Tag: Workers Interfaith Network

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News The Fly-By

Workers Interfaith Network Reopens Office, Launches Campaign Against New Trade Deal

CREDIT: Alexandra Pusateri

The Workers Interfaith Network (WIN) has a new home for its worker’s center and a new laser focus on a trade deal currently up for debate in Congress.

The worker’s center, which helps low-wage, non-union workers organize for better wages and benefits, has a new home inside First Congregational Church in Cooper-Young. For years, WIN and the center operated out of an office near Brooks and Airways.

Moving was a slow process that started in August 2013, organizers said, but the First Congo location provides a centralized office for the community and the organization’s partners.

Emilie Bowman, an organizer with WIN, said now that the office has reopened, worker’s center meetings can resume. Along with that comes new worker complaints, ranging from wage theft to loss of benefits.

Alexandra Pusateri

Protesters rally against the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

“We want to let people know that we were in operation again and taking cases,” Bowman said.

The new office seems to have reinvigorated the staff as they resume taking new worker complaints for their services. As more workers are informed about where the new office is, “workers who are having trouble are able to show up once more,” Bowman said.

Worker’s center meetings are held every third Thursday. Workers can talk with organizers and volunteers about issues with their jobs. The center also hosts “know your rights” seminars, which focus on labor and work laws.

Since the worker’s center opened on May 1st, its parent organization, WIN, has turned its focus on Rep. Steve Cohen and the fast track authority that’s currently up for debate in Congress. The debate swirls around the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade agreement among 12 countries, including Canada and Japan. The fast track authority would give the U.S. president the power to submit trade deals that Congress could not amend — only approve or deny — and make way for the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

“Previously, Rep. Cohen had made it clear that he was against ‘fast track action’ within Congress, but now he’s started to waffle,” Bowman said. “He said he was unsure [if] he would support fast track for the Trans-Pacific Partnership or not. It is our opinion that the Trans-Pacific Partnership would be a terrible trade deal for Americans. It would push more jobs overseas. The fast track process just completely overrules the democratic process we have in this country.”

Since 1974, previous presidents had the option of fast track authority. The last incarnation expired in 2007. However, some members of Congress believe that, taking lessons after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), this may be the chance to prevent outsourcing. Others, including Barack Obama, have said the TPP is good for the middle class.

On Friday, members of WIN and concerned citizens held signs at the corner of Park and Highland to protest the TPP and fast track authority. Tom Smith, the lead organizer for a local chapter of the communication workers union, said manufacturing jobs are the first ones to go overseas.

“After NAFTA, Memphis lost 20,000 manufacturing jobs,” Smith said. “Just this week, we lost nearly another 600 jobs at Conduit Global. It would cost us more jobs.”

The proposed trade agreement isn’t just a national issue, according to Smith. He said local government officials need to weigh in, too.

“I think this is an issue for the city council, those running for mayor, all the way up to Congress,” he said. “The city of Memphis is giving away millions of dollars in incentives to bring light manufacturing here, to bring call center jobs here, and those are the types of jobs we will lose if TPP passes.”

WIN will hold another TPP protest on Friday, May 15th at 4:45 p.m. outside the federal building.

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Wage Theft Victims and Employer Reach Resolution

A battle over unpaid wages started more than eight months ago at La Shish Café in Southwind, and it finally came to a head last weekend when a protest outside the café led to a resolution for three workers.

Last Saturday, more than 40 people stood in solidarity with three workers who were fighting for back wages owed to them by café owner William Summers. By the end of the demonstration, Summers made an effort to pay up.

Most of the money owed is for a remodel of the café that occurred last year. Angel said he is owed more than $17,000 for remodeling the restaurant, including the demolition of the previous restaurant. Jeff claimed he is owed more than $2,000 for laying tile. Jennifer cleaned the café and says she never received $450 for her services. All three workers’ last names have been withheld per their request.

Protesters fight wage theft at La Shish Café.

The trio came to the Workers Interfaith Network (WIN) Worker’s Center in January after attempts to negotiate with Summers themselves failed.

“We’ve set up meetings with him, trying to resolve it,” said Jeshua Schuster, an organizer with WIN. “Every meeting we’ve made with him has been canceled, moved back, or delayed.”

According to Schuster, the organization and Summers came to an agreement on a repayment plan so that he would not have to pay the entirety of the owed wages upfront. When the due date for the first payment hit, Summers asked for an extension. The extended due date was April 3rd, the Friday before the protest. Organizers said they repeatedly stressed to Summers that if he made the first payments for the plan, the action would be called off.

Summers failed to make those payments, and the protest went on as scheduled — with support from Memph15, Comunidades Unidas en Una Voz, and the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center.

“Finally, he wrote the checks while we were there. That was a pretty great moment,” Schuster said, adding that Summers paid $500 to Angel and $100 for Jennifer.

Summers said later that he was willing to commit to the payment plan.

“I’m not disputing that I owe them,” Summers said. “I feel that could’ve been handled a lot better. They’ve got to be careful how they go about doing things. If their concern was to help the workers, suppose their protest ran me out of business. Then how would the workers get the proceeds for the work they did here? The ultimate goal should be to see if we can resolve it through a payment plan, which is what I’m trying to do.”

Emilie Bowman, an organizing assistant for WIN, said that, while this action was a success, if the workers do not continue to see payments, more protests will be planned.

“It was really wonderful to see the workers’ actions have such an immediate effect,” she said. “We hope that [this] sent a message to Mr. Summers — that we do have the community on our side, and we will be back if he does not honor these payments.”

There’s no way currently to report wage theft in Tennessee. A county ordinance aimed at preventing wage theft failed in 2012. Owed wages can be sought in civil court, but organizations like WIN handle situations outside of court until it reaches a boiling point, when the group refers the worker to a lawyer.

“[This] happens to low-wage workers on a regular basis,” Schuster said. “[Wage theft] is something we have to actively fight against or else people are going to continue taking advantage of folks.”

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Local Group Fights Wage Theft

CREDIT: Bianca Phillips

Shouting chants of “A to Z, we don’t work for free!” and “We work! We sweat! Stop this wage theft!,” a crowd of about 15 protesters gathered outside A to Z Construction on Vandalia near Summer Avenue on a frigid late November morning.

They were protesting in support of Marcos and Esteban Mendoza, two brothers who worked for subcontractor Jose Rocha on two separate renovation jobs. The Mendoza brothers claim Rocha owes them a total of $7,142 in unpaid wages. When the brothers confronted Rocha about the money they were owed, Rocha claimed the work crew left some windows dirty and said he would not pay them.

Bianca Phillips

Esteban and Marcos Mendoza demand wages from A to Z Construction.

After three weeks of communication, Rocha began ignoring their calls. So the brothers turned to the Workers Interfaith Network (WIN), which fought unsuccessfully last year to get wage theft ordinances passed in the city and county.

WIN organizers got in touch with the contractor Rocha was working for, A to Z Construction. WIN claims that, since A to Z employed Rocha’s services, the company should be responsible to pay the Mendoza brothers’ wages since Rocha refuses to.

“It’s the company’s responsibility, even if they’ve paid Jose Rocha. They have the power to request a meeting with him, even if these workers don’t,” said WIN organizer Jeshua Schuster.

WIN organized the protest outside A to Z that was held the day before Thanksgiving. Marcos stood in the parking lot, surrounded by supporters, as he spoke in Spanish through a bullhorn, “We did the work for A to Z. Pay us so we can support our families.”

The owner of A to Z was unavailable to comment, but on the morning of the protest, the crowd went inside A to Z’s office and presented the office manager with a letter demanding the company pay the Mendozas their lost wages. The office manager told the protesters that they had tried to call Rocha but that paying the brothers was not the responsibility of the company.

“This is Jose Rocha’s battle, not ours. It’s not our responsibility,” she said. “You can go protest at his house. I don’t know what to tell you. I feel bad, but there is nothing that I can to do fix this.”

WIN will continue to negotiate with A to Z over the Mendozas’ wages. Schuster says situations like theirs are all too common. WIN’s Memphis Workers’ Center is a resource for employees who experience wage theft in any industry, and organizers there help workers fight for the money they’re owed.

“We get cases from all over — the restaurant industry, the distribution industry, staffing agencies. Historically, we’ve worked most with construction workers and restaurant workers,” Schuster said. “It happens to low-wage workers pretty regularly, whether they’re not receiving a paycheck, having their hours reduced or dollars deducted from their paycheck, or not receiving overtime pay.”

WIN began fighting to get the Shelby County Commission to adopt an ordinance that would have allowed wage theft victims to file a complaint with the county. That ordinance would have given employers a chance to negotiate with aggrieved workers, and if neither side could agree, the case would get a hearing. When employers were found at fault, they would have been forced to pay triple the amount of the wages owed. That ordinance failed on third reading.

A similar ordinance was making its way through the Memphis City Council when state legislators passed a law banning local governments from passing ordinances addressing wage theft.

For now, on a local level, WIN is fighting to address the issue on a case-by-case basis.

“They could report to the state Department of Labor, but a lot of these workers work day to day. And [going through the state could lead to waiting] two to three years for a paycheck,” Schuster said. “They need that money for their rent and their food. It’s a tough situation. They’re the most vulnerable people in our society. There’s really no help for them.”

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Women’s Workers Collective Aims to Empower Immigrant Women

CREDIT: Chris Shaw

At about 10 a.m. on a recent Saturday morning at the Cooper-Young Community Farmer’s Market, the line for homemade tamales and fruit-flavored aqua fresca at the Mujeres Trabajando Juntas booth was by far the longest line for any vendor.

In an attempt to give immigrant women workers a larger role in the local economy, the Workers Interfaith Network (WIN) recently launched the Mujeres Trabajando Juntas (or the Women Worker Collective).

After noticing that fewer women were coming to the meetings at the WIN Workers’ Center, Fabiola Cervantes, a workers’ rights organizer for WIN, said the organization began planning the new program designed specifically for low-income, immigrant women workers.

“We decided we needed to make a program specifically for women as the attendance numbers kept declining,” Cervantes said. “We created the Women Worker Collective to give women a place to go where they can talk to female leaders in the community about injustice at their jobs and get valuable advice.”

WIN teamed up with First Congo Church to secure a booth at the farmer’s market, and on July 19th, the women showed up at the market for the first time to sell their tamales, salsas, agua fresca, chocoflan, and other Mexican food.

WIN offers loans to women who join the Women Worker Collective. After being a member for three months, women are eligible for a $250 loan, and after six months, they may receive a $500 loan. The collective provides economic advice, tips on marketing and communication, and advice on launching a new business.  

Cervantes said the Cooper-Young market was a good place to begin getting the word out about the new program.

Chris Shaw

Women Worker Collective member at the CY market

“A place like the farmers market values the hard work that these women put in to making food and also shows the women that they have the ability to create something valued by the community,” Cervantes said. “The farmers market allows these women to benefit from something they actually like doing, which is exactly what we want to happen.

“The women pay for the ingredients themselves, make whatever they want, and then set their own prices. Last week, we had a woman make more than $300 selling tamales.”

WIN also helps Memphis workers fight against wage theft and fight for the right to organize, for workers’ safety, and the right to a living wage. WIN helped organize recent walk-outs of many Memphis fast-food restaurants earlier this year, and the group has also helped countless employees fight for a living wage.

The organization is one of the only sources immigrant workers can turn to for help and education in Memphis. WIN Executive Director Sheena Foster said, in the future, she hopes that the Women Worker Collective will grow into something bigger than a booth at the farmers market.

“We want to expand, and we have big visions for this collective,” Foster said. “We want the Women Worker Collective to grow its own wings and become its own nonprofit to support immigrant women who aren’t a part of the traditional work force.” 

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Memphis Workers Protest After Recent Nationwide Wage Wins

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Workers Interfaith Network and fast-food workers banded together this morning to protest minimum wages and the lack of ability to form a union. The protesters rallied at two McDonald’s locations before marching from the county courthouse downtown to the intersection of Danny Thomas Boulevard and Poplar Avenue, where Wendy’s and KFC are located.

“Before we were invisible, now our voices are being heard. We’re telling fast-food companies it’s not OK anymore to rake in huge profits but pay poverty wages,” said Ashley Cathey, a McDonald’s worker. “We’re standing up for higher pay, which will not just help fast-food workers but will help get Memphis’ economy moving again.”

In Memphis, the median wage is $8.49 and there are 11,400 fast-food workers, according to the Workers Interfaith Network. The organization also cites a model developed by a professor at MIT, which showed that an adult worker in Memphis with a child has to make $18.18 an hour to make a living wage.

“Corporations like McDonald’s are making big profits by paying poverty wages, and that’s just wrong,” said Dr. Herbert Lester from the Workers Interfaith Network. “They can afford to pay a living wage, which would put more money in workers’ pockets, so they can spend it in our community and lift our economy.”

Last month, voters raised the minimum wage in SeaTac, Wash., to $15 an hour, among other cities and states in the process of raising their respective minimum wages. The White House also announced Dec. 3 that it would support a Senate bill to increase the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.