The Washington Post - December 5, 2013 - The American Civil Liberties Union has sued the Federal Housing Finance Agency, asking it to disclose efforts to stop municipalities from...
[created] | Published by: Capitol Media Services
Restaurant group preps for fight against Ariz. minimum wage boost
Restaurant group preps for fight against Ariz. minimum wage boost
PHOENIX -- The head of the state's restaurant industry is gearing up to convince voters to quash an initiative that would boost the state's minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2020.
Steve Chucri...
PHOENIX -- The head of the state's restaurant industry is gearing up to convince voters to quash an initiative that would boost the state's minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2020.
Steve Chucri, president of the Arizona Restaurant and Hospitality Association, said Wednesday the campaign against the measure will be based on showing them how much wages in Arizona have gone up since voters enacted the first minimum wage law in 2006.
Prior to that, Arizona employers had to pay only what was mandated in federal law, which was $5.15 an hour. The ballot measure pushed that to $6.75, with a requirement for annual adjustments based on inflation.
That has pushed the current state minimum to $8.05.
"The public will say, 'Enough's enough,'" Chucri said. And he said polls done for the industry in the spring show people believe that $12 is "too much."
The comments come as Arizonans for Fair Wages and Healthy Families is planning to submit its petitions for the $12 wage plus required paid leave today to the secretary of state's office.
Spokeswoman Suzanne Wilson said organizers have collected more than 250,000 signatures. That is 100,000 more than are needed to qualify for the ballot.
But Chucri said he's not convinced his organization will even have to fight the battle in November. He questioned whether petition circulators, both volunteer and paid, were careful to ensure that those who signed are qualified to vote in the state.
Arizona has become the latest battleground over what can be considered a living wage.
Several states have enacted their own laws, often through legislation. Most recently, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a measure that will take that state's minimum, now $10 an hour, up to $15 by 2022 for large employers; small companies will get another year to comply.
Chucri said part of the campaign against the ballot measure will be to remind voters here that Arizona already has a minimum wage that's higher than what federal law requires.
And that same law requires annual revision. Chucri pointed out that has meant a boost every year except for two when the rate of inflation was too small for even a nickel more, the bare minimum adjustment.
The difference, though, is not great: That $8.05 an hour is just 80 cents more than the federal minimum.
What Chucri also faces is that $8.05, assuming it's a family's sole source of income, translates out to $16,744 a year.
For a single person, the federal government considers anything below $11,880 a year to be living in poverty. That figure is $16,020 for a family of two and $20,160 for a family of three.
That's part of what has driven similar living wage efforts elsewhere in the country. But Chucri said the idea of a $12 minimum won't sell here.
"That is too high of a wage for a place like Arizona,'' he said.
Chucri said part of the campaign against the ballot measure will be the argument that higher wages mean fewer jobs.
"Restaurateurs are going to survive,'' he said. But what they will do, Chucri said, is simply hire fewer people.
He pointed out the push toward automation already is underway.
At Panera Bread, customers place their orders through computer screens and then can pick up what they want. And even at more traditional sit-down place like Applebee's, orders can be placed through tablets at each table.
Chucri conceded, though, that is happening even in places where the minimum wage is not going up. What approval of this measure would do, he said, is hasten the day.
"I don't think it's a matter of 'if,' '' Chucri said. "It's a matter of 'when.' ''
He would not say how much his group and other business organizations intend to spend to kill the measure.
The most recent campaign finance reports show campaign organizers have raised more than $342,000. Virtually all of that comes from Living United for Change in Arizona. But Tomas Robles, former executive director of LUCHA, said much of that is from a grant to the organization from The Center for Popular Democracy, an organization involved in efforts to establish a $15 minimum wage nationally.
Another $25,000 came from The Fairness Project which has its own efforts to push higher minimum wages on a state-by-state basis.
By Howard Fischer
Source
Jackson Hole Journal: Rate Rise Friends, Foes Encircle Fed Event
Also getting under way at the lodge is a protest conference organized by the Center for Popular Democracy, a liberal group that has been cajoling the Fed to hold off on raising interest rates....
Also getting under way at the lodge is a protest conference organized by the Center for Popular Democracy, a liberal group that has been cajoling the Fed to hold off on raising interest rates. Their headline speaker will be Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize-winning economist and once a mentor to Fed Chair Janet Yellen, who is not attending the Fed event.
Policy makers such as Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer won’t be able to avoid seeing their activists, roaming around the lodge in green t-shirts, reading “Whose recovery?” and “Let our wages grow.”
The group, which this year includes representatives from the Black Lives Matter movement, have reserved conference space directly below the room where the Kansas City Fed’s sessions take place.
Left out is the American Principles Project, a conservative organization that has heavily criticized the Fed’s monetary policy as excessively accommodative. They believe interest rates should have been lifted long ago.
The group tried to reserve space at the Jackson Lake Lodge but were refused, according to Steve Lonegan, their director of monetary affairs. So they’ll get their alternative conference started this evening in Teton Village, a more than 30-mile (48-kilometer) drive away. Scheduled speakers include Representative Scott Garrett, a New Jersey Republican who has sponsored legislation to make the Fed more accountable to Congress.
Better Access
Standing at an information table covered with gold-coin chocolates on Wednesday in Jackson Hole Airport, Lonegan complained that his group was refused space at the lodge while the other protesters enjoyed much closer access to the Fed attendees, including the media.
Kansas City Fed Spokesman Bill Medley said the bank had “no say over who else books space here.”
Elizabeth Biebl, a spokeswoman for lodge operator Vail Resorts Hospitality and Real Estate, said in an e-mail there are space limitations and the Center for Popular Democracy was accommodated at the Jackson Lake Lodge because it requested smaller numbers than American Principles Project.
“Groups interested in booking with us are not subject to the approval of other groups who already have bookings,” she wrote.
Source: Bloomberg
Pro-Yellen Ad Hits the Air
The Wall Street Journal’s Michael Derby reports. “The Center for Popular Democracy’s Fed Up campaign broadcast a 30-second TV spot urging Mr. Trump to offer Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen a second...
The Wall Street Journal’s Michael Derby reports. “The Center for Popular Democracy’s Fed Up campaign broadcast a 30-second TV spot urging Mr. Trump to offer Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen a second term. The ad ran during 'Fox & Friends,' a morning show the president watches and often reacts to on Twitter.” The group is behind Twitter ads bashing Kevin Warsh, another candidate for the chairmanship, that have popped up in my feed over the past couple of weeks, too.
Read the full article here.
Groups sue feds over foreclosure fighting tactic
The Washington Post - December 5, 2013 - The American Civil Liberties Union has sued the Federal Housing Finance Agency, asking it to disclose efforts to stop municipalities from using eminent domain to bail out underwater homeowners and make its dealings with the financial industry more transparent.
The ACLU, Center for Popular Democracy and other nonprofits filed a freedom of information lawsuit against the agency Thursday in federal court in San Francisco.Richmond, Calif., was the first city to officially codify the divisive foreclosure fighting plan, which has drawn zealous opposition from Wall Street and Washington. Two lawsuits challenging the use of eminent domain have been thrown out, but will likely be refiled. The city has not yet used eminent domain to seize a mortgage.Irvington, N.J., is moving forward with the strategy, and the city council in Newark took its first steps toward moving forward with a plan Wednesday. Yonkers, N.Y., is considering it, but other places have scrapped the idea because of opposition from banks or legal hurdles.The agency said in August it may initiate legal challenges against municipalities that want to use eminent domain to fight foreclosures and could direct regulated entities to stop doing business in those places. The nonprofits said most of the cities exploring the use of eminent domain have been besieged by foreclosures and have predominantly low-income, minority populations.The nonprofits filed freedom of information requests with the agency in October, seeking communication between agency leadership and representatives of the banking, mortgage and financial industry, and records of meetings between the agency and financiers, among other requests.FHFA acknowledged, but did not complete, the requests, according to the lawsuit, so the groups sued. The nonprofits are asking for the documents to be procured on an expedited basis.“The FHFA has taken an aggressive stance on this issue in a way that has harmed minority communities. The public deserves to know why,” said Linda Lye, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Northern California, in a statement.A FHFA spokeswoman said the agency is not commenting on the lawsuit.By using eminent domain, municipalities can circumvent mortgage contracts, acquire loans from bondholders, write them down and give them back to the bondholders with reduced principals. According to Cornell University law professor Robert C. Hockett, who devised the plan, only government has the power to forcibly sidestep mortgage contracts.The tactic only works with so-called private label security mortgages, or ones that are not backed by the federal government.FHFA oversees government-backed loans owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. They cannot be seized by eminent domain.The lawsuit said one of the agency’s “statutory mandates is to help the housing market recover,” and threatening to sue municipalities that try to use eminent domain conflicts with that obligation.“By threatening legal action,” the suit said, the agency “effectively blocks the communities hit hardest by the foreclosure crisis from pursuing one potentially effective solution on behalf of their residents.”The suit also said the agency’s threats to deny credit to communities raises Fair Housing Act and Equal Credit Opportunity Act concerns.Members of the financial industry have said they fear using eminent domain could be a slippery slope, and penalizes people who save and invest in mortgage-backed securities.In Washington, Texas Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling and Calif. Republican Rep. John Campbell proposed legislation that would bar the federal government from backing mortgages in places that use eminent domain to seize mortgages. SIFMA, a group that represents security firms, banks and asset managers and 11 other groups sent a letter to Congress opposing the use of eminent domain.Last month, 10 members of Congress sent a letter asking the head of FHFA to rescind its threat to sue places that use eminent domain.Source
[created] | Published by: The Washington Post
Hot topic of next Fed chair not on program at Jackson Hole
Hot topic of next Fed chair not on program at Jackson Hole
JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. — This year’s gathering of the world’s central bankers had a theme as lofty as the Grant Teton Mountains which loomed over their meeting place — “Fostering a Dynamic Global...
JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. — This year’s gathering of the world’s central bankers had a theme as lofty as the Grant Teton Mountains which loomed over their meeting place — “Fostering a Dynamic Global Economy.”
But while many hours were devoted to sitting in a windowless conference room dissecting the symposium’s academic papers on how to bolster lackluster global growth, one hot topic was not on the program — who will President Donald Trump nominate to be the next leader of the Federal Reserve once current Chair Janet Yellen’s four-year term is up next February.
Read the full article here.
[created] | Published by: The New York Times
Are Superstar Firms and Amazon Effects Reshaping the Economy?
Are Superstar Firms and Amazon Effects Reshaping the Economy?
“Wage stagnation is not a puzzle,” said Marshall Steinbaum, a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, who spoke on a panel organized by the activist group Fed Up outside the lodge where the Fed...
“Wage stagnation is not a puzzle,” said Marshall Steinbaum, a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, who spoke on a panel organized by the activist group Fed Up outside the lodge where the Fed symposium later took place. “Cutting-edge research tells us exactly what’s going on, and yet the Fed seems to be considering this for the first time.”
Read the full article here.
Lingo still a barrier to relief
Times Union – August 7, 2013, by Jimmy Vielkind - Immigrant advocacy groups say it remains difficult to get access to government services in languages other than English — nearly two years after...
Times Union – August 7, 2013, by Jimmy Vielkind - Immigrant advocacy groups say it remains difficult to get access to government services in languages other than English — nearly two years after Gov. Andrew Cuomo decreed that written and oral interpretation would be available the state’s six most-spoken foreign languages.
Cuomo signed an executive order that took effect last October mandating state officials to offer language assistance for speakers of Spanish, French, Italian, French Creole, Russian and Chinese. But the order’s scope was necessarily limited to state agencies, even though state-funded services like food stamps, driver’s licenses and unemployment benefits are administered by New York City or other counties.
The groups — including Make the Road New York, the Center for Popular Democracy and the Center for the Elimination of Minority Health Disparities at the University at Albany — visited government offices and surveyed people with limited English proficiency to develop a measure of compliance. In a report released earlier this week, they found that less than half the people who needed language assistance were able to receive it.
According to Nisha Agarwal, deputy director of the Center for Popular Democracy, the survey found 63 percent of citizens using state-operated facilities that are explicitly covered by the order were not successful in their quest to gain language assistance.
“The governor’s team has been very engaged on implementation, and we’re sympathetic to the challenges of getting an entire state apparatus to change,” said Agarwal. “That said, the results are by no means satisfactory, and we were quite disappointed that the state took the position that county-run agencies for state services were not within the ambit of the order. We feel it’s a pretty big gap.”
The Cuomo administration responded by saying that all covered state agencies are in compliance with this executive order
“This report paints an inaccurate picture of reality by relying on visits to county-run agencies that by law fall outside the executive order,” said Cuomo spokesman Richard Azzopardi. “Everyone should have the same access to their government, and we encourage counties to follow the state’s lead.”
Source
[created] | Published by: The American Prospect
Despite Trump, State Progressives Advance Pro-Worker Policies
Despite Trump, State Progressives Advance Pro-Worker Policies
While the president goes on the attack, Democratic-controlled states and municipalities forge ahead.
...
While the president goes on the attack, Democratic-controlled states and municipalities forge ahead.
Read the full article here.
[created] | Published by: cityandstateny.com
New York City Schools' Discriminatory and Damaging School-to-Prison Pipeline
New York City Schools' Discriminatory and Damaging School-to-Prison Pipeline
New York City schools feed young black and Latino youth into a school-to-prison pipeline by leveling criminal punishments on students for small infractions and normal youthful behavior.
...
New York City schools feed young black and Latino youth into a school-to-prison pipeline by leveling criminal punishments on students for small infractions and normal youthful behavior.
Read the full article here.
Is the Federal Reserve’s Leadership Diverse Enough?
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) has shown in the past that she is not afraid to aggressively confront members of her own party on issues that she is passionate about.
This...
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) has shown in the past that she is not afraid to aggressively confront members of her own party on issues that she is passionate about.
This has been especially evident on issues facing the mortgage industry. Warren famously grilled FHFA Director Mel Watt in November 2014 in a Senate Banking Committee hearing on why the Director had not yet instituted a principal reduction program for underwater homeowners. In September 2015, she and Rep. Michael Capuano (D-Massachusetts) led a protest in Washington over HUD’s and FHFA’s sales of delinquent mortgage loans to private investors. Both organizations are led by Democrats.
Now Warren has turned her attention toward the Federal Reserve Board and Chair Janet Yellen. On Thursday, Warren and 10 other U.S. Senators, along with 116 of the 193 Democratic members of the U.S. House of Representatives (led by John Conyers, D-Michigan) wrote a letter to Yellen calling for more diversity in the leadership of the central bank.
After starting off by calling Yellen’s tenure at the Fed “historic” and pointing out some economic gains the country has made since Yellen was appointed as the head of the central bank in February 2014, the lawmakers then addressed what they believe to be a problem in the demographic makeup among the Fed’s leadership.
“A lack of diverse leadership is hurting the Federal Reserve's policy decision-making process.”
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren
“However, despite these gains, we remain deeply concerned that the Federal Reserve has not yet fulfilled its statutory and moral obligation to ensure that its leadership reflects the composition of our diverse nation in terms of gender, race and ethnicity, economic background, and occupation, and we call on you to take steps to promptly begin to remedy this issue,” the lawmakers wrote.
The lawmakers cited a law passed by Congress in 1977 requiring the Fed’s leadership to more reflect the country’s diverse makeup without discrimination based on race, creed, color, sex, or national origin. The letter pointed out that nearly four decades later, “the leadership across the Federal Reserve system remains overwhelmingly and disproportionately white and male, while major financial institutions and corporations are overrepresented in senior roles.”
The letter cited a February 2016 study by the Center for Popular Democracy which found that 83 percent of Federal Reserve head office board members are white and nearly three-quarters of all regional bank directorships are held by men.
“When the voices of women, African-Americans, Latinos, Asian Pacific Americans, and representatives of consumers and labor are excluded from key discussions, their interests are too often neglected,” the letter stated. Warren further tweeted on Thursday that “[a] lack of diverse leadership is hurting the Federal Reserve's policy decision-making process.”
In addition to what the lawmakers perceive as racial and gender disparities, they also expressed concern over a “persistent lack of occupational diversity, noting that only 11 percent of the Fed’s regional bank directors come from community, labor, or academic organizations compared to 39 percent that represent financial institutions and 47 percent that represent commerce, industry, and services firms.
A Fed spokesperson responded to the letter with the following statement: “The Federal Reserve is committed to fostering diversity—by race, ethnicity, gender, and professional background—within its leadership ranks.
“To bring a variety of perspectives to Federal Reserve Bank and Branch boards, we have focused considerable attention in recent years on recruiting directors with diverse backgrounds and experiences. By law, we consider the interests of agriculture, commerce, industry, services, labor, and consumers. We also are aiming to increase ethnic and gender diversity.
“Minority representation on Reserve Bank and Branch boards has increased from 16 percent in 2010 to 24 percent in 2016. The proportion of women directors has risen from 23 percent to 30 percent over the same period. Currently, 46 percent of all directors are diverse in terms of race and/or gender (with a director who is both female and a minority counted only one time). We are striving to continue that progress.”
By Brian Honea
Source
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