By Rachel Brahinsky

CINTAS CORP. would like to be known as a successful company that came from small-town roots and made it big. During 74 years in business it has expanded from a Cincinnati rag-cleaning operation to the nation's largest uniform manufacturer and industrial laundry, serving Exxon, Chevron, Ford, and UPS, along with massive government agencies like the U.S. Postal Service.

In the past few years, though, an effort by workers and union organizers to shed light on some of Cintas's less flattering behavior has tarnished the company's image. Cintas spokesperson Wade Gates says the campaign, primarily by service workers union UNITE HERE, is being waged out of spite because Cintas refuses to sign a national contract.

But even a quick perusal of Cintas's record reveals serious problems that are hard to ignore – including efforts to undermine local living-wage laws and a systematic habit of billing customers for a mysterious "environmental charge" that may be bogus.

Why should you care? Cintas has eight facilities in the Bay Area and Sacramento and serves an estimated 300 to 400 businesses in San Francisco alone – from small garages, taquerias, and markets to behemoth companies like Hertz and Pacific Gas and Electric Co. It also has a uniform and cleaning contract with the federal Department of Veterans Affairs, which serves the San Francisco veterans hospital.

Less than two years ago Cintas agreed to a $14 million settlement in a lawsuit over the allegedly fraudulent charges, and although the company admitted no wrongdoing, the Postal Inspector General began an independent investigation into the allegations. In January the Justice Department stepped into the fray, investigating possible Cintas overcharges on contracts with other federal agencies, including the Pentagon. While Cintas's contract with the V.A., signed last year, initially included the environmental charge, it was later removed.

It's impossible to say how many other local contracts include such charges, but Gates told the Bay Guardian it's standard for the company, although since the settlement they more often call the fee a "service" charge, he said. According to Gates the fee is also common throughout the industry and pays for things like "fluctuating fuel costs and changes in requirements at local entities."

Even with all the scrutiny, there are questions about how vigorously the feds will go after Cintas, mainly because of its connections in Washington, D.C. Cintas board chair and founder Richard T. Farmer gives prodigiously to Republican candidates and was the country's third-largest political donor between 1999 and 2003, according to Mother Jones. Last year he was a Bush Ranger, one of the elite crew who pledged to raise at least $200,000 for George W. Bush's reelection.

According to Campaignmoneywatch.org, Bush has repaid Farmer's kindnesses. For example, after Farmer hosted a $1.7 million fundraiser for Bush in 2003, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed rules to "weaken federal safeguards for employees who handle toxin-soaked 'shop' towels." Cintas workers routinely collect and clean such towels for auto body shops and other businesses.

That's not Cintas's only environmental foible. In January the company agreed to a large settlement in Louisiana after being sued for allegedly dumping untreated wastewater – contaminated with oil, grease, and carbon-based chemicals – into the Baton Rouge sewage system, which discharges into the Mississippi River. Last year the Sierra Club accused another Cintas plant in Tampa, Fla., of similar activities.

Locally, other Cintas business practices have come into question. The company has sought to derail the living-wage ordinance in Hayward by saying that a municipality doesn't have the right to impose wage restrictions on an out-of-town company.

Cintas has generally been aggressive in its self-defense. Last year it sued a shareholder after he denounced what he called sweatshop conditions in its Haitian factories. The defamation suit was later dropped, and the company now says it plans to release annual reports about labor conditions at its overseas factories. Cintas also sued UNITE HERE, accusing the union of violating a federal license plate privacy act in its zeal to organize Pennsylvania Cintas workers.

Meanwhile, the company seems to be doing something right for the people at the top: it was just named one of the nation's "most admired companies" by Fortune Magazine for the fifth consecutive year. Fortune used various measures to make its selection, including long-term investment value and employee talent. It did not look into labor and pricing practices or environmental concerns.

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