PEP, June 2009: Immigrants fight for justice

By ALFREDO ALVARADO

As unionists worldwide celebrated International Workers Day on May 1, labor activists and undocumented workers from California to New York joined forces to press for better immigration policies in the United States.

In New York City, union members and leaders and elected officials converged at Madison Square Park on East 23rd Street to hear messages of solidarity. With the new Obama administration in Washington, “We have a real opportunity, something that we haven’t had in a very long time, to push through major immigration reform,” said Ed Ott, executive director of the Central Labor Council.

Maf Misbah Uddin, treasurer of DC 37 and president of Local 1407, also addressed the crowd. “We support a path to citizenship, equal rights for all workers and the Employee Free Choice Act,” said Uddin, himself an immigrant from Bangladesh.

Among the political leaders who spoke to the ethnically diverse crowd was Congress menber Nydia M. Velazquez (D-NY). “We have a moral obligation to fix the immigration system,” said Velazquez, who also addressed the crowd in Spanish. She was joined on the stage by City Council member John C. Liu, from Flushing and Sonia Ivany, president of the local chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement.

In a later demonstration at Union Square Park, several hundred marchers held signs demanding an end to Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and reminding President Obama of his campaign promise to address immigration policy during his first year in office.

Recently the White House issued new guidelines for ICE that emphasize prosecuting employers who knowingly hire undocumented workers — an improvement over the Bush policy of conducting mass raids on workers but leaving management alone, a policy that resulted in tearing apart thousands of families.

Professor Jennifer Gordon of Fordham Law School has called for government policy to focus on enforcing wage and hour laws, health and safety protections and the right to organize — actions that would reduce the incentive for businesses to hire undocumented workers and raise standards for all workers.

Union forum on rights

The DC 37 Citizenship Committee held its 2nd annual Citizenship and Immigration Forum April 12 at the union. The committee, chaired by Local 374 President Cuthbert Dickenson, presented a distinguished panel that discussed vital issues regarding the citizenship process, the rights of immigrant workers and the importance of participating in the U.S. Census next year.

Joan Foy, an attorney at DC 37’s Municipal Employees Legal Services program, reminded members that MELS can help them apply for citizenship. “I would like to see a lot more members become citizens,” she said. With fees increasing, she advised members to apply as soon as possible.

Carmen Calderon of the Bureau for Immigrant Workers’ Rights at the state Labor Dept. explained that workers have legal rights regardless of their immigration status. “We will go after any employer that does not comply with the law,” said Calderon, who pointed out that her agency keeps information about a worker’s legal status confidential.

Panelist Michelle Centeno, outreach director of the city comptroller’s Labor Law Bureau, said that her office has collected $1.5 million for underpaid workers by enforcing wage laws. She made it clear that undocumented workers are eligible to file complaints to claim wages from employers who violate the law.

Panelist Charles H. Mohan from the U.S. Census Bureau encouraged members to participate in the 2010 census. “If we are not counted, our communities will not get a fair share of funding,” he said.

The deadline to respond to the next census will be April 1, 2010.

“Enumerators will be sent a total of six times to your homes if you don’t respond by April 1,” he said. Census information is also confidential.

“A lot of valuable information was shared with the members this evening,” said Dickenson. “And that’s due to our committee members who worked very hard to organize this interesting forum.”