San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

You are here: Home / Archives for Business / Labor

Occupy-Linked Lawsuit Settled: Registering Voters Outside City Hall is No Longer a Crime in San Diego

by

By Doug Porter

Perhaps the most outrageous of the arrests made two years ago at the height of San Diego’s Occupy Movement was that of Ray Lutz, activist and former Congressional Candidate. On Nov 29, 2011, he was arrested for attempting to register voters in the Civic Center Plaza, adjacent to City Hall. (You can watch a video of the arrest here.)

Lutz sued the City of San Diego, along with the property management company (CBRE Group) and the private security contractor (ABM Security) who ordered a citizen’s arrest for trespassing.  All the parties have now agreed to a mediated settlement conducted by Hon. Judge David H. Bartick, in Federal Court.

Part of the deal involves scheduling a public hearing of the grievances involved, which will occur on Tuesday, December 10th at a session of San Diego City Council.  The rest of settlement has already been approved by the City in closed session.

 Lutz is encouraging all persons who support the right to peaceful political activity, such as registering voters, in the public square of San Diego, to appear and voice their support of the settlement, as well as to voice any concerns regarding the disgusting abuse of recent invalid arrests or other actions by the San Diego Police Department.   [Read more…]

Bracero Guestworkers, Unpaid

by

Congress is preparing to expand the guestworker program, but Mexican braceros remain unpaid after half a century.

By Adam Goodman & Verónica Zapata Rivera / Jacobin Magazine

Every Tuesday, 76-year-old Miguel Díaz spends the better part of the day outside the House of Representatives in Mexico City. Díaz went to the United States in 1960s as a bracero, a contracted guestworker. Upon returning to Mexico, he and millions of other braceros were never paid the 10 percent of their earnings that had been withheld and sent to the Mexican government in an attempt to ensure braceros’ temporary status.

Each week, Díaz is joined outside the House of Representatives by around 100 other braceros, as well as widows and children of braceros. The vast majority are in their 70s or 80s. Some live in Mexico City, but others travel hours from other states to get there. Wearing sombreros to protect themselves from the sun, the braceros hang a large banner on the fence in front of the House that reads, “EPN [Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto] Pay Us or Kill Us!” According to their organization, the Binational Bracero Proa Alliance, an average of 14 braceros die each day. Their cause is urgent.

The braceros’ struggle to recoup decades-old back pay sheds light on the unjust treatment and unexpected consequences of guestworker programs.   [Read more…]

Goodwill Gets Thrifty With Many Disabled Employees, Pays Pennies For Hours of Labor

by

By Annie Lane

Having relied on Goodwill for years as the place to drop off my “unwanteds” in the hope they would find new life with people who could better appreciate them (the tax write off was a nice touch, too), it saddens me to discover that the famous thrift store is, in many ways, just another large company run by a disconnected wealthy few who have forgotten what it means to demonstrate humanity, or, more aptly, good will unto others.

Sure, as the video below states, it should not be forgotten the incredible impact Goodwill has had on the communities it inhabits, including the countless people it has hired, disabled and otherwise. But wouldn’t you know my tolerance for companies that do mostly good while still managing to take advantage of some of the most vulnerable members of society is at an all time low.   [Read more…]

Tens of Thousands Protest, Over 100 Arrested in Black Friday Challenge to Wal-Mart

by

By Josh Eidelson / Salon / Originally published on Nov. 29, 2013, at 4:40 p.m.

Organizers say 111 people were arrested in eight Black Friday civil disobedience actions against Wal-Mart, with more arrests expected at a ninth and final such demonstration now underway in San Leandro, California. Those actions are among 1,500 total protests promised for today by the union-backed group OUR Walmart, which last year said it mobilized 400-some Wal-Mart employees to strike.

“Wal-Mart workers and community supporters, we refuse to live in fear and refuse to accept scraps,” employee Martha Sellers told reporters on a mid-day call. She was joined by arrestee Betty Shove, who said she’d been “harassed” for OUR Walmart activism, and was “standing up for every member that cannot, that will not, because they’re too afraid to lose their job.”   [Read more…]

Walmart Workers Plan Raucous Black Friday

by

By Jenny Brown / Labor Notes

Walmart workers are gearing up for Black Friday with a series of short strikes around the country this week, including in California, Florida, Minnesota, Washington, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Many more actions are expected on Black Friday itself. (Click here to find one near you.)

OUR Walmart, the group planning the actions, hopes the biggest shopping day of the year will become better known as a day of action for retail workers. OUR Walmart is asking community members all over the country to participate.

“Be expecting things [on November 29]… but there’s nothing specifically I can mention,” said Los Angeles-area Walmart worker Anthony Goytia, noting that activists are trying to take their employer by surprise.   [Read more…]

Just Say No! To a Depressingly Grey Thursday and Black Friday at Walmart

by

By Doug Porter

It’s the last week in November and Americans are supposed to be in a frenzied holiday mode. It’s one of the rare times when Hanukkah and Thanksgiving converge. There are even recipes in People magazine for Thanksgivukkah.

It’s one of those years when FDR’s decision to make turkey day the fourth Thursday in November, provides a smaller than usual window of opportunity for shopping for the December holidays.

Do yourselves and the country’s working poor a favor. Stay home. If the truth were to be told, the actual deals offered on Black Friday, and now, Depressingly Grey Thursday, are becoming increasingly limited in scope and quantity.  It’s also a rotten deal for employees who are called in on a holiday with the promise of a plate full of “fixin’s” eaten while standing up just before the hordes rush the doors.   [Read more…]

Why Poor People Make Terrible Decisions — And the Perfect Sense Behind Them

by

By Linda Tirado / Killer Martinis

There’s no way to structure this coherently. They are random observations that might help explain the mental processes. But often, I think that we look at the academic problems of poverty and have no idea of the why. We know the what and the how, and we can see systemic problems, but it’s rare to have a poor person actually explain it on their own behalf. So this is me doing that, sort of.

Rest is a luxury for the rich. I get up at 6AM, go to school (I have a full courseload, but I only have to go to two in-person classes) then work, then I get the kids, then I pick up my husband, then I have half an hour to change and go to Job 2. I get home from that at around 1230AM, then I have the rest of my classes and work to tend to. I’m in bed by 3.   [Read more…]

McDonald’s Advice To Underpaid Employees: Break Food Into Pieces To Keep You Full

by

The “advice” was published on the “McResource” website, meant to give tips to fast-food workers.

By Alex Kane / Alternet

The latest friendly advice from McDonald’s to their low-wage workers includes tips on how to better handle stress–as well as how to fill yourself up better with dinner. The fast-food corporation instructs workers that breaking food “into pieces” will keep you full.

The advice was published on the “McResource” website, meant to give tips to fast-food workers. While you need to be a McDonald’s worker to log-in to the website, details of the advice have been publicized by the group Low Pay Is Not OK, a union-backed group seeking to organize low-wage workers at McDonald’s. The effort is part of the larger campaign to push for living wages, benefits and the right to organize among low-wage workers across a variety of industries.   [Read more…]

Labor’s Ground Game Made the Difference in Alvarez Win

by

By Doug Porter

Mayoral candidate David Alvarez isn’t taking the victory laps today on the morning talk shows. He can’t.  He completely lost his voice talking to voters as the special election neared.

With 100 percent of precincts reporting this morning, Faulconer received 89,043 votes, Alvarez 52,283 votes, and Fletcher 49,645 votes. There remain as many as 34,500 mail and provisional ballots still to be counted.  By shortly after 10pm last night Alvarez had moved into second place and his lead grew throughout the night.

What little life was left in his vocal chords was expended as he thanked supporters last night at a rally held in the old Weber bakery building in the heart of the neighborhood he came from.    [Read more…]

Looking Back at Our Special Election Coverage: Sixty One Articles by Sixteen Writers

by

By Doug Porter

The email said: “You have lost me”.

The reader was presumably upset by an interview with Nathan Fletcher posted a few days ago. After posting five dozen articles by sixteen different writers, this conversation with one of the major Democratic candidates was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

So today as people have their final opportunity to cast their ballots, I thought that taking a look back over our coverage might be useful.  If you haven’t voted this might prove useful.  If you have voted, good for you; send this story to a friend who might not have voted.

Mostly this column will be about short quotes and links to the articles. I strongly encourage you to click through to the original stories early and often. In case the words “Progressive Views” on the top of the page have somehow eluded you, SDFP has (and encourages) a certain point of view. We’d rather be honest about that fact than try to delude you as is the standard in much of the mainstream media.   [Read more…]

What Happens If [Fill-in the Candidate’s Name] Wins the Runoff Mayoral Election?

by

By Doug Porter

There will be two winners come Wednesday morning, since nobody outside of GOP Bossman Tony Krvaric’s opium dreams thinks any candidate will win more than fifty percent of the vote.  The accepted wisdom is that City Councilman Kevin Faulconer, a Republican who’d like voters to forget about that fact, will take “first place.”

Faulconer would prefer that we ignore the sources of his cash, since voter registration in San Diego is tilted in favor of the Democratic Party.  The local GOP is currently less popular than even Congress, with a mere 3% of newly registered voters willing to affiliate themselves with the Party of Lincoln.

What we’re really voting on is who makes it to the runoff election, which will take place at sometime in February… Or maybe March, depending on when this round’s votes are certified.

And it’s that runoff election I’ll be talking about today, in the hopes you’ll be further inspired to vote this time around. (Did I mention yet how important it is to vote?)   [Read more…]

Face Up to It, San Diego is a Beta Project for All-Seeing Law Enforcement

by

By Doug Porter

Facial recognition technology developed for battlefield use in Afghanistan and Iraq is getting its first major domestic field test right here in San Diego County.  A report by the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR), based on documents obtained by the Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF) through a California Public Records Act request, spells out the parameters of this endeavor.

The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) is coordinating a program involving twenty five local state and federal agencies in the region using a vast data sharing program called the Automated Regional Justice Information System. Participants include U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, San Diego State University and the San Diego Unified School District Police.

Utilizing tablet and android cell phone technologies, law enforcement officers are snapping photographs of individuals they encounter and running them through databases that include 32 million driver’s license photos.  The system can quickly match images with the 1.4 million arrest mug shots in the San Diego County system.   [Read more…]

©2010-2017 SanDiegoFreePress.org

Code is Poetry