WE DON’T WANT to strike, but we will if we have to!

It’s a typical threat made by union organizers in the middle of contract negotiations, but this time, the threat carries serious weight. The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) #6–which represents roughly 2,000 janitors in the Seattle area–is currently enmeshed in some tough bargaining with several cleaning companies, who dispatch the janitors to local businesses. The existing collective-bargaining agreement ends on July 1.

When you think of janitors, you probably conjure up a very lonely image: a solitary cleaning person at 1:00 a.m., emptying out the office trash cans amid a vast grid of empty cubicles. SEIU #6, however, would rather you have a more topical picture in mind: the organized custodial strikes that other locals have recently staged in other cities. Last month, janitors struck in San Diego, suburban Chicago, and Los Angeles. Those strikes lasted from two to four weeks, and as cleaning companies caved, the union declared itself victorious each time.

Seattle’s custodians, who work everywhere from the Bank of America Building downtown to Microsoft’s Redmond campus (imagine the janitor-less buildup of shredded documents alone!), have a few basic demands: They want a $1-an-hour raise, as well as a reinstatement of the two weeks of vacation per year that they lost in the 1980s. Plus they want two more holidays off: Presidents’ Day and Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Local SEIU folks are campaigning hard on this contract, and sending media organizations thick informational packets asking why janitors are paid such crappy wages (they average $7.40 to $10.05 an hour) and get such meager benefits when the area’s economy is doing so well. Last week, the SEIU held a protest downtown at Westlake Center. Around 100 supporters showed up and delivered a mission statement to a variety of business owners who use janitors. Some of the business owners locked the protesters out; others welcomed them, announcing support for their goals.

SEIU organizer Ricardo Valadez is cautiously optimistic that his union will reach an agreement before a strike is necessary. “Most likely we will extend the [current] contract during negotiations if we still feel like we’re getting somewhere,” he says. “We are preparing for a strike, although both sides are trying to avoid it.”