Four takeaways from the new report on raising St. Paul’s minimum wage

February 22, 2018 by

Jess Manthe, a longtime retail worker in St. Paul, speaks at a rally outside council chambers, calling poverty wages a barrier to the middle class for too many people in the city.

Low-wage workers listened as the author of a report on raising St. Paul’s minimum wage summarized her findings at yesterday’s City Council meeting. Then they put council members on notice.

“Now is the time for the city to take a stand and get us the wages we need,” personal care attendant Daniel Maddox, a member of the low-wage worker center CTUL, said during a brief rally outside council chambers.

Council members at the meeting indicated they plan to move at a more deliberate pace. Council President Amy Brendmoen said the plan is to “have an ordinance in front of us by fall.”

What that ordinance should look like is already the subject of a heated debate, as the report presented yesterday confirmed.

The nonpartisan Citizens League prepared the report to give council members an overview of available data and research on the topic, and to identify which constituencies are likely to be impacted by a higher minimum wage. It’s available on the Citizen League’s website.

Here are four takeaways from the report and Citizen League Executive Director Pahoua Yang Hoffman’s presentation to the Council yesterday.

1. Despite an unemployment rate of 3.1 percent, too many working people and families in St. Paul live in poverty.

The Met Council’s most recent analysis of census data shows 40.8 percent of St. Paul residents live in poverty, a higher rate than any other metro-area community. And areas of concentrated poverty are spreading within the city, a trend Ward 7’s Jane Prince called “disturbing.”

Jess Manthe, a longtime retail worker in St. Paul, called poverty wages a barrier to the middle class.

“I have huge amounts of (student) debt that I’ll carry with me for the next 25 years,” she said. “Our unlivable wages mean my husband and I aren’t going to be able to buy a house, and having kids is completely off the table. I think it’s time for St. Paul to invest in its workers.”

2. People working for poverty wages know their paychecks don’t get bigger by accident or their bosses’ goodwill.

In preparing the Citizens League’s report, Hoffman met with more than 100 “stakeholders.” In her presentation to the Council, she singled out the story of a retail janitor who, after 14 years on the job, has seen her wages increase from $7.25 to $10.75 per hour.

The state minimum wage has increased from $6.15 to $9.65 over the same time frame. “She wanted me to let you know that if not for a mandate, she may never get to $15,” Hoffman said.

3. The janitor working for $10.75 after 14 years on the job is not a statistical outlier. In St. Paul poverty wages affect workers of all ages.

Stereotypes that cast minimum-wage earners as students working around classes or retirees keeping themselves busy are bogus. The Citizens League report cites a 2016 study by the Roy Wilkins Center for Human Relations and Social Justice, which considered the impacts of a minimum-wage increase in Minneapolis and in Hennepin and Ramsey counties.

“There is no distinction between ages where there might be in other cities, where low-wage workers might be younger or older,” Hoffman said.

Tipped workers packed council chambers to hear the report on raising St. Paul’s minimum wage.

4. Whether it’s a tip penalty or a training wage, interest groups will attempt to poke holes in St. Paul’s minimum wage.

The Citizens League report reflects a split within the restaurant industry over the tip penalty, which allows employers to pay a sub-minimum wage as long as workers make up the difference in tips. Working people on both sides of the issue showed up in council chambers yesterday.

Servers who support a tip penalty say a lower minimum wage is vital to their employers’ profitability, as well as preservation of a tipping culture. Opponents argue the tip penalty opens the door to wage theft, as some employers fail to make up the difference between workers’ tips and the minimum wage.

Research also shows tip penalties contribute to a culture of sexual harassment in the restaurant industry. A study released earlier this month found female tipped workers in states like Minnesota experience report sexual harassment at half the rate of their counterparts in states with a lower minimum wage for tipped workers.

Catherine Olsen, a tipped worker at a small business in St. Paul, called on city officials to pass an ordinance lifting all workers to $15 per hour, with no tip penalty and no youth wage. “St. Paul has an opportunity to act now and act fast – and to not leave anybody behind,” she said.

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Bobby Kasper: Raising wages starts at home

February 5, 2018 by

Bobby Kasper

Unemployment is down. Corporate earnings are up. But for most hardworking Americans, wages aren’t going anywhere.

Congress and President Trump say their $1.5 trillion tax plan will shift wage growth out of neutral. Working people see the tax scam for what it is: a massive and deeply corrupt giveaway to millionaires, billionaires and wealthy corporations. With the gap between rich and poor as large as it’s been since the Great Depression, politicians in Washington are only rigging the game even more.

Here in St. Paul, we can cross our fingers and wait for corporate tax cuts to trickle down into our paychecks, or we can take matters into our own hands. We can cut through federal inaction by passing a $15 minimum wage that ensures no one working in our city lives in poverty.

The labor movement has a long history of backing legislation that improves working people’s lives, from the eight-hour day to child labor laws. Today, unions carry on the work of raising standards for all workers, whether they hold a union card or not. That’s why unions in St. Paul are leading the campaign for one fair minimum wage in our city, with no penalty for tipped workers.

Poverty wages are the biggest barrier to realizing our self-styled billing as the most livable city in America. St. Paul boasts an unemployment rate well below the national average, but an estimated 40 percent of the city’s residents live in poverty.

Too many jobs in our community aren’t paying wages that reflect the cost of living here. The state Department of Employment and Economic Development estimates people working full-time, year-round jobs must earn $15.31 per hour to meet their basic needs in Ramsey County. Anyone earning less is forced to make impossible choices. Do I pay the rent or buy groceries? Fill my prescription or my gas tank?

Too often, those choices fall on women and people of color. Poverty wages exacerbate our region’s yawning economic disparities along gender and racial lines. Poverty rates among workers of color are nearly four times higher than white workers in the metro area. Raising the wage to $15 is the single most effective way our elected officials can narrow the gap.

Working people in St. Paul deserve to see their wages keep pace with those in Minneapolis, where all workers are on track to make $15 by 2024. Expect low-wage employers and their front groups to trot out the same tired arguments and doomsday scenarios here as they did in Minneapolis. By now, you’ve heard them all – businesses will pick up and leave, employers will cut hours, the restaurant scene will wither.

Don’t buy it. Minnesota’s economy has thrived since Gov. Mark Dayton signed the statewide minimum-wage hike in 2014. Back then, the restaurant industry warned of layoffs and closings if the legislation passed. Today, business is booming in the restaurant industry, with job openings up 75 percent over the past year in the metro area. Cities and states across the country are raising the minimum wage gradually and prudently, without any signs of economic contraction. There’s no reason we can’t do the same in St. Paul.

Poverty wages are a real crisis in St. Paul, one that should be at the top of our city’s agenda in 2018. Mayor-elect Melvin Carter’s support for $15, both during the campaign and since his election, is encouraging. But working people have waited too long already for the gains of this economic recovery to trickle down into our paychecks. It’s time to turn promises into a concrete timeline for action. St. Paul needs a $15 minimum wage ordinance by next summer.

– Bobby Kasper is president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, representing more than 100 affiliate unions with over 50,000 members in Ramsey, Washington, Dakota and Chisago counties.

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Here’s how labor activists plan to celebrate Super Bowl week

January 26, 2018 by

Today marks the kickoff of Super Bowl events in the Twin Cities, and organizers plan a 10-day run of concerts, parties, conventions and other events leading up to the big game Feb. 4 at U.S. Bank Stadium.

What you won’t find listed on the Super Bowl Host Committee’s online calendar are several opportunities to support working people organizing for dignity, respect on the job and quality public services.

“Minnesota’s Super Bowl shouldn’t just be about entertaining the rich and the powerful,” said bakery worker Travis Reinhart, whose union-busting employer will host a star-studded celebrity fundraiser in St. Paul next Saturday.

Already, the St. Paul Federation of Teachers is promoting a social media campaign targeting two of the Super Bowl committee’s biggest corporate sponsors: Ecolab and U.S. Bank. Teachers are in a difficult round of contract negotiations with the St. Paul school district, which is facing a multi-million dollar budget shortfall.

“Money has been stolen from our schools over the last 20 years … and that money has been going into tax breaks for corporations,” SPFT President Nick Faber said.

Kirinda Anderson, a parent active in union-led efforts to address the district’s racial disparities, called on Ecolab and U.S. bank to “step up and be better partners with the schools and the students … and to support public education in the same way they’ve supported this game.”

Here’s a rundown of events you won’t find on the Super Bowl committee’s website:

• The Pre-Game: Our lives over their game. Monday, Jan. 29, 6 to 8:30 p.m. Hamm Plaza, St. Paul.

Unions and worker groups are teaming up with racial-justice, climate-defense and immigrant-rights organizations to plan a march and rally outside the NFL’s Super Bowl Opening Night party in St. Paul.

Activists like Antonia Sanchez, a member of the Twin Cities low-wage worker center CTUL, are calling on the corporations sponsoring Super Bowl week to do more in their community than hold a round-the-clock party for ultra-rich.

“The millionaires are just going to get richer, and we’re not going to get anything out of it,” Sanchez said at a press conference announcing the groups’ Super Bowl plans. “These corporations are grinding us all down.

“We want to demand that these corporations … support raising the minimum wage in St. Paul to $15 an hour. We want them to support ending wage theft in Minneapolis and St. Paul.”

• Super Bowl Protest: Tackle Corporate Greed! Friday, Feb. 2, 4:30 p.m. Home Depot, 1520 New Brighton Blvd, Minneapolis.

Home Depot co-founder Arthur Blank owns the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons, making Super Bowl week the perfect time for janitors who clean Home Depot stores in the Twin Cities to renew their demand that the retailer adopt a responsible contractor policy.

CTUL, which is organizing janitors who clean Home Depot, has negotiated policies with Best Buy, Target and other retailers, paving the way for 500 retail cleaning workers to form a union last year.

Most people working in retail cleaning are immigrants, and CTUL is teaming up with immigrant-rights group Navigate MN to demand Home Depot use its lobbying clout to support so-called Dreamers’ protected status, pass a clean immigration reform bill and end immigration raids dividing families across the country.

• Super Bowl Breakfast: Support $15 and Workers’ Rights! Saturday, Feb. 3, 7 a.m. Hilton Minneapolis, 1001 Marquette Ave.

As the Super Bowl Committee and its corporate sponsors hold a breakfast inside the hotel to honor the NFL’s “positive legacy” of community service, worker groups will gather outside for a “people’s breakfast to honor the worker leaders and community members in Minneapolis and St. Paul who fight for living wages rights on the job for themselves, their families and their communities.”

The event will call attention to the need to fund enforcement of Minneapolis’ new minimum-wage ordinance, and lift up the campaign for a $15 minimum wage – without a tip penalty – in St. Paul.

• A Taste of Justice. Saturday, Feb. 3, 5 p.m. St. Paul Labor Center, 353 W. 7th St.

Workers at Franklin Street Bakery have been trying to organize a union for over two years, looking to improve wages and working conditions in the Minneapolis facility. Their campaign has drawn a stifling – and sometimes illegal – response from management, which recently sent a labor lawyer to intimidate one worker in his own home, according to a report from Bakery Workers Local 22.

Bakery owner Wayne Kostroski holds a hunger-relief event – “Taste of the NFL” – with celebrity chefs, NFL players and wealthy executives each year during Super Bowl week. Last year, bakery workers countered with a fundraiser of their own, and this year they plan to do it again, only blocks away.

“While helping food shelves is a good thing, Wayne pays many workers as little as $11 an hour, forcing us to use food shelves,” Reinhart said. “I know I’ve been there. The Taste of the NFL’s slogan is ‘kick hunger.’ We have a simple answer for Wayne: Kicking hunger starts at home.”

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One Fair Wage or tip penalty? Debate splits St. Paul service industry

January 24, 2018 by

The minimum wage debate in St. Paul has only begun, and already tipped workers are at the forefront.

Two public events this month exposed a divide within the restaurant industry over whether employers should be allowed to pay less than minimum wage, as long as workers make up the difference in tip income.

Proponents call it a “tip credit.” Opponents call it a “tip penalty.”

Whatever it’s called, Minnesota is one of just seven states without one, and that won’t change as Minneapolis’ citywide minimum wage edges closer to $15 over the next six years.

But it’s not for the restaurant industry’s lack of trying. Employers lobbied fiercely for a tip penalty last year in Minneapolis. At the Capitol, they backed Republican lawmakers’ bill to block cities from passing minimum-wage ordinances.

So it’s unlikely the restaurant industry will sit on the sidelines as St. Paul’s newly elected mayor, Melvin Carter, looks to deliver on his campaign pledge to make $15 a reality in the capital city.

A push for ‘one fair wage’

Unions and worker advocacy groups like the Restaurant Opportunities Center United, which is organizing tipped workers in St. Paul, oppose a two-tier wage system. They argue it leaves behind the very workers a minimum-wage increase is supposed to benefit.

“If your business is on the verge of closing because your workers demand to be paid an equitable wage, then you need to think twice about your business model,” said Steven Lewer, a server who lives and works in St. Paul and a supporter of maintaining one fair wage in his industry.

Government data shows job growth in the restaurant industry is outpacing any other area of the economy, but average earnings in the industry – $22,350 per year for full-service waitstaff in Minnesota – are stuck at the poverty level.

That’s why lawmakers in New York, Michigan and elsewhere are moving to roll back tip penalties, ROC United President Saru Jayaraman told tipped workers gathered at the St. Paul Labor Center Jan. 17.

“You as a state have been a shining example for the rest of us,” Jayaraman said. “Why would we consider going backward in St. Paul when the rest of the country is going forward?”

ROC United’s Saru Jayaraman talked with tipped workers supporting one fair wage in St. Paul.

An imbalance of power

Jayaraman presented evidence that restaurant workers in states with a tip penalty experience sexual harassment at nearly double the rate of their counterparts in states like Minnesota. The connection between tipping and harassment isn’t hard to understand, St. Paul server Sarah Kopp-Reddy said.

“When tipped workers rely too heavily on tips, it becomes a lot easier for power dynamics to be thrown off,” Kopp-Reddy said. “When power dynamics are off, servers put up with a lot more. The customer can truly never be wrong.”

Restaurant workers in the U.S. already experience sexual harassment more frequently than workers in any other industry, according to a Buzzfeed analysis of complaints filed with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. A ROC United survey found 90 percent of women working in the restaurant industry have experienced sexual harassment.

Many employers in the industry, Lewer said, take advantage of workers’ reliance on tips to create a “toxic work environment.”

“Employers will say you’re not smiling enough, or you need to be able to take this harassment you’re getting at the table,” Lewer said. “You’re going to view those things as OK because you need the job, you need the tips. That’s not the way a working environment should exist.”

A split among servers

Lewer and Kopp-Reddy, both 28, see growing support among tipped workers in St. Paul for an ordinance establishing one fair wage, but they acknowledged support is far from universal.

Proponents of the tip penalty staged a public event Jan. 8 at a Cathedral Hill bar, where restaurant owners and staff made the case for paying tipped workers less. Several servers and bartenders expressed concern that their employers would not be able to absorb a higher minimum wage, or that patrons would no longer leave tips.

One shift manager from a bar on West 7th Street spoke on behalf of his wife, a server who, when it comes to higher wages, “doesn’t need it, doesn’t want it.” A bartender from Minneapolis said he’s looking for work in St. Paul now that his hourly wage is on track to increase annually. The owner of a Como Park eatery warned that iPads could replace waitstaff if their wages go up.

Doomsday predictions and scare tactics are a permanent fixture of the minimum wage debate, Jayaraman said, but they aren’t backed up by empirical evidence.

Look no further than Minnesota’s own restaurant industry. The state’s minimum wage has increased by 33 percent since 2014, when state lawmakers passed the first increase in decades. Despite dire warnings from industry lobbyists during the legislative process, employment in restaurants and bars has grown by over 16,000  since 2014, according to data compiled by the state’s Department of Employment and Economic Development. On average, people working in restaurants are earning $57 more per week.

“Tipping isn’t going to go away” as the minimum wage goes up, Jayaraman said. “But no amount of evidence seems to overcome fear.

“What we’re trying to do is offer hope, to let people know that there’s a beautiful future on the horizon in which we, as tipped workers, are treated as the professionals we truly are.”

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Prominent activist to talk $15, #MeToo with tipped workers in St. Paul

January 16, 2018 by

Saru Jayaraman

A leading voice in the nationwide campaign to improve wages and working conditions for restaurant workers will meet tomorrow with tipped workers fighting for a $15 minimum wage in St. Paul.

In a 7 p.m. presentation at the St. Paul Labor Center, Saru Jayaraman will examine the connection between efforts to raise the minimum wage and the #MeToo movement to stop sexual harassment in the workplace. The event is free and open to the public.

Jayaraman is co-founder of the Restaurant Opportunities Center and director of the University of California-Berkeley’s Food and Labor Research Center. An advocate of one fair wage for hospitality workers, Jayaraman walked the red carpet at the Golden Globes last week with Amy Poehler, one of several actresses who invited #MeToo activists as their guests.

Jayaraman’s visit to St. Paul reflects growing momentum in support of a citywide $15 minimum wage. Minneapolis put a strong $15 ordinance on the books last year, and St. Paul’s newly elected mayor, Melvin Carter, made $15 a rallying cry during his 2017 campaign.

A key question elected officials will face as they craft a minimum-wage ordinance is whether St. Paul, like Minneapolis, should establish one fair wage or carve out a subminimum wage for tipped workers, known as a tip penalty.

Restaurant industry groups fought hard for a tip penalty in Minneapolis, serving up doomsday predictions of layoffs and restaurant closings if servers’ wages increase. The same arguments already are surfacing in St. Paul.

Jayaraman’s work, meanwhile, has exposed the tip penalty’s troubling impact on working conditions in the restaurant industry. Tipped workers in two-tiered minimum wage states experience sexual harassment at nearly double the rate of their counterparts in states like Minnesota with no subminimum wage.

Learn more about the Jan. 17 event, RSVP and invite others to attend on Facebook. The St. Paul Labor Center is located at 353 West 7th Street.

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St. Paul fast-food workers strike for $15 on Labor Day

September 4, 2017 by

Striking fast-food workers rallied with supporters outside a St. Paul McDonald’s this morning, demanding $15 per hour and respect on the job.

“We need something to live on,” said 27-year-old Tay Polite, on strike from her job at McDonald’s in the city’s Midway district. “Even with a job we’re still struggling to support our families.

“For as much as we work and as hard as we work, we deserve that $15 an hour.”

Fight for $15 strikes and demonstrations targeted fast-food employers in 400 cities worldwide on Labor Day.

Locally, the strike kicked off a series of events planned by unions and community groups pushing a $15 minimum wage in St. Paul and funding for enforcement of the historic minimum-wage ordinance passed in Minneapolis earlier this year.

“Many people are currently working two and three jobs to support their families,” St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Bobby Kasper said. “Working families are just not able to get by with the current minimum wage. We need to stand behind striking fast food workers and keep working to get families back in the middle class.”

Striking fast-food workers, including Tay Polite and April Reeves (R), were recognized during a rally on Labor Day.

Elected officials, including U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, supported striking workers on the early-morning picket line.

“The CEO of McDonald’s is making $9,000 an hour and can probably afford to get by on $6,000 an hour,” Ellison said. “It’s absolutely ridiculous that they claim they can’t afford to pay workers $15 minimum wage and I’m proud to stand with workers this Labor Day as they fight to reclaim what the true meaning of what Labor Day really means, and that is to uplift workers.”

Fast-food workers in the Twin Cities are organizing with the low-wage worker center CTUL, which began reaching out to workers in the industry three years ago. The campaign has gained momentum since then, with several strikes targeting fast-food employers and actions in support of local minimum-wage ordinances.

Although the federal minimum wage hasn’t budged since 2009, Fight for $15 campaigns nationwide have resulted in wage hikes totaling more than $62 billion for 22 million working people, according to a recent report. The estimate reflects both corporate policy changes and political victories in places like California, New York, Seattle and Minneapolis.

April Reeves, who earns $11 an hour working at the Midway McDonald’s, hopes St. Paul is the next city to join that list.

“More money is always better when you’re struggling check to check,” Reeves said. “What do my grandkids need? What does my child need? Should we buy food or pay these bills? Those are the day-to-day choices I face.

“All I want is justice. Give us the money we need to survive.”

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Campaign for $15 sets sights on St. Paul

August 21, 2017 by

After an inspiring victory in Minneapolis, the coalition of unions, faith groups and community organizations working in support of a $15 minimum wage has shifted its focus to St. Paul, where a wide-open mayoral contest creates a strategic window of opportunity.

After it passed the City Council by an 11-1 vote, Mayor Betsy Hodges signed Minneapolis’ minimum wage ordinance into law June 30.

It marked a stunning turnaround for the city’s elected officials, who, when pressed to act on the minimum wage three years earlier, commissioned a study instead. Two years later, they voted to block a ballot initiative after 15 Now activists delivered over 20,000 signatures on a petition seeking to put the minimum wage question before voters.

While the city succeeded in keeping $15 off the ballot, 15 Now Minnesota lead organizer Celeste Robinson said, the overwhelming community support delivered a powerful message to Hodges and members of the City Council that “poverty wages aren’t a negotiable issue.”

“It’s not something they could stall on, it’s not something they could bargain away – because the rent won’t wait,” she added. “That relentless pressure that we applied to elected officials was the key.”

Organizers are taking a different approach in St. Paul, where a the mayor’s race already has catapulted the question of raising the minimum wage to the front burner. All five candidates who attended a mayoral debate hosted by the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation earlier this year spoke in favor of raising the minimum wage to $15.

With candidates for mayor using $15 as a campaign pledge, organizers see an opportunity to win at City Hall without pounding the pavement to collect signatures on a petition.

“Of course, we’re having problems nailing down support on the City Council,” Robinson said. “But there does seem to be a lot of enthusiasm (in the mayor’s race), and that does offer us a window. Hopefully, those mayoral candidates can kind of pull the council members along with them.”

Union members played a critical role in the success of Minneapolis’ campaign to raise the wage, and they figure to do the same in St. Paul.

Some unions support 15 Now because the cause – a $15 wage floor – has become central to their contract campaigns. In Minneapolis, the United Food and Commercial Workers’ efforts to organize co-op workers got a boost from the fight for $15. Robinson called it an “incredibly effective” approach that resonated with young workers in particular.”

“For workers who haven’t had experiences with union power before, it might not be immediately evident to them why a union is good,” she said. “But if you tell people we can have $15 an hour and that’s not all – ask them, ‘What else should we fight for?’ – that’s a really good segue into unionization.”

Other unions see fighting poverty wages as a necessary part of the work their members do. For example, teachers see in their classrooms the strain poverty puts on working families, and nurses know the connection between higher incomes and better health outcomes.

“This is a public health issue,” said Deb Haugen, a registered nurse at Children’s Hospital. “We see it daily: people who can afford their medicine, eat a healthy diet and take time to exercise tend to be less sick than those who can’t because they are working two or three jobs and don’t have the wages to support these important pillars of health.

“That’s why the Minnesota Nurses Association supports a $15 minimum wage and, as a St. Paul resident, I am excited that the campaign is coming to my city next.”

Nick Faber, president of the St. Paul Federation of Teachers, said his union not only supports a minimum wage ordinance, but has pushed the St. Paul Public Schools to adopt a policy requiring its contractors to pay $15 an hour.

“We know when the adults in our students’ lives are working three jobs at poverty wages, it negatively impacts a student’s ability to learn,” Faber said. “As educators, we not only want what’s best for our students in the classroom, but what’s best for their family. Families that are not worrying about food, rent or health care are more able to engage in their students’ learning the way we know all parents want to.”

In Minneapolis, studies found 71,000 working people will see their wages increase as a result of the city’s new ordinance. So far no similar study exists for St. Paul, but ballpark estimates put the number between 50,000 and 100,000.

15 Now has opened up a temporary office in the St. Paul Labor Center, thanks to support from the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation. RLF President Bobby Kasper urged unions to get involved in the fight to raise St. Paul’s minimum wage.

“We made great strides in St. Paul by passing the nation’s strongest earned sick and safe time ordinance,” Kasper said. “I have confidence we’re going to make history with a $15 minimum wage, too.”

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As local preemption debate heats up, new book charts CA city’s progressive renewal

March 1, 2017 by

978-080709426-6Mayoral elections are on the horizon in both Minneapolis and St. Paul. Corporate lobbyists at the Minnesota Capitol are taking aim at local ordinances expanding access to earned sick and safe time.

The timing, it seems, couldn’t be better for author Steve Early’s book reading and discussion at 7 p.m. March 7 at the East Side Freedom Library. The labor rep-turned-journalist’s latest book, “Refinery Town,” traces a progressive revival afoot in Richmond, Calif., an industrial city in the Bay Area long dominated politically by its largest employer, the Chevron Corporation.

The book charts the course activists took, beginning more than a decade ago, to combat the deindustrialization, poverty, crime and public corruption plaguing Richmond in the late 20th century by electing municipal representatives who have since passed a string of progressive reforms, from a higher minimum wage to a nationally heralded approach to community policing.

In the forward to “Refinery Town,” Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders argues that Richmond’s success “reflects the lessons of grassroots organizing elsewhere,” and Early’s latest book “offers ideas and inspiration for making change where it counts the most – among friends, neighbors, and fellow community members.”

We asked Early what lessons Richmond’s progressive renewal might offer for activists in Minnesota and what to expect at the book event March 7. His answers have been edited for length.

UA: Why did you decide to write about the progressive turnaround in Richmond?

SE: “I retired (from the CWA) in 2007 and started doing a series of labor-related books. Five years ago I moved to Richmond from Boston, and that’s when I first got invested in the Richmond Progressive Alliance, which is the subject of the book. I got invested as a rank-and-file member of the RPA, and as it attracted more attention because of the unusual trajectory from a company town to a widely hailed progressive city, I decided it was going to be a good subject for a book.”

UA: The list of progressive policies coming out of Richmond City Hall is impressive. Is it replicable?

SE: “In some ways the agenda of people thinking about running for local office in Minneapolis and St. Paul seems to be very similar: trying to raise the minimum wage, raising labor standards, making housing more affordable, trying to make the police accountable and trying to provide greater environmental protections to the extent any municipality can impact the problem of global warming.

“They might not be the big-picture issues that motivated you to go to Bernie Sanders’ rallies or to join the resistance to Trump… It isn’t going to begin to change electoral politics as much as we need, but it is one way to do that incrementally, to start locally, to build a bottom-up base for a broader – hopefully nationwide – progressive movement.”

UA: What lessons does Richmond’s progressive success story offer for the rest of us?

SE: “To be successful here in Richmond, progressives really had to set aside some of the differences they had. People here have been willing to coalesce and campaign under a common banner. That’s paid off. And you have to be patient and persistent in pursuing your goals. You can’t expect to accomplish them overnight. Also, don’t just pop up every two years and run candidates. The RPA functions year round, it’s a membership organization that people pay dues to, and it’s constantly engaging in issue-based organizing. That’s not the usual model for political parties in this country.

“And the key part is RPA candidates are corporate free. They refuse corporate donations, just like Bernie.”

UA: In Minnesota, Republican lawmakers are pushing a bill to restrict local governments’ power to act on issues like sick time and minimum wage. Have you seen similar pushback in California or around the country?

SE: “This is very definitely part of a wider pattern to curb public policy initiatives at the city level, where governments have become more progressive. But this is happening not just as a conflict between progressives or Democrats at the city level and Republicans at the state level. In New York, progressives on the New York City Council adopted a modest measure to tax plastic bag use, trying to wean people away from an environmentally destructive practice, and this was blocked by a Democratic governor.”

UA: What can people expect at the event March 7?

“I try to make these events not just about telling tall tales about a city in California, but exchanging ideas and strategizing jointly with people who are similarly engaged in progressive local politics and community organizing.”

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‘End run’ around local sick-pay victories advances at Capitol

February 3, 2017 by

web-localcontrol-buttonsCorporate special interests clashed with working people during a Capitol hearing last night on legislation that would roll back ordinances extending earned sick and safe time to an estimated 150,000 workers in Minneapolis and St. Paul.

The local preemption bill, authored by Rep. Pat Garafalo (R-Farmington), passed its first committee hearing after a lengthy round of public testimony. A companion bill in the Senate will receive its first committee hearing Monday.

The measure would restrict local governments from establishing higher employment standards – like earned sick time, fair scheduling and minimum wage – within their boundaries. Additionally, it would strike down any such ordinances passed after Jan. 1, 2016, nulling historic victories on earned sick time in Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Minnesota Nurses Association director Rose Roach, who co-chaired a citizen task force that helped draft St. Paul’s sick time ordinance, called Garafalo’s bill “an end run around the will of the people” in her city.

Roach was among dozens of people who lined up to testify on the measure before the House jobs committee. An overflow crowd spilled into two additional hearing rooms, and the committee’s decision to take a dinner break – passed by a party-line, roll-call vote – drew groans from those still waiting for their chance to speak.

A diverse group of working people, religious leaders and small business owners voiced concerns with the bill, which they called a corporate power grab.

“We see what’s going on here,” Javen Swanson, pastor at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in St. Paul, told committee members. “Businesses don’t want to expand worker benefits or increase wages. And with vast resources and an army of lobbyists in Washington and here in St. Paul, they usually get their way.”

Indeed, lobbyists for several industry associations and trade groups – representing restaurants, banks, temp agencies and others – spoke in favor of stripping local governments of their power to set higher workplace standards. A “patchwork” approach to workplace regulations, they warned, creates bookkeeping headaches for firms doing business across the state.

Doug Sams, owner of D. Brian’s catering, said his employees are like family, and he worried that different wage-and-benefit standards would drive a wedge between employees in different municipalities. “I’m looking at this as a challenge for me to keep my family together,” he said.

Mike Griffin, field director for Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, rallied opponents of the local preemption bill during the House jobs committee's unexpected dinner break.

Mike Griffin, field director for Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, rallied opponents of the local preemption bill during the House jobs committee’s unexpected dinner break.

But one after the other, working people at the hearing came forward to express fear and outrage that state lawmakers would seek to undermine their efforts to secure the sick time necessary to care for themselves and their families.

“My whole working life I have been a number, and an easily replaceable number,” retail worker Katie Drahos, a member of Neighborhoods Organizing for Change, told committee members. “I have no say in the corporate world. My only saving grace is that I am able to lobby for my interests at a city level.”

“We get sick because we are human beings, so we need sick time,” SEIU Local 26 member Kadra Ali of St. Paul said. “If I miss one day at my job because I’m sick, I miss my check, or if I stay with my children when they get sick.”

Several small business owners joined workers in opposition, including Todd Mikkelson, a small business owner from Orono. While corporations and industry associations might have the ear of state and national lawmakers, he said, Main Street businesses have the ear of their local officials.

“To take away our local control of things is nothing more than an intrusion,” Mikkelson said. “City councils are listening to us constantly. We have much easier access to them, and they are our neighbors. To stifle them is to stifle us.”

If it’s uniformity corporate interests want, Swanson offered a proposal: “Let’s use St. Paul’s sick time ordinance as a model for statewide legislation that protects the most vulnerable members of our communities,” he said.

Filed Under: Organizing, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Teamsters say U of M policy punishes dining workers who use earned sick time

November 3, 2016 by
Brian Aldes, Local 320's principal officer, leads a rally at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities.

Brian Aldes, Local 320’s principal officer, leads a rally at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities.

 

On the steps of Morrill Hall Tuesday, front-line staff at the University of Minnesota rallied with other U of M workers, including faculty members seeking a union vote, to protest an attendance policy that, workers say, unfairly disciplines them for getting sick.

Teamsters Local 320, which organized the rally, represents food-service workers at the university who, according to the union, face automatic discipline for exceeding a threshold of three unscheduled “occurrences,” the university’s term for unforeseen uses of sick leave.

The local has filed 30 grievances seeking to rescind disciplinary actions, including one against a dining-hall worker sent home after vomiting.

Brian Aldes, Local 320’s principal officer, said no worker should face discipline for using their earned sick time. “We’re not going away,” he said at the rally. “We’re going to keep the heat up on the U of M.”

Students, researchers and members of other unions joined the rally in solidarity with Local 320 members. Minnesota Nurses Association President Mary Turner called food-service workers’ access to sick leave “a public health issue,” and Geoffrey Rojas, president of the U’s Postdoctoral Association, said sick time is essential for workers with disabilities or chronic health issues “in order to be productive at work.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Debra Hillstrom (DFL-Brooklyn Center), a U of M graduate, took the opportunity to show her support for another of Local 320’s campaigns. “I would be proud to have a university that paid everyone a $15 minimum wage,” she said.

Filed Under: Organizing Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
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