CPD IN THE NEWS

Crain's New York Business - July 8, 2014, by Chris Bragg - An initiative creating an identification card for New York City residents could allow hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants to open bank accounts, where identification is required. That is just one way the law could boost the city's economy, according to advocates for the card, though thorny security concerns for the city remain unresolved.

Aimed at making life easier for the city's half-million undocumented immigrants, the bill to create a municipal identification card was passed by the City Council last month, and Mayor Bill de Blasio is expected to sign it. A secondary impact could be boosting immigrants' spending and entrepreneurship, say advocates.

"The multiplier effect of the municipal ID is going to be huge because of the financial empowerment aspect," said Steven Choi, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition. "People who don't have IDs or a bank account can't participate in the financial system."

Applicants for the cards, which the city is expected to begin issuing in late 2014 or early 2015, will have to prove their identities with birth certificates or passports from any country. They will also have to prove their city residency with documents such as utility bills or pay stubs.

The cards will include a person's name, picture, address and date of birth. But questions remain whether that will be enough for banks, which have security concerns and have not yet publicly committed to accepting the IDs. For one, undocumented immigrants do not have Social Security numbers.

Mr. Choi believes these immigrants could apply for Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs), a tax-processing number for which foreign workers can apply. Banks currently have inconsistent polices on whether to accept ITINs in lieu of Social Security numbers, but Mr. Choi thinks that having the city government's full weight behind the initiative will prod the institutions to accept them.

Banks have concerns about the cards being secure enough, and fear that accounts could be used for money laundering. Whether or not banks large and small decide to accept the ID cards will likely rest on the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and state Department of Financial Services giving their sign-offs, according to Brian Blake, vice president of Spring Bank, a community lender that focuses primarily on low-income and underserved neighborhoods.

"There are a lot of banks that have flexibility above the minimum requirements to open an account, and below that minimum there's no flexibility," Mr. Blake said. "We try to be as open-minded as possible, as far as the regulators allow."

Although the City Council overwhelmingly passed the bill, the measure faced opposition from the chamber's three Republican members, who cited security concerns. Republicans in Albany are set to make the cards a campaign issue in the 2014 election, saying they legitimize immigrants who are here illegally and create the potential for fraud and abuse.

Another key question is whether a broad swath of New Yorkers—not just undocumented immigrants—will apply for the municipal ID cards. Advocates say that for immigrants to avoid being stigmatized, card ownership must extend beyond those living here illegally.

To that end, the city is planning on putting benefits such as discounts to museums on the cards.

That could encourage a whole new population to take in New York's cultural institutions—including both undocumented immigrants and citizens—although the details have yet to be worked out. Cities that have passed municipal ID laws, such as San Francisco, Los Angeles and New Haven, Conn., have employed these incentives.

Signing leases

The cards are also intended to ease holders' abilities to sign leases and give them access to government buildings, which often require identification, said Andrew Friedman, co-executive director of the Center for Popular Democracy, a New York-based group that released a study on the impact of similar laws around the country.

That could make it easier for entrepreneurial immigrants to deal with regulators and other gatekeepers of the area's economy.

"For immigrant-owned small businesses and vendors seeking to open and get a license, it makes a huge difference," Mr. Friedman said.

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Baristas are among the 10 job titles that received the biggest pay hikes this year, but CBS MoneyWatch reports that some Starbucks baristas may be getting shortchanged in another way.

Last year, Starbucks promised to start posting employees’ work schedules at least 10 days in advance after a New York Times article titled “Working Anything but 9 to 5” detailed the burdens employees faced because they were receiving only a few days’ notice about their schedules.

But by some accounts, Starbucks’ promise has yet to become a reality.

One student tells CBS that “wild inconsistency” plagues his Starbucks work schedules and that lack of advance notice forced him to pay a co-worker to cover one shift so he could take an exam.

A report released this month by the nonprofit Center for Popular Democracy — “The Grind: Striving for Scheduling Fairness at Starbucks” — questions six facets of Starbucks’ scheduling practices:

Unpredictable workweeks.

Inconsistency in days, times and amounts of work.

Insufficient rest due to working “clopen” shifts (when employees are scheduled to close one night and to open the store early the next morning).

Obstacles to taking sick leave.

Understaffing and insufficient hours.

Failure to honor employees’ availability.

Carrie Gleason, director of the Fair Workweek Initiative at the Center for Popular Democracy and a co-author of the organization’s report, tells CBS that even though Starbucks “has the values and wants to do right by their employees,” many troubling issues persist.

CBS reports that Starbucks did not respond to its requests for comment. In an internal memo later published by Time, Starbucks executive Cliff Burrows wrote that the company couldn’t validate the survey, but noted that:

“The findings suggest, contrary to the expectations we have in place, that some partners are receiving their schedules less than one week in advance and that there is a continuing issue with some partners working a close and then an opening shift the following morning.”

Burrows also asked store managers “to go the extra mile to ensure partners have a consistent schedule.”

Source: MoneyTalks News

Death Cab for Cutie

After writer Dave Eggers attended a Donald Trump rally this past June, he realized now would be a good time for the “resurrection of the political protest song.” So he called up some artists, including Jim James and Aimee Mann, who wrote tracks for a project that would later become a playlist titled 30 Days, 30 Songs. That playlist, touted as being “written and recorded by musicians for a Trump-free America” launched Monday with Death Cab for Cutie’s “Million Dollar Loan.”

“From Woody Guthrie to Public Enemy, we know that songs can change minds, and particularly now, we need to motivate voters to stand against bigotry, sexism, hatred and ignorance,” Eggers said in a statement.

Eggers launched the playlist — available on Spotify and Apple Music — Oct. 10, 30 days before election day. Thao Nguyen, clipping., and Bhi Bhiman, among others, also contributed tracks, along with R.E.M., who offered up a never-before-released live song for the compilation.

A new track will debut at noon ET each day up until Nov. 8, and all proceeds will go toward the Center for Popular Democracy. Hear Death Cab’s entry below.

BY ARIANA BACLE

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NY Daily News - December 2, 2013, by Phyllis Furman - Coalition urges city to change its relationship with banks as a way to address income inequality.

Wall Street has put the squeeze on the city to the tune of $1 billion, a report due out Tuesday claims.

As much as $723 million worth of unnecessary fees and bad deals, coupled with $300 million in bank subsidies should be rejiggered, says a study from a new left-leaning coalition called New Day, New York Coalition.

"New York City could be saving $1 billion annually just by changing the way it does business with Wall Street," one of the report's authors, Connie Razza, director of strategic research initiatives at the Center for Popular Democracy, told the Daily News.

The study, dubbed "Leveraging New York's Financial Power to Combat Inequality," kicks off a week of events organized by the group, culminating in a rally set for Thursday at Foley Square.

The coalition, whose members include veterans of Occupy Wall Street, labor unions such as 1199SEIU, and faith organizations, says its goal is to "draw attention to the ways Wall Street and big corporations continue to siphon resources away from average New Yorkers and point toward solutions that would help reduce inequality and build economic fairness."

Mirroring a key campaign theme of Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio, the report notes the huge disparity between the city's haves and have-nots, with the 1% controlling a whopping 40% of the city's income.

The city and its pension funds have tremendous leverage that can be used to bridge the gap, the study says: $350 billion that travels through the financial system.

"We should be using that leverage to demand a different relationship" with Wall Street, Razza said.

Among the key findings: the city, its pension funds and the MTA pay $563 million in Wall Street fees each year.

 

Rather than pay out megabucks to Wall Street big shots, the city should set up an in-house group to manage its pension assets and bond offerings, the report recommends.

That suggestion comes on the heels of a recent city report that showed fees paid by New York City pension funds surged by 28% to $472.5 million in the year ended June 30.

The idea of bringing the management of the city's money in-house isn't new.

New York's former chief investment officer, Larry Schloss, recommended just that before he recently stepped down. A number of public pension funds in Canada, including Ontario's $126 billion teachers' pension fund, have already moved in that direction.

But achieving that goal here is a long shot, said Leo Kolivakis, publisher of Pension Pulse Blog.

"Attracting and retaining qualified managers to manage money in-house is a huge challenge," Kolivakis told the News.

Patrick Muncie, a spokesman for Mayor Bloomberg, noted the financial services industry's crucial contributions to the local economy.

"The financial services sector is a critical driver of New York City's economy, providing more than 400,000 jobs and generating $3 billion in tax revenue last year alone," he said.

A spokesman for outgoing New York City Comptroller John Liu said the report encapsulates many of the comptroller's efforts, including "better and more cost-effective in-house management of pension assets."

The report "effectively and succinctly aggregates the real underlying issues of deepening inequality," Liu said in a statement.

Reps for de Blasio and incoming New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer, declined to comment.

Other recommendations of the report include holding banks to firm commitments to improve the community in exchange for the $300 million a year they receive in subsidies.

pfurman@nydailynews.com

What they want:

*Renegotiate financial deals to save up to $725 million each year

*Hold banks to commitments in exchange for $300 million in subsidies

*Banks should write down underwater mortgages to keep 86,000 families in their homes

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