[Educationforall] spam con huevos labor news, views and concerns, 5.19.12‏‏‏‏-I

[Carlos Pelayo]

California Attorney General Sues Los Angeles Carwash FOCUS: Robert Reich | The Commencement Address That Won't Be Given  Maquiladora Worker rights defender kidnapped, beaten and threatened with death in Mexico  AZ SB 1070 IS NOT A LAW‏Big Beer Brewers Like Anheuser-Busch Are Drunk on Greed   Pharoah Bloomberg: Paying Workers Enough to Live Is 'Communism
The Number of Those Working Past 65 Is at a Record High  New York Nurses Take Back Their Union, Push for Safe Staffing 
Return of the Indignados: Spain's Anti-Austerity Movement Marks A Year of Protest     U.N. Strike in Jordan Shows Convergence of Labor and Middle East Politics  
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http://launionaflcio.org/?p=6386

California Attorney General Sues Los Angeles CarwashSuit Alleges Rampant Wage Violations, Unsafe Working ConditionsToday Attorney General Jerry Brown filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court against an L.A. carwash, seeking $630,000 in unpaid wages for workers and over $2 million in penalties for violations of the state’s Unfair Competition Law. Violations include failure to pay minimum wage and overtime, failure to report injuries workers suffered on the job, and failure to pay various state payroll taxes. The Attorney General is also seeking an injunction to prevent the carwash from continuing to commit violations in the future.Henry Huerta, Director of the CLEAN Carwash Campaign said, “The CLEAN Carwash Campaign brought these violations to the attention of the Attorney General because workers reported abuses to us that were horrendous. We applaud the Attorney General for taking such strong action to right these injustices and recover monies owed to carwash workers and the state of California.”Auto Spa Express ran its carwash business at 2028 Sunset Boulevard, on the corner of Alvarado Street, in LA’s Echo Park neighborhood and had been the target of complaints by carwash workers and the Community-Labor-Environmental Action Network (CLEAN) because of its treatment of workers. Workers reported pay that fell far below the minimum wage, dangerous working conditions, and management harassment of workers who sought to organize a union. The carwash was sold in spring of this year to Sunset Car Wash, LLC.Last year the LA City Council passed a resolution in response to reports of rampant violations of employment and health and safety laws at Los Angeles-area carwashes. The resolution mandated an investigation into City contracts with carwashes. As a result of an investigation, it was discovered that Auto Spa Express should have been paying its workers the living wage since August of 2006. Although the carwash was subject to the Living Wage Ordinance, workers at Auto Spa Express reported being paid approximately $50-60 per day – or $5-6 per hour – for a ten-hour shift. The Living Wage is currently $11.55 an hour. The City subsequently canceled its contract with the carwash.Custodio Camacho, a former carwash worker at Auto Spa Express said, “The conditions at Auto Spa were awful. We had no place to eat lunch except the chemical storage room and we often worked in the hot sun all day without drinking water or time to take breaks. Several of my coworkers got their hands or legs caught in the conveyor chain because the owners refused to fix it.”With the help of the CLEAN Carwash Campaign and its community partners, Custodio and his coworkers filed a complaint with Cal/OSHA detailing serious health and safety hazards at the carwash.  As a result, Cal/OSHA issued Auto Spa Express $18,890 in citations for health and safety violations in February of 2009. Four violations were classified as “serious” by Cal/OSHA, meaning they created a substantial probability of death or serious physical harm. The Attorney General’s suit also includes allegations that Auto Spa Express failed to report workers’ industrial injuries.Custodio added, “My coworkers and I wanted to form a union to improve the bad conditions but after they found out I was a union supporter I was fired.”  The Carwash Workers Organizing Committee of the United Steelworkers Union filed charges against Auto Spa Express with the National Labor Relations Board last year for unfair labor practices, including firing workers who supported efforts to form a union. The General Counsel for the NLRB issued a complaint against Auto Spa Express and the case is now before the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C. Maria Aide Hernandez, a former cashier at Auto Spa Express Car Wash, said, “I hurt my back on the job at the carwash. When I told the manager I was injured and need to apply for workers’ compensation he said he had no idea what I was talking about and refused to give me the forms.” Maria Aide eventually stopped working at Auto Spa when management began paying her with bouncing checks, sometimes leaving her without enough money to buy a bus pass to get to work, let alone provide food for herself and her son or pay rent. According to Henry Huerta, “The conditions at Auto Spa Express were appalling but all too common in the carwash industry. We hope this action by the Attorney General causes employers who are operating illegally to appreciate that they cannot expect to violate workers’ rights with impunity.”Huerta added that, “An important part of the effort to clean up the industry is identifying and promoting those carwash operators who play by the rules. On behalf of the CLEAN Carwash Campaign, I would like to invite any carwash employer who wants to do the right thing to sign the CLEAN Carwash Agreement. By doing so they simply pledge to abide by minimum employment, health and safety, and environmental standards, and to respect workers’ right to organize a union free from intimidation, harassment, or other interference.”RelatedL.A. Carwash Workers Fight for Justice@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/279-82/11507-focus-the-commencement-address-that-wont-be-given

FOCUS: Robert Reich | The Commencement Address That Won't Be Given Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Blog Reich writes: "Members of the Class of 2012, As a former secretary of labor and current professor, I feel I owe it to you to tell you the truth about the pieces of parchment you're picking up today." READ MORE
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Maquiladora Worker rights defender kidnapped, beaten and threatened with death in Puebla, Mexico Maquila Solidarity Network'Maquila Network' <maquilatijuanasandiego at earthlink.net>en.maquilasolidarity.org May 17, 2012On May 15 at approximately 1:00 pm, four masked men in a van kidnapped worker rights defender José Enrique Morales Montaño, a member of the Worker Support Centre (CAT) in Puebla, Mexico. Morales was abducted as he was on his way to a hearing of at the Local Conciliation and Arbitration Board where the CAT was defending the rights of a group of garment workers.The kidnappers repeatedly held a gun to his head and threatened to kill him. At approximately 5:00 am the next morning, they stole his cell phone and backpack and left him on an abandoned highway leading to Veracruz. At approximately 7:30 am the following morning, CAT director Blanca Velázquez received a message from Morales' stolen cell phone, stating: "You will die, bitch."Unfortunately, this is not the first time members of the CAT team have been harassed, assaulted and subjected to death threats for defending workers' rights in Puebla's maquiladora factories (see background). MSN and other Canadian, international and Mexican trade union and human rights organizations are extremely concerned about the safety of the members of the CAT.Please send a letter today to the Mexican authorities, urging them to take immediate action to guarantee the safety of Morales and other members of the CAT and to bring those responsible for the attacks and threats to justice.Send a letter now: http://en.maquilasolidarity.org/node/1068?SESS89c5db41a82abcd7da7c9ac60e04ca5f=mrdvpcufw@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@AZ SB1070 IS NOT A LAWPlay videoAZ SB 1070 Is Not a Law When in the course of Human Events, it becomes necessary for the Voice of the Peoples to be heard, and their presence as members all of the PUBLIC to be recognized as Human…00:04:59Added on 4/25/12325 viewsLos Comités de Defensa del Barrio
YouTube:AZ  SB1070  IS NOT A LAW

Phoenix, AZ - “AZ SB 1070 is not a law.”  With these words, TONATIERRA representative Tupac Enrique Acosta addressed a press conference on April 11, 2011 at the Arizona State Capitol upon announcement that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld District Court Judge Susan R. Bolton's injunction against the most heinous parts of AZ Senate Bill 1070.
Today, over a year later, the US Supreme Court will begin to hear arguments on the US Justice Department challenge to AZ SB1070, with the state of Arizona in defense.  Yet, both sides of the debate frame their arguments in terms of the legitimacy of the legislation as national immigration policy, arguing over where and how both the ultimate and local authority for enforcement must be implemented. This is the wrong frame.  AZ SB 1070 is not an issue of either US or Arizona's "immigration" policies.  The framing of the issue as an "immigration" issue is a collusion by both sides arguing in the US Supreme Court today to disguise the projected policies of continuing colonization in the territories under the rubric of  "the rule of law", while the crime of colonialism against the Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous Peoples goes unchallenged, and undefined.  It is a ploy to position the NAFTA government states of North America (Canada-US-Mexico) as the only legitimate authorities for the determination of legal status in the region.  It is an act of premeditated genocide against the sovereign powers of the surviving Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous Peoples to freely determine their own future in their own terms, and with their own jurisdictions of nationhood, citizenship and nationality. By framing the issue under the concept of "immigration" and legalization under the constructs of the NAFTA government states, without addressing the underlying and ongoing policies and genocide and ethnic cleansing against Indigenous Peoples since 1492, the elites on both sides of the border position themselves for the final solution in collusion against the resistance and rebellion of the Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous Peoples of the hemisphere who are moving towards self determination and decolonization.The injunction by Judge Bolton came on July 28, 2010 one day before the legislation was to take effect and as a result of a U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit against AZ SB1070 that argued that the statute was unconstitutional and preempted by federal law.  Arizona Governor Jan Brewer then appealed the injunction and that appeal was denied, which sent the case back to Judge Bolton’s court where the lawsuit will continued.AZ SB170 was signed by Governor Brewer last April 23, 2010.Referring to grave “foreign policy implications” which could come to effect if the enjoined sections of 1070 were unleashed, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals still did not address the issues of violations of international law which are at the core of the US-Mexico-Canada immigration policies taken as a whole, vis-a-vi the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Human Rights of Migrant Workers and their Families.“We support and agree with the position of the 9th Circuit Court today which upheld the partial injunction against section of AZ SB10, yet these judicial and legislative acts and remedies have not addressed the underlying foreign policy of genocide and territorial expropriation via immigration policies that favor the European-American constituencies at the expense of the Self-Determination of the Indigenous Nations, Pueblos, and the Mexicano Barrios referenced by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (US-Mexico 1848),” said the representative of TONATIERRA.“Where is the recognition of the Nations of Indigenous Peoples of this continent, and for the territorial rights of the O’otham Nations upon whose lands this state capitol stands?” he said.Instead the 9th Court of Appeals decision references to the “movement” by Angles and Saxons into Roman Britain, but there is no cognition much less recognition that the baseline of legality for the US jurisdiction itself in the hemisphere, Arizona included, is the Doctrine of Discovery, which legitimized a political construct of race supremacy continentally and subsequently the establishment of regional anchor baby settlements by European-American “White” populations under the guise of the Doctrine of Manifest Destiny.“The hemispheric religio-political constructs of white supremacy which frame AZ SB10 are violations of our common human spirit and will not be tolerated, much less endorsed as public policy or law for our Communities or Peoples.  We will not comply.  AZ SB 1070 is not a Law.” said Tupac.
The decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals today reiterates what has been stated many times over by the protests and mega-marches of hundreds of thousands of people from all walks of life against the policies of discriminatory law enforcement and legislation that promotes racial profiling which have been coming out of the Arizona state legislature under the leadership of now ex-Senate President Russell Pearce, who has since been removed from office.AZ SB170 was never an immigration law, but a tactic of the war of attrition in alignment with the federal Operation End Game program.  It was and is still is a law of persecution, state sanctioned persecution under the guise of law, whose real purpose is to prop up the position of privilege and power of the constituencies of "white" America.  The decision by the 9th Circuit Court is yet another bump in the night, another Wakeup Call from that nightmare, the Nightmare of Manifest Destiny.
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AZ SB 1070 Is Not a Law
When in the course of Human Events, it becomes necessary for the Voice of the Peoples to be heard, and their presence as members all of the PUBLIC to be recognized as Human Beings with equal right of self identification and self determination as PEOPLES of the Nations and Pueblos of Mother Earth, such jurisprudence demands that at the present time the clarification be boldly made and convincingly argued that:AZ SB1070 IS NOT RECOGNIZED AS LAW,
Being instead an ill-conceived and illegitimate product of state sanctioned racial profiling in the form of an unacceptable act of legislation, which is to the detriment of the common well being of all members of the State of Arizona, and which without recognition as law by the Peoples of Arizona, is hereby denounced and shall be defied in theSpirit of Nonviolent Peaceful Resistance.
AZ SB 1070 a product of the tragically flawed legislative process of collusion and illegal manipulation of the powers of representative government to the benefit of an illegitimate and immoral power structure of historical complicity built upon the discriminatory principles of Manifest Destiny, whose precedent in the form of the Doctrine of Discovery we also now reject once more and shall continue to challenge as a deformation of our COMMON HUMANITY, which we share with All Our Relatives from the:Four Directions of Mother Earth.

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Arizona State Capitol House of Representatives
Indigenous Peoples Forum on the Doctrine of Discovery
March 23, 2012

Huehuecoyotl:
Wakeup Call From the Nightmare of Manifest Destiny
In terms of jurisprudence, there's an attribute of what goes on today, when when we are discussing legalization or comprehension and comprehensive immigration reform it seems to be that we are taking the framing of the colonizing regimes and assuming and presuming that those are the instruments of legality in denial of the Right of Self Determination of the Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous Peoples.@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
http://www.alternet.org/story/155485/big_beer_brewers_like_anheuser-busch_are_drunk_on_greed_?akid=8811.16102.Z6jE_f&rd=1&t=5

Big Beer Brewers Like Anheuser-Busch Are Drunk on GreedHow the beer lobby is taking advantage of addiction. READ MOREJim Hightowe
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http://www.alternet.org/story/155424/pharoah_bloomberg%3A_paying_workers_enough_to_live_is_%27communism%27?akid=8811.16102.Z6jE_f&rd=1&t=13

-Pharoah Bloomberg: Paying Workers Enough to Live Is 'Communism'New York's billionaire mayor is so opposed to a tiny raise for workers at companies that get public money that he's vowed to sue. What's the deal with living wage laws anyway? READ MOREBy Sarah Jaffe / AlterNet
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OFF THE CHARTSThe Number of Those Working Past 65 Is at a Record HighBy FLOYD NORRISWhile the number of workers over the traditional retirement age has risen, those 55 and under are doing worse.   Graphic: The Older the Worker, the Better• More Business News »
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New York Nurses Take Back Their Union, Push for Safe Staffing 

Mark Brenner | May 18, 2012

http://labornotes.org/2012/05/new-york-nurses-take-back-their-union-push-safe-staffing

New York nurses upended the 100-year power imbalance
between bedside nurses and nurse managers yesterday,
voting to bar supervisors from elected office in the
New York State Nurses Association.

NYSNA simultaneously launched a public campaign to make
New York the second state that legally mandates
staffing levels for nurses, pushing a nurse-to-patient
ratio bill similar to one adopted in California in
2004.

Thursday's one-two punch, at a mass meeting attended by
2,400 members, showcased the reform agenda promoted by
a slate of nurses who took over NYSNA leadership last
fall. "This has been a long time coming," said Pat
Holloman, a veteran NYSNA member from Mount Sinai
hospital. "After so many false starts and stops, it's
hard to believe we made it."

Members of the Staffing, Security, and Strength slate
ran for office pledging to take a more aggressive stand
against hospital management and to make structural
changes that would put the union squarely in the hands
of the staff nurses who comprise 99 percent of the
association's membership.

Earlier this year the new leaders made good on the
first part of the platform, launching a coordinated
contract campaign that shook up management at four of
New York's busiest hospitals in January. The union beat
back a laundry list of concessions.

Split Personality

The bylaw changes that nurses approved are the product
of many years of struggle inside the union, against a
bizarre structure that often left the union hamstrung.

Because of a holdover from the days of professional
associations that pre-dated nurse unionism, nurse
managers were eligible to serve on the NYSNA board of
directors. Indeed, nurse managers frequently controlled
the board.

Managerial involvement in unions is, of course,
prohibited by labor law. To stay within legal bounds,
the board of directors couldn't oversee the central
work of the organization--union representation,
organizing, and bargaining--despite the fact that the
lion's share of NYSNA's resources came from union
members and was spent on union activity.

The board could not debate or discuss the union's
future or vote on any matters relating to the union.
That left union functions, including decision-making
over bargaining strategy, resource allocation and what
grievances and arbitrations to invest time and money
in, controlled by staff.

Elected leaders were marginalized. The union had a
delegate assembly composed of bedside nurses, which
ostensibly set policy, but as an advisory body without
control of the union's resources and agenda, it was
ignored.

By voting to give power to leaders elected by bedside
nurses, New York is following the lead of nurses in
many states, from Massachusetts to California.

The tension between staff nurses and managers bubbled
up in most statewide nursing organizations over the
past 20 years, driving many to abandon the American
Nurses Association. The 115-year-old professional
association formulates standards for nursing practice,
and opposed nurse unionism for years. ANA includes
managers in its ranks and leadership.

Such divisions fueled the creation of National Nurses
United (AFL-CIO) in 2009, bringing together unions in
California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and
Minnesota with the United Association of Nurses,
formerly the union arm of the ANA.

The ability of the thousands of NYSNA nurses to chart
their own course, ensuring that patient care and
bedside nursing are the priority of the organization,
is a reminder that unions can change based on member
involvement. Mary Fitzgerald, a case manager at
Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, said, "Nurses
are so pumped that their voices are being heard."

The next step is a campaign for safe staffing, learning
from the California model that has improved patient
safety and quality of care by limiting the number of
patients per nurse.

NYSNA members adopted a staffing ratios bill as their
top legislative priority for 2013, but leaders know the
only way to achieve their goal is to mobilize thousands
of members, allied organizations, and communities to
share their vision--and fight for it.

"The members are more involved than I've ever seen
them," said Marva Wade, an OR nurse in Manhattan. "Now
the real work starts."




New York nurses shift to union-style format

The 37,000-member New York State Nurses Association
voted Thursday to become more like a traditional labor
union than a professional association.

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20120517/HEALTH_CARE/120519887

By Daniel Massey

May 17, 2012 3:51 p.m.

Following a leadership shakeup last fall, members of
the 37,000-member New York State Nurses Association
voted overwhelmingly Thursday to approve bylaw changes
that will transform the organization from a
professional association into a more traditional labor
union.

Members opted Thursday to give more power to elected
leaders to set the course of the union; to ban
supervisors from serving as union leaders; and to
replace the position of CEO with an executive director.

The association traditionally had a board that included
supervisors, which limited its ability to discuss union
issues. A delegate assembly made up of non-supervisory
nurses had only an advisory role.

"People wanted to change the structure so members can
have control over the organization," said Judy
Sheridan-Gonzalez, an emergency room nurse at
Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx and a NYSNA vice
president. "Members are going to have a voice in their
union that they never had and it means the union can
aggressively pursue the issues that matter to them."

The limited opposition to the changes came mostly from
nurses worried that being a more traditional union
would mean the nurses were less professional.

Also Thursday, the union kicked off a campaign to get
the state Legislature to pass a law mandating
staff-to-patient ratios. The ratios are currently
negotiated via collective bargaining.

"Our union is unique," said Patricia Donahue, a nurse
from Ellis Hospital in Schenectady, N.Y. "We speak for
ourselves, but we also speak for our communities and
our patients and their need for quality health care."

In a memo, the Greater New York Hospital Association
wrote that it "strongly opposes" the legislation.
"Requirements to comply with fixed, prescriptive and
arbitrary staff-patient ratios may lead to closure of
nursing units because of a shortage of appropriately
trained nursing staff," the Association argued.

Bruce McIver, who has negotiated contracts with NYSNA
as president of the League of Voluntary Hospitals, said
the changes will not affect his work.

"I don't think it means a whole lot [will be] different
for the industry," he said. "From the perspective I've
dealt with them, they were a pretty traditional union
anyway."

Labor experts agreed the vote wouldn't change the
union's relationship with the industry, but said it
raised interesting questions about the future of nurse
unions in the city. About 6,000 nurses in the area are
represented by 1199 SEIU, which has historically
believed in one union for all health care workers.

"The question is, what happens to nurses in New York?"
one labor expert asked. "Do you continue to have
competing nurse unions?"

____________________________________________

PortsideLabor aims to provide material of interest to
people on the left that will help them to interpret the
world and to change it.
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Return of the Indignados: Spain's Anti-Austerity Movement Marks A Year of ProtestThe day of action this year exceeded the expectations of many people who thought the movement in Spain was dead. Tens of thousands demonstrated in the streets.READ MORETer Garcia / Waging Nonviolence
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http://www.alternet.org/story/155406/u.n._strike_in_jordan_shows_convergence_of_labor_and_middle_east_politics?akid=8809.16102.CBwBzz&rd=1&t=18

-U.N. Strike in Jordan Shows Convergence of Labor and Middle East PoliticsGeopolitics turned humanitarian workers and refugees into hostages of a budget war that makes life for the community absurdly hard, from seeing a doctor to earning a paycheck. READ MOREBy Michelle Chen / In These Times
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