m struggling a little right now.”

Public Square’s owner, Aaron Henderson, did not respond to multiple requests for comment, but sent this message to employees:

Hey team,

Thank you for your honest and direct feedback. I completely understand, and to be candid, I would probably do the same, if I was in your shoes.

As I mentioned in the meeting, I totally support you guys in your decision to what is necessary for your own personal finances. No judgment at all, and again, I understand.

In the meantime, I assure you, we are not taking advantage of your good will, we truly don’t have the money. I wasn’t bullshitting in the meeting, we really do care and appreciate you all, and I feel terrible it’s come to this.

In full transparency, our entire family is owed tens of thousands of dollars in back pay. My personal house is currently in forbearance in order to avoid being foreclosed on. Once again, I know this is not your problem, and you have the right to not come to work until you’re caught up, but I assure, we honestly don’t have the money. We would pay you if we could In the meantime, from what money we have, I will get the few of you left caught up for the 15th. We will not be able to pay all of you in full on the 1st as requested, so l assume you will all not be coming into work this week. Our family will come in to cover, (working free of compensation), until we can afford to pay you all in full. Hopefully, we will have a solution this week, but there’s no guarantee of course. We will not be letting you go, and we will not replace you, but obviously we won’t be able to schedule you until we can afford to catch up on backpay.

Due to the uncertainty of it all, if some of you would like to get laid off in the meantime to qualify for Unemployment Insurance, we would be happy to do so. I don’t expect you to wait around.

Lastly, I’m a phone call away. If any of you need to talk, I’m here for you.

The Employee Rights Center is investigating the situation. Henderson has not been formally charged with wage theft.

“If they really were concerned about the employers or the legal consequences, at some point they would know way in advance of the paycheck that there’s no money,” said Alor Calderon, the center’s director. “So what would you have to do then? Stop the work.”

Calderon said this situation is a drop in the bucket and millions of dollars are being stolen across San Diego. He calls it a crisis across different industries too.

“Nurses, doctors, technicians, and labs have wage theft,” he said. “You would think, ‘oh,’ but no, this is really, truly across the board.”

He’s been helping workers for decades and said there’s a culture for people to keep quiet.

“Normally they go and hide and talk about it instead of thinking that there’s a process in which you should be able to resolve it because you did do the work.”

Calderon said to the countless other people who either already are or could be in the same boat: learn the ropes.

“You’ve got to get trained on how to deal with conflict at work before it happens,” he said. “The second thing that happens with that is that if you know a little bit what’s going on, you start documenting things that you know are important.”

Workers can take all of this to the Employee Rights Center, San Diego County’s Office of Labor Standards and Enforcement or even the labor commissioner for free help filing a wage theft claim.

San Diego County’s Office of Labor Standards and Enforcement also has a free database where you can check which businesses have wage theft judgements.