Laws & Lives
New York Daily News - January 23, 2015, by Josie Duffy - We all want to see New York thrive, but weakening critical...
New York Daily News - January 23, 2015, by Josie Duffy - We all want to see New York thrive, but weakening critical workplace safety laws like the Scaffold Safety Law would only put the most vulnerable workers at risk (“Cure what ails New York, gov,” Column, Jan. 21). As Fox News recently reported, deaths among Latino and immigrant construction workers are on the rise, even as they fall for other workers. The Scaffold Safety Law creates a strong incentive to keep workers safe. It says that if those who control a worksite fail to follow commonsense rules, they can be held liable for the injuries they cause. Without a strong Scaffold Safety Law, we’ll only see many more injured construction workers across New York — with Latino and immigrant workers most at risk. Josie Duffy, policy advocate Center for Popular Democracy
Dozen protesters arrested in Manhattan during May Day rallies
Dozen protesters arrested in Manhattan during May Day rallies
Exuberant rallies, inspirational speeches and more than two dozen arrests for the cause of immigrant workers marked May...
Exuberant rallies, inspirational speeches and more than two dozen arrests for the cause of immigrant workers marked May Day celebrations around the city on Monday.
A dozen protesters were arrested outside JPMorgan Chase’s Park Ave. headquarters, and demonstrators also gathered in front of a Wells Fargo bank nearby, highlighting the two institutions’ financing of private Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities.
Read full article here.
Divided Democrats face liberal backlash on immigration
Divided Democrats face liberal backlash on immigration
Opponents of demonstrators urging the Democratic Party to protect the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Act (DACA...
Opponents of demonstrators urging the Democratic Party to protect the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Act (DACA) stand outside the office of California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein in Los Angeles Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2018. California has the largest number of people who are affected by the law, also known as the Dream Act.
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Massive Fraud In PA Charter Schools Under Corbett's Leadership
Crooks and Liars - October 2, 2014, by Karoli - What could $30 million lost dollars mean to students in Pennsylvania?...
Crooks and Liars - October 2, 2014, by Karoli - What could $30 million lost dollars mean to students in Pennsylvania? Maybe more teachers, more textbooks, better classrooms? Well, forget about it, because at least that much is in the pockets of corrupt charter school operators.
The waste and fraud in Pennsylvania charter schools is even worse than I thought. It was bad enough when Nicholas Trombetta created a nice pyramid to skim off millions in public education money to fund his own fun, but it seems he was more the rule than the exception.
Philly.com:
The instances of fraud cited in the new report include cases where charter officials were indicted or pleaded guilty and instances uncovered in state audits.
Examples include Nicholas Trombetta, founder and former CEO of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School in Midland, who is awaiting federal trial in Pittsburgh on charges that he diverted $8 million in school funds for personal use.
The tally also includes $6.3 million that federal prosecutors allege Dorothy June Brown defrauded from the four Philadelphia-area charters she founded.
But the authors give special attention to another recent case involving a city charter: New Media Technology Charter School in the city's Stenton section. The former CEO and founding board president went to federal prison in 2012 after admitting they stole $522,000 in taxpayer money to prop up a restaurant, a health-food store, and a private school they controlled, and for defrauding a bank.
From 2005 to 2009, when the crimes were occurring, third-party auditors hired by New Media failed to spot the fraudulent payments.
"Fraud detection in Pennsylvania charter schools should not be dependent upon parent complaints, media exposés, and whistle-blowers," the authors wrote. Rather, they urged, the system should be proactive and use forensic accounting methods.
But that would mean Tom Corbett couldn't make his sweet deals with the charter operators! Perish the thought.
What we have here is the sale of our public schools by Republicans to for-profit concerns who are perfectly content to take taxpayers' money to pad their own bottom lines while making sure our children 'isn't learning.'
Source
Trump expected to nominate Powell for Fed chair
Most on Wall Street welcomed the news that Powell is the likely nominee. Investment bank Deutsche Bank put out a note...
Most on Wall Street welcomed the news that Powell is the likely nominee. Investment bank Deutsche Bank put out a note last week to clients saying Powell would be the best choice if Trump did not want to keep Yellen on. But some liberal groups, including Fed Up, were disappointed and see the selection of Powell as an attempt to make the Fed more favorable to big banks. "Jerome Powell's most important qualification is that he served with Janet Yellen. His confirmation should depend on his willingness to follow in Yellen's footsteps on both monetary and regulatory policy," said Shawn Sebastian, co-director of Fed Up, a campaign from the Center for Popular Democracy.
Read the full article here.
Fed policymakers see rate hikes, blurring dove-hawk divide
Whitehurst’s group of activists, Fed Up, has printed pamphlets to distribute at the conference venue that say George,...
Whitehurst’s group of activists, Fed Up, has printed pamphlets to distribute at the conference venue that say George, along with other traditionally hawkish policymakers, “wants more people to be unemployed.”
Read the full article here.
Poor Immigrants Get Free Legal Defense in New York City Program
NBC News - June 25, 2014, by Kat Aaron and Seth Freed Wessler - Leroy Samuels walked into the Varick Street immigration...
NBC News - June 25, 2014, by Kat Aaron and Seth Freed Wessler - Leroy Samuels walked into the Varick Street immigration court in lower Manhattan, his wrists handcuffed and attached to a chain around his waist. “My heart is beating,” Samuels’ older sister Anneisha said from a courtroom bench as her father beside her, his head in his hands to hide tears. Samuels, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, nodded at his family and lowered his eyes.
Three days earlier, the 24-year-old had been in a New Jersey detention center preparing to appear at his first hearing alone. Immigrants facing deportation, like Samuels, aren’t eligible for court-appointed attorneys. And like most immigrants in his position, he couldn’t afford one on his own
“I found some lawyers online, but they asked for $4,000,” Anneisha said. “I just hung up.”
Without legal defense, Samuels was sure he’d be deported to Jamaica, the country where he was born but has not been for nearly 15 years since his father brought him to the U.S.
But Samuels arrived in court that December morning with an attorney anyway. He is one of 190 people facing deportation from New York City who have been provided a free lawyer through the Family Unity Program, a city council-funded pilot initiative that provides for two public defenders’ offices to hire lawyers to represent poor immigrants in detention. It's the first program of its kind in the country. Now city lawmakers are poised to expand it almost ten-fold, making New York City the first municipality to provide legal defense to all detained indigent residents facing deportation.
“Justice shouldn't depend on the income level of anyone,” says Judge Robert Katzmann, Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, who convened a multi-year study group from which the pilot emerged. “I think that the project will create momentum for greater support for providing counsel for people facing deportation.”
A number of other cities, including Boston and Chicago, are exploring similar programs. And this year, Alameda County, California, which includes the cities of Oakland, Fremont and Berkeley, started a program that approaches New York’s.
“This is part of a trend,” says Raha Jorjani, the immigration attorney hired by Alameda County. “Public defenders are saying that until Congress acts to provide legal defense for immigrants in deportation proceedings, we at the county level have to do our part to mitigate harm to clients.
In recent years, more immigrants have found themselves in court as the U.S. government has deported and detained nearly 400,000 each year. Though not all people facing deportation are detained, those who get locked up, either because they were previously charged with a crime or entered the country without papers, are less likely to have an attorney to represent them and more likely to be deported. The two biggest factors in successfully resolving a case are having a lawyer and being free during the trial, according to a report by Katzmann’s group.
Preliminary data on the New York City pilot, which comes to a close on June 30th, shows that of 190 detainees, almost half have been released or have a legal case to argue for release. Some may still be deported but can now fight from outside prison.
Providing these immigrants with legal defense, Katzmann says, creates both fairness and efficiency, saving county and federal governments money they’d otherwise spend locking people up. “It's a benefit to the judge, it’s a benefit to the government and to the non-citizen. It's really an example of how the government process can be made better.”
For Samuels, the road to immigration court started with legal trouble in 2010. He’d been without a place to stay and was sleeping on a friend’s couch. The friend, Samuels says, asked him to hold onto a package of drugs. Samuels says police officers arrived at the apartment and arrested him. He pleaded guilty and was convicted of criminal possession of a controlled substance and sentenced to time-served, six days in jail.
Samuels and his family say he quickly straightened his life. He found a steady job at a pharmacy, stopped hanging with friends who sold drugs and made sure to see his son, who lived with his ex-girlfriend, at least twice a week. A year passed and then two. He thought the criminal case was behind him.
Then at around 8:30 one morning last December, as he walked home to his Brooklyn apartment after working the night shift, he was stopped on the street and arrested by federal immigration agents. He was placed in detention in New Jersey, facing deportation. Immigration attorneys say it’s not uncommon for officials to detain immigrants long after an arrest.
“I never really thought about being deported,” Samuels said this winter from behind glass in the visitation room at the Hudson County, New Jersey, detention center. “I had a good job. I had visits with my son. I was on my way,” Samuels said. He’d hoped to enroll in culinary school, but from detention, he saw his plans evaporating. And his live-in girlfriend was pregnant and due in May. “What if I’m not there?” he said.
“The first time that I visited my brother at Hudson,” Anneisha Samuels says, “I didn’t know what to do. It’s not like when people are arrested, regular arrested, and they get a lawyer.”
Anneisha had recently lost her job as a home health aide. Their father was between jobs, too.
The next day, Anneisha received a call from Talia Peleg of Brooklyn Defenders Services, one of three attorneys from her office working on the immigrant defense pilot program. (The Bronx Defenders office employs three others.) Peleg bore good news: She would represent Leroy in court free of charge.
“An attorney knows how to talk the talk and walk the walk,” Peleg explained recently. “And to translate these complex immigration issues into a narrative that makes sense to the court,” without a lawyer, “I don’t know if that would be possible.”
The program attorneys say their representation by no means guarantees that their clients will stay in the U.S. For people with many criminal convictions, there’s no viable legal argument to stay. Many of these people are subject to what's known as mandatory detention. For them, fighting to remain in America can mean months or even years in detention while their case winds through the system. Some opt to leave.
Diego Garcia, originally from Guerrero, Mexico, picked up several misdemeanor and disorderly conduct charges in New York. He was fired from a catering job and was drinking heavily.
Eventually, those arrests led to deportation proceedings. He landed in the Hudson County detention center, and then at the Varick Street Immigration Court, where he, too, met Peleg. He was so eager to get out of prison that he told her he just wanted to be deported, but she encouraged him to sit through a 35-minute intake questionnaire to see what his options might be.
It turned out Garcia was eligible for a U visa, a special visa for victims of crime–in his case, witness tampering. The catering company he’d worked for had paid him and others far less than minimum wage, according to the Department of Labor. Garcia’s lawyers say his employer then pressured him to lie to federal investigators who were at the time looking into workplace violations.
Garcia was thrilled to hear there was a possible path to staying in America.
Peleg explained that the visa—if it came through—would take months, and he'd have to stay at Hudson while they fought. Rather than wait in jail, Garcia accepted the removal order, and went back to Mexico. “I wanted to be free,” he said recently by phone from Mexico City, “and fight from there.”
“It's very hard to be incarcerated, waiting,” Garcia said “When you're there, you feel confused, fearful.”
Peleg and Garcia are in regular contact as she pursues his U visa. And he has some money to help him get through the wait. When Peleg contacted the Department of Labor, which had repeatedly fined the catering company, officials said they had more than $3,000 in back wages for Garcia.
According to New York City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras, who represents several heavily immigrant communities in Queens, before the pilot project, she heard from families who spent thousands of dollars on immigration lawyers. “Often times it was money that these families didn't have,” she said. But no one was beating down her door demanding publicly-funded lawyers, she said. “My constituency didn't even know that that's what they needed to cry out for.”
Now, that’s changed. The families she talks to are getting help from attorneys whose sole focus is on immigration defense. “We're raising the level of justice,” Ferreras said.
The final draft of the budget, released by the city council Tuesday night, allocates $4.9 million to expand the program. Now, all poor New Yorkers facing deportation, both at Varick Street and nearby immigration courts in New Jersey, will be appointed an attorney.
Ultimately, the goal of the project’s advocates is to provide counsel for all migrants facing deportation in New York State, which would cost $7.4 million, said Peter Markowitz, who runs the immigration legal clinic at Cardozo School of Law, which has helped lead advocacy for the pilot program.
That price tag would be offset by savings for the state, which would spend less on health care and foster care for children whose parents are deported, according to a study by the Center for Popular Democracy, another group supporting the program. The private sector would benefit, too; New York State employers now lose an estimated $9.1 million dollars in turnover costs to replace detained and deported workers, the study found.
Nationally, it would cost just over $200 million to give a lawyer to every indigent immigrant facing deportation, according to one recent study. The federal government would save close to $175 million in detention costs, the study found.
In April, Leroy Samuels appeared in in the Varick Street court again. He walked through the doors in cuffs, and his sister and father sat in the same spot. His attorney had already made a deal with the federal government’s lawyer: Samuels would be granted release. After a short hearing, the judge warned Leroy not to get into any more trouble, and then told the now-25-year old that he could leave. In the courthouse cafeteria Samuels embraced his father and sister and thanked his attorneys.
Samuels’ return has been difficult. He says that he hasn’t been able to get his job back—his former boss told him the company isn’t hiring.
But weeks ago, his girlfriend gave birth to their son. The day he was released, Samuels said, “I feel like I got a fresh start because of these lawyers.”
Source.
Im Hinterhof eines Mythos
Silicon Valley - Sitz von Google, Facebook und Co.: If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere. Was aber, wenn...
Silicon Valley - Sitz von Google, Facebook und Co.: If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere. Was aber, wenn man es nicht schafft? Oder wenn man kein Hightech-Jünger ist, sondern einfach nur Busfahrer? Das Silicon Valley ist das krasseste Exempel der immer weiter auseinander driftenden US-Gesellschaft.
Das Silicon Valley ist die Pilgerstätte der Hightech-Jünger, ein Magnet für Talente aus aller Welt. Eingeklemmt zwischen Pazifik und San Francisco Bay, liegt die Heimat von Apple, Intel, Google, von Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, Facebook und etlichen weiteren Technologiefirmen - und von knapp drei Millionen Menschen. Während die Hard- und Softwarefirmen Spitzengehälter zahlen, fallen die Einkommen der weniger noblen Jobs.
Wer als Lehrer, Verkäufer, Busfahrer oder Maurer arbeitet, kann sich ein Leben im superteuren Silicon Valley kaum mehr leisten, die Zahl der "working poor" wächst - also derjenigen, die trotz Job in Armut leben. Auch die Zahl der Obdachlosen nimmt zu. Der soziale Abstieg kommt mitunter rasant: Eine Trennung, eine Firmenpleite oder ein Unfall können auch einen Aktienmillionär über Nacht zum Sozialfall machen. In den Hinterhöfen des Valley finden sich immer mehr Asyle und Ausgabestellen für Essen und Kleidung. Die Schlangen sind lang für die, die im Schatten des amerikanischen Traums leben.
Das Silicon Valley
"Silicon Valley" ist nur ein Spitzname. Weil Silicon – Silizium – der Grundstoff der Computerchips ist, die hier erfunden wurden. Computerchips, die längst auch in Smartphones, Autos, Spielzeug und Küchenmaschinen stecken. Das Silizium-Tal liegt zwischen San Francisco und San Jose auf einer Halbinsel, die im Westen vom Pazifik und den Santa Cruz Mountains begrenzt wird, im Osten von der San Francisco Bay und, dahinter, dem Höhenzug Diablo Range.
Source: Bayern
Pittsburgh police tightening security for march after Dallas
Pittsburgh police tightening security for march after Dallas
PITTSBURGH (AP) - Pittsburgh police say they're using uniformed and plainclothes officers and "extreme caution" to...
PITTSBURGH (AP) - Pittsburgh police say they're using uniformed and plainclothes officers and "extreme caution" to safeguard police and the public at an activists march on Friday.
The march opening the People's Convention at the city's convention center is billed as protesting "growing inequality and a toxic atmosphere of hate." Organizers expect 1,500 activists to march through downtown protesting what they believe are various social ills.
Pittsburgh's Public Safety Department is working with the FBI and other law enforcement in the wake of sniper shootings that killed five police officers and wounded seven others at a protest march in Dallas on Thursday.
Pittsburgh Bishop David Zubik also planned a noon Mass to pray for "peace and reconciliation."
And Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput (SHAP'-yoo) says the Dallas murders "only discredit" such protesters' "legitimate anger."
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Can We Forgo Wells Fargo?
When disgraced Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf was forced to resign a few weeks ago, it was a victory for economic justice...
When disgraced Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf was forced to resign a few weeks ago, it was a victory for economic justice. But this move, however dramatic, does not go far enough to fix the problems with Wells Fargo and Wall Street.
Christina Livingston, executive director of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE).
A diverse array of progressive organizations are joining forces to not only end Wells Fargo's predatory practices, but also increase the pressure for broad Wall Street reform that puts people and communities first.
Through a new "Forgo Wells" campaign, they are pushing city councils, state legislatures, school boards, and other public bodies to stop doing business with Wells Fargo. And they've already scored some wins.
The groups launching this divestment campaign include national organizations like Jobs with Justice, the Communications Workers of America, and Center for Popular Democracy, as well as local groups like New York Communities for Change, Minnesota-based Isaiah, and the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE).
Inequality.org co-editor Sarah Anderson interviewed ACCE's executive director, Christina Livingston, about her involvement in the Forgo Wells campaign.
Sarah Anderson: How did you come to be involved in this campaign?
Christina Livingston: Since our doors opened in 2010, Wall Street accountability work has been a staple issue. That's because so many of the issues people are battling have connections to Wall Street banks. From the foreclosure crisis, to wealth stripping of cities and municipalities, to student debt, and beyond, Wall Street banks and hedge funds are behaving in ways that harm you and me for the sake of unchecked power and greed.
Last year we engaged in a campaign organizing bank workers under our worker justice campaign umbrella and quickly realized that bank workers were being treated poorly by the big banks in many ways, including the use of unrealistic sales goals.
Working with the Communications Workers of America (CWA), we began to research how widespread these sales goals were and the impact they were having on workers. We didn't know then that because of these sales goals Wells Fargo workers were being compelled to open fraudulent accounts. However, given our interactions with Wells Fargo in the past, we were not surprised to find that such a widespread fraudulent practice existed. In fact, this is very reminiscent of the robo-signing practice Wells Fargo was found guilty of during the height of the foreclosure crisis.
What role will ACCE be playing in the Forgo Wells campaign?
Given that Wells Fargo is based in San Francisco, we felt compelled to immediately begin working with some of our largest California cities to call on the city government to take action. Already the Los Angeles City Council and the San Francisco Board of Supervisors have moved to suspend business with Wells Fargo and we plan to move at least 2-3 other cities in the coming months to take action. We are also encouraging organizing groups in other states to work with their legislators to suspend business with Wells at the state or city level.
Why is this a strategic moment for targeting Wells Fargo?
First, hubris and exploitation is in their DNA. They have never worked with community organizations, and racially biased marketing and fraud is baked into their way of doing business. It is sort of like a game of Jenga (or house of cards). Once you pull out that piece that makes the tower fall, which in this case was the fraud that front-line workers were forced to commit, you unearth many more parts of fraudulent behavior, and realize it is pervasive through everything.
Just a couple days ago, Wells reached a $50 million settlement for mortgage appraisal fraud. There are so many ways in which they are corrupt, and their tentacles are everywhere. They are invested big in private prisons, police foundations, the Dakota Access pipeline, Puerto Rican bonds. Basically, they are invested everywhere, and bad things come from their investments.
Do you see any potential for building alliances that cut across partisan lines in this campaign?
We think so. Part of the right-wing pushback against Hillary Clinton is that she has been friends with Wall Street. People do not trust her to stand up to the banks and hedge funds. Some of Trump's economic appeal has been his willingness to "tell it like it is." And there are unfortunately some Bernie followers who are supporting Trump. The anti-Wall Street message holds both major parties accountable.
Is this campaign just about Wells Fargo or are you trying to address broader problems with Wall Street?
This is absolutely not just a campaign about Wells Fargo, it is about all the big banks and hedge funds that are implementing practices and policies that hurt communities in order to deliver for the wealthy few at the top. Wells is emblematic of what everyone else is doing.
What would victory look like for you?
If we are really successful, we would see the break-up of Wells Fargo and would send a message that banks will be held responsible for the ways they treat their workers, shareholders, and customers. Along the way, we hope to get a fair amount of justice in monetary settlements, rights for workers, and divestment from a host of racist and exploitative investments.
This piece was reprinted by Truthout with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.
By Sarah Anderson
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2 months ago
2 months ago