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Labor and Community Job Opportunities, Opportunities

Multicultural Communities for Mobility – Program and Policy Coordinator (Los Angeles, P/T)

Multicultural Communities for Mobility (MCM) advocates for safe, equitable streets for & with people who walk, bike, and use public transit in Los Angeles.

The Program and Policy Coordinator will be responsible for developing and implementing programming and managing volunteer roles for events and activities, and serving as an ambassador for MCM at local meetings, leadership convenings, and conferences.

Program Management Responsibilities:

The Program and Policy Coordinator will convene the MCM programs committee to guide, organize logistics, monitor, and evaluate all programming identified during an annual strategic planning meeting involving MCM’s advisory board. The coordinator may also have the opportunity to create new programs that fit their interests in research, policy development, and community organizing. This person will work actively with the Advisory Board and volunteer Program Committee members.

Policy-related Responsibilities:

This position is expected to develop social and political capital for MCM by representing the organization in meetings with public officials and/or staff, as well as by serving in coalitions. The ideal candidate is passionate about social justice, growing partnerships, serving communities of color, and improving access to walking, biking, rolling, and transit use in communities.

The ideal candidate:

  • Is confident in their communication abilities and interpersonal skills (in-person, on the phone, via e-mail, and on social media)
  • Is concerned with cultural humility and learning about people’s personal and cultural identities
  • Has experience with non-profit organizations
  • Is detail and deadline oriented; self-motivated and can work independently
  • Has great time management skills
  • Has excellent written and verbal communication skills with a variety of individuals
  • Has the ability to work with in groups of all sizes and levels of professional experience
  • Is fluent in English and Spanish
  • Is a great team member and team leader
  • Is open to working remotely, from home, and in the field
  • Is available to work 20-28 hours a week
  • Has a fantastic sense of humor and is down for La Causa

Salary range for this part-time position is $23,000 – $30,000 depending on experience and qualifications.

Please send cover letter and resume to Betty Avila, MCM Board Chair at betty@multicultimobility.org. Deadline to apply is November 15, 2015. Women, LGBT, and people of color highly encouraged to apply.

Home, Murphy News

Dr. Mimi Abramovitz to Receive Award from NASW

abramovitzThe New York City Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) has named Dr. Mimi Abramovitz a “Top Social Work Leader” in recognition of her “outstanding leadership in the social work profession in New York City.” Dr. Abramovitz is a member of the consortial faculty at the Murphy Institute and is the Bertha Capen Reynolds Professor of Social Policy at Silberman School of Social Work, Hunter College, CUNY. The award will be presented to Dr. Abramovitz at NASW’s annual awards dinner in New York City on December 3 , 2015.

Home, Labor Studies

Can the Bay Area Tech Economy Embrace Equity Before It’s Too Late?

Featured photo credit: SEIU-USWW

By Chris Schildt, PolicyLink

This post originally appeared at New Economy Week 2015: From Austerity to Prosperity.

Uber recently purchased one of the largest office spaces in downtown Oakland, California, with plans to move3,000 of its workers there by 2017. For a city facing a housing crisis and rapid displacement of Black families and low-income communities, many fear this act will accelerate gentrification pressures. It has also led to some cautious optimism for an opportunity to make Oakland a leader in what Mayor Libby Schaaf has called techquity: “fostering our local technology sector’s growth so it leads to shared prosperity.”

Tech companies can play a role in advancing an equitable economy, but they will first have to confront a deeply inequitable status quo. The San Francisco Bay Area has one of the highest levels of inequality of any region in the country, and it is growing at an alarming pace. Unequal access to business and job opportunities have deepened racial economic gaps – Black and Latino workers earn a median wage that is $10 an hour less than White workers in the Bay Area, and these racial inequities exist across all education levels. The tech-driven “innovation economy” can reverse these trends. But to understand how, it’s important to examine how the innovation economy works. Continue reading Can the Bay Area Tech Economy Embrace Equity Before It’s Too Late? →

Home, Urban Studies

Bringing Neighborhoods Wealth — Not Gentrification

By Marjorie Kelly and Sarah McKinley 

This article was originally featured at Yes! Magazine and adapted from Cities Building Community Wealth, a project of The Democracy Collaborative, for New Economy Week.

In cities across the nation, a few enjoy rising affluence while many struggle to get by.

An August 2015 study by The Century Foundation reported that—after a dramatic decline in concentrated poverty between 1990 and 2000—poverty has since reconcentrated. Nationwide, the number of people  living in high-poverty ghettos and slums has nearly doubled since 2000. This situation is created in part by the practices of traditional economic development, which prioritize corporate subsidy after corporate subsidy over the needs of the local economy. Current trends threaten to worsen, unless we can answer the design challenge before us.

Can we create an economic system—beginning at the local level—that builds the wealth and prosperity of everyone? Continue reading Bringing Neighborhoods Wealth — Not Gentrification →

Exciting Opportunities, Opportunities

2016 Hillman Prize for Excellence in Journalism in The Public Interest — Call for Entries Now Open

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The Sidney Hillman Foundation is now accepting nominations for the 2016 Hillman Prize honoring excellence in journalism in the public interest.

The Hillman Prize seeks out top investigative reporting that draws attention to social or economic injustice and hopefully leads to corrective measures.The goal is to recognize discernment of a significant news story, resourcefulness and courage in reporting, skill in relating the story and the impact of the coverage.

The received-by deadline for all submissions will be January 30, 2016. Nominations can be submitted here.

The Sidney Hillman Foundation has sought to illuminate the great issues of the day—from the search for a basis for lasting peace, to the need for better housing, medical care, and employment security for all people, the promotion of civil liberties and the battle against discrimination based on race, nationality, or religion.

Home, Labor Studies, Urban Studies

Prof. Kafui Attoh Investigates the On-Demand Mobile Service Sector

Dr. Kafui Attoh, Assistant Professor of Urban Studies at the Murphy Institute, has been awarded a grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. His project is called Economic Inequality in the Driver’s Seat: Household Budgets in the On-Demand Mobile Services Sector, and it aims to get a snapshot of what work in the On-Demand Mobile Service Sector looks like — and what it means for how on-demand workers navigate the broader economy.

To get that snapshot, Prof. Attoh, along with collaborator Katie Wells, will examine contingent and part-time on-demand work in mobile transportation, hospitality, home services, delivery and logistics services, such as Uber, Seamless, Taskrabbit, and AirBnB.

Professor Attoh explains that “the project starts from the presumption that the growth of the on-demand mobile service sector…raises both important and timely questions for researchers concerned with the future of employment. Our study examines the household balance sheets of contingent workers employed by Uber Transportation, one of the fastest growing on-demand mobile services. By looking at the household balance sheets of Uber drivers, we will be able to examine the financial costs, benefits, and challenges facing this new type of worker, as well as the burdens and benefits such work creates for these workers’ households. This project poses two questions:

“How does contingent part-time work for Uber affect the stability and health of household finances and the allocation of household responsibilities, and what does the emergence of the on-demand mobile services sector mean for understanding inequitable growth in the U.S.?”