Beyond the Bill Communities of Learning and Practice

After years of dogged advocacy a Reagan-era guidance that prohibited local jobs standards for federal funding has been overturned! The newly-updated ‘uniform guidance’ (wonky name for a revolutionary tool!) opens a powerful new strategy for organizations at the state and local levels to attach equity and job quality standards to federal funds being spent in our communities.  With over $2 Trillion in new Infrastructure Funding coming into our communities over the next decade, this new guidance is a game-changer.  Local Opportunities Coalition, Jobs to Move America (JMA), and Workplace Justice Lab at Rutgers co-hosted this webinar for close to 100 advocates to learn about this new ruling and what this means for our organizing and communities.  We heard from Brad Lander, NYC Comptroller & Local Progress Co-Founder and Leone Jose Bicchieri from Working Family Solidarity in Chicago about how they are planning for this work.  Madeline Janis, Anna Smith, and Valerie Lizárraga from Jobs to Move America shared which new worker protections the guidelines mandates, encourages and allows. Janice Fine from Workplace Justice Lab shared key steps to start this work.

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For Uniform Guidance brochure click here

Funding and financing streams for Department of Energy infrastructure projects now require companies to submit Community Benefits Plans with their application that will account for 20% of the project‘s final bid score. We heard from Doug Bloch about the strong language the Department of Energy has laid out about exactly what community and worker benefits they expect to be included -- and the role our groups should play in enforcement. This provides a major opportunity for community and labor groups to win concessions to ensure deeper equity commitments, high road hiring practices, and community enforcement programs on these projects. We heard from Miranda Nelson about the first multi-state Community Benefits Agreement won by Jobs to Move America and partners from New Flyer Bus Company.  She shared their campaign strategy and leverage points, what they won in the CBA and how the company is so far exceeding many of those goals.  We also heard from Janel Bailey from the Los Angeles Black Workers Center about the Project Labor Agreement they won with Crenshaw Metro Line. She shared lessons learned from the PLA enforcement, the toll construction work has on black workers and their organizational shift to focus on public sector jobs in their 1,000 strong campaign. 

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Rebuilding our communities means delivering good jobs to those most in need. New federal funding flowing into our communities should meet this goal. In this session, we reviewed efforts at the federal, state and local level to strengthen equitable hiring linked to infrastructure funding. We reviewed existing equity standards covered by Executive Order 11246 and new opportunities in the recent legislation to win local hire agreements in federally funded road, highway, and transit construction projects. We heard from the organizations who’ve been working to strengthen the standards and organizers who’ve been working to make the standards real on the ground.  Session panelists included Allie Perez, Texas Women in Trades; Valerie Lizarraga, Jobs to Move America; Nate Howell, Local Progress and Meg Vasey, Tradeswomen Taskforce
 

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Over $2 Trillion in Federal funding to rebuild our nation’s Infrastructure, transition to a green economy and strengthen domestic manufacturing is flowing into our states and cities over the next 10 years. This new funding is coming from the American Rescue Plan Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Inflation Reduction Act, Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) Act, and the Biden administration’s general industrial policy. This funding provides our biggest opportunity in decades to shape labor standards in the millions of jobs that will be created. 

In this, the first in our new GEL series, we provide an overview of funding streams, where labor standards exist or can be won, and how community enforcement will be key to securing gains. Panelists included: Janice Fine, Workplace Justice Lab at Rutgers University; Miranda Nelson, Jobs to Move America and Aquilina Soriano Versoza, Pilipino Workers Center of Southern California. 

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We heard from Maria Maldonado and Adam Weisberg from SEIU’s California Fast Food Organizing Campaign just as they were on the verge of winning a major victory to ensure the FAST Act goes into effect next year – with a $20/hour wage for fast food employees and the creation of the Fast Food Council.  For more details on the final bill that advanced in the California legislature on Thursday, see this article.  They shared how they are incorporating creative organizing and enforcement strategies into their campaign to set up a Fast Food Standards Board in California.

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Danielle Alvarado,  Executive Director from Fair Work Center & Working Washington shared how Seattle’s Domestic Workers Labor Standards board has been a strategic tool in Fair Work Center’s overall power-building strategy – but not an end in itself. She shared lessons learned on how to leverage the board to create resources for organizing and reflected on the unexpected challenges and breakthroughs the board has created. Adam Kader from ARISE Chicago, Isaiah Toney from East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy (E-Base), Camila Trujillo from Worker’s Defense and Ruth Schultz from Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en Lucha (CTUL) shared updates on their labor standards campaigns and poised questions for Danielle.

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Brian Elliott, Executive Director of the SEIU Minnesota State Council provided an overview of their proposed Labor Standards Board legislation in Minneapolis and Minnesota and discussed guidelines for organizers considering launching a worker standards board campaign. A paper co-written by Brian and Janice Fine lays out key provisions to include in legislation to build worker power and set up for successful strategic enforcement plans.

This paper is available in English and Spanish. 

• Setting Standards Is Not Enough: Labor Standards Boards Must Facilitate Worker Organizing and Robust Enforcement
• Establecer estándares no es suficiente: Juntas de Estándares Labores Deben Facilitar La Organización de Trabajadores y Cumplimiento Fuerte

The NY Healthy Nail Salon Coalition was founded in 2014 by Adhikaar and the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH). The coalition won the nation's first Nail Salon Workers' Bill of Rights in 2015, and successfully advocated to eliminated the tipped subminimum wage for nail salon workers in 2019. In this deep dive, we will dig into the current campaign to create a Nail Salon Standards Council in New York State, with a focus on how the campaign and the Council can used to build worker power and shift the dynamics of the industry.

For this session we take a step back and look at the current moment in the labor movement, and discuss how co-enforcement and sectoral bargaining fit into the moment we are in. In particular, we look at the upswell in worker organizing and its limitations, and we examine whether and how local enforcement and policy structures can be used to build long-standing worker power.

How organizers can use protected concerted activities rights under the NLRA to support workers outside of a traditional union organizing context, with a deep dive on protecting immigrant workers.  This session features presentations from:

• Teresa Poor, Assistant Regional Director, Region 29 (Brooklyn), National Labor Relations Board
• Mori Rubin, Regional Director, Region 31 (Los Angeles), National Labor Relations Board
• Rayos Burciaga, Community Organizer, Somos
• Jessie Hahn, Senior Labor and Employment Policy Attorney, National Immigration Legal Center (NILC)

View the recording 
Please note that this webinar contains a mix of English and Spanish.