Spring is officially upon us. We saw it in the Fight for 15 protests, bringing workers and activists to the streets in cities across the country. We see it in the upcoming days of action for climate justice. Possibility is in the air. How will you help fight for the world we want to see? Some updates from the week:
On Wednesday, workers in 200 cities walked out of work and took to the streets to fight for a $15 minimum wage. Was it the “largest protest by low-wage workers in US history”? It very well might have been.
Republican and Democratic lawmakers came to a deal on something! Unfortunately, it’s an agreement to give Pres. Obama fast-track authority on the Trans Pacific Partnership — meaning it will be negotiated in secret, and presented to congress for a yes-or-no vote, with no amendments allowed.
Nathan Schneider wrote an excellent story for VICE on Catalan bank robber and activist Enric Duran and the Catalan Integral Cooperative, an organizing initiative and network of cooperatives with potentially transformative political, social and economic implications. A must-read.
The Intercept published a video from Federal Prison Industries calling prison labor the “best kept secret in outsourcing” — what with prisoners being available for as little as 23 cents an hour. Charming stuff.
Denver cab drivers have started building a worker cooperative — an Uber-like service that’s worker-owned. (via Yes! Magazine)
Last weekend, Murphy served as a sponsor for the annual Organizing 2.0 Digital Boots conference. Lots of mingling, workshops, and conspiring. ‘Til next year!
Last week, long-time Murphy Institute Adjunct Professor Basil Smikle Jr. was named Executive Director of the New York State Democratic Party. From the New York Observer:
“Basil is a national-caliber political operative and we are lucky to have him leading day-to-day operations for the State Democratic Party,” [Former Gov. David] Paterson said. “Basil combines a mastery of public policy with an inherent feel for communities throughout New York State.”
Mr. Paterson said that Mr. Smikle, a PhD candidate at Columbia University’s Teachers College, will play a “key role” in the 2016 election cycle, though he did not say specifically this would include returning Democrats to the majority in the State Senate.
Yesterday, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a federal commission on fair employment practices, ruled that New York City has underpaid its female and minority employees, engaging in a broad pattern of discrimination that could cost the City hundreds of millions of dollars. From the New York Times:
The ruling comes in response to a complaint brought against the administraton of former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on behalf of more than 1,000 administrative managers employed by the city and represented by Local 1180 of the Communications Workers of America.
Specifically, the commission found that “structural and historic problems” have resulted in the pay of minorities and women being suppressed.
Something exciting is happening in Poughkeepsie. In the last two years a group of local residents — under the name “Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson” (NLMH) — have been organizing to fight for the rights of the city’s low-income residents. For those whose knowledge of Poughkeepsie begins and ends with “The French Connection,” Poughkeepsie is not unlike many postindustrial cities in upstate NY — defined by decades of capital flight, city center decline and entrenched poverty. In this context, the emergence of NLMH has been an important development.
More than anything, it has been important for what the group has already accomplished. Last year, NLMH spearheaded the passage of the state’s first municipal foreclosure bond law — an ordinance requiring owners of properties in foreclosure (mostly banks) to post a $10,000 bond to the city for upkeep. Poughkeepsie is only the seventh city in the country to pass such legislation. This year, NLMH has embarked on a new campaign aimed at fighting the Central Hudson Gas and Electric Company — the public utility monopoly that serves the Mid-Hudson region. As Central Hudson pushes for a rate hike and as local residents —already on the margins — consider the possibility of power shut-offs, NLMH has raised a set of important questions. What rights do people have to heat, electricity and a warm home? More to the point, what rights should they have? Continue reading Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson: An Interview→
Most compelling is the book’s format. The book is little more than a collection of letters printed in the editorial page of The Hoboken Reporter. Written by locals, displaced “yorkies,” gentrifiers and the begrudgingly gentrified, the letters are impassioned, angry, spiteful, nostalgic, triumphant, cringe-inducing and often deeply amusing. More than anything, they give the reader a visceral sense of both the promise and the costs of the city’s so-called “renaissance.” Continue reading Yuppies Invade my House at Dinnertime: A Classic!→
On March 30th, the Murphy Institute hosted “Building a Worker Coop Ecosystem: Mondragon Meets the Five Boroughs,” a public conversation featuring Frederick Freundlich of Mondragon University and moderated by Stephanie Guico.
The conversation began with an explanation by Freudlich of the Mondragon network of worker coops in the Basque region of Spain. The network includes approximately 120 cooperatives and 130 affiliates or subsidiaries, all working across four broad areas — manufacturing, retail, finance, knowledge — and creating a livelihood for approximately 74,000 people. Freundlich discussed the history of the Mondragon system, tracing its origins back to the Spanish Civil War and describing the emergence of ancillary institutions, such as the cooperative bank, that have provided resources and support to the cooperative network throughout its development. Continue reading Coop Event at Murphy Draws Large Crowd→
A conversation about workers, communities and social justice
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