‘It felt like a home. Now it feels like you’re going into a prison where they give you a three month stay and you’re out of there to the slums,’ said factory foreman Eddie Marrero.

By Kate Pastor

As if they didn’t have enough cluttering their minds, Stella D’oro’s union employees returned to work July 7, to find a mess at the West 237th factory, sources say, and immediately started cleaning it up.

After nearly a year on strike, and only one day after being told they could come back to work in a factory set to close in 90 days, some union members stayed late on their first day to try to restore some semblance of order, said Mike Filippou, a representative for Local 50 of the Bakery, Confectioners, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union.

“It was like a different factory,” he said, noting that the bathrooms were filthy and had broken doors, workers’ lockers were broken and had junk stacked on top of them. Eddie Marrrero, a foreman at the factory, said there was also damaged machinery and misplaced equipment.

“They had to call the plumber because all the toilets were clogged and filthy,” said Mr. Marrero, a worker there for 30 years.

“It felt like a home. Now it feels like you’re going into a prison where they give you a three month stay and you’re out of there to the slums,” he said.

The union and its lawyers are also trying to ward off a second more crucial mess facing the workers — Brynwood Partners’ decision to shut down the factory.

The union filed a National Labor Relations Board complaint against the company on Monday, claiming the unfair labor practice of threatening to close the factory in retaliation for the union going on strike.

“It’s runaway shop,” said Joyce Alston, president of Local 50. “Taking the product elsewhere to avoid the union.”

The NLRB has played a crucial role in the strike, ruling two weeks ago that Stella D’oro’s owners had negotiated in bad faith with the union.