CPD IN THE NEWS

Main Street activists and community groups plan to turn up the pressure on the Federal Reserve at an annual conference of the economic elite this month, in hopes of convincing the central bank to maintain its support of the American recovery.

The campaign, known as Fed Up, is staging a conference in Jackson Hole, Wyo., that will run at the same time as the invite-only gathering of the world’s top financial and economic policymakers and academics hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. The campaign’s organizers said they expect at least 50 people -- ranging from workers to economists -- to attend the so-called “teach in,” which will be held in the same hotel as the Fed’s gathering. Topics include income inequality, efforts to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour and whether the Fed should invest in municipal bonds.

The conference in Jackson Hole comes as the Fed nears an historic crossroads. The central bank has kept the target for its benchmark interest at zero since 2008, a legacy of the darkest days of the financial crisis and a reflection of the lumbering economic recovery since then. Over the past year and a half, amid faster economic growth and a rapid improvement in the job market, the Fed has taken small steps toward reducing its support.

But the big decision to raise its target interest rate still looms ahead, and Fed officials are seriously considering whether to finally abandon its crisis-era stance at its meeting next month.

“For inexplicable reasons, the Fed seems primed to intentionally slow down the economy in September,” said Ady Barkan, campaign director for Fed Up. “ The real crisis in America is stagnant wages and a lack of good jobs. We are going to Jackson Hole to remind the Fed of this stark reality: slowing the economy down now will leave African-American and Hispanic communities permanently mired in a Great Recession.”

The Fed Up campaign made history last year when about a dozen demonstrators showed up at the conference to draw attention to the country’s uneven economic progress, particularly among minority communities. The protest led to meetings with top Fed officials over the past year, starting off with Kansas City Fed President Esther George, one of the central bank’s most vocal supporters of tightening the reins on the economy, who met with the group for two hours in Jackson Hole. In the fall, Fed Chair Janet Yellenhosted the group, and organizers have reached out to other officials since then with mixed success.

The campaign is returning this year with a more concrete agenda and the backing of a growing number of established left-leaning academics and think tanks, including the Roosevelt Institute, the AFL-CIO and the Economic Policy Institute. The campaign is led by the Center for Popular Democracy.

The group is also slated to release a report touting the economic benefits of an economy at full employment, which it pegged at a jobless rate of 4 percent -- significantly lower than the Fed’s estimate of about 5 to 5.2 percent. The lower rate would amount to 14.3 million more jobs, boost the economy by $1.3 trillion and generate an additional $261 billion in tax revenue, according to the analysis by PolicyLink and the Program for Environmental and Regional Equity at the University of Southern California.

True full employment, the report argues, would translate into a much lower jobless rate among minorities. The study estimated the impact of a 4 percent unemployment rate for every gender and racial group, adjusted for disparities in age. Black households, for example, would see their income jump by 23 percent, from $37,025 to $45,568. While Fed policy is not going to be the only solution to getting to full employment for all, we see it as a critical component of a broad policy agenda,” said Sarah Treuhaft, a director at PolicyLink. “We know that we need more growth and we need more jobs to stimulate hiring of people who have been left behind.”

Treuhaft said that the report does not estimate what inflation would be under this scenario but pointed out that it remained relatively stable in 2000, the last time the labor market hovered around full employment. But many analysts believe that a 4 percent jobless rate would cause the economy to overheat and inflation to spike. And some economists -- including a vocal minority within the Fed -- believe the central bank is already in the danger zone.

Those groups are also taking their message to Jackson Hole in hopes of bending the ear of policymakers ahead of their crucial decision in September. The conservative American Principles Project is staging a conference in the shadows of the Grand Tetons that coincides with the Fed’s gathering. The group has been skeptical of the benefits of the Fed’s easy-money stance and the reach of its powers, Several members have called on the central bank to rely on prescribed rules for conducting monetary policy, a recommendation the Fed has opposed.

Steve Lonegan, director of monetary policy at APP, said the group hopes its conference will reinvigorate the public conversation about monetary policy, which he argues deserves as much attention among conservatives as cutting taxes and reducing regulations.

“This is a recent phenomenon that Americans are disconnected from the value of their money. It’s the third leg of an economic growth plan for America,” Lonegan said. “It’s their savings. It’s their wages. It’s their life’s work.”

The Jackson Hole conferences will take place Aug. 27 to 29. The theme of the official Fed meeting this year is inflation. The central bank has set a 2 percent target for price-level increases, but it has consistently undershot that goal in recent years and wage growth has been stagnant

The Fed Up campaign has called on the Fed to set a target for wage growth as well. It is also calling for reforms of the selection process for presidents and boards of directors at the Fed’s 12 regional banks.

Source: Washington Post

El Diario - February 24, 2015, by Cristina Loboguerrero - Legisladores estatales y grupos que abogan por los derechos de los inmigrantes pidieron ayer al gobernador Andrew Cuomo que apruebe fondos para implementar un programa que daría defensoría legal gratuita a los inmigrantes indocumentados que afrontan un proceso de deportación.Los asambleístas Francisco Moya y Marcos Crespo, junto a representantes de varias organizaciones hicieron su pedido frente a la Corte federal de inmigración en el bajo Manhattan."El derecho de acceder a un abogado es uno de los derechos más importantes", precisó Moya, asambleísta de Corona, Queens, quien estima que hacen falta $4.5 millones para implementar el programa en todo el estado.Su colega Marco Crespo, por su parte, indicó que la iniciativa permitiría mantener unidas muchas familias y traería además beneficios "sociales y económicos".Ambos legisladores pusieron como ejemplo el programa Unidad Familiar Inmigrante de la Ciudad de Nueva York (NYIFUP, por su sigla en inglés), que con un financiamiento de $5 millones otorgado por el Concejo Municipal opera a pleno desde noviembre pasado. Según la abogada Ángela Fernández, directora de la Coalición de Derechos de los Inmigrantes del Norte de Manhattan, NYIFUP ha beneficiado a unos 900 inmigrantes."Hay 1,300 inmigrantes en el estado que por no poder pagar a un abogado están en riesgo de ser deportadas", dijo Fernández.

Los lunes, martes y miércoles, tres jueces revisan los nuevos casos en sus oficinas del piso 11 de la mencionada Corte, 201 de la calle Varick. Se estima que cada magistrado ve entre 7 a 15 casos por día; el resto de la semana lo dedican a los casos ya presentados.

Cada sala tiene unas pocas sillas, destinadas a la familia del procesado. Delante de las sillas hay un pequeño escritorio donde se sienta el acusado, vestido con el uniforme de recluso; a su izquierda, un intérprete; a su derecha, el abogado defensor. Enfrente, un representante del gobierno argumenta por la deportación.En el centro de la pequeña sala, el juez escucha atentamente a las dos partes. El acusado no puede dirigirse directamente al juez.Los abogados llegan temprano en la mañana para entrevistar a los detenidos y revisar sus casos antes de presentarlos en la corte durante las horas de la tarde.Oscar Hernández (21) fue detenido en 2011. Gracias a la ayuda legal del grupo de Servicios de Defensores de Brooklyn pudo salvarse de ser deportado y ahora está en proceso de legalizar su situación migratoria."No es lo mismo cuando uno está representado por un abogado, porque al desconocer las leyes y no poder pagar a alguien se está desorientado en todo el proceso", dijo el hombre, que vino a Estados Unidos hace siete años escapando de la violencia de su país

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In a recent Center for Popular Democracy report, we detailed examples of youth-focused campaigns for high school registration around the country. In Phoenix, organizers at Living United for Change in Arizona regularly go door-to-door registering eligible students in the 27,000-student Phoenix Union High School district. They also work with school district officials to integrate voter registration in high schools.

Read the full article here.

Chicago Tribune - March 31, 2015, by Alejandra Cancino - The group huddled in front of a McDonald's in downtown Chicago, preparing to tell the 100 people who had gathered there how the Fight for $15 had taken on a broader fight on behalf of low-wage workers ranging from airport workers to adjunct college professors.

Many of the people who listened to the speeches were young, too young to recall the 1960s-era protests. But that clearly was the vibe of Tuesday's rally.

Participants in the Fight for $15 movement, who are planning protests on April 15, say they have taken on a broader fight on behalf of low-wage workers ranging from airport workers to adjunct college professors.

"This fight is a fight about racial justice and economic justice," Charlene Carruthers, national director of the Black Youth Project 100, told the crowd. Her organization is composed of black activists ranging in age from 18 to 35.

"For us, the Fight for 15 is also a fight for our lives," Carruthers said. "When we say 'black lives matter,' that includes black workers."

Ed Shurna, executive director of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, which is participating in the Fight for $15 campaign, said its strategy seems to borrow elements from eras of the 1930s and the 1960s.

"It has the feel of the civil rights movement, the feel of the labor movement, but it's 2015 so it's done in a different way," Shurna said. He said this campaign is trying to get corporations to take responsibility for the struggles of their workers and get them to increase wages, offer benefits and improve working conditions.

McDonald's and its franchisees have been the main target of the campaign. Workers have filed lawsuits and complaints at various federal agencies alleging labor law violations, wage theft and unsafe working conditions. Moreover, the campaign, backed by the Service Employees International Union, wants the National Labor Relations Board to declare that McDonald's and its franchisees share responsibility for working conditions, benefits and pay.

"We won't stop until these multibillion-dollar companies pay us a living wage of $15 per hour," said Douglas Hunter, a McDonald's worker.

In a statement, McDonald's said it respects people's right to peacefully protest. "Historically, very few McDonald's employees have participated in these organized events," Heidi Barker Sa Shekhem, a McDonald's spokeswoman, said in the statement.

Matt Hoffmann, an adjunct professor at Loyola University, said faculty members of colleges in Chicago and across the nation have drawn inspiration from fast-food workers and the Fight for $15.

He said adjuncts want to be paid $15,000 per course, a figure that would include wages and benefits. He said he currently is paid $4,500 per course and doesn't receive benefits.

Hoffmann, who spoke at Tuesday's rally, said, "We struggle with our bills; we receive no benefits and we have little job stability."

At an event announcing the actions in front of a McDonald's in New York City's Times Square, organizers said home health care aides, airport workers, adjunct professors, child care workers and Wal-Mart workers will be among those turning out in April.

Terrence Wise, a Burger King worker from Kansas City, Mo., and a national leader of the Fight for $15 push, said more than 2,000 groups including Jobs With Justice and the Center for Popular Democracy will show their support as well.

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