CEDAR HOLLOW PARK — In a move labor experts are calling “unprecedented and frankly adorable,” the town’s scarecrows have unionized, filing a collective bargaining demand with the Harvest Festival Committee late Friday.
The Scarecrow Labor Alliance, Local 13, represents all 41 registered scarecrows in the municipal display program. Their demands include overtime pay for night shifts, a switch to organic straw, and what the union calls “an end to the indignity of the floppy hat.”
“We stand in fields from dawn to dusk, and then from dusk to dawn, because apparently the crows work nights now,” read the union’s statement, delivered by spokes-scarecrow Bartholomew, who stands at the corner of Elm and 4th. “We ask only for dignity, fair straw, and a hat with a brim that means business.”
The Town Responds
Festival coordinator Linda Cho, 51, said she was “blindsided but sympathetic.”
“I built half of these scarecrows with my own hands,” Cho said. “I gave Bartholomew a lovely corduroy jacket. And now this.”
Councilmember Doris Tran proposed a compromise: a Straw Quality Task Force, a modest night-shift stipend paid in buttons, and a town-wide Hat Dignity Audit scheduled for next spring.
“We take labor rights seriously,” Tran said. “Even when the laborers are stuffed with hay and cannot sign their own forms. Their representative signed with an X. It was very moving.”
Crows Unimpressed
The local crow population, reached for comment near the Miller Farm silo, declined to negotiate.
“The scarecrows can unionize all they want,” said one crow, through an interpreter. “We were never scared of them. The hats were the only thing holding the illusion together, and frankly, the floppy ones helped.”
Bargaining sessions begin Thursday. Bartholomew will attend. He has been promised a chair.
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