Over the past few years, we have worked with Strategic Actions for a Just Economy on supporting long-term campaigns addressing community impact of redevelopment agency decisions – one to secure affordable housing and living wage jobs in the face of the University of Southern California’s (USC) persistent expansion into the neighborhood community, and another to reform Los Angeles redevelopment policy to work for – rather than against – the interests of low-income residents. As part of this ongoing struggle, we are now working with SAJE’s Figueroa Corridor Coalition for Economic Justice on a new campaign. The Figueroa Corridor is a 40-block strip between USC and the Staples Center. USC has decided to build a sports arena in this area and the Coalition wants to ensure that the millions of development dollars that will be spent have tangible benefits for the low-income people who live in the surrounding neighborhoods. To help the Coalition negotiate a stakeholder’s voice in future USC planning, we are researching Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) programs around the country to document “best practices” mitigating university impact upon local communities. We are also researching “Town and Gown” agreements, to document “best practices” for community/college relationships. In addition to providing research, we have been participating in campaign strategy meetings.
The New York Taxi Workers Alliance fights for a living wage, health benefits, and safe working conditions for drivers, who are often at the mercy of wealthy taxi owners and the Taxi and Limousine Commission. The DataCenter has been helping NYTWA research the finances and connections within the taxi industry.
Since the abolition of institutionalized slavery, domestic workers have been invisible, exploited and left out of labor protections and the labor movement. Their labor has rarely been recognized by lawmakers or society at large as “real work.” However, in global cities like New York, the domestic work industry is expanding, providing childcare and home care while their employers go to work. Today, the New York City economy is supported by one of the largest domestic worker labor forces in the country. Still, working conditions have improved little since the 1860s. Once a field for predominantly African American women, the domestic work industry is now dominated by immigrant women fleeing the widespread destruction and devastation left by the globalization process in the Third World. Domestic workers, especially live-in workers, work long hours, have little job security, and no control over living or working conditions. Domestic workers are isolated in their workplace, forced to negotiate conditions one-on-one with employers. There are no clear standards for domestic employment and the few protections that exist are rarely enforced.
Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) workers and their allies emerged victorious from a 5-year national boycott of Mount Olive Pickle Company, winning union representation and higher wages for more than 8000 cucumber pickers brought to North Carolina farms through the federal H-2A visa program. The agreement between FLOC, the North Carolina Growers Association and Mount Olive Pickle Company represents another success in holding major food packaging corporations responsible for the working conditions of the farm laborers who supply their vegetables.
Young people from environmental justice communities around the U.S. and abroad converged in Flagstaff, Arizona at the base of the sacred mountain known as the San Francisco Peaks for the ALL PEOPLES POWER SUMMIT: Building Communities of Hope, Strength, and Sustainability in July. Hosted by the Black Mesa Water Coalition, a grassroots coalition of Navajo and Hopi youths and young adults working together for environmental justice, the Summit took place at the site of one of the most heated sacred land-protection struggles in North America today.
Keynote speaker Winona Laduke emphasized the importance of information in the hands of our communities fighting for environmental justice. At a DataCenter popular education workshop “research-for-action: Building an Effective Campaign to Win!,” participants practiced developing a research plan rooted in a community environmental justice agenda. A power mapping workshop also led by DataCenter helped participants visualize the power relations that must be altered through their campaigns.
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