tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4359131825214407112024-03-13T12:37:45.838-06:00Colorado Jobs with Justicescott-http://www.blogger.com/profile/03405336372560229662noreply@blogger.comBlogger109125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-7054180357605621492012-11-23T11:04:00.001-07:002012-11-23T11:31:06.679-07:00Walmart Workers & Supporters Can Claim a Victory This Black Friday<br />
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Today, Colorado Jobs with Justice activists joined almost 75 supporters of the Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart) associates. True to the Jobs with Justice model, these supporters came from labor, faith, community, and student-youth groups, marching, leafleting, and letting Walmart's customers and associates know that we all support OUR Walmart members' demands for dignity, fair wages, full-time work, and decent working conditions. For more photos, <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/72039732@N08/sets/72157632083328006/">click here</a>. </div>
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See below for a statement from the national Jobs with Justice on this historic day of action.</div>
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A Statement of Jobs with Justice</div>
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In a historic move, nearly a thousand actions have begun around the country as a part of a rolling series of walk-outs by Walmart’s store associates. The <a href="http://forrespect.org/">Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart)</a>, called for the strike after numerous unfair labor practices (ULPs) the company committed against worker and in protest of Walmart’s ongoing attempts to silence workers for speaking out for better jobs. This strike follow successful direct action by warehouse workers and seafood workers along the company’s vast supply chain.</div>
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In response, the company continued to make illegal threats to workers in the stores—even going so far as to file a <a href="http://www.jwj.org/blog/walmart-files-bogus-legal-complaint-quell-strikes">bogus ULP claim</a> with the National Labor Relations Board.</div>
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However, public support has been widespread, with many mobilizing to stores over the holidays to support workers who are walking out. Over $125,000 has already been raised for strike support. Jobs with Justice coalitions alone are responsible for mobilizing to over 50 store actions around the country.</div>
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This new movement of the Walmart 99% is only going to grow, and more rapidly each day. It has become clear that the company cannot deflect it forever. </div>
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The only solution is for Walmart to sit down with all of its workers, from factory to store, to collectively negotiate better conditions for the people the company depends on.</div>
Joe Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12249314681492592784noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-8821352083943020802012-08-08T17:04:00.000-06:002012-08-08T17:04:25.946-06:00Adelante! No Papers, No Fear, Ride for Justice<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Oe55bOno7jDmSuuV8xrwH2ii0cTpmrwNZqtcIGt8YK9ZsTwYk1ZTtH7KnA1-qJ0-EHKHLtmtTHYHAi8NxskhkmKdvsQcExzth1Rsb0ZzhypnbHsglpA2UvRflk_J00EacpQnnSjO_Rqs/s1600/JwJ+at+Rally.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Oe55bOno7jDmSuuV8xrwH2ii0cTpmrwNZqtcIGt8YK9ZsTwYk1ZTtH7KnA1-qJ0-EHKHLtmtTHYHAi8NxskhkmKdvsQcExzth1Rsb0ZzhypnbHsglpA2UvRflk_J00EacpQnnSjO_Rqs/s320/JwJ+at+Rally.jpg" width="213" /></a><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Last week the No Papers, No Fear Ride for Justice took off for a six week tour of the South. They are stopping in local communities to share challenges undocumented immigrants face </span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">and are organ</span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">izing</span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">actions </span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">that </span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">confronts fear and builds community. Colorado Jobs with Justice, along with many other organizations, welcome the riders on their first stop in Denver. For two days, riders and local community leaders sha</span></span><span style="line-height: 21px;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">red stories, engaged in strategy sessions and shared laughter over meals.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"></span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Coloradans face their own "show me your papers" SB90 which has been in effect since 2006. <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://afsc.org/sites/afsc.civicactions.net/files/documents/SB90%20pamphlet.pdf">SB90</a></span> has kept communities under attack and has added more</span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> family and friends into ICE's deportation dragnet. Local leaders shared stories of courage, their commitment to organizing, and the need to overturn SB90 at a rally on the capitol steps.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">"When we are made fearful and divided, whether it is in the workplace or in the community, that is when we become vulnerable to exploitation." Said Joe Thomas of Colorado Jobs with Justice, "But when are organize we shed our fears and become powerful."</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">This week the riders are in New Orleans meeting with day laborers, civil rights leaders, and to support <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://org2.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=YxknFNm%2BgJDdFnoa9cty2DbfPFA7lJZj" title="http://org2.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=YxknFNm%2BgJDdFnoa9cty2DbfPFA7lJZj">the Southern 32</a></span></span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"></span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> in their effort to stop their deportation.</span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> The Southern 32 is </span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">a group of immigrant labor organizers and civil rights defenders currently in deportation proceedings for having the courage to stand up for their rights and is another demonstration that we are stronger when we are organized. Another great example of the courage power that comes from organizing for dignity and respect.</span></span><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> The riders take with them the strength, encouragement, and the stories of the lives they are now connected to all the way their last stop, Charlotte, North Carolina. Adelante! </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Every day we are posting to <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/UndocuBus">Facebook</a></span>, <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="https://twitter.com/undocubus">Twitter</a></span>, and to the blog: <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://nopapersnofear.org/">http://nopapersnofear.org</a></span> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>Joe Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12249314681492592784noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-62050145643875375122012-03-22T19:49:00.008-06:002012-03-22T20:23:57.807-06:00Jobs with Justice & Allies Confront Corporate Power<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkIQYEgcM81wKJ_TmIGPMbkY0bzVHiUsZit4GoOkRWG0OXFK864fE8ZGVuuYx_A3Jpz9dX9c70Udt_nU34n0LPGf68BIH_K72EAL87LGE8V_jgV2HFQxudLOxnojcVGMUxcKsS17AJ-RE/s1600/Banner.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkIQYEgcM81wKJ_TmIGPMbkY0bzVHiUsZit4GoOkRWG0OXFK864fE8ZGVuuYx_A3Jpz9dX9c70Udt_nU34n0LPGf68BIH_K72EAL87LGE8V_jgV2HFQxudLOxnojcVGMUxcKsS17AJ-RE/s400/Banner.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5722904954183150770" border="0" /></a>Today, Colorado Jobs with Justice joined the Denver Area Labor Federation, SEIU, UFCW, and CWA in confronting corporate power. With all of the national conversation around income inequality, we wanted to be clear: The massive and growing gap between the rich and the rest of us is not an accident. It's not the inevitable result of mysterious market forces. It's about corporate bad actors and greedy corporate executives deliberately driving down wages and benefits for their workers so that they can take home ever more massive profits and executive paychecks.<div><br /></div><div><span style=";font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjg5w7pfLHvtk4BTLbfm1TZ4txunBIf_w3_elA9MRamrtlrjtgSOoALN6_xSge8P3_QhhK9WJg86mladQIJVysRZIm5uaa4CvYQIT6xwNYqxfGXFfBbIVYIA-4WRybH0SbkUDwUdw8lMS0/s1600/Crowd+%2526+Placard.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjg5w7pfLHvtk4BTLbfm1TZ4txunBIf_w3_elA9MRamrtlrjtgSOoALN6_xSge8P3_QhhK9WJg86mladQIJVysRZIm5uaa4CvYQIT6xwNYqxfGXFfBbIVYIA-4WRybH0SbkUDwUdw8lMS0/s400/Crowd+%2526+Placard.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5722908835832835426" border="0" /></a><span style=";font-size:100%;" >From CWA District 7, Jay Boyle told the crowd of fifty labor and community activists about how</span><span style=";font-size:100%;" > Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam took home more than $20 million last year, and their retired CEO gets a pension of millions a year -- while Verizon is demanding to gut pensions for its workers. </span><span style=";font-size:100%;" >The crowd all made phone calls to CEO Lowell McAdam's voicemail, just to brighten his day. Then the UFCW's Mark Belkin spoke about efforts at organizing with Walmart associates, as well as a strike at Buckley Air Force Base, where eight barbers have struck at their location of a nationwide chain of barbershops.<br /><br /><br /></span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXnmjyPJtBtT62IfH6uDlzxu0IJrBgNnmbifPxDwf2Rh4EatpMvvlUpQgigVM_-6urHgLjaQUPxMSlcOHj7aJmqoXwWQIABqzHG7MJjrMJIU3YiCzyyTCg2N7qnsT06VrJVcT-gpRhjvc/s1600/Mobile+Billboard.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXnmjyPJtBtT62IfH6uDlzxu0IJrBgNnmbifPxDwf2Rh4EatpMvvlUpQgigVM_-6urHgLjaQUPxMSlcOHj7aJmqoXwWQIABqzHG7MJjrMJIU3YiCzyyTCg2N7qnsT06VrJVcT-gpRhjvc/s400/Mobile+Billboard.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5722909996006250514" border="0" /></a><span style=";font-size:100%;" >Walmart will be opening new stores in Denver and </span><span style=" ;font-size:100%;" >across Colorado in the coming year, and UFCW and Jobs with Justice will be there to stand up to their greed. Last but certainly not least, we heard from Celia, a proud SEIU 105 member and janitor, who -- along with her sisters and brothers at Local 105 -- are fighting for a fair contract this year. The cleaning companies and the property owners of the building 105's members clean are making huge profits -- again -- and again they want to work their employees even harder for too little pay.</span></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Thanks to all those who joined us today, but this is only the beginning of these campaigns. With Walmart expanding, Walmart associates organizing under the banner of OUR Walmart (Organization United for Respect at Walmart), CenturyLink looking to follow in Verizon's footsteps in attacking CWA members hard-earned middle-class jobs, and SEIU's Justice for Janitors campaign officially launching in April, there will be many opportunities to be there, standing up for workers and against corporate greed! See you next time!</div>scott-http://www.blogger.com/profile/03405336372560229662noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-90222019806244945452011-12-12T15:23:00.007-07:002011-12-12T15:56:12.203-07:00Jobs with Justice Rallies to Support Verizon Workers<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6avoFwGcUfnoq6w4JTKJJO2AsoBvp78MxtRfSee-0FKhgEQLhi8Ao_uAIg8fPTwmVUEUV-MC3_bWEiEIQ0QQ_Pu6Li90-azq6ympOmDQrb5SdIXG9btQpl3yiwXCyxIXRR22h1ls0ON8/s1600/IMG_2090.JPG"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6avoFwGcUfnoq6w4JTKJJO2AsoBvp78MxtRfSee-0FKhgEQLhi8Ao_uAIg8fPTwmVUEUV-MC3_bWEiEIQ0QQ_Pu6Li90-azq6ympOmDQrb5SdIXG9btQpl3yiwXCyxIXRR22h1ls0ON8/s400/IMG_2090.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5685372734171894802" border="0" /></a>This past Saturday, December 10th, more than forty activists from Colorado Jobs with Justice rallied to tell Verizon to bargain fairly with its workers. All across the East Coast, forty five thousand CWA and IBEW members are trying to hold on to middle class jobs, but the massively-profitable Verizon wants to cut starting pay, force retirees to pay up to $6,000 a year for healthcare they've already earned, make it easier to outsource jobs, and cut pensions. Jobs with Justice coalitions across the country have been taking action in solidarity.<br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghkSoQ2toluGFketuJNG_xT23q_1ncYW1ofBNvA8x0vKzclMvFkV08zGjZcukJlcdXDHeBIFSibyATf0lK3Q3hGtkMV-sVBH-NGSUP1BC9QJUxS74X4s_WX50bl_X6jigoq86Wd-lAdzU/s1600/IMG_2123.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghkSoQ2toluGFketuJNG_xT23q_1ncYW1ofBNvA8x0vKzclMvFkV08zGjZcukJlcdXDHeBIFSibyATf0lK3Q3hGtkMV-sVBH-NGSUP1BC9QJUxS74X4s_WX50bl_X6jigoq86Wd-lAdzU/s320/IMG_2123.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5685374190888684898" border="0" /></a>Here in Denver, in front of the Verizon Wireless store on the 16th Street Mall, the gathered crowd heard from Mary Taylor, Vice President of District 7 for CWA, Brother David Garner of Interfaith Worker Justice, and Seth Donovan, Co-Chair for Colorado Jobs with Justice. Mary Taylor said CWA is "proud of the fact that [we've] worked hard to make sure our member have stable middle-class jobs. . .what Verizon is doing is not just an attack on its own workers, but an attack on working people across the country." Brother David Garner emphasized that this struggle "must be seen in a moral context" because "we believe in people over profits. . .but profits over people is in the corporate DNA."<br /><br /><br />Last but not least, Seth Donovan from Jobs with Justice spoke to why JwJ turned out for our sisters and brothers at Verizon: We all took the Be There Pledge to show up for others' fights as well as our own, to stand against corporate greed and for workers' rights, and Jobs with Justice promised to show up to support Verizon workers. Thanks to everyone who showed up to help us keep that promise!<br /><br />For more pictures from the rally, go <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/72039732@N08/?saved=1">here</a>.<br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEi6ZhKtF0hUImSOBLZFJ1EbORVDxaZFTLeAqRcAOW-uG67JQKlqNeLJTcqRFr_4WPti5JkQNpmuM1Ekwj4QoQWaTWPy1xPM_GhZVeRZ5aKaRaTPkJaSwnRNSRm6k81sHjUMV_sSRU39w/s1600/IMG_2092.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEi6ZhKtF0hUImSOBLZFJ1EbORVDxaZFTLeAqRcAOW-uG67JQKlqNeLJTcqRFr_4WPti5JkQNpmuM1Ekwj4QoQWaTWPy1xPM_GhZVeRZ5aKaRaTPkJaSwnRNSRm6k81sHjUMV_sSRU39w/s400/IMG_2092.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5685375399334647762" border="0" /></a>scott-http://www.blogger.com/profile/03405336372560229662noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-45273424139070834182011-06-07T16:59:00.001-06:002011-06-07T17:47:53.247-06:00Time to stand up for Jeanette Vizguerra<div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; clear: left; float: left; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">by David Garner</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;">posted orginally at <a href="http://www.examiner.com/community-activism-in-denver/the-third-kind-of-lie">examiner.com</a></span></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Jeanette Vizguerra, a Colorado leader and mother of four, faces what may be her final court date on July 13. She faces deportation as an undocumented alien. Jeanette has lived in Colorado for over 14 years. She has 3 small children who are all US citizens</span></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><a href="http://www.examiner.com/sites/default/files/styles/image_full_width/hash/Standing%20Tall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.examiner.com/sites/default/files/styles/image_full_width/hash/Standing%20Tall.jpg" width="292" /></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">During her time in Colorado, she started a small business with her husband and has given selflessly as a community activist. She worked for SEIU as a labor organizer and currently volunteers at her children’s schools. She is part of the the Aurora Neighborhood Watch Program, and Rights for All People. During the time she was doing all of this, her husband was diagnosed with cancer and the family incurred over twenty eight thousand dollars in medical bills. By working sometimes as many as three jobs at one time, this debt was retired. Not one dime of tax payer money went toward helping the family because, in Jeanette’s words, “It wouldn’t have been right.” In any other situation, and most any other country, all of this would have qualified Jeanette for a Citizen of the Year award. But not in our community and not in this country at this time in our nation’ history.</span></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Jeanette’s story exemplifies our broken immigration system in which mothers, fathers, students, and workers are criminalized for minor violations. In her case, it was a matter of an expired emissions sticker. When she was pulled over, the first question asked was “Are you in this country illegally?” With that traffic stop, she entered the criminal justice system and became a statistic.</span></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">In testifying before the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary on March 9 of this year, Secretary of Interior Janet Napolitano said the following: “Likeour actions at the border, our interior enforcement efforts are achieving major results. In Fiscal Years 2009 and 2010, ICE removed more illegal immigrants from our country than ever before, with more than 779,000 removals nationwide in the last two years. Most importantly, more than half of those aliens removed last year – upwards of 195,000 – were convicted criminals, the most ever removed from our country in a single year.”There is a good chance that Jeanette Vizguerra will join that number.</span></div><div style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font: inherit; line-height: 19px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Mark Twain once wrote that “there are three kinds of lies: plain lies, damned lies and statistics.” Our immigration policy is based upon the third kind of lie. It is time we change that. There will be a demonstration prior to Jeanette’s court appearance. It will be at 7:30Am in front of the federal court building at 17th and Welton in downtown Denver. It is your chance to help in this change.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><span style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font-size: 14px; font: inherit; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 21px;"><i>Br. David received his doctorate in religious studies from Emerson Theological Institute. Dr. Garner also holds an MBA from Fairleigh Dickinson University and a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Denver. Br. David is a member of the Interfaith Worker Justice Council of Colorado and serves on the Steering Committee of the Abrahamic Initiative here in Denver. He was recently recognized by the Denver Area Chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement for his commitment to the community and to the Latino Movement. Author, teacher and social activist , he is currently Abbot of St. Dunstan's Benedictine Abbey in Denver, Colorado.</i></span></span></span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-47191488531960328882011-06-03T15:15:00.002-06:002011-06-03T15:15:52.842-06:00Regis University Ends Relationship with Sodexoby Victoria Harris<br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">After a student and faculty campaign to raise awareness about Sodexo’s practices, Regis has ended its relationship with Sodexo.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Students on campus were concerned that they weren’t getting what they were paying for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Regis students described the campaign “ 'I Love Sodexo Workers’<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>as an effort to bring awareness to the fact that Sodexo, one of the biggest food service providers for college campuses here in the US, and also at Regis, has been accused of paying poverty wages, cutting hours, and offering its employees unaffordable health insurance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Meanwhile students are paying high prices for low quality food, and contributing their money to a corporation that mistreats its employees. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The purpose of the campaign is that we want to show Sodexo workers that we appreciate them, but find that Sodexo as a company does not fit in with the Regis motto of 'How Ought We to Live?"<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Students wore purple on campus to show support for workers rights and to send a message to Sodexo management and university decision makers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Students also filled out hundreds of comment cards, reflecting on the poor quality of food and their continuing support of the workers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>"The workers are the only reason why I still eat at Sodexo. The food is AWFUL! But the workers try to make your eating experiences better,” said one Regis student. Another student comments, “<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">"The workers here deserve better. We are a Jesuit University, let's start acting like one!"<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In a speech to classmates in the Sodexo dining hall, Jon Denzler stated, “Workers have a right to organize, have decent pay, and affordable health care benefits. We think at Regis University, as a Jesuit School, when we ask “How Ought We to Live?” maybe our campus food providers should fit into that model as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We also think that whoever the food service provider is, the workers should be hired back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These aren’t just workers, they are our friends.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The new food service provider, Bon Apetit, will be on campus beginning in July.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-1869567562851091602011-05-27T16:27:00.000-06:002011-05-27T16:27:06.365-06:00<div class="post-headline" style="color: #003366; font-family: arial, 'helvetica sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;"><h2 style="font-size: 28px; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/2011/05/build-power-fight-back-win/" rel="bookmark" style="color: #336699; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" title="Permanent Link to Build Power. Fight Back. Win!">Build Power. Fight Back. Win!</a></h2></div><div class="post-byline" style="color: #003366; font-family: arial, 'helvetica sans-serif'; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 5px;">By <a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/author/admin/" style="color: #336699; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" title="Posts by jwjnational">jwjnational</a>, on May 26th, 2011</div><div class="post-bodycopy clearfix" style="color: #003366; display: block; font-family: arial, 'helvetica sans-serif'; font-size: 12px; min-width: 0px;"><a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/2011/05/build-power-fight-back-win/" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="newsmall" class="attachment-post-thumbnail wp-post-image" height="150" src="http://www.jwjblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/newsmall-150x150.gif" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-image: none; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-style: initial; border-top-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-width: 0px; float: left; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="newsmall" width="150" /></a><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><strong><a href="https://afl.salsalabs.com/o/4023/c/33/p/salsa/event/common/public/?event_KEY=1412" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="alignright size-full wp-image-3649" height="300" src="http://www.jwjblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/newsmall.gif" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-bottom-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-top-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 0px; float: right; height: auto; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 10px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 10px; max-width: 96%; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="newsmall" width="300" /></a><a href="http://www.jwj.org/conference/index.html" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">JOBS WITH JUSTICE NATIONAL CONFERENCE</a> AUGUST 5-7, 2011 IN WASHINGTON, DC</strong></div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Corporations want to use the failing economy as an excuse to reverse every worker protection put in place over the last century, but we are standing together and fighting back!</div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Come to the Jobs with Justice conference to learn from and strategize with labor leaders, rank & file workers, students, religious leaders, community activists, workers excluded from labor law protection, and many, many more about how to <strong>build a powerful movement of working people to defeat the corporate agenda!</strong> Join us as we explore:</div><li>Establishing a new framework for collective bargaining rights in the 21st century</li><br />
<li>Building a new economy that supports full & fair employment</li><br />
<li>From the Middle East to the Midwest, building a culture of resistance – what’s next?</li><br />
<li>Defending, promoting, & expanding collective bargaining rights</li><br />
<li>Defeating attacks that divide workers by turning the tide on immigration criminalization & enforcement</li><br />
<li>Forging successful coalitions to defeat the corporate attack on working people</li><br />
<li>Kickoff to the Jobs with Justice 25th Anniversary Celebration</li><br />
<div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="https://afl.salsalabs.com/o/4023/c/33/p/salsa/event/common/public/?event_KEY=1412" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;"><strong>REGISTER NOW!</strong></a><strong> </strong>Early bird rates in effect until June 24th.</div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><strong><a href="http://www.jwj.org/conference/program.html" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;">HIGHLIGHTS OF</a></strong></div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><strong><a href="http://www.jwj.org/conference/program.html" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;">Continue reading </a><a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/2011/05/build-power-fight-back-win/" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;">Build Power. Fight Back. Win!</a></strong></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-48096332551539614002011-05-16T17:34:00.000-06:002011-05-16T17:34:34.778-06:00After Three Years, Reynolds Agrees to Meet with Tobacco Workers | AFL-CIO NOW BLOG<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; "><table style="width: 530px; "><tbody><tr><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; width: 480px; "><h2 style="font-family: 'Arial Black', Impact, Arial, serif; font-size: 22px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); margin-top: 3px; letter-spacing: -1px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0px; ">After Three Years, Reynolds Agrees to Meet with Tobacco Workers</h2><div style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); height: 10px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); ">by <a href="http://blog.aflcio.org/?page_id=289" style="color: rgb(221, 0, 17); text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal; ">James Parks</a>, May 15, 2011</span></div></td><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; width: 130px; "><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" width="22" align="left"><tbody><tr><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "><img title="Photo credit: Jeremy Sprinkle" src="http://blog.aflcio.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/marchingpastraibetter_wp.jpg" border="1" alt="Photo credit: Jeremy Sprinkle" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 10px; " /></td><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" width="100%" align="left" style="height: 24px; "><tbody><tr><td width="10" style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </td><td width="250" style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; font-weight: bold; ">Tobacco workers march in front of Reynolds American headquarters last week.</td><td width="10" style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </td></tr></tbody></table></td><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </td></tr><tr><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </td><td style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); vertical-align: top; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; "> </td></tr></tbody></table><p style="font-size: 13px; margin-top: 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; ">In a major turnaround, officials of Reynolds American, who have refused for three years to meet with representatives of tobacco workers, agreed last week to look into the labor practices in their supply chain and work with other parties, including the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (<a href="http://supportfloc.org/default.aspx" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(221, 0, 17); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; ">FLOC</a>) to ensure they are not complicit with human rights violations.</p><p style="font-size: 13px; margin-top: 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; ">More than 50 FLOC members entered the<a href="http://blog.aflcio.org/2011/05/05/study-tobacco-workers-face-brutal-conditions-in-tobacco-fields" style="color: rgb(221, 0, 17); text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; ">Reynolds American shareholders’ meeting last week </a>in Winston-Salem, N.C., to deliver a report on the horrible conditions in the fields. Nearly 100,000 immigrant tobacco workers in North Carolina are paid sub-minimum wages and are exposed to dangerous conditions in the fields.</p></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, verdana, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; ">The FLOC representatives pressed company executives to ensure that this new stance is more than just words and is backed up with serious action, including meeting with farmworkers and their representatives. No date for a meeting has yet been set.</span></div><div><br /></div><div>Continue reading <a href="http://blog.aflcio.org/2011/05/15/after-three-years-reynolds-agrees-to-meet-with-tobacco-workers/">After Three Years, Reynolds Agrees to Meet with Tobacco Workers | AFL-CIO NOW BLOG</a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-3246926290698243892011-05-14T16:33:00.014-06:002011-05-15T19:00:43.750-06:00BREAKING NEWS: The National Labor Relations Board Doing Its Job: GOP Upset<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">by</span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black;"> </span></span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://www.twitter.com/russellbannan">Russell Bannan</a></span></span></span></span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The National Labor Relations Board filed a</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://www.nlrb.gov/sites/default/files/documents/443/cpt_19-ca-032431_boeing__4-20-2011_complaint_and_not_hrg.pdf">complaint</a></span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">against Boeing for violating sections of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). In its complaint, the board said that Boeing’s decision to move a production line to South Carolina was illegal retaliation against union workers for a previous strike and would discourage employees from striking again in the future (</span></span><span style="color: black;">employees went out on a 58-day strike in 2008 over a contract dispute).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The board explained that Boeing officials had clearly, in both interoffice communications and in a news interview, stated that the move to South Carolina was to avoid potential work stoppages. According to the NLRA, i</span></span><span style="color: black;">t is illegal for employers to retaliate against workers for striking or for<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span">engaging in protected concerted activity.</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The GOP quickly began defending the corporation by verbally attacking the board for holding Boeing accountable to the law. South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley stated several times that the board is “bullying” employers. </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">“</span></span><strong><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">The administration, I believe, is acting like thugs that you might see in a third-world country, trying to bully and intimidate employers,” stated Senator Jim Demint (dictionary.com defines “bully” as “a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates”).<u1:p></u1:p></span></strong><span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><strong><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal;">Also now Senator Lindsey Graham is threatening to defund the NLRB. Why? He doesn’t agree with the board’s complaint against Boeing. Sen. Graham’s threat to defund the board would be like someone threatening to defund the Supreme Court because they did not agree with a decision made. South Carolina politicians have a history of staging flamboyant political theatre when they do not get their way.<sup>1</sup><u1:p></u1:p></span></strong><span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The GOP’s recent bullying has made one thing crystal clear: they will stand to defend corporations; not working people.<u1:p></u1:p></span></span><span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><u1:p></u1:p><sup><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;">1</span></sup></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"> </span></span><strong><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt; font-weight: normal;">Senator Strom Thurmond</span></i></strong><span class="apple-converted-space"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"> </span></i></span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;">has the record for the longest</span></i></span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-converted-space"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"> </span></i></span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;">filibuster, speaking for 24 hours and 18 minutes in a failed effort to stop the</span></i></span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-converted-space"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"> </span></i></span><span class="yiv1442872848apple-style-span"><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;">Civil Rights Act of 1957. More recently Joe Wilson continued the tradition by yelling “You Lie!” at President Obama.</span></i></span><span style="color: black; font-size: 13pt;"><br />
</span><i><span style="color: black; font-size: 10pt;"><br />
</span></i><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The title for this article came from the Mario Solis-Marich show in the interview below.</span></span></span><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
<a href="http://goo.gl/kXPnU"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: blue; text-decoration: none;">Listen to AM 760's Mario Solis-Marich interview with Russell Bannan about the GOP's attack on the NLRB</span></span></a></span><o:p></o:p></span></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-46529709236488244812011-05-11T17:50:00.000-06:002011-05-13T14:31:43.177-06:00Wisconsin: The Implications<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">by <a href="http://www.twitter.com/russellbannan">Russell Bannan</a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">originally published in the Colorado Labor Advocate</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Wisconsin public sector unions face a sobering truth after nine weeks of over 100,000 activists in the streets --- no contracts.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Wisconsin Republicans with the leadership of Governor Scott Walker railroaded through the “budget repair” bill on March 9, which will strip many public sector unions of almost all of their collective bargaining rights. Although it is currently tied up in the legal process many expect the bill to eventually take effect.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">This may seem like a statement we should be depressed about, but it is not. It is a statement we should be proud of. Out of the nine week struggle came forth a realization that all of us, together, must fight back. Out of the nine week struggle rose up unprecedented solidarity across the country speaking out loud enough that a sleeping giant awoke---the labor movement.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The implications of what has already taken place in Wisconsin are now being felt across the country. Governors are using the budget crisis to justify cutting resources to public programs and blaming teachers, firefighters, and nurses who exercise their right to collectively speak together to advocate for safety and economic democracy as the problem. Why? Politicians receive financial contributions from the same individuals and corporations that are not contributing to the community by paying their fair share in taxes.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Dennis Kucinich, U.S. representative from Ohio, stated it best at a rally in Wisconsin:</div><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">This attack on our workers, this attack in Washington on working people that results in wealth being accelerated to the top, that results in tax cuts going to the rich, that results in energy policy turned over to the oil companies, that results in defense policy turned over to the arms manufacturers, that results in endless war, that results in the National security State, it's all a part of the same thing, and it's up to us to FIGHT BACK!</span></blockquote><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">So now working people are being asked to bear the budget on their backs. The question is: Will we?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-24336199492576455192011-05-09T15:02:00.000-06:002011-05-09T15:02:34.350-06:00Letter sent by British Ambassador Nigel Sheinwald to Joslyn Williams, President of the Metropolitan Washington Council of the AFL-CIO.<span style="font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.docstoc.com/docs/79154313/BAT-actions-Ambassador-Letter-to-Mr--Williams-AFL-CIO-5-4-11pdf">BAT actions Ambassador Letter to Mr Williams AFL-CIO 5 4 11.pdf</a></span><br />
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<tr><td colspan="1" rowspan="1" style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; width: 783px;" valign="top"><div class="MS_WH_ZoneContent" style="overflow-x: hidden; padding-bottom: 3px; padding-left: 3px; padding-right: 3px; padding-top: 3px;"><div align="left"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;">CONTACTS: FLOC: Briana Connors, 763-229-5970<br />
Oxfam America: Patrick Scully, 617-678-9098</span></div><div> </div><div align="center"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: medium;"><strong>SEVERE HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES PERSIST IN NC TOBACCO FIELD,<br />
NEW STUDY BY OXFAM AMERICA & FLOC REVEALS<br />
Manufacturers Urged to Pursue Industry-Wide Solutions</strong></span></div><div align="center"> <span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;"><a href="http://supportfloc.org/Documents/FLOC%20report%20toplines-US%20Final.pdf"><div align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><em>Download the Executive Summary (PDF)</em></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div></a></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;"><em>Winston Salem, NC –</em>The men and women who arrive in North Carolina each summer to tend and harvest the state’s economically critical tobacco crop are often repaid for their hard journey and work with subminimum wages, needlessly dangerous conditions in the fields, and inhumane living conditions. These are among the <a href="http://supportfloc.org/Documents/FLOC%20report%20toplines-US%20Final.pdf">findings released today</a> from a forthcoming, in-depth human rights assessment conducted by Oxfam America and the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO (FLOC).That assessment, “A State of Fear: Human rights abuses in North Carolina’s tobacco industry,” will be published in full this summer.</span></div><div> </div><div><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;">Oxfam and FLOC released their summary of findings, together with recommendations for correcting abuses in the industry, on the eve of the annual shareholders’ meeting of Reynolds American International (RAI). RAI is one of the major tobacco manufacturers whose profits are based on the abusive system they created and control. Those abuses were documented during the last growing season and harvest by researchers who conducted over 100 one-on-one interviews with farm workers, and with growers, tobacco manufacturers and the governmental and nongovernmental agencies mandated to protect and serve the workers’ needs.</span></div><div> </div><div><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;">“This research reveals an industry that systematically exploits farm workers’ fears of arrest and deportation to deprive them of their basic, internationally recognized human rights,” said Minor Sinclair, Director of Oxfam America’s U. S. Regional Office, which oversaw the adaptation and execution of the international research model used for this study. ”These stunning findings should be a wake-up call to everyone attending the RAI shareholders’ meeting. Do they really want to be a part of system that perpetuates these inhumane conditions? We hope the people who can truly influence RAI will review this meticulously documented, first-hand research and take the suggested actions contained in the report. Nothing less is acceptable,” he said.</span></div><div> </div><div><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;">Among the findings highlighted in the summary released today are:</span></div><div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;"><br />
• One-fourth of workers reported being paid less than the federal minimum of $7.25 per hour.<br />
• Most of the workers interviewed suffer regularly from symptoms of “green tobacco sickness” (GTS) including dizziness, vomiting, weakness, coughing, nosebleeds, and headaches. GTS is caused by excessive absorption of nicotine through the skin and can be prevented by use of gloves and other protective clothing.<br />
• Heat stroke is the leading cause of work-related death among farm workers, and many workers reported a lack of clean water or sufficient breaks to protect themselves from dehydration.<br />
• Nearly all who lived in employer-provided housing described inadequate or non-working showers and toilets, overcrowding, leaky roofs, beds with mattresses that were worn out or missing, insect and rodent infestations, and lacking or inadequate cooking and laundry facilities.<br />
• Growers who were interviewed said that changes in the industry have left them with little or no profit margin and no way to negotiate for better prices that would enable them to offer more to their workers.<br />
The report concludes with these recommendations:<br />
• Manufacturers must ensure respect for international human rights just as strictly as they ensure the quality and quantity of tobacco from their growers.<br />
• Industry leaders should create a council that brings together manufacturers, growers, farm workers, and their chosen representative, allowing all parties to have a voice and creating an effective tool for workers to ensure legal compliance in the workplace.<br />
• Manufacturers should act to ensure stability in the tobacco industry by allowing more grower input in their pricing formulas and by using multiyear contracts, agreed to earlier in the season, giving the growers more time to plan.</span></div><div> </div><div><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;">As summer approaches, the next cycle is beginning. Hundreds of workers have already arrived at farms across the state to begin preparing and planting the fields. Their numbers will swell to about 100,000 by harvest time. This gives special urgency to efforts to address the problems uncovered by the researchers and to begin implementing their recommendations for resolving them. Although many of the tobacco manufacturers, including RAI, profess support for human rights throughout the tobacco supply chain, those words are not enough.</span></div><div> </div><div><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;"> “Every day of delay is a day when workers will be needlessly sickened because of the lack of safety equipment or of adequate clean drinking water, when workers will continue to be paid illegal sub-minimum wages, when they will have to endure squalid, unsanitary housing, and when instead of being able to speak up to change these conditions they will continue to be silenced by fear,” said FLOC organizer Justin Flores. “This is an emergency that shames the entire tobacco industry and at Reynolds’ shareholder meeting tomorrow we will challenge the company to be a leader in its industry by taking responsibility and taking action to make things right.”</span></div><div> </div><div align="center"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Garamond, serif; font-size: small;"># # #</span></div></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-21574690507908521712011-05-01T19:35:00.001-06:002011-05-01T19:41:11.274-06:00Axioms for Organizers by Fred Ross, Sr. 1989<div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br />
</span></b></span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.learntoquestion.com/seevak/groups/1999/sites/chavez/graphics/fredross.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://www.learntoquestion.com/seevak/groups/1999/sites/chavez/graphics/fredross.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;"><b>Fred Ross</b> (1910 – 1992)</span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Every Day</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Organizing isn't a job done once and done with. If organizers don’t renew their efforts every day of their lives, then only the grasping and greedy people remain active.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Doing It “For” People</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If you think you can do it for people, you’ve stopped understanding what it means to be an organizer.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Lead By Pushing</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –An organizer is a leader who does not lead but gets behind the people and pushes.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Duty of Organizer</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –The duty of the organizer is to provide people with the opportunity to work for what they believe in.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Follow-up</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –90% of organizing is follow-up.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Never Give Up</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Good organizers never give up –they get the opposition to do that.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Urgency</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –A good organizer must be able to charge an issue with a supreme sense of urgency.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">“From The Heart”</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;">–How can you move others unless you are moved yourself?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Little Things</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If you are able to achieve anything big in life, it’s because you paid attention to the “little” things.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Half-Assed Job</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –In any kind of work if you do a half-assed job at least you get some of the work done; in organizing you don’t get anything done.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">People</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –It’s the way people are that counts, not the way you’d like them to be.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Short-Cuts</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Short-cuts usually end in detours, which lead to dead ends.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Organizing Is</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Organizing is providing people with the opportunity to become aware of their own capabilities and potential.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Hope</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –To inspire hope, you have to have hope yourself.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Winning Hearts & Minds</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –to win the hearts and minds of people, forget the dry facts and statistics; tell them the stories that won you to the cause.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Questions</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –When you are tempted to make a statement, ask a question. Temporary Organizer –An organizer tries to turn each person she meets into a temporary organizer.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Ask #1</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Don’t tell the people–ask them.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Build New</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Don’t try and rebuild a dead organization; start over and build a new one. (Cesar Chavez)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Organizing or Manipulating?</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If you are moving people to act through truth and for truth, as you understand it, then you are organizing them. If you are moving them to act through deception, then you are manipulating them.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Do It Now #1</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If there is something to be done, do it now.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Do It Now #2</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If you wait until you have all the time, people and resources to go ahead, you may still never get there because you didn’t fill the interval with the action needed to get you there.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Winning & Losing People</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –It’s easy to win people–and twice as easy to lose them<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Losers </span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;">–Losers are loaded with alibis.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Maybe</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –“Maybe” is a double, triple “No!”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Messages #1</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Rare is the delivered message.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">People Power</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –People power must be visible.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Reminding </span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;">–Reminding is the essence of organizing.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Organize</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –The only way to organize is to organize, not sit around and jaw about it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Burn-Out</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Organizers don’t “burn-out”, they just give up and cease being organizers.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">Pressure</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 115%;"> </span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;">–It’s not the quantity of pressure we exert that counts, it’s the quality.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Willpower #1</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –There is no substitute for willpower in an organizer.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Ask #2</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Usually those who can spare a little time for the cause are actually ready to give it all if only someone would ask them.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Concentration</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –When you are pushing a big drive or issue, you stay on it to the total exclusion of everything else –until it is done.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Live Wires</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –When you find “live-wires” put them to work immediately. Find something they can do –any little thing –get them started and ready to do more, or you’ll lose them for the cause.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">All the Way</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –When you do something –do it all the way!<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Leadership</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –You don’t develop new leaders, you push people in to taking action by refusing to do it yourself. You are then providing them the opportunity to become aware of their own capabilities.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Willpower #2</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –An organizer has to want to win badly enough to succeed.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Volunteers</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Never get so hungry for volunteers that you do their work for them instead of insisting they do it themselves.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Hardest Choice</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –The hardest choice is usually the correct one.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Vacations</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Injustice never takes a vacation.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Monotony</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –the way to break monotony is with motion and emotion.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Appreciation #1</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Appreciation has an exceedingly short memory so strike while the iron is hot.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Appreciation #2</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –People are infinitely more appreciative of what they do for you than what you do for them. (Cesar Chavez)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Respect Yourself</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Don’t let them kick you around. You have to live and organize, in such a way that you can respect yourself and be treated with respect by others.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Put People To Work</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Don’t talk at people –put them to work.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">The Disrupter</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –The disrupter is the lowest form of organizational life.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Be Ready</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –A good organizer delegates responsibility but is always ready to jump in and do the job himself if necessary. (Saul Alinsky 1947)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Social Arsonist</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –A good organizer is a social arsonist who goes around setting people on fire.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Messages #2</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –There is nothing less likely to be delivered than a message.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Reaching People</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –If you can’t catch people at home during ordinary hours, you’ve got to go after them during extra-ordinary hours, to the outer edge of your tenacity and forbearance.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">By Brick</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –It isn’t hard to organize if you take it granule by granule, brick by brick.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Fast Talkers</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Look out for the fast talkers.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Details</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –The measure of a good organizer is the amount of attention she pays to the most minute details.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Helping People</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –Organizers must grow beyond helping people to “egging them on.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">A Time For Silence</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –There is a time for sound and a time for silence and a good organizer needs to be able to differentiate between the two.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;">Finding That Person</span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"> –To keep an organization alive you’ve got to find that person who has to do something about it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The Incidentals</span></span></b><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"> –The incidentals make up the fundamentals.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-49989549293879469492011-05-01T16:22:00.001-06:002011-05-01T16:27:34.971-06:00United Front: Labor, Immigrant Rights Movements See Converging Future<div style="text-align: right;"></div><div class="blogimage" style="clear: right; float: right; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden;"><div style="color: #555555; float: left; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 4px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
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<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">originally<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"> posted on </span><a href="http://inthesetimes.com/" style="font-family: inherit;">inthesetimes.com</a></span></i><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">By </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://www.inthesetimes.com/community/profile/24" style="color: #333333;">R. M. Arrieta</a></span></span><br />
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<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">This May Day, the immigrant rights movement and the labor movement are joining forces for large rallies across the nation.</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Five years ago, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_United_States_immigration_reform_protests" style="color: #24418d;">the massive crowds</a> who turned out in support of immigrant rights and finding a path to citizenship surprised the nation. Those May Day marches were among the largest coordinated protests in U.S. history.</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Now, with the labor movement itself under attack, an effort is underway to strengthen the alliances between immigrant rights and labor. Both Latinos and labor are under atack by right-wing forces. This year public-sector workers' collective bargaining rights have been rolled back in some states, and are being challenged in others. Hate crimes and anti-immigrant rhetoric against Latinos have increased by 40 percent in the last five years.</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">With their falling membership numbers, unions need Latino workers in order to grow. By virtue of their enormous numbers in the service sector and the construction industry, their role is pivotal for bringing union numbers up. Latino immigrants possess one of the highest participation rates in the labor force: 70.8 percent.<br />
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The relationship is mutual. Latinos, among the most vulnerable workers, need the protections and benefits provided by unions. Union leadership has to reflect inclusion of minorities.</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">For much of its history, unions have opposed the loosening of immigration restrictions. Now leaders of labor groups are realizing that Latino workers could positively impact the future their unions.<br />
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The new report “Latino Workers in the United States 2011” by the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA), offers a critical analysis about the state of Latino and undocumented workers. (The report can be downloaded on LCLAA’s <a href="http://www.lclaa.org/index.php/Latino-workers-in-the-US/the-state-of-latino-workers-in-the-us.html" style="color: #24418d;" target="_blank">website</a>.)<br />
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Latinos are the fastest growing segment of the U.S. workforce, which is now joining unions is at ‘near record lows.” The report says:</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">"If the U.S. economy is a many-colored fabric, then Latino workers are the foundational cross-threads on which the bright pattern is woven. Without their dependable presence in nearly every job, the U.S. economy would literally disintegrate. Yet these workers remain stubbornly invisible to mainstream media and to those with the power to enforce and change labor laws that could help protect them."</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Tom Buffenbarger, International President of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAMAW) wrote:</div><blockquote style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #eeeeee; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 15px; margin-right: 15px; margin-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 12px; padding-right: 12px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">The future of America’s labor movement will be written in Spanish. Over the next twenty years, Latinos and Latinas will lead new fights for new rights all across this country. They will organize and mobilize a new generation of labor activists who will prevail over prejudice, corporate power and political foes. And they will change their communities and our country forever.</div></blockquote><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Hector E. Sanchez, executive director of LCLAA and the report’s main author, <a href="http://blog.latinovations.com/2010/04/30/guest-blogger-series-hector-sanchez-may-day-and-the-dangerous-reality-for-latino-workers/" style="color: #24418d;" target="_blank">wrote</a>: “…As we reflect on this historical evolution of social conditions and labor rights for workers, there is a serious contradiction today where millions of workers in the nation still lack access to any of the benefits that this movement brought. This is especially true for a particular group of workers — Latino and immigrant workers — a community that has been under constant attack from various fronts throughout this nation over the last several years.”</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">He told <em><a href="http://www.peoplesworld.org/latinos-immigrants-and-labor-form-strategic-alliance/" style="color: #24418d;" target="_blank">People’s World</a></em>:</div><blockquote style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #eeeeee; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 15px; margin-right: 15px; margin-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 12px; padding-right: 12px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Enforcement-only policies have only enhanced that vulnerability to the point that immigrants have become disposable workers. It's a perfect system for exploitation, but we need to ask who is really benefiting from this, because so far everyone wants to blame undocumented workers. Eleven million immigrants living in the U.S. is not a mistake. This is public policy and the corporations and entire sectors of the economy are profiting from this broken system.</div></blockquote><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Many Latinos in the labor force have to endure unsafe or abusive working conditions to make ends meet. Latino workers also deal with more minimum-wage and overtime pay violations than any other ethnic group. More than 77 percent of Latinos surveyed in various minimum wage industries did not receive overtime pay with higher incidences among immigrants.<br />
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The bottom line: Thousands of working-class people, whether immigrants or not, unionized or not, are under attack across the board and they are beginning to understand their common links.</div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><br />
Sanchez writes:</div><blockquote style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #eeeeee; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-left-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(102, 102, 102); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #333333; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 15px; margin-right: 15px; margin-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 12px; padding-right: 12px; padding-top: 0px;"><div style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Organized labor has been on the front line defending the most vulnerable and exploited workers. As we celebrate May Day all over the world, this is the time to stand in solidarity with those that are under serious attack in this nation – our immigrant brothers and sisters. </div><div style="color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">The union movement must welcome these workers in a more aggressive way. Furthermore, Latinos and immigrants must embrace the labor movement as a tool for social protection and economic advancement. This is the future of our movement, but more importantly this is the future of a more just and a stronger nation. No one should allow the assault of labor, human or civil rights of any group. It’s just bad political, social and economic policy.</div><div><br />
</div></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-50398447060634125452011-04-27T16:19:00.009-06:002011-05-01T19:48:28.509-06:00LCLAA AND COLORADO JOBS WITH JUSTICE ADDRESS HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 23px;"></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinm8T2kHYIkTSd2NEuU8k8XY4VHVVxyBTwEflPPCMqwcsnqhqwOq_DALwVG3_mwUBva8Lyo21Rz8Ig63nNKXcoa8ajD-g6kbW_hyeGpQx-_NXthOeLtI_VO70cfhmD3w_tU0npGvnJyjDt/s1600/IMG_0417-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinm8T2kHYIkTSd2NEuU8k8XY4VHVVxyBTwEflPPCMqwcsnqhqwOq_DALwVG3_mwUBva8Lyo21Rz8Ig63nNKXcoa8ajD-g6kbW_hyeGpQx-_NXthOeLtI_VO70cfhmD3w_tU0npGvnJyjDt/s400/IMG_0417-2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Delegation delivering the letter to H.M. Consul General Kevin Lynch. </span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><b>DENVER</b>—<a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_902739235">The </a><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://denver.co.lclaa.org/">Labor Council for Latin American Advance (LCLAA</a>),</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/cojwj">Colorado Jobs with Justice</a>, and community activists, led a delegation on </span></span><span style="color: black;">behalf of the <a href="http://floc.com/">Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC)</a>, the <a href="http://aflcio.org/">AFL-CIO</a>, the TUC, the Geneva-based federation of food and agriculture workers, IUF, and American church groups<span class="apple-style-span"> into the British Consulate to deliver a </span></span><span class="apple-style-span">letter</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="apple-style-span">to British Ambassador Nigel Sheinwald at the British Embassy in Washington, DC addressing human rights abuses.</span></span></div></div></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The letter and </span>delegation<span style="color: black;"> </span></span><span style="color: black;">addressed the <span class="apple-style-span">widespread and egregious human rights abuses against U.S. tobacco field workers involving a British-based corporation, British American Tobacco (BAT), which owns the controlling shares in the U.S. tobacco giant Reynolds American.</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">"These workers are scared to exercise their most basic human right. The right and freedom to associate and </span>collectively<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"> work to together to raise standards, living conditions, and fight for a living wage," stated <a href="http://twitter.com/russellbannan">Russell Bannan</a> with Colorado Jobs with Justice. "At Reynolds and out in the fields there is a culture that is conditioning this type of fear and it is unacceptable."</span></span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: inherit;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">LCLAA Denver Metro President Solomon Juarez </span>who organized the <span style="color: black;">delegation and asked, </span></span><span style="color: black;">"Is it too much to ask that farm workers be treated like human beings?" After a few seconds Kevin Lynch, Consul General, responded</span><span style="color: #1f497d;"> </span><span style="color: black;">"No."</span><span style="color: #1f497d;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">The delegation was part of an International call to protect human rights of U.S. tobacco farm</span><span style="color: #1f497d;"> </span><span style="color: black;">workers.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: black;"> </span></span><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: black;">Similar</span><span style="color: #1f497d;"> </span><span style="color: black;">delegations and letters were delivered to consulates in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Miami, Los Angeles, New York City, and San Francisco. </span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="apple-style-span"><b><span style="color: black;">Tomorrow in London,</span></b><span style="color: black;"> at BAT’s annual shareholders’ meeting, FLOC President Baldemar Velasquez will present a new report detailing the abuses of workers in the U.S. tobacco supply chain and will urge BAT to take immediate steps to ensure that all of the companies in its supply chain respect and follow the standards spelled out in the company’s corporate code of conduct.</span></span><span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: black; font-family: inherit;">“We are urging the company to back up its words of support for human rights with monitoring and enforcement,” said Velasquez. “Through its control of Reynolds, BAT has the power and the moral obligation to take action to end these abuses.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: black; font-family: inherit;"></span>AUDIO: <a href="http://denver.co.lclaa.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Russell-Bannan-4-28-11.mp3">Listen to the interview from AM760's The Mario Solis-Marich Show with Russell Bannan</a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-64673410158296336062011-04-25T19:24:00.000-06:002011-04-25T19:24:53.478-06:00DENVER ACTIVISTS JOIN INTERNATIONAL CALL TO PROTECT HUMAN RIGHTS OF U.S.TOBACCO FARM WORKERS<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif";">M</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">EDIA ADVISORY FOR<span style="color: #1f497d;">: </span>Wednesday, April 27, 12 NOON</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><br />
</b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>WHERE:</b><span style="color: #1f497d;"> </span><b>British Consulate -1675 Broadway Denver, CO</b> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: xx-small;">(</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: .5in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">British Embassy in Washington, DC, and Consulates in Atlanta, Boston, <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: .5in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Chicago, Denver, Houston, Miami, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><br />
</b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>CONTACTS:</b> In Denver: Russell Bannan 864-978-9374 (C), <a href="mailto:rpbannan@gmail.com">rpbannan@gmail.com</a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="mailto:rpbannan@gmail.com"></a></span> FLOC contact: Nancy Coleman 301-587-1034 (O); 301-537-0172 (C)</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">DENVER ACTIVISTS JOIN INTERNATIONAL CALL TO PROTECT HUMAN RIGHTS<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">OF U.S.TOBACCO FARM WORKERS<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt; text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Community leaders urge British Consulate to help end tobacco industry abuses</b><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>At noon on Wednesday, April 27</b>, union and community leaders will hand-deliver a letter to British Ambassador Nigel Sheinwald at the British Embassy in Washington, DC, asking him to urge British American Tobacco (BAT), which owns the controlling share in the U.S. tobacco giant Reynolds American, to end “widespread and egregious” human rights abuses against U.S. tobacco field workers. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>In Denver,</b> a copy of that letter will be delivered to the British Consulate by Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, Denver Area Labor Federation, and Colorado Jobs with Justice. Similar deliveries are slated for the consulates in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Houston, Miami, Los Angeles, New York City, and San Francisco. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The letter cites “widespread and egregious violations” on tobacco farms in North Carolina, which supplies the largest share of the U.S.-grown crop. These include: <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: .4in; margin-right: .4in; margin-top: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“. . . tobacco farm workers in North Carolina are exposed to pesticides and nicotine poisoning in the fields—while they endure squalid farm labor housing. There is no protection for these workers if they complain or are fired for seeking union representation to help them improve their working and living conditions. . . <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt; margin-left: .4in; margin-right: .4in; margin-top: 0in;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“We believe you will agree that these workers’ desperate situation is something that no civilized society can tolerate, and we hope that you will use your good offices to urge BAT to take a leadership role in safeguarding human rights by insisting that the companies and suppliers they do business with must abide by the same code of corporate social responsibility they established for their own company.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>In London on Thursday, April 28</b>, at BAT’s annual shareholders’ meeting, FLOC President Baldemar Velasquez will present a new report detailing the abuses of workers in the U.S. tobacco supply chain and will urge BAT to take immediate steps to ensure that all of the companies in its supply chain respect and follow the standards spelled out in the company’s corporate code of conduct. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 6.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“We are urging the company to back up its words of support for human rights with monitoring and enforcement,” said Velasquez. “Through its control of Reynolds, BAT has the power and the moral obligation to take action to end these abuses.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-50526355419753871332011-04-25T18:44:00.000-06:002011-04-25T18:44:39.646-06:00OBITUARY of Hazel Dickens<h3 class="post-title entry-title" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, FreeSerif, serif; font-size: 18px; font: normal normal normal 30px/normal 'Times New Roman', Times, FreeSerif, serif; line-height: 25px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; position: relative;"><br />
</h3><div class="post-header" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, FreeSerif, serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.6; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div class="post-header-line-1"></div></div><div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-7863281501458189330" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, FreeSerif, serif; font-size: 19px; line-height: 1.5; position: relative; width: 598px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwrNtPcjodTkiEX7xq8TWhycATvC2f_p5_JF4PpAOzP1M9Ht5tJLO6CzqnRpeqx6rsu7Z13CobvsXvZcHqtdwK0vIleivMounJeO76qyjty_Ei3ObPFTWGzi-CMq0JJZSgxZ5WgA7mg0w/s1600/hazel+dickens.jpg" style="text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5599447930583618162" 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semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 5" priority="69" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Dark List Accent 5" priority="70" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful Shading Accent 5" priority="71" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful List Accent 5" priority="72" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful Grid Accent 5" priority="73" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Light Shading Accent 6" priority="60" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Light List Accent 6" priority="61" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Light Grid Accent 6" priority="62" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 6" priority="63" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 6" priority="64" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium List 1 Accent 6" priority="65" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium List 2 Accent 6" priority="66" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 6" priority="67" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 6" priority="68" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 6" priority="69" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Dark List Accent 6" priority="70" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful Shading Accent 6" priority="71" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful List Accent 6" priority="72" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Colorful Grid Accent 6" priority="73" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Subtle Emphasis" priority="19" qformat="true" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Intense Emphasis" priority="21" qformat="true" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Subtle Reference" priority="31" qformat="true" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Intense Reference" priority="32" qformat="true" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><w:lsdexception locked="false" name="Book Title" priority="33" qformat="true" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b>Hazel Dickens</b> <b>1935 –2011</b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b><br />
</b></div><div class="MsoNormal">An Obituary by John Pietaro</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">The high lonesome sound that touched so many, so deeply, could only have been born of both strife and fight-back in equal proportions. Singer/guitarist Hazel Dickens’ sound was probably about as high and lonesome as one got. The soundtrack of “Harlan County USA” introduced her to the many outside of the country home she remained a visceral part of, even long after she’d physically moved on. Dickens didn’t just sing the anthems of labor, she lived them and her place on many a picket line, staring down gunfire and goon squads, embedded her into the cause.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">She was born on June 1, 1935 in Montcalm, West Virginia, one of the faceless towns dotting Appalachian coal country. Her father was an amateur banjo player who worked as a truck driver for the mines and ran a Primitive Baptist church each Sunday. Here was where Hazel first began singing, unaccompanied out of necessity and the laws of tradition. But the devotional songs melded with the mountain tunes and ballads, creating a unique personal style. Bearing a rough, at times coarse timber, her voice eagerly reflected the broken topography about her as well as the pains of poverty in her midst. In a family of thirteen residing in a three-room shack, the music was far from distant symbolism for her.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">At age 16 Dickens relocated to Baltimore where she encountered Mike Seeger on the still fledgling folk scene. Seeger, working alongside his parents Charles and Ruth Crawford Seeger in the Library of Congress Archive of American Folksong, began performing with the Dickens family trio, but it was Hazel’s association with Seeger’s wife Alice Gerrard that offered notable area for impact on the music. The duet of Hazel & Alice recorded original compositions and deeply explored the feminist archetypes in Appalachian song.<span> </span>Dickens was sure to not only raise issues such as the need for equal pay for women workers, but to actively fight for these on and off stage. Among the titles she penned were “Working Girl Blues” and “Don’t Put Her Down, You Helped Put Her There”. She also composed the noted “Black Lung”, which called on the miners’ plight back home. Like Aunt Mollie Jackson before her, Dickens was able to capture the struggle of the moment in song, and this was most evident in her on-screen performances in celebrated films such as “Matewan” and “Song Catcher” and her work on the above noted “Harlan County USA”. The union cause was her cause and it lived anew each time she conjured a topical song set to a melody that sounded as old as the ages.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">A clear heir to the Appalachian stylings of Aunt Mollie Jackson and Sarah Ogan, Dickens became a respected figure and was a featured singer at folk festivals for decades. Since the 1970s, Dickens had performed with a wide array of musicians including Emmy Lou Harris, Elvis Costello, Linda Ronstadt, Mary Chapin Carpenter and Rosanne Cash. In 2007 she was inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall of Fame. Dickens was active as recent as last month when she was seen attending the South By Southwest Festival in Austin. Hazel Dickens died of complications of pneumonia in Washington DC on April 22. In the blackened crawlspaces of West Virginia’s mines the lament was a deafening silence as the mountain peaks seemed to bow in solemn reverence.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><i>-John Pietaro is a musician, writer and labor organizer from New York City—http:TheCulturalWorker.blogspot.com</i></div></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:lsdexception></w:latentstyles></xml></span><div style="clear: both;"></div></div><div class="post-footer" style="border-top-color: rgb(153, 119, 119); border-top-style: dashed; border-top-width: 1px; font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, FreeSerif, serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 1.6; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 10px;"><div class="post-footer-line post-footer-line-1"><span class="post-author vcard">Posted by <span class="fn">JOHN PIETARO</span> </span><span class="post-timestamp">at <a class="timestamp-link" href="http://theculturalworker.blogspot.com/2011/04/obituary-of-hazel-dickens.html" rel="bookmark" style="text-decoration: none;" title="permanent link"><abbr class="published" style="border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial;" title="2011-04-25T02:15:00-07:00">2:15 AM</abbr></a> </span></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-1050531591685780212011-04-21T15:04:00.001-06:002011-04-21T15:21:50.071-06:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwurU8MiYhHVosyCsLzUSwLJpLKBaDJu_hqxPQu2DAyVN036MerDHC4Nkgpncm9aM_uaQxAtU4Ax6bGfYtK7N-c9ySE6jJzk4cem4RNKGxjipbV-vrrf-bxNn-mQLWoSE0egQuQDtHarkN/s1600/Denver+Flyer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwurU8MiYhHVosyCsLzUSwLJpLKBaDJu_hqxPQu2DAyVN036MerDHC4Nkgpncm9aM_uaQxAtU4Ax6bGfYtK7N-c9ySE6jJzk4cem4RNKGxjipbV-vrrf-bxNn-mQLWoSE0egQuQDtHarkN/s1600/Denver+Flyer.jpg" /></a></div>Print the flyer here: <a href="http://www.docstoc.com/docs/77535010/FLOC-Seeks-Justice-for-Reynolds-Tobacco-Field-Workers">FLOC Seeks Justice for Reynolds Tobacco Field Workers</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-13662873370469112552011-04-21T01:51:00.000-06:002011-04-21T01:51:12.021-06:00National Labor-Community Conference to Defeat the Corporate Agenda and Fight for a Working People’s Agenda<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Working people across the country — from Wisconsin and Ohio to New York, Oregon, and California — are facing unprecedented attacks by corporations and the rich with the help of the federal, state and local politicians that they fund.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The corporate agenda is clear: It is to bust unions and cut workers’ pay and benefits — both in the private and public sectors. It is to erode and privatize Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. It is to dismantle the public sector and social services by denying funds for job creation, education, health care, environmental protection, and rebuilding the infrastructure. It is to ensure that taxes on the wealthy are constantly lowered while the bite on workers and the poor is constantly increased. It is to perpetuate U.S. wars and occupations whenever it serves the interests of the multinationals. It is to divide the working class by race, gender, national origin, religion, and sexual orientation. It is also to limit and restrict constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties. The list goes on.<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">In state capitals, communities and workplaces across the country, workers are fighting back. But if we're going to be successful in pushing back the attacks on collective bargaining, stopping the budget cuts and concessions, creating jobs, and defending social services and education, we need to build unity within our movement, including forging stronger ties with labor's allies: communities of color, students and youth, single-payer advocates, environmentalists, antiwar activists, immigrant rights supporters, and other progressive forces.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Relying on politicians to defend us — the so-called “friends of labor” — has proven to be disastrous. During the past three decades, working people have suffered a dramatic decline in their standard of living while the rich have amassed an unprecedented amount of wealth at the top, regardless of which of the major parties was running the government. We have had every combination imaginable: Republicans occupying the White House with a majority in Congress, Democrats occupying the White House with a majority in Congress, or some kind of “divided government.” But in each case the result for working people has been the same: conditions got worse for workers while the corporations prospered even more. Why should we continue this vicious cycle?</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span>The working class has the power to put an end to this situation. And as the debate over the debt and the deficit intensifies, the need has never been greater for an organized campaign to demand “No Cuts, No Concessions!” whether in regard to social programs or workers' wages and benefits. We say place the burden for solving the financial crises squarely where it belongs: on the rich and the corporations. They caused the crisis, let them pay for it!</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"></span><br />
The Emergency Labor Network (ELN) was initiated earlier this year at a historic meeting of 100 union leaders and activists from around the country. Join us June 24–26, 2011 at Kent State University in Ohio for a national labor-community conference to spur the campaign to build a more militant fight-back movement and to launch a national campaign for an alternative agenda for working people. Together we can move forward on both fronts.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">For more information visit <a href="http://laborfightback.org/">laborfightback.org</a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-88292062794035155862011-04-20T13:26:00.000-06:002011-04-20T13:26:39.883-06:00Independent Philadelphia Security Officers Union Wins First Union Contract at the Museum of Art<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">By <a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/author/allison-fletcher-acosta/" title="Posts by Allison Fletcher Acosta"><span style="color: blue; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Allison Fletcher Acosta</span></a>, on April 20th, 2011<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-outline-level: 2;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">After four years of organizing, officers at the Philadelphia Museum of Art employed by AlliedBarton Security Services have a union contract! The agreement, ratified by a majority of guards on April 18th, will increase wages by 14.5% over the life of the 3-year contract and will institute a grievance procedure and a seniority system.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 12.0pt; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“We are proud that our 4 year struggle has resulted in a better quality of life for our coworkers and families,” says Donald Lindsey, President of the union.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 12.0pt; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The union mounted a public pressure campaign which engaged supportive city council members, the Philadelphia labor movement, student activists, Jobs with Justice, and dozens of local faith leaders to win their victory against the nation’s second-largest security company.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 12.0pt; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span style="color: black;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Security guards are prevented from joining most labor unions due to the Section 9 (B) 3 of the National Labor Relations Act. This clause of the National Labor Relations Act states that security guards must join “security guard only unions,” of which there are few.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 12.0pt; mso-outline-level: 2;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: black;">On October 10, 2009, the Continue reading</span><span style="color: #003366;"> </span></span><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/2011/04/independent-philadelphia-security-officers-union-wins-first-union-contract-at-the-museum-of-art/"><span style="color: #990000;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Independent Philadelphia Security Officers Union Wins First Union Contract at the Museum of Art</span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-27654467658065073062011-04-18T16:40:00.000-06:002011-04-18T16:40:07.386-06:00Purple Lunch in Solidarity with Sodexo Workers at Regis University<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;">Come out Tomorrow (4/19) and wear purple and bring a brown bag lunch to show solidarity and with Sodexo workers. Lets show our workers how much we appreciate them and our willingness to stand up for social justice.</span></span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;">Student Labor Action Project and Colorado Jobs with Justice </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;">will be out in full support of <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; line-height: normal;">Regis Students & Workers.</span></span></span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"><span class="fn org">Regis University Dining Hall (</span>3333 Regis Boulevard, Denver, CO)</span></b></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;">The Dining Hall is in the Student Center near 51st Ave and Lowell Blvd.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; line-height: 15px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Link to the facebook event: <a href="http://goo.gl/XBumj" style="color: #333333;">http://goo.gl/XBumj</a></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl9fxyvOmVTPavMUGWFBX9ZfdMAAnNdmub3148wtNgnbplkfU4Nj3HK7IUJ8AeuoWonkWfKT6WgEyRr3X83EqibgPYkSkiIR-58Lczg52zgARX-w_sw0HTZrCwpYSyerhOsXvs4ZJKqVTV/s1600/216883_539329144118_120702090_31290670_8111519_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl9fxyvOmVTPavMUGWFBX9ZfdMAAnNdmub3148wtNgnbplkfU4Nj3HK7IUJ8AeuoWonkWfKT6WgEyRr3X83EqibgPYkSkiIR-58Lczg52zgARX-w_sw0HTZrCwpYSyerhOsXvs4ZJKqVTV/s1600/216883_539329144118_120702090_31290670_8111519_n.jpg" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: #333333; line-height: 15px;"><br />
</span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-33359854245191608002011-04-10T22:45:00.002-06:002011-06-05T22:10:13.080-06:00Colorado Stands Ground to Maintain Workers Rights<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-XBM1Ll_Kbq4PO522FaxClWuOvwJL6vfL27ADcjOLmKrQqFmzswEY5-qVm21wkbjBTJrazsg5Rnksv7Z9st1Kcay_Q5vUn3ONShdFvwBzkOOG-pCwDi_p1Pz1qbyxY7EXGpE6qKx825zZ/s1600/4.07.11_Page_01.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: left;"></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; color: black;">by Toni Fresquez<a href="http://www.elsemanario.net/news/1889/0/0/"><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Posted on El Seminario 04-06-2011</span></a></span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; color: black;"><a href="http://www.elsemanario.net/news/1889/0/0/"></a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br />
</span><br />
<div class="news_body" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><a href="http://www.elsemanario.net/uploaded_pictures/1889_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.elsemanario.net/uploaded_pictures/1889_1.jpg" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: inherit;">In 1968, Martin Luther King went to Memphis to support the Sanitation workers’ struggle to earn a living wage. On April 4, 1968, Dr. King was assassinated in the midst of a battle for dignity for those public employees. Decades later, in response to attacks by ultra-conservative governors, the struggle for workers’ rights is spreading from union workers in states like Wisconsin to Americans who just want the chance find a job and earn a decent living.</span></div><div class="news_body" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span></div><div class="news_body" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-XBM1Ll_Kbq4PO522FaxClWuOvwJL6vfL27ADcjOLmKrQqFmzswEY5-qVm21wkbjBTJrazsg5Rnksv7Z9st1Kcay_Q5vUn3ONShdFvwBzkOOG-pCwDi_p1Pz1qbyxY7EXGpE6qKx825zZ/s1600/4.07.11_Page_01.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-XBM1Ll_Kbq4PO522FaxClWuOvwJL6vfL27ADcjOLmKrQqFmzswEY5-qVm21wkbjBTJrazsg5Rnksv7Z9st1Kcay_Q5vUn3ONShdFvwBzkOOG-pCwDi_p1Pz1qbyxY7EXGpE6qKx825zZ/s400/4.07.11_Page_01.png" width="312" /></a></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Several of Denver’s prominent union forces -- Colorado Jobs with Justice, Service Employees International Union, American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees, Communications Workers of America -- assembled along with students and community members who marched throughout downtown Denver on Monday, participating in a national ‘We Are One’ themed rally to commemorate the 43rd anniversary of Rev. King’s last speech and assassination. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"></span>The march ended at the Auraria Campus in Denver with an energetic rally featuring various human rights advocates carrying signs with bold slogans, some holding brooms and mops high symbolizing the depths of the service industry workers – who make up 90% of the nations workforce, according to recent research.</div><div class="news_body" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">In conjunction with the March, the Student Labor Action Project (SLAP) coordinated a student “walk-out” to attend the events on campus, and to send a message of solidarity with workers.</span></div><div class="news_body" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
Curious students gathered around the rally to listen to the scheduled speakers, learning first-hand on the necessity of a renewed movement.<br />
<br />
</div><div class="news_body" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">“We are going to take back as a movement what is rightfully ours, the power and prestige of this great nation,” stated Prior Kieran of St. Dunstan's Priory in Denver, an ecumenical order of Benedictines. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Citing prose from late civil rights leaders, Prior Kiernan recalled Rev. King’s quote, “‘Faith is never voluntary given by the oppressor it must be demanded by the oppressed.’ Today we demand our rights, we demand our rights to organize, to bargain to not only have a say, but to have a majority say in what is produced in this great nation of ours.</span></div><div class="news_body" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><br />
“I had the honor and privilege to be arrested with my friends and companions as part of The Denver 14 last June, by the time we got out of jail we were announced in over 200 places in this great nation of ours -- so I thought I should tell the head of my order,” explained Prior Kiernan. “I’ve always believed in the old Jesuit axiom that it is better to pray for forgiveness than to ask permission. So I didn’t ask permission to go to jail, I went jail because it was the right thing to do.<br />
<br />
“So I called the head of my religious order, I said ‘Brother Abbott I have something to tell you. I was arrested and its’ been in all of the papers so you are probably going to hear about it.’ He asked, ‘Brother why were you arrested?’ I said I was arrested to protest the immigration policy or lack thereof, at the federal level in this country. He immediately answered back, ‘Oh Brother don’t you worry about a thing, I was with César in the fields in the sixties.’”<br />
<br />
Prior Kiernan offered a quote from César Chávez, “‘You cannot oppress a people who are not afraid anymore.’ We have seen the future, and the future is ours; and in the words of Dolores Huerta and César Chávez – Yes we can, Si Se Puede,” he said to a resounding applause.<br />
<br />
Guest speaker Nita Gonzales, CEO of the Escuela Tlatelolco Centro de Estudios offered an uplifting speech at the Campus ‘teach-in", "Mil gracias to all of you who heard the call and stand together today. I stand here today with each and every one of you in the spirit of my father Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzales. In Denver Colorado we weren't waiting for superman – we had our superman in Corky Gonzales. Who thankfully lived a life that gave me the advantage of not only meeting César Chávez and Dolores Huerta, but marching, organizing rallies and supporting the work and struggle for human rights for this nations farmworkers, for human rights and for work that is not yet finished; and it isn't finished and we marched today because of that. We march in the spirit of our ancestors who overcame fear and injustice who struggled and died because they chose to live as free human beings who walked the talk.<br />
<br />
“Chavez and Huerta grasped the essential task – organize, organize, organize – his legacy and that of my father Corky Gonzales is one of action, not words, not promises that are not kept – but action. Mobilization against injustice hatred, mobilize, unionize, so that all workers can reap the fruit of their labor,” said Gonzales to her captive audience.</div><div><div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" /></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">“Let me teach you something about our homeland, we’ve always been here, this is our homeland, we will always be here. So let me remind you of that. We stand here today in honor of the memory of those nineteen who died right here in Colorado at Ludlow. Do you remember that? April 20, 1914? The United Mine Workers stood up against the Rockefeller corporations – they weren’t fearful. What are we afraid of,” challenged Gonzales.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">“In the spirit of César Chávez, Emiliano Zapata, Dolores Huerta, Cuauhtémoc – learn those names – Crazy Heart, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr…people of destiny </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">of courage, of sacrifice and vision. This is a global struggle for rights for all people and we must remember that this work is not yet done. Our nation continues to wage war upon its own working class and people, the powers that be make themselves richer by exploiting everyone of us – workers, middle class, poor, - in the words of Dr. King, I love these words, ‘There comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression,’” quoted Gonzales.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">“We are tired of being trampled, we have to stand up, stop being fearful. We need more marches, we need thousands of people blocking the streets. Nothing in the development in the history of this country regarding justice and human rights came because some President or Congress thought it was the right thing to do – it came because people marched in the streets like we do today.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px;">“In the words of my father, he said ‘no one has the right to oppress people and all oppressed people have the right to a revolution.’ So let us send a message today, workers rights are human rights, we stand unified and tell the people of Colorado we are not Wisconsin and united we stand and united we will win,” proclaimed Gonzales.</span></div></div></div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-42027907199189710782011-04-10T20:35:00.000-06:002011-04-10T20:35:23.698-06:00Dock workers shut down ports in solidarity with Wisconsin struggle<div class="heading" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px;">by Dave Welsh </span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px;"><em>Wednesday Apr 6th, 2011 11:50 AM</em></span><br />
<blockquote class="summary" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;">The power of workers to bring production to a halt was on dramatic display April 4th, when longshore workers of ILWU Local 10 shut down the ports of Oakland and San Francisco for 24 hours, in solidarity with the heroic struggles in Wisconsin. The big container port of Oakland was deader than a doornail Monday at 6:00 a.m. I saw a long snake-line of trucks bearing shipping containers idled on the roadway. The shipping cranes were all “standing at attention” – i.e., not working any containers. The dock workers stayed away, and no cargo was worked on any shift Monday in Oakland or San Francisco.<br />
“This was a voluntary rank and file action – an organized act of resistance,” said Clarence Thomas, Lo.10 exec board member. </blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;"><b>Oakland, CA, April 4, 2011</b> - The power of workers to bring production to a halt was on dramatic display April 4th, when longshore workers of ILWU Local 10 shut down the ports of Oakland and San Francisco for 24 hours, in solidarity with the heroic struggles in Wisconsin. </span><br />
<div class="article" style="color: #111111; font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px; margin-top: 12px;">The big container port of Oakland was deader than a doornail Monday at 6:00 a.m. I saw a long snake-line of trucks bearing shipping containers idled on the roadway. The shipping cranes were all “standing at attention” – i.e., not working any containers. [These are same Port of Oakland cranes that gave George Lucas the idea for some of his “Star Wars” imagery.]<br />
<br />
The ILWU hiring hall was practically deserted at dispatch time for the night shift, leaving several hundred jobs unfilled. The dock workers stayed away, and no cargo was worked on any shift Monday in Oakland or San Francisco.<br />
<br />
The rank-and-file-initiated shutdown was part of nationwide actions on April 4th to challenge the draconian budget cuts and union busting in Wisconsin and other states.<br />
<br />
An “organized act of resistance” by rank-and-file dock workers<br />
<br />
“This was a voluntary rank and file action – an organized act of resistance,” said Clarence Thomas, a dock worker and Local 10 executive board member.<br />
<br />
“It is significant that the action by Local 10 was taken in solidarity with Wisconsin public sector workers who are facing the loss of collective bargaining,” Thomas said. He pointed out that April 4th is also the anniversary of the assassination of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. – who was killed in Memphis demanding collective bargaining for sanitation workers in that city.<br />
<br />
“So we’ve come full circle,” he concluded. The Memphis public workers got their union, after a two-month strike. Now 40 years later their Wisconsin counterparts are threatened with losing theirs. But it is Wisconsin’s “fierce resistance that is inspiring all of us today.”<br />
<br />
It is not surprising that the 24-hour port work stoppage came out of International Longshore & Warehouse Union Local 10, a racially diverse, predominantly African American local, and the home local of legendary labor leader Harry Bridges. Martin Luther King was named an honorary member of Local 10, six months before he was killed.<br />
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Oakland teachers shut down Wells Fargo Bank for 3 hours on Apr. 4<br />
<br />
The Oakland Education Association has been facing crippling attacks on the public school system - including layoff notices for 600 of their members. When the April 4th Day of Action arrived, the OEA chose to protest at Wells Fargo Bank in downtown Oakland, demanding “Bail out schools, not banks.”<br />
<br />
About 100 teachers and supporters chanted, marched and sat down at the bank entrance, effectively shutting down the bank for three hours. They set up a makeshift classroom in the bank plaza to teach about the key role of the banks in bringing on today’s economic crisis. OEA President Betty Olson-Jones pointed out that Wells Fargo received a $50 Billion federal bailout, and the people chanted: “Banks took our money…Now give it to the schools!”<br />
<br />
Protesters took turns at the bullhorn:<br />
<br />
1. They demanded that workers' jobs, pensions, schools & social services must be safeguarded before one cent of interest is paid to the banks and wealthy bond investors. Which has priority, they asked: Profits for the wealthy, or our children’s future?<br />
<br />
2. They highlighted Wells Fargo's role in the foreclosure epidemic – affecting many families of district school children – and demand a moratorium on foreclosures, so families can stay in their homes. An OEA press release said Wells Fargo must "stop foreclosures and lower mortgage debt to reflect homes' reduced market value."<br />
<br />
The Bail out the People Movement organized demonstrations Monday at Wells Fargo branches in Los Angeles and Baltimore, in solidarity with the teachers’ action in Oakland. Wells Fargo is based in California, with their main headquarters in San Francisco. </div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-39607505467059933732011-04-10T16:48:00.000-06:002011-04-10T16:48:20.129-06:00<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><a href="http://www.docstoc.com/docs/75988438/ELM---National-Conference-to-Build-Unity-in-the-Labor-Movement-and-Defeat-the-Corporate-Agenda">ELM - National Conference to Build Unity in the Labor Movement & Defeat the Corporate Agenda</a></span><br />
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</script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-435913182521440711.post-34419592353653683952011-04-08T10:35:00.001-06:002011-04-10T16:50:30.331-06:00200+ Denver Students Stage Walkout for Labor & Education<div class="post-byline" style="color: #003366; font-family: arial, 'helvetica sans-serif'; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 5px;">By <a href="http://www.jwjblog.org/author/chris-hicks/" style="color: #336699; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" title="Posts by Chris Hicks">Chris Hicks</a>, on April 8th, 2011</div><div class="post-bodycopy clearfix" style="color: #003366; display: block; font-family: arial, 'helvetica sans-serif'; font-size: 12px; min-width: 0px;"><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jwjnational/5600926610/" style="clear: right; color: #990000; float: right; font-weight: bold; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-decoration: none;" title="Denver We Are One by Jobs with Justice, on Flickr"><img align="right" alt="Denver We Are One" height="300" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5105/5600926610_b87cae5c6b.jpg" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-bottom-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); border-top-left-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px 3px; border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" width="229" /></a>On Monday, April 4<sup>th</sup>, over 200 students from University of Colorado Denver, Community College of Denver, and Metropolitan State College of Denver participated in a walkout and rally in support of labor and education. The action was in conjunction with the April 4<sup>th</sup> “We Are One” National Day of Action that SLAP, Jobs with Justice, and United States Student Association all actively participated in as a response to the recent attack on workers and students across the country.</div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">In Colorado, two anti-worker bills earlier this February:</div><ul style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><li>Senate Bill 12, by Sen. Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs, would have prohibited public entities from collectively bargaining with a labor union, or an employee association from acting as a bargaining agent for public employees.</li>
<li>Senate Bill 38, by Sen. Shawn Mitchell, R-Broomfield, would have prohibited an employee organization from being officially recognized as the exclusive representative of state employees, barred the state from negotiating with an employee organization to create an employee partnership agreement, and terminated any existing partnership agreements.</li>
</ul><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">At a time when workers’ rights are under attack around the country, many students have provided the spark for protest and fighting back. Students in Denver saw the direct impact these laws will have on them and their own livelihood, which inspired them to walk out.</div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Speakers at the rally came from different backgrounds and issues, but showed how our movement must unite as one in order to protect all rights. The speakers from the rally came from local radio stations, students who identify as LGBTQ, anti-war, immigrant rights, education reform, and labor. The theme of the speakers was shared struggle, shared identity, and how we must begin to view ourselves within our own communities: “We Are One”!</div><div style="display: block; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 1em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"><a href="http://studentlabor.org/" style="color: #990000; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Learn more about SLAP</a>.</div></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0