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Penn Live – August 5, 2013, by Ivy DeJesus - Close to 100 protesters rallied on Monday within ear shot of a political event in Harrisburg headlined by House Speaker John Boehner and Rep. Scott Perry (PA-4) to demand immigration reform.

Chanting in English and Spanish, protesters made their way from the City Island parking lot up to the path leading to Metro Bank Park where the Republican lawmakers held a fundraiser.

Protesters carried placards and shouted in unison a string of chants, including: “Serve the needy, not the greedy,” and “Move Boehner, get out of the way. You’re not welcome in Pa.”

The rally was organized by a coalition of advocacy groups, among them Keystone Progress, Pennsylvanians United for Immigration Reform, Center for Popular Democracy and Central PA Area Labor Federation. The majority of participants drove in from other parts of the state or were bused in.

As House members return to their districts for August recess, representatives of the coalition said they intended to take their messages to lawmakers’ local offices.

Perry’s 4th congressional district encompasses York County and parts of Dauphin County.

Hiro Nishikawa, one of the protesters, said that the long-simmering debate is finally getting widespread public attention.

Nishikawa said immigration policy continues to be dictated by outdated laws, including the 1996 law that mandates detention and apprehension of undocumented immigrants who have any prior police records. The law has led to approximately 400,000 undocumented immigrants being detained under the Obama Administration.

“People recognize things are messed up,” Nishikawa said. “The huge concern is the fairness of the law. It needs to be changed.”

Amid widespread calls for an immigration policy overhaul, a deeply divided Congress has been unable to advance any comprehensive reform. President Obama has used his executive power to push some laws that provide pathways to citizenship, including an amnesty program for qualified young people. In spite of a bipartisan Senate bill approved in June, Washington insiders are largely in agreement that the House is not likely to agree on a major bill this year.“We are entrenched in the culture that is America..we are part of the people that are here.” – Jorge Salazar

Rally participants represented a diverse group of people, including church and labor groups, immigrants from a number of countries, and even undocumented immigrants.

Carmen Guerrero, a community organizer from outside Philadelphia, said lawmakers have not given the immigration issue the urgency it deserves.

“The law is broken,” Guerrero said in Spanish. She came from Mexico 13 years ago. “This is a country of immigrants. It’s a country where immigration has to keep moving forward with its law. It’s been too long without reform. It has been reformed but only to attack the immigrant community, to suppress the community.”

Guerrero said that U.S. immigration policy is so cumbersome, many immigrants prefer to sidestep the system and enter the country illegally. She said most countries face daunting obstacles for legal entry, including excessively long waiting periods.

“The opportunity to come here legally is too small,” she said. “At the end of the day, we rather break the law. There is no realization to be able to come legally and be part of society, as we should.”

Guerrero, a single mother of three who has worked two full-time jobs back to back as a hotel housekeeper and restaurant dishwasher, says she pays taxes and is in no way taking jobs away from citizens.

“We are the landscapers, the service, the dishwashsers at the restaurants and hotels,” she said. “I don’t think a professional would want those jobs.” -Jorge Salazar

Another undocumented immigrant, Jorge Salazar acknowledged that it would be difficult to process 11 million undocumented immigrants through the immigration system, but that in the end, it would not burden taxpayers.

“It’s not going to be costly,” he said. “We are going to pay for it. Immigration is one of the few government programs funded by the applicants.”

Salazar’s family arrived from Bolivia 23 years ago, but due to a series of legal mistakes, his family found itself staying put once their visa expired.

Salazar said he considers himself a part of the American society; he said he works and goes to school and is an active member of his community. He traveled to Harrisburg from his Philadelphia suburb home.

He said he and his family were concerned that they were risking deportation by being vocally and actively involved in calling for immigration reform.

“The reality is we have to do this,” he said. “People need to know that we are your neighbors, we are next to you in school, we are next to you in church. All my friends are American citizens. We are entrenched in the culture that is America..we are part of the people that are here.”

Source

Dive Brief:

Attorneys general from eight states and the District of Columbia sent letters to 15 retailers asking them to explain their policies regarding “on-call” scheduling, seeking information and documents related to their use of on-call shifts. 

Letters were sent to American Eagle, Aeropostale, Payless, Disney, Coach, PacSun, Forever 21, Vans, Justice Just for Girls, BCBG Maxazria, Tilly’s, Inc., David’s Tea, Zumiez, Uniqlo, and Carter’s, with signatures from any attorney general involved in the state where the retailer has operations.

The coordinated move follows a similar one last year from New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office, an effort that prompted six retail brands, including Urban Outfitters, Gap Inc., L. Brands, J. Crew, Pier 1, and Abercrombie & Fitch to end on-call scheduling.

Dive Insight:

Algorithms in software have helped retailers lower costs through efficient staffing, cutting workers loose in slow times, having them wait "on call" in case things get busy, and leaving little room for flexibility. The practice makes it difficult for retail employees to juggle the realities of their those jobs while also trying to manage their households and earn enough money to get by.

“On-call shifts are unfair to workers who must keep the day free, arrange for child care, and give up the chance to get another job or attend a class–often all for nothing,” Schneiderman said in a statement. “On-call shifts are not a business necessity, as we see from the many retailers that no longer use this unjust method of scheduling work hours.”

Schneiderman’s office has been keen on cracking down on the practice for a while now, which in most cases violates his state’s laws, and there’s been rising sentiment among lawmakers in several states—and possibly even in Congress—to pull back on the practice.

But even with this pressure, and despite its dubious legality in some areas, on-call scheduling is still fairly widespread, according to the Fair WorkWeek Initiative.

“Over the past year, workers have been speaking out about the struggles caused by increasingly unpredictable hours,” Fair Workweek Initiative director Carrie Gleason said in an email to Retail Dive. “Workers should not have to choose between living with dignity and getting enough hours to put food on the table. It is heartening to see more and more policymakers and regulators take action to address a crisis affecting millions of Americans.”

Retailers should be prepared to see more such concerns, warnings, and even legislation as just-in time scheduling gets more scrutiny, Gail Gottehrer, a labor & employment litigator at Axinn Veltrop & Harkrider in New York who works on behalf of employers, told Retail Dive last year. The practice was a major concern when the San Francisco Board of Supervisors last year unanimously passed its Worker Bill of Rights law.

“This can be especially difficult for multi-state employers,” Gottehrer said. “If you’re in a lot of jurisdictions it can be complicated to get things right.”

Not all the retailers that received letters use the practice. Forever 21 emailed Retail Dive to say, "Contrary to published reports, Forever 21 does not permit on-call scheduling nor do we have a company policy around doing so." On Friday, American Eagle Outfitters also released a press release reiterating that it has banned the practice nationwide. "We decided in November 2015 to cease the use of “on-call shifts” and advised our stores," the company states. "We are taking steps to reinforce and assure adherence to this policy across our store fleet."

Spokespeople for Coach and Payless told Reuters that they don’t use on-call scheduling, and a Zumiez spokesperson told Reuters that it’s cooperating, and a spokesperson for Carter's said that company is reviewing the letter. Other retailers receiving the new letters did not immediately respond to requests for comment, according to Reuters.

Recommended Reading

Reuters: US regulators probe retailers' on-call scheduling

By Daphne Howland

Source

Arizona Republican Senator Jeff Flake recently has been masquerading as a Republican with a heart, someone willing to stand up to Donald Trump and others in the GOP whose lack of principles is tearing the country apart.

Flake recently wrote a check for a whopping $100 to support Democratic Senate candidate Doug Jones in Alabama. He claims to have secured political promises from the Trump administration over DACA, which protects immigrants who came to the U.S. as children. (The White House denies there are any deals.)

Read the full article here.

In the face of a legal challenge in California and a probe by the New York State attorney general, underwear purveyor Victoria's Secret is said to have pulled the plug on a controversial labor practice known as on-call scheduling.

BuzzFeed reported the chain informed employees on Monday that it would no longer require its workers be available for shifts that could then be canceled with little notice and zero pay.

Victoria's Secret, one of five brands run by Columbus, Ohio-based L Brands (LB), on Tuesday said it was working on a response to the online publication's story but was not yet ready to do so seven hours after being called for comment.

In addition to Victoria's Secret, L Brands operates Bath and Body Works, La Senza, Victoria's Secret PINK and Henri Bendel. The company rang up $11.5 billion in sales in 2014 and runs nearly 3,000 specialty stores in the U.S.

"It feels like a safe bet to say that Victoria Secret's is feeling pressure," Elianne Farhat, deputy campaign director for the Fair Workweek Initiative at the Center for Popular Democracy, said. "We've seen a growing demand across the country for fair schedules because of the extreme chaos it creates."

Workers and labor activists say on-call scheduling can create havoc for livelihoods and personal lives, with the unpredictable hours making tasks such as taking classes, working another part-time job and covering child care difficult.

The practice of having on-call shifts has historically involved professions including emergency and medical workers, "but they are fairly compensated," Farhat said. "Over the last 10 years, as the retail sector has become the source of many jobs in our economy. It has seen the increased use of on-call scheduling."

If Victoria's Secret is shelving the on-call practice, "they are probably doing it to err on the side of caution, and not spend the time or money litigating the issue," said Los Angeles attorney Laura Reathaford, a partner at Venable who specializes in management-side employment issues. "California is a very employee-friendly state -- it's a very litigious state too."

If the company is indeed discontinuing the system, it would be offering some of what is sought in a lawsuit pending against the retailer in California.

"We're suing to recoup wages, and we're also seeking to put an end to the practice," David Leimbach, an attorney at Marlin & Saltzman, said of the litigation filed on behalf of two former Victoria Secret workers.

The complaint was filed on July 9, 2014, and the proposed class includes all individuals who worked at Victoria's Secret in California from July 9, 2010, to the present. L Brands told the court the proposed class numbered around 20,000, Leimbach said.

The federal judge presiding over the case dismissed the workers' claim that they were entitled to compensation under the state's reporting-time-pay law for on-call shifts for which they did not have to show up for work. But he also granted the two the right to appeal, saying the question of on-call shifts presented a question of law that could go either way.

"I can see the judge's point, no one really showed up, no one took the bus only to turn around and go home," Reathaford said.

"The district court dismissed that one claim, but said it's something the 9th circuit should immediately consider," Leimbach said.

Beyond the pending suit, no-call scheduling is drawing the attention of the New York state attorney general's office, which in April sent letters to 13 retailers, including Victoria's Secret, seeking information about their scheduling practices. A spokesman on Tuesday said the AG's office had no further comment.

And San Francisco next week begins enforcing an ordinance that requires major retailers give at least 24 hours notice to workers when changing or canceling shifts, or give them at least two hours of pay. The measure, which took effect in January, applies to retailers with at least 20 stores worldwide and 20 or more employees in San Francisco.

Source: CBS News