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By Melissa Evans, sick Staff Writer | Posted: 07/14/2011 05:42:10 PM PDT | Source: DailyBreeze.com
Health fair
When: 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. July 23
Where: Harbor City Day Laborer site, 1301 N. Figueroa Place, Wilmington
Information: 310-534-6221
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Local medical students, researchers and high school students are coming together again this summer to offer health services to low-income and underserved residents.
The Urban Health Fellowship includes two health fairs and then a July 26 summit where students will present findings from a research project.
Those involved will continue last year’s work, looking at health problems and access to health services among the day laborer population in the Harbor Area.
Students are surveying those who come for health screenings and other services at fairs this month, said Lisa Hean, one of the medical students involved.
“We want to find out where they go for health services, what problems they’re having, whether they’re scared for immigration issues,” she said.
The program, organized by the Harbor-UCLA Department of Family Medicine and Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute, brings together high school and undergraduate students, medical students, medical residents and professional researchers who work together for six weeks.
The goal is to inspire young students from underserved areas to go into the medical field, and to encourage medical students to direct attention toward the disadvantaged in urban areas.
Last year’s group interviewed day laborers at work sites and health fairs, finding that the majority didn’t have any source of health care.
Many of those who came for services also did not have basic immunizations for tuberculosis and other highly infectious diseases, and many suffered respiratory problems and other health issues.The first health fair last weekend drew about 150 people. The next fair is July 23 at the Harbor City day laborer site.
Services include screening for anemia and diabetes, blood pressure checks, dental services, women’s and children’s health, immunizations and diet and nutrition information.
The program is supported by several groups, including Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe, L.A. City Councilwoman Janice Hahn, Molina Medical Centers and the UCLA School of Dentistry.
The summit will be held at 12:30 in the Cragin Theater at Banning High School in Wilmington.
DetailsBy Bonnie Hobbs | Thursday, July 14, 2011 | Source: ConnectionNewspapers.com
The Centreville Immigration Forum (CIF) was initially begun as a way to connect people and organizations that worked with Centreville’s immigrant population. It provided ESOL classes to teach English to the day laborers and eventually evolved into a group focused on creating a worker center for them.
The CIF is now interviewing potential staff members, raising money and making plans to open this facility — to be called Centreville Labor Resource Center (CLARC) — sometime in September.
“We’ve made excellent progress,” said CIF President Alice Foltz. “We’ve had good support from many volunteers in the community, plus new volunteers in the last couple months. And we believe that, when the center opens, we’ll be ready to operate it successfully.”
Currently, day laborers looking for jobs congregate outside the Centreville Square Shopping Center, on the outskirts of Centrewood Plaza and near the Centreville Regional Library. But store owners said their presence discouraged customers from coming to their businesses. And some moms were uncomfortable bringing their children to a library with men standing outside of it.
So Al Dwoskin, who owns the Centreville Square Shopping Center, volunteered to provide a space for a worker center if the CIF would run it. The facility will get the workers off the streets and provide an organized way for employers to connect with them.
Although CLARC will be within his ping center, it will be housed in a storefront in an area away from most customer traffic. It will also be large enough to accommodate all the laborers indoors. The resource center will be open Monday-Saturday, from 6 a.m.-noon. CIF volunteers will participate in the day-to-day operation, under the guidance of a full-time, professional director.
“Over a two-month period, we interviewed people for this position before our personnel committee, worker committee and the CIF Board of Directors,” said Foltz. “We had 19 excellent applications, but the person we selected was just outstanding.”
While declining at this point to reveal the potential director’s name, she said, “We decided to hire a person who we believe has great skills and capabilities, as well as experience with similar work in other areas. But we won’t formally offer the position until all the funds are raised.”
Foltz did say, however, that the director will be bilingual. Since the day laborers are Hispanic, it’s a requirement for all jobs at the center. She also stressed that the director-to-be has experience, not only with management, but also with an immigrant population and grant-writing.
Meanwhile, the CIF is also working on several other things in tandem to prepare for the center’s opening — deciding on support staff, figuring out how many workers it will serve and tending to the myriad details involved in running such an entity. And, of course, said Foltz, “We need to complete our fund-raising, in part, to make sure we can hire support staff.”
The CIF may hire one full-time or nearly full-time assistant director. But its Board of Directors and the center director together will make the decision on the support staff. Said Foltz: “Even though we haven’t advertised for these positions, we already have about 10 applications.”
She said the support staff will assist with the job matching between the employers and workers and will help schedule and oversee the volunteers. The CIF has already trained 35 volunteers and will hold another training session shortly before the center opens its doors.
This summer, two student volunteers — one from Pennsylvania and one from New Jersey — have interned with the CIF, doing counts of the day laborers. “We need to know how many folks are on the corner in the morning, how many employers pick them up and how many workers get jobs,” explained Foltz. “This information will help us plan well for when the center opens.”
Although the facility is not anticipated to be open on Sunday, Foltz said worker counts are also being made on Sundays, too, “because people in the community are concerned that they’d be there when the center would be closed.” The interns have also spent a few mornings each week talking with the workers about how CLARC will operate, telling them about its benefits and describing how the job distribution will work.
There’ll eventually be signs directing potential employers to the resource center. And the CIF has already given the workers flyers to hand to their employers, so they, too, will know about the new center.
The space, itself, is also being readied. Needed repairs are already underway and, said Foltz, “A good number of furnishings have been donated by a lot of generous folks.”
Regarding finances, she said the CIF needs about $45,000 more for salaries and benefits for the paid staff. “We’ve raised about $50,000 and have some more pledged,” said Foltz. “Our total, annual budget is $234,000, including the cost of the space, utilities — for which Dwoskin is paying, supplies, furnishings and salaries for the director and assistant director.
CIF members have visited other, similar centers and its directors to obtain guidance about how best to operate its own facility. It’s also prepared the forms that both workers and employers will fill out, as well as flyers and informational brochures for when the center debuts.
On June 21, CIF members considered the staff hiring-timeline and also discussed answers to tough questions they’ll receive once the center is up and running. These included operational, practical and philosophical questions that local residents may pose, such as, “Will it solve the problem of day laborers standing outside waiting for work?”
“We’re certainly convinced the center will benefit the entire community,” said Foltz. “It will provide a safe place for the workers to wait for employment, off the street, so it will reduce traffic congestion. And it will resolve folks’ concerns about [their own] safety and loitering.”
Many of the workers have wives and young children to support, and all they ask is fair pay for an honest day’s labor. But as things stand now, they have no recourse if they toil all day for an employer who then refuses to pay them. But once the new facility is operational, that should no longer be a problem. Said Foltz: “Because we’ll know who the employers who hire them are, the center will provide a system to make sure the workers are paid fairly.”
She said the workers will be inside the center and volunteers will greet the employers, possibly outside the entrance, as they arrive. In addition, the workers will receive training and classes there on English, taxes, job skills and financial management. Health screening for things such as blood pressure and diabetes may also be offered.
For more information about the center, to volunteer or to donate, go to centrevilleimmigrationforum.org. or call (this summer) 703-257-4111. Besides being excited about this project finally coming to fruition, Foltz hopes it will be accepted and welcomed by the residents.
“One of the community’s concerns is that the workers won’t use the center,” she said. “But that’s not true. They’re enthusiastic about it and see the benefits very clearly. If anyone has any worries, I’d definitely encourage people to find out firsthand what’s going on by volunteering.”
The public will be notified in advance of the opening and will also be invited to attend an open house there. “We’re not trying to solve the national immigration problem,” said Foltz. “This center has no government funding — so this is a private solution to a public problem. And in many ways, this is a model for the way many problems can be solved.”
DetailsBy Tina Griego | Denver Post Columnist | Source: DenverPost.com
The Aurora Human Rights Center occupies a small, two-story brick building on the corner of Dayton Street and 14th Avenue in what’s called Original Aurora, which is in north Aurora. It’s the kind of neighborhood where you can find a Somali market, an African hair-braiding and, in between, a great Mexican restaurantLa Cueva, if you’ve never been. It has its pawns, art galleries, a light-filled library, a small theater, apartments full of refugees, a corner claimed by day laborers.
It’s a changing neighborhood and has been for a while now. Some enjoy this. Some don’t. In either case, it holds a collection of communities that tend to be isolated from one another. It’s a kind of default isolation that’s generally a product of language or legal status or economic class.
What city and community leaders know is that isolated communities serve no one well. Not the people who live in them. Not the neighborhoods that surround them. Isolation breeds stagnation.
This, then, is the context for the Aurora Human Rights Center. The idea was sparked by the Denver Foundation’s Strengthening Neighborhoods program, with funding from the Buck Foundation, whose matriarch is Mims Buck. She has been described as a 101-year-old maverick, which makes her the kind of woman I want to meet.
The AHRC building is plain, drab, even. It doesn’t look like a bridge, but it is.
“We want to create the cross-fertilization of cultures, backgrounds, languages,” says Patrick Horvath, director of the Strengthening Neighborhood program. “It really is designed to be a melting pot.”
Five nonprofits are housed here: El Centro Humanitario, which is well- known for its work advocating the fair of day laborers; Rights for All People, which cultivates leadership among the Spanish- speaking immigrant community; the Lowry Family Center, which supports low-income families through a variety of services; and the Somali Community Center, where a small sign reads: “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.” Strengthening Neighborhoods also has a satellite office run by Mario Flores, a longtime community organizer.
A day laborer can come here for workplace-safety training. An immigrant can sign up for citizenship classes. A Somali refugee can learn computer skills. Struggling mothers and fathers can take parenting classes.
Like other nonprofits in the city, the AHRC seeks to do more than serve clients. It wants to grow leaders. What’s different here, the experiment, if you will, is how to take five entities sharing one building and make them more than five entities sharing one building. That’s where the bridge comes in — the cross-fertilization, as Horvath called it. It can manifest itself in the simplest way. The Somali Community Center started a sewing group for its women. Soon enough, it was inviting Mexican women to join.
“We can say we want to know people outside our own communities, but how do we that? Where does it begin?” says Lisa Duran, the executive director of Rights for All People. “It’s not a small thing, and the Aurora Human Rights Center has that built into its vision.”
The AHRC held its open house a few weeks ago. It’s taken three years to get here and not without some controversy. El Centro Humanitario wanted to move the informal day-laborer gathering site to this building. It planned to establish a hiring center much as it has in Denver. The pushback from some city and neighborhood leaders has shelved that plan.
In some ways, the AHRC is still figuring out how to articulate the vision expressed by Mims Buck, who gets the final word today. On the occasion of her 100th birthday, she was asked for her wish. “Fewer wars and more tolerance for people of all backgrounds, faiths and races,” she said, and then added: “I think peace is something we are all wishing for, but it is not enough to wish or hope; we all need to strive towards it.”
Tina Griego writes Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Reach her at 303-954-2699 or tgriego@denverpost.com.
DetailsBy Davie Jamieson | HuffingtonPost.com
Late last year, advocates for low-wage workers in Florida’s Palm Beach County made what they thought was a modest request of their county commissioners: pass a wage-theft ordinance that would make it easier for working people to reclaim unpaid wages from employers who stiff them.
But that seemingly simple request is now in limbo, as Florida’s business interests have begun campaigning strongly against such ordinances. Some local clergy in Palm Beach are wondering what’s so controversial about making sure working people are paid what’s owed them.
“I had a much higher opinion of our business community,” said Holy Name of Jesus Catholic Church Deacon Peter Mazzella, who’s part of a coalition of religious leaders advocating for the law. “Being paid for one’s efforts — the salary that’s agreed upon for one’s work — is something very foundational to our whole economic system.”
In recent years, religious leaders and worker advocates have managed to raise national awareness about wage theft, which occurs when employers fail to pay the minimum wage or overtime, force employees to work off the clock or decline to pay workers altogether. A number of state and local governments have since moved to toughen their laws. New York State passed this past winter its Wage Theft Prevention Act, which increased penalties against unscrupulous employers and boosted the amount of back wages a worker can recoup. And Texas enacted a law this spring that makes wage theft a criminal act, empowering local authorities to arrest business owners who don’t pay their employees.
Such laws have had their detractors, but nowhere has the opposition seemed to be so strong as in Florida.
Last year the County of Miami-Dade passed one of the most progressive wage-theft laws in the country, establishing a municipal hearing process for allegations of unpaid wages. Workers owed at least $60 from their employer now have a right to make their case to an examiner through the county’s small-business development office.
To date, the program has fielded around 1,000 complaints, totaling more than $1 million in owed wages, and has so far recovered $130,000 for workers, according to statistics provided by the county. Many of those cases never went through the hearing process and were instead resolved quickly through mediation.
“Overall, it’s going great,” said Sheri McGriff, the program’s director. “With this law in place, people feel more empowered to come forward.”
Less thrilled with the law are some of the state’s business leaders. The Florida Retail Federation, a powerful statewide trade group, lobbied against the Miami-Dade ordinance, arguing that there were already systems in place to help workers recoup owed money. The group also believes businesses could wind up in “double jeopardy” with workers, being forced to pay back wages through the county, then again through the federal department of labor — a scenario that the law’s backers say is highly unlikely.
With the law now on the books, the retail federation is suing in state court, claiming the ordinance violates the state constitution. If successful, the lawsuit could nullify the Miami-Dade law and likely scuttle any attempts in Palm Beach to move forward with a similar ordinance.
The retail federation has also pushed a state bill that would preempt local ordinances like the one in Miami-Dade. Though that attempt failed, the bill will likely be brought forth again next session.
“You [already] have laws that protect against these violations,” said Samantha Hunter Padgett, deputy general counsel for the federation, which has officials from Walmart, Macy’s, CVS, Home Depot and Disney World on its board. “If this is truly a problem, then the issue is education and access.”
The federation may fear that the Miami-Dade ordinance could metastasize to other counties, creating red tape and making employers and their books more accountable to local governments. Indeed, the ordinance served as the basis for the proposal now stalled in Palm Beach.
But Jose Javier Rodriguez, the public-interest lawyer who drafted the Miami-Dade law, said employers have nothing to worry about — so long as they’re paying their employees properly.
“The burden of proof is on the employee,” Rodriguez said. “They have to prove they were employed and that they were owed money. It’s a basic contract: ‘I worked for you; you didn’t pay me.’ ”
The retail federation’s resistance to the law seems a bit puzzling to some given that retailers haven’t exactly been dragged in great numbers before hearing examiners in Miami-Dade. In fact, according to McGriff, the greatest numbers of wage-theft cases come out of industries other than retail — specifically construction, ity, and food-services. Many of the violations tend to happen under day-labor arrangements, an uncommon occurance in retail. She says the complaints are vetted early on to make sure they’re not frivolous or fraudulent.
“A lot of it is in industries that feel they can bring in folk and not be accountable,” said McGriff. “Say, a construction company may pick up some folk that are at a ping center, promise them work, work them for the week, and then not pay them. We’ve had that.”
Perhaps not surprisingly, many of the people who’ve found recourse through the new law are undocumented workers. Fearing deportation, such workers are easily taken advantage of, and many of them would be reluctant to step forward and file a complaint with the federal labor department. The county, however, doesn’t care what a worker’s status is, McGriff said. “Our question is whether you were paid or not.”
Although Palm Beach’s county commissioners voted unanimously last year to support the drafting of a wage-theft ordinance, no such law will be coming soon. In the wake of the retail federation’s lawsuit and pressure from business groups, the commission has tabled the issue and likely won’t deal with it at least until after the new year.
Palm Beach Commissioner Shelley Vana said that the best route for workers who are owed wages may be through legal aid societies and their pro bono lawyers. In a best-case scenario, Vana said, “we can get everyone working together without an ordinance.”
Jeanette Smith, the director of the faith-based advocacy group South Florida Interfaith Worker Justice, believes ordinances like the one on the table in Palm Beach are all the more important because Florida does not have a state labor department, which in other states is often the agency that investigates wage violations. Florida’s department was dismantled a decade ago.
The business community’s opposition, Smith said, doesn’t hold up on moral grounds.
“We all agree: Wage theft is bad; it hurts good businesses,” she said. “So what’s to know? Just pay your employees.”
Details