Groups launch 'people's filibuster' against GOP health bill
Groups launch 'people's filibuster' against GOP health bill
More than a dozen groups opposing the Senate GOP's healthcare bill will hold a "people's filibuster" for two days on the lawn of the Capitol.
Activists and Democratic lawmakers will speak...
More than a dozen groups opposing the Senate GOP's healthcare bill will hold a "people's filibuster" for two days on the lawn of the Capitol.
Activists and Democratic lawmakers will speak out against the ObamaCare repeal bill Monday and Tuesday and possibly later in the week.
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Report: $15 Chicago Minimum Wage Would Lift Up Struggling Workers
Progress Illinois - May 27, 2014, by Ellyn Fortino - A proposal to hike Chicago's minimum wage to $15 an hour would not only be a boon for many low-wage workers but also the city's economy,...
Progress Illinois - May 27, 2014, by Ellyn Fortino - A proposal to hike Chicago's minimum wage to $15 an hour would not only be a boon for many low-wage workers but also the city's economy, according to a new report by the Center for Popular Democracy.
"Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour would promote economic stability among Chicago workers, economic vitality in their neighborhoods and economic growth throughout this city," said Connie Razza, director of strategic research at the center, which works both locally and nationally to build "the strength and capacity of democratic organizations to envision and advance a pro-worker, pro-immigrant, racial and economic justice agenda."
The new report comes ahead of Wednesday's Chicago City Council meeting, during which aldermen with the Progressive Reform Caucus plan to introduce an ordinance for a citywide hourly minimum wage of $15 an hour. The ordinance was developed with members of Raise Chicago, a coalition of community and labor groups advocating for a higher hourly wage floor in the city. Chicago's current minimum wage is $8.25 an hour, the same as the base hourly wage in Illinois and $1 more than the federal level.
Under the proposed ordinance, large companies in Chicago making at least $50 million annually would have one year to phase in a $15 minimum hourly wage, including for workers at their subsidiaries and franchise locations, according to Raise Chicago. Small and mid-sized businesses would have slightly more than five years to boost their employees' wages to $15 an hour.
The first phase of the proposed ordinance, which would apply to larger firms, would increase the wages for 22 percent of Chicago workers, or 229,000 people, according to the report. Phase one would generate nearly $1.5 billion in new gross wages annually, or $1.1 billion after deductions. During the first stage of the proposed ordinance, the higher employee wages would mean an estimated $616 million in new economic activity across the region, leading to the creation of 5,350 new jobs, the report showed. A $15 hourly wage for workers employed by large businesses in the city would also provide approximately $45 million in new sales tax revenue.
Increased wages for workers could also lower employee turnover costs for businesses, according to the report. Requiring Chicago employers with annual gross revenues of $50 million or greater to pay their workers at least $15 an hour would reduce labor turnover in the workforce by as much as 80 percent per year.
However, larger firms covered under the proposed ordinance could see their overall employer costs increase by up to 4 percent, according to the report's estimations. As a result, affected firms may raise consumer prices by about 2 percent. Such a price hike would translate into an $0.08 increase for a $4 hamburger, the report noted.
Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th), who intends to co-sponsor the ordinance, said he expects about 10 out of the 50 Chicago aldermen to initially sign on to the legislation.
"The push then would be to get others to join with us in this cause, because it's important," the alderman said. "We should have talked about this many, many years ago, and had (the minimum wage) kept up with inflation, we might not be having this conversation right now. ... I'm hoping that our colleagues will see that this is not a job killer."
Sawyer said there is no specific date planned for when the proposal could go up for a full city council vote.
It is the alderman's hope that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's recently-formed minimum wage task force will consider the $15 minimum wage proposal. Emanuel has asked members on the diverse committee, chaired by Ald. Will Burns (4th) and the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law's President John Bouman, to craft a plan to increase the wages for hourly minimum wage and tipped workers in the city.
"I understand the interest in forming this committee," Sawyer said. "I don't think it's necessary because a proposed ordinance is ready to be submitted tomorrow. But now that the committee has been talked about, this [$15 minimum wage ordinance] is the first thing they can look at."
Sawyer and other backers of a $15 minimum wage are "open to listening to any and all suggestions" about the proposed ordinance, the alderman said. Sawyer also noted that Chicagoans are in favor of a $15 minimum wage.
During the March primary election, Chicago voters overwhelming supported a non-binding ballot referendum to increase the city's minimum wage to $15 an hour for employees of companies with annual revenues over $50 million. The referendum appeared on the ballot in 103 city precincts, garnering support from 87 percent of voters.
Katelyn Johnson, executive director of Action Now, which is involved with the Raise Chicago campaign, said the city's strong public support of a $15 minimum wage is not surprising.
"We know that people in this city are struggling," she stressed. "The current minimum wage in Illinois is only $8.25 an hour, and that's so low that the workers, and certainly those who are supporting families, simply cannot survive, oftentimes working two or three jobs just to make ends meet and make other major personal sacrifices for themselves and their families.
"The $15 an hour wage will correct that," Johnson added. "It will provide a path out of poverty for families and allow (workers) to meet their families' basic needs so they no longer have to rely on food stamps or other public assistance. And in addition, it will stimulate the city's economy."
A total of 900,000 people work in Chicago, and 329,000 of them make less than $15 an hour, according to the report. Blacks and Latinos are disproportionately represented among low-wage workers in the city.
Blacks and Latinos make up 23.6 percent and 26.8 percent of the share of all Chicago workers, respectively. However, 28 percent of low-wage earners in the city are black and 42.4 percent are Latino. Low-wage workers who live in the city are concentrated in the Chicago neighborhoods of Austin, Avondale, Bridgeport and McKinley Park, among other areas.
"This geographic concentration of residents earning low wages means that an increase in the minimum wage will offer larger benefits to certain neighborhoods, while also stimulating the citywide economy," the report reads.
Meanwhile, Chicago aldermen are up for re-election next year, and Sawyer said those who co-sponsor the $15 minimum wage ordinance might see more support from voters at the polls.
"I think in my community, (supporting a $15 an hour minimum wage) plays better. People that try to live off of minimum wage understand that it needs to be raised, so those [aldermen] that have people that can understand that will obviously fare better," Sawyer said. "Maybe some in more affluent wards, it many not play as well, but even those there can understand the economic impact."
People who "have more disposable income, they spend it," the alderman continued. "And if you have more disposable income and you spend it, that means the money is circulating in those individual communities. Sales taxes are paid. That means we can get more revenue to do things: Pay down debt, infrastructure improvements, capital improvements."
Over the next few months, Raise Chicago members and others plan to take part in a number of activities to build community support for a $15 Chicago minimum wage and "put pressure on elected officials to carry out the will of the people," Johnson said.
When asked if Chicagoans can expect to see more public protests concerning the minimum wage, Johnson said, "We'll see."
Be sure to check back with Progress Illinois for our coverage of Wednesday's Chicago City Council meeting.
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Big Demand for NYC Municipal ID Cards
Aljazeera America - January 14, 2015, by Wilson Dizard - New York City’s municipal identification card, launched Monday, quickly became a...
Aljazeera America - January 14, 2015, by Wilson Dizard - New York City’s municipal identification card, launched Monday, quickly became a hot ticket, with thousands of residents eager to receive one lining up at distribution centers across the city — a volume that prompted city officials on Wednesday to start processing card applications by appointment only.
The nation’s largest city joins a handful of other municipalities — from San Francisco to Mercer County, New Jersey — that in recent years have issued their own ID cards to make life easier and safer for large populations of undocumented immigrants and anyone else in need of identification. Available free of charge to anyone 14 years or older in New York City, the cards also provide discounts at businesses and free access to some of the city's museums.
“It’s something good they should have done a long time ago," Alice King, 46, originally from Trinidad but a Brooklyn resident for the last 15 years, told local news site DNAInfo.
Based on its size alone, New York City’s program could become a model for municipal IDs in other U.S. cities, civil liberties advocates say. There are about 500,000 undocumented immigrants in New York City.
“It remains to be seen, but I think the intended effect is that New Yorkers will have a lot easier time accessing city services and being part of the economic life of the city,” said Emily Tucker, senior staff attorney with the Center for Popular Democracy, an advocacy group that published a report in 2013 hailing the use of municipal ID cards across the nation.
So far, nine U.S. municipalities issue ID cards, with most in the San Francisco or New York City metropolitan areas. Washington, D.C., has a version as well. Other cities — including Chicago and Phoenix — are looking into launching similar programs.
Supporters of municipal IDs, which were piloted in 2007 in New Haven, Connecticut, say that issuing the cards to undocumented residents fills a gap left by a lack of immigration reform in Congress.
They also say the IDs make everyone safer by allowing such residents to no longer be afraid to report crimes against them or others to police. Without identification, many undocumented immigrants fear risking deportation by speaking to authorities.
In New York City, police say they will accept the cards as an adequate form of identification, which Tucker said will “make interactions with police smoother.”
“Now police can issue a summons instead of arresting a person without ID for something like an open container violation, instead of taking them to the precinct to spend a night in jail,” she added.
The cards can help undocumented residents do simple things like open bank accounts, rent apartments, board flights and access medical help — tasks made far more difficult or even impossible without identification.
“We’ve heard of school districts where parents without ID are not able to pick up their kids from extracurricular activities,” said Layla Razvani, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union. “These parents are part of the community.”
Still, not everyone supports municipal ID programs. Their most vocal opponents argue that by issuing cards, municipalities are flagrantly disobeying federal laws that prohibit illegal immigration, aiding the undocumented by providing IDs to people who can’t prove they’re citizens.
“We don’t know who these people really are. We have to take their word for it. It makes it more difficult to enforce federal immigration law,” said Ira Mehlmann, a spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a group that opposes the continued presence of undocumented immigrants in the U.S.
“They say it’s to stop them [undocumented immigrants] from being treated like second-class citizens. It’s an oxymoron. They aren’t citizens. They don’t have a legal right to be in the country,” he added.
Mehlmann particularly fears that undocumented residents could exploit municipal ID card programs to carry out acts of violence. Although he could not point to a single instance of a city ID being used in the commission of a crime, he said, “the fact that nobody with one of these IDs has committed a terrorist act yet doesn’t mean it doesn’t pose a threat.”
The New York Civil Liberties Union has also expressed skepticism about the city’s municipal ID program, wary that authorities might misuse the information provided by undocumented residents who are some of society’s most vulnerable.
NYCLU spokeswoman Jen Carnig said that the cards could make life easier for people but that police don’t have to provide the same level of probable cause to access the municipal IDs as they do for regular driver’s licenses. She credited the city with saying it would inform people whose information police have accessed, but she argued that the protections should be as strong as they are for citizens.
“No one should be subject to having their personal documents accessed by law enforcement or become subject to an investigation based on a hunch, and it’s possible that could be the case for some people,” she said.
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Movement for paid sick leave gains ground
The New Crossroads - May 13, 2013, By Gregory N. Heires - Grassroots campaigns for local and state laws requiring employers to provide their workers with paid sick days are gaining steam.
...
The New Crossroads - May 13, 2013, By Gregory N. Heires - Grassroots campaigns for local and state laws requiring employers to provide their workers with paid sick days are gaining steam.
In the latest sign of the growing movement, the New York City Council approved legislation that would make 1 million workers eligible for paid sick days.
The passage of the bill capped a three-year fight for the legislation by unions and health-care advocates.
But the legislation faces a possible veto by billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has said he would not sign the bill into law. However, the City Council approved the legislation by a veto-proof margin.
On the day of the vote, Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, executive director of MomsRising.org, an online and on-the-ground grassroots organization of more than a million people who are working to achieve economic security for all families in the United States, said, “It’s been a long fight, but today the New York City Council heeded the call of New York families and passed a bill that would allow more than a million New Yorkers to earn paid time off to use when they are sick or to take care of a sick child, spouse or parent.”
Rowe-Finkbeiner called upon Bloomberg to “stand up to corporate lobbyists, listen to the people who elected him and sign this important bill.”
The new paid sick leave bill, which the Council passed by a 45-3 vote, would go into effect in April 2014. Initially, the law would require businesses with 20 or more workers to provide five paid sick days to its employees.
In October 2015, it would be expanded to cover firms with 15 or more workers. Furthermore, the law would protect workers who are not entitled to paid sick leave from being fired if they take time off.
“This is a sweet victory,” Bill Lipton, state director of the Working Families Party, told The New York Times. “It provides economic security for New Yorkers, and a shot in the arm for the paid sick days movement across the country.”
The Working Families Party and MomsRising.org were part of a coalition that included the New York City Central Labor Council, the Center for Popular Democracy, the New York City Council’s Progressive Caucus, 32 BJ SEIU, Make the Road New York, A Better Balance and NY Paid Sick Leave Coalition.
New York City joins an increasing number of municipalities and states that are supporting sick pay legislation. San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Milwaukee have adopted paid sick day laws. Pushes for similar legislation are underway in nearly 20 cities and states, including Denver, Miami, Seattle, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.
In March, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) introduced the Health Families Act. The legislation would allow workers to earn paid sick leave that they could use for personal illnesses, caring for a sick family member, preventive care or treatment for domestic violence.
In the United States, 40 million people work in jobs that don’t offer paid sick leave. One million workers in New York City, primarily low-wage workers, don’t have paid sick days.
In addition to arguing that workers have the right to paid sick leave, supporters of the New York City bill argued that the policy simply makes common sense. Faced with the prospect of losing pay, workers without the right to paid time off often decide to go to work when they have contagious illnesses. Furthermore, workers are less productive when they are ill.
“It’s an incredible feeling to know that I won’t ever again have to choose between my child’s health and my job,” said Juana Sanchez, who has three children and is a member of Make the Road New York, a Brooklyn-based community organization that represents Latino and other low-income workers.
“I believe this law enshrines the principle that American exceptionalism is not just about large profits and small elites, but a workplace that is safe, fair and respectful of the lives of workers,” said City Council member Gale Brewer, who first introduced the bill in 2009.
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Carlos Menchaca: Sunset Park’s Councilman Brings A Voice To The Voiceless
Carlos Menchaca: Sunset Park’s Councilman Brings A Voice To The Voiceless
New York City Council Member Carlos Menchaca loves to grow spices and chilies to add to his home cooked meals — but when it comes to choosing his favorite Mexican food spot in Sunset Park, he...
New York City Council Member Carlos Menchaca loves to grow spices and chilies to add to his home cooked meals — but when it comes to choosing his favorite Mexican food spot in Sunset Park, he doesn’t play favorites.
“That’s a hard one,” Menchaca chuckled. “I always order tacos al pastor with a side of Mexican rice and beans,” he said of his traditional go-to dish. It binds him to his Mexican roots and the vibrant immigrant community that has adopted him as their hometown hero.
“What I love about Sunset Park is that anywhere you go, Bush Terminal Park, the senior center, down 5th Avenue, or even 8th Avenue, you feel at home,” Menchaca, who also represents Red Hook, parts of Bensonhurst and Borough Park, told the Sunset Park Voice. “It’s a neighborhood of families.”
A large majority of those Sunset Park families hail from the neighborhood’s Mexican and Asian immigrant communities — the two largest ethnic groups in New York City, after Dominicans, according to Census data — which stood firmly behind Menchaca during his 2013 run for District 38 council member.
Menchaca made history as the first Mexican-American Democrat elected to serve in the New York City Council. His victory over an incumbent councilwoman signified the rise of Mexican Americans in the political landscape, putting the young trailblazer on the map.
“We grew as a family. They took care of me and I took care of them,” Menchaca said of his constituents.
The 35-year-old Manchaca already knew he wanted to go into politics while growing up in the border town of El Paso, Texas, described himself as a “feisty kid, wanting to know everything” to advocate for his family.
He witnessed his single mother, Magdalena, struggle to raise seven children on her own.
“I don’t know how she did it,” Menchaca said of the hardships the family faced. “We interacted with government all the time, and it made me passionate about understanding how the system could be better.”
The first in his family to graduate from college, Menchaca holds a degree from the University of San Francisco in performing arts and social justice. His experience in political activism led him to New York to join the Coro Fellows Program – where he learned the value of community-government relations.
Since then, he’s made it his mission to bridge communities and as a council member he introduced participatory budgeting in Sunset Park – a democratic process that allows residents to decide how to spend a public budget and where taxpayers dollars go to fund their neighborhoods.
Menchaca’s success at empowering disenfranchised communities through the initiative has garnered write-ups in The New York Times, DNAInfo, and the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. In his first year of PB, two-thirds of the ballots in his district were cast in Spanish and Chinese.
“Whether you live or work here, your voice matters, and what we’ve been able to do through participatory budgeting is bring opportunities to invite everyone to the table no matter their age, sexual orientation, or immigration status,” Menchaca said.
As Chair of the Committee on Immigration and member of the LGBT Caucus, Menchaca sponsored the 2015 launch of IDNYC, a municipal identification card offered to New Yorkers and undocumented immigrants. It gave them an opportunity to have legal identification without fears of deportation, open a bank account, access to public places, among other benefits.
But Menchaca was just getting started.
His next mission: Invest in adult education to help immigrant New Yorkers learn English. Menchaca says he receives daily letters at his legislative office from non-English speaking parents requesting for classes to help them communicate with their children’s teachers.
That’s why he’s advocating for $16 million and calling on Mayor Bill de Blasio to fund the Adult Literacy Initiative they way he did with universal pre-kindergarten. A recent report by the Center for Popular Democracy and Make the Road New York suggests that these classes could raise immigrants’ wages and reduce income inequality in impoverished communities.
“This is where it gets serious,” Menchaca said. “We think about gentrification and all the things that make us so afraid, because we don’t know what it is. But one thing that’s clear is how we can affect family’s lives through education.”
As our conversation steered towards immigration reform and the importance of ethnic and community media, Menchaca’s calm demeanor turned sympathetic. The 102-year-old El Diario/La Presna, the nation’s oldest Spanish language newspaper, laid off nearly half of its staff due to budget cuts, which shocked its readers, including Menchaca.
“The second I heard those real issues of El Diario, I called for a public hearing,” he said. He calls ethnic and community media a lifeline to many people in the city because it connects them to job postings, news, and immigration issues vital to families.
An hour before the hearing, Mayor Bill de Blasio and City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito announced, via press release, an expansion of the administrations outreach to community and ethnic media companies across the city. In addition, the city created an online directory of 200 media ethnic media outlets, that will be available to city agencies and the city vowed to place more advertising in the ethnic papers.
Aside from the legal and education proposals, gentrification is another issue Menchaca’s community knows all too well. People have seen the factory district west of the Gowanus Expressway redeveloped as Industry City, a home for trendy shops, hip cafes, and markets like the Brooklyn Flea and Smorgasburg aimed at food fanatics.
In February, when the mayor proposed the BQX Connector, a streetcar line that would link Sunset Park to Astoria, Queens, some residents feared this new development would accelerate gentrification in their waterfront neighborhood, but the councilman says it can also ease transportation woes in his district.
“We are in desperate need of transportation options and I think the BQX serves as one idea we need to explore,” Menchaca said. “We want to increase the ability for people to travel outside the neighborhood for jobs.”
People have been vocal on fixing the R trains, the extension of bus lines, potentially bringing Citi bike and the ferry into their communities. For now, Menchaca sees the BXQ as an economic development to help community members, but it will only happen if people work together, he noted.
Menchaca confirmed that he plans to embark on a City Council re-election campaign in 2017.
What will his campaign be about? Preserving manufacturing jobs in Sunset Park, protecting immigrants through legal services, and shaping how the police force works with the community, he said.
“No matter the immigration status, you help everybody, and when you do that, you get these beautiful communities that are so diverse,” said Menchaca.
Clarification [June 2, 10am]: An earlier version of the headline misleadingly referred to the councilman as Sunset Park’s hometown hero, although he was not born in New York. We’ve adjusted the headline accordingly.
BY ELIZABETH ELIZALDE
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Immigration Advocates on SB 4: We’re Resisting in Texas
Grassroots leaders and local officials wasted little time organizing a coordinated campaign to fight SB 4, a new Texas law that targets cities, towns and sheriffs that don’t cooperate with federal...
Grassroots leaders and local officials wasted little time organizing a coordinated campaign to fight SB 4, a new Texas law that targets cities, towns and sheriffs that don’t cooperate with federal immigration enforcement.
Only nine days after Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed the legislation, formally known as Senate Bill 4, into law, grassroots advocates announced a “Summer of Resistance” campaign May 16. The statute allows police officers, sheriff deputies and Texas state troopers to ask about a person’s immigration status – whether they are here legally – during a routine stop.
Read the full article here.
Protesters Stage 'Die-In' At Harvard Museum To Criticize Namesake's Link To Opioid Crisis
Protesters Stage 'Die-In' At Harvard Museum To Criticize Namesake's Link To Opioid Crisis
Several organizations, including the Center for Popular Democracy, SIFMA NOW, ACT UP Boston, participated in the protest.
...
Several organizations, including the Center for Popular Democracy, SIFMA NOW, ACT UP Boston, participated in the protest.
Read the full article here.
Fed district that includes Charlotte announces new president
Fed district that includes Charlotte announces new president
The Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, which monitors large banks in a district that includes Charlotte, announced a new president on Monday.
Thomas Barkin, chief risk officer for consulting...
The Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, which monitors large banks in a district that includes Charlotte, announced a new president on Monday.
Thomas Barkin, chief risk officer for consulting firm McKinsey & Company, assumes the Fed role Jan. 1. He replaces Jeffrey Lacker, who abruptly retired this year after acknowledging he had improperly discussed sensitive information involving Fed policy with an analyst.
Read the full article here.
Automatic Voter Registration Will Make America a Real Democracy
Last weekend, California Governor Jerry Brown signed a historic bill making California the second state in the country to automatically register voters. The new legislation will give 6.6 million...
Last weekend, California Governor Jerry Brown signed a historic bill making California the second state in the country to automatically register voters. The new legislation will give 6.6 million eligible but unregistered voters an opportunity to exercise their citizenship right.
The bill, which registers voters who show up at the Department of Motor Vehicles to obtain a driver’s license or an identification card, follows record low turnout in last year’s midterm elections, for which only 42 percent of those eligible to vote in California went to the polls. California’s low turnout is a snapshot of what’s happening across the country.
Beset with long lines on Election Day, strict voter ID laws and teetering piles of paper records full of errors, the country’s voter registration system is fundamentally broken—leaving nearly a third of all eligible Americans unregistered to vote. By comparison, 93 percent of eligible voters are on the rolls in our neighboring country of Canada.
In the United States, we take pride in our democracy and freedom, and voting should serve as the cornerstone of that proud democracy. Automatic voter registration is critical to that democratic process.
Imagine if all 50 states implemented automatic voter registration. The Center for Popular Democracy did, crunched the numbers and found that a voter registration system collecting data from not just the DMV but also revenue agencies, the Postal Service and others could result in the registration of 56 million more voters. This is assuming that automatic voter registration systems would capture approximately 90 percent of the total electorate.
Right now, our state of democracy is far from what it should be. In the 2012 presidential election, a mere 133 million out of 215 million Americans eligible to vote exercised their right to do so. The U.S. ranks 120 out of 162 countries in electoral participation.
Our current outmoded paper-based voter registration system makes the process of registering to vote unnecessarily cumbersome, disproportionately disenfranchising low-income communities, blacks, Latinos and young people.
Roughly 62 million eligible voters are currently unregistered, either because they never registered or their registration information is incorrect. In a 2008 Current Population Survey, blacks and Latinos cited “difficulties with the registration process” as their reason for not registering to vote, while whites disproportionately reported not registering because they were “not interested in elections or politics.”
Automatic voter registration could change this scenario, and the tide is right now turning toward building a stronger democracy. Political leaders and grassroots movements across the nation are succeeding in pushing universal voter registration forward.
A strong democracy with easy access to voter registration would give power to communities frequently marginalized by the system. Universal automatic voter registration would provide power to push for causes such as affordable high-quality child care, better wages, job security and quality public education.
A truly democratic America doesn’t make its citizens jump through hoops to gain access to a basic entitlement: the right to vote. It’s time for automatic voter registration.
Source: Newsweek
Parsippany contractor fined $3.2M for underpaying immigrant labor
Parsippany contractor fined $3.2M for underpaying immigrant labor
New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer on Tuesday assessed $3.2 million in fines against a Parsippany-based contractor for cheating dozens of workers out of the prevailing wages and benefits...
New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer on Tuesday assessed $3.2 million in fines against a Parsippany-based contractor for cheating dozens of workers out of the prevailing wages and benefits they were owed under the New York State Labor Law.
K.S. Contracting Corp. and its owner, Paresh Shah, also will be barred from working on New York City and State contracts for five years.
“With President Trump taking clear aim at immigrants across the country, we need to stand up and protect the foreign-born New Yorkers who keep our city running. Every New Yorker has rights, and my office won’t back down in defending them,” Stringer said. “Contractors might think they can take advantage of immigrants, but today we’re sending a strong message: my office will fight for every worker in New York City. This is about basic fairness and accountability.”
K.S. Contracting was named as one of the worst wage theft violators in New York in a report by the Center for Popular Democracy in 2015. The majority of the workers impacted were immigrants of Latino, South Asian, or West Indian descent.
An Internet search produced two Parsippany addresses for K.S. Contracting, both listing Shah as the owner. The number listed for an office at 342 Parsippany Road has been disconnected. A woman answering a call to the other Parsippany location listed for the company, a residential address at 29 Phillip Drive, said no one by the name Paresh Shah was there, and "no contracting."
Paresh Shah is listed in New Jersey tax records as the owner at 29 Phillip Drive.
According to Stringer's statement announcing the penalties, K.S. Contracting was awarded more than $21 million in contracts by the City Departments of Design and Construction, Parks and Recreation, and Sanitation between 2007 and 2010. Those projects included the Morrisania Health Center in the Bronx, the 122 Community Center in Manhattan, the Barbara S. Kleinman Men’s Residence in Brooklyn, the North Infirmary Command Building on Rikers Island, Bronx River Park, the District 15 Sanitation Garage in Brooklyn, and various city sidewalks in Queens.
The comptroller’s office began investigating the company after an employee filed a complaint with the office in May 2010. The multi-year investigation used subpoenas, video evidence, union records, and city agency data to uncover a kickback scheme that preyed on immigrant workers.
Stringer's statement included a video shot with a hidden camera by a foreman on several of the aforementioned construction jobs. A comptroller's office spokesperson said the foreman, who was cooperating with authorities as a victim of the scheme, is seen handing $4,982 in cash to the K.B. manager in a car and asking the manager to count it. The manager then takes the cash out of an envelope and counts it.
According to the comptroller's office, the cash was the proceeds of paychecks distributed to workers, who then cashed the checks and gave it back to the foreman.
After a four-day administrative trial in May 2016, Stringer found that K.S. Contracting routinely issued paychecks to just half of its workforce and then required those employees to cash the checks and surrender the money to company supervisors. The Comptroller further found that those supervisors would then redistribute the cash to all of the employees on a jobsite, paying them at rates significantly below prevailing wages. Stringer added that the company falsely reported to city agencies that all employees on the job site who received checks were paid the prevailing wage.
Between August 2008 and November 2011, the company cheated at least 36 workers out of $1.7 million in wages and benefits on seven New York City public works projects, stringer said. K.S. Contracting reported that it paid its workers combined wage and benefit rates starting at $50 per hour but actually paid daily cash salaries starting at $90 per day.
The New York City Comptroller’s office enforces state and local laws which require private contractors working on New York City public works projects or those with service contracts with City agencies to pay no less than the prevailing wage or living wage rate to their employees.
When workers are underpaid, the New York City Comptroller’s office works to recoup the amount of the underpayment plus interest.
By William Westhoven
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