New York City Council condemns Hempstead laundry FDR Services Corp. 

The New York City Council has condemned the work conditions of a Hempstead-based industrial laundry that cleans contaminated linens of area hospitals and nursing homes.

The laundry, FDR Services Corp., was the subject of a resolution that passed Thursday unanimously, 47-0, with one abstention, according to Julia Agos, a council spokeswoman.

The resolution — which carries no tangible force but is a formal statement reflecting the opinion of the council — "calls on New York City health care institutions to contract with industrial laundry companies that respect workers' legal rights and adhere to area standards for wages and benefits."

Keith Luneburg, who is the company’s chief executive according to a business filing, said he hadn’t seen the resolution until Newsday texted a copy.

"No comments, no comments right now," Luneburg said Wednesday evening before hanging up. 

He didn't respond to a follow-up text message sent Sunday. 

Strife over pay, hours and working conditions of what were once called laundresses or washerwomen dates to the earliest days of the labor movement in the late 1800s and have involved attempts at unionization and strikes. The fights continued into the 20th century to the present.

The resolution, 598 of 2024, criticizes the company — one of about 45 industrial laundry companies in the metropolitan area, employing nearly 3,000 workers — for having "refused to enter into a collective bargaining agreement that matches area standards for its workers since their last contract expired in 2017."

The resolution says that FDR Services Corp. "repeatedly violated federal and state health, safety and labor laws." The company was fined in 2019 by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration "for five serious safety violations that could have resulted in death or serious harm," the resolution says. Also, 10 workers "were unlawfully fired and denied paid sick leave when they were ill with COVID-19," the resolution says. In that case, it continues, the company in 2021 "reached a settlement with the New York State Attorney General’s Office including $400,000 in backpay." The National Labor Relations Board also issued complaints against the company in 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2022, the resolution says.

A 2023 Newsday article reported that company employees, along with supportive lawmakers, rallied outside the facility, chanting "Shame on FDR," to allege sweatshop-like and rodent-infested conditions that included a lack of hot water and extreme heat. The workers said they'd been without a labor contract and health insurance for years.

A Newsday article in 2018 said the company had been eyed for tax breaks by Hempstead Town.

Megan Chambers, co-manager of the union — Laundry, Distribution and Food Service Joint Board, Workers United, SEIU — who represents the company’s 175 employees in the region, all at its Newmans Court facility in Hempstead, said the workers’ medical insurance was cut off more than eight years ago after FDR kept underpaying the insurance company.

Also, Chambers said, FDR has refused to agree to a contract matching what similar industrial laundry companies have signed.

She said the company handles health care laundry for institutions like hospitals and nursing homes in New York City, on Long Island and throughout the region.

"They’re handling laundry far dirtier than any type of household laundry, they’re dealing with product that may come in soaked in blood, there may be feces, other kinds of bodily fluids, various medical contaminants, the possibility of being exposed to hepatitis B in the workplace, so they are dealing with that kind of product, and handling it is unpleasant and difficult," Chambers said.

She added of the workers: "They deserve to be treated with a modicum of dignity and respect. They deserve to have proper benefits."

FDR’s average wage for someone who does the laundry, mostly women and immigrant workers, is around the minimum wage, she said: $16.50. Some are in the soil department or the wash room, and others work commercial ironing machines or in the packing department. 

The 2023 Newsday article quoted an employee describing difficult working conditions.

Through a Spanish translator, that worker, Estabana Morales, of West Hempstead, said she’d been there for 27 years folding clothes.

"It's too hot, very dirty," she said, "and the restrooms don't work."

By Matthew Chayes

matthew.chayes@newsday.comchayesmatthew

Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.