CPD IN THE NEWS

Aljazeera America - July 24, 2014 - The Center for Popular Democracy's Fair Workweek Initiative Director Carrie Gleason joins Aljazeera America to discuss how unfair work scheduling impedes low-wage workers from dignity and justice on the job.

Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond President Jeffrey Lacker plans to retire Oct. 1, marking the exit of one of the U.S. central bank’s most steadfast inflation fighters at a time when the Fed is weighing how quickly to raise interest rates.

The Richmond Fed said Tuesday that a committee had been formed to find a successor for Lacker, who has led the regional Fed bank since 2004, and has engaged professional services firm Heidrick & Struggles to conduct the search. The head of the Richmond Fed will be a voting member of the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee in 2018.

Lacker, 61, was a voice of restraint in the use of monetary policy and the central bank’s balance sheet as the Fed deployed extraordinary powers to combat the financial crisis, the worst recession since the Great Depression as well as a sluggish recovery.

“He was consistent in terms of wanting a narrow Fed that stuck to the business of ensuring price stability because that would be the Fed’s best contribution to society,” said Vincent Reinhart, chief economist at Standish Mellon Asset Management Co. LLC in Boston. “Jeff Lacker kept the faith.”

Lacker dissented frequently in favor of tighter policy when he was a voter on the FOMC, including at every meeting in 2012. During the financial crisis he warned about channeling credit to specific sectors of the economy, inflation risks and government rescues of troubled banks.

Core Doctrines

One of Lacker’s core doctrines was that an expansion of Fed credit to other sectors of the economy would create expectations of further support and thus further destabilize markets in the future as investors tested the perceived safety net.

“The striking feature of central bank lending during the recent turmoil is the extent to which it has extended well beyond the boundaries that previously were understood to constrain such lending,” Lacker said in a speech in November 2008.

Lacker wasn’t alone in those views. Former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker said the bailouts had taken the central bank to “the very edge of its lawful and implied powers, transcending in the process certain long-embedded central banking principles and practices.”

Arguing for constraint when the entire financial system was at risk seemed overly cautious to some of his colleagues. Former Chairman Ben S. Bernanke noted that Lacker opposed a crisis-era innovation called the Term Securities Lending Facility, where the Fed loaned out its Treasury portfolio to primary dealers in exchange for mortgage-backed securities as collateral.

“Jeff Lacker spoke against the TSLF,” Bernanke wrote in his book, “The Courage to Act.”

Lacker will depart three years ahead of his mandatory retirement age of 65. He hasn’t lined up another job, according to Richmond Fed spokeswoman Laura Fortunato. “He does want to get back to writing and research,” she said.

The search for his successor, which gets under way as the Atlanta Fed is undertaking its own campaign to replace its president Dennis Lockhart, who retires Feb. 28, will be conducted nationally to “identify a broad, diverse and highly qualified candidate pool for this leadership role,” the Richmond Fed said in a statement on its website.

The Fed is under pressure to increase diversity among its leaders after criticism that it is dominated by white men. Janet Yellen, the first woman to chair the central bank, has said she’d like to see more diversity, though the Richmond Fed’s own board of directors will make the ultimate selection.

Jordan Haedtler, campaign manager for the Fed Up coalition, which has called for a more diverse leadership that includes more minorities and women, said the group will push for “a publicly inclusive and transparent process with the consideration of diverse candidates who will consider labor market conditions for all workers in weighing their decisions.”

Haedtler said Lacker was “always gracious” and toured low-income communities in Charlotte, North Carolina, with one of their member groups.

Given the Richmond Fed’s tradition of standing firm on price stability, “my guess is that the Richmond Fed will find a hawk,” said Mark Vitner, a senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities LLC in Charlotte. “Part of this reflects the sentiment of businesses, residents and bankers located in this part of the country, who tend to take a more cautious view on what monetary policy can and cannot do,” he said.

Atlanta’s Vacancy

Lacker admitted in speeches that his forecasts for the recovery were at times too optimistic. His warnings about inflation were defused as shocks hit the economy. When the Fed decided to go forward with a second round of quantitative easing in November 2010, Lacker raised concerns that it could make it hard to restrain inflation.

“This poses unacceptable risks to price stability and to our credibility,” he said, according to the meeting transcript. “I fear today’s decision and the expectations it encourages will come back to haunt us.”

The Fed’s preferred inflation measure, the personal consumption expenditures price index, did rise above its 2 percent target in 2011 and for part of 2012. It then fell below 2 percent in May that year and has never risen above that level since, partly due to a tumble in oil prices that began in 2014.

By Craig Torres

Source

Minnesota’s campaign finance regulatory board heads into election season with its slimmest possible board membership for taking action after the Legislature failed to confirm two appointees before adjourning its session.

Two appointments before lawmakers got hung up over concerns raised by Senate Republicans about the DFL political background of Emma Greenman. Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board appointments require confirmation from the House and Senate on a three-fifths vote; the House supplied sufficient votes to confirm Greenman and former Republican state Rep. Margaret “Peggy” Leppik during the session’s final day.

Board chairman Christian Sande said Friday that it could be August before the board is back to full strength. That’s because of the legal steps Gov. Mark Dayton must take to fill the slots, by which time election contests will be in full swing and campaign finance complaints will be streaming in.

“It means for the board to take any action the votes have to be unanimous,” Sande said. “I don’t know that it handicaps us. But it certainly does indicate that where in the past with six active members of the board it might be easier to arrive at four votes to achieve something.”

Absence of a single member would deprive the board of the quorum it needs to even meet.

The remaining members would have to be in complete agreement to impose any penalties, issue any advisory opinions or take other substantive action because state law requires four votes in favor when the typically six-member board makes decisions.

Campaign finance board appointments always have come with more political sensitivity and scrutiny than most agencies. In fact, state law dictates a specific political makeup and that some members be former lawmakers.

Greenman and Leppik had been serving on the board pending confirmation but their appointments were considered null when the Legislature adjourned without positive votes.

A Dayton spokesman says the governor plans to resubmit their names once the openings are posted, which would allow them to serve again until the Legislature returns next year and takes another look. It’s not clear when that could happen.

Sen. Scott Newman of Hutchinson said he and his Republican colleagues weren’t willing to confirm Greenman because of past and present political activity.

“Is this someone who would be able to set aside partisan politics and render judgment as to violations of campaign finance laws? We really doubted it,” Newman said in a phone interview. “We were very concerned about it because of the degree of involvement in political partisanship.”

He added, “This is not a personal attack on her. It is simply a realization of her past activities. She was a very politically active person.”

Greenman, a 36-year-old Minneapolis lawyer, is director of voting rights and democracy for the Center for Popular Democracy. Past stints include work for the Wellstone Action organization formed after the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone and for a Minnesota unit of the Service Employees International Union. In her appointment materials, she lists her political affiliation as with the DFL.

Greenman didn’t immediately return a call or email inquiring about her intentions moving forward said in an email Friday that the lack of a vote was disappointing. She said she is considering reapplying and has been encouraged to do so.

“I have had the pleasure of of serving on the board since January and believe it plays an important role in supporting and protecting Minnesota’s democracy,” she wrote.

In a packet compiled in connection with her earlier appointment, Greenman disclosed details about her past political involvement and her present job, which she said posed no conflict with a campaign board role and didn’t encompass campaign finance matters.

“At this point in my career I am able to serve on the board without any direct conflicts of interest. I do not work for any candidates or any political campaign committees. I do not currently represent the Minnesota DFL or any party official or political candidate,” she wrote in a November letter to Dayton seeking the appointment.

By Brian Bakst

Source

CBSNew York - February 11, 2014 - Undocumented immigrants and their supporters are cheering Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan for creating city identification cards this year. But, as WCBS 880′s Alex Silverman reported, they also want to make sure New York gets it right.

During his State of the City address Monday, de Blasio vowed to make municipal ID cards available to all residents in 2014 regardless of their immigration status, “so that no daughter or son of our city goes without bank accounts, leases, library cards, simply because they lack identification.”

“To all of my fellow New Yorkers who are undocumented, I say: New York City is your home, too, and we will not force any of our residents to live their lives in the shadows,” he said.

Aracely Cruz said she’s been waiting 10 years to hear a promise like de Blasio’s.

“I face fear every day,” she said. “I don’t trust anybody.”

Cruz was among the immigration reform proponents who gathered at a news conference Tuesday in lower Manhattan. Also in attendance were a mother who wants the freedom to walk into her child’s school and a day laborer who says he has spent 15 years in Queens with nothing to show to prove he’s part of the city.

City Councilman Carlos Menchaca, D-Brooklyn, head of the Immigration Committee, said members are drafting a bill to create the cards and plans to hold a hearing on the matter within the next month.

“We’re not going to wait for a federal government to give us reform,” he said.

“We’re tired of Congress failing us and failing our families,” said Linda Sarsour, executive director of the Arab American Association of New York. “And what we do in New York is we don’t wait for Congress.”

One concern advocates such as Steve Choi, executive director of the New York City Immigration Coalition, have is “we have to make sure we are ensuring trust, that the city agencies, such as the library and the police, are able to really accept these municipal ID cards without fear that folks are going to be branded somehow.”

Brittny Saunders, a lawyer with the Center for Popular Democracy, said other cities have created an incentive for citizens to also obtain the cards ”by connecting up these IDs with discounts at local businesses.”

Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, agreed the ID cards should be used for all New Yorkers, not just undocumented immigrants.

“I, for one, intend to get a municipal ID because I want to use the ID that’s accessible to all New Yorkers,” she said.

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