Rally to Protect Medicaid with 1199 and more!

Happy New Year! From your friends at LIJWJ, we hope you had a happy, healthy, and restorative holiday season. Not least of all because 2025 is bound to hold many struggles, challenges, and calls to action from the LI workers’ movement. We’ll start our inaugural 2025 email with one of those calls!

Rallies to Protect Medicaid with 1199 SEIU!

The incoming presidential administration and its allies in congress are poised to continue assaulting what little social supports remain in the US. This includes funding for Medicaid, most of which is provided to states by the federal government. In New York, Medicaid provides healthcare access for about 7 million people (35% of NY’s 19.5 million people). This means if the federal government guts Medicaid over a third of New Yorkers will lose their coverage.

To show our local federal representatives that our communities support Medicaid, and are in dire need of any healthcare access available, 1199 SEIU is hosting two LI rallies tomorrow in Hauppauge and Patchogue.

If you are able please help start 2025 out strong and join 1199 in sending a strong message from the people of LI! Please let them know you’ll be there here!

2024 Holiday Season Recap

Since we last checked in there were a series of local labor actions that appropriately closed out 2024 as a year of solidarity on LI.

Starbucks

From Starbucks Workers United:

“Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol makes more in an HOUR than most baristas make in a YEAR. Its insulting that not only are annual raises lower this year than in previous years, but Starbucks offered our union NO immediate wages during contract bargaining. It’s unacceptable – we need fair wages, fair scheduling, and accessible benefits!

Union baristas went on the biggest Starbucks ULP strike in history from Dec. 20-24 – and until Starbucks bargains a fair contract with us, this is just the beginning.”

98% of unionized Starbucks workers voted for this strike in an inspiring show of determination and solidarity with one another. LI showed its solidarity too with community supporters and LIJWJ’s own Diane Cantave joining workers on the picket line in the frigid December weather.

To show your support on your phone or computer right now head here to sign the No Contract, No Coffee Pledge! And follow Starbucks Workers United on social media to get the latest updates direct from the source!

NYSNA

NYSNA nurses were joined by LIJWJ on a cold and rainy December 9 to tell Mt. Sinai South Nassau’s management to deliver a fair contract that respects nurses and patients!

From NYSNA: “Nurses at Mount Sinai South Nassau always put quality care for Long Island patients first. That’s why they’re working toward a fair union contract that guarantees there are always enough experienced nurses at the bedside. 

Management at Mount Sinai South Nassau has been pushing back on the nurses’ proposals every step of the way and claims they can’t “Find a Way” to deliver a fair contract on Long Island. Meanwhile, nurses at the hospital are stretched thin and concerned that patient care will suffer. NYSNA nurses have been fighting for almost a year to win a fair union contract that puts patients first.

Show your support for our local community nurses. Sign the petition to tell Mount Sinai executives to “Find a Way” to deliver a fair contract that respects nurses and patients!”

32BJ

From 32BJ: “Custodians working at Molloy University [went] on strike to protest Molloy’s failure to provide any additional dates for contract negotiations, despite repeated requests by the Union for additional dates. The last bargaining session took place before Thanksgiving.

In the past, the Union and Molloy University have always been able to reach fair Union agreements without a strike.

After a period of record inflation and with the high cost of living on Long Island, the Union’s priority in bargaining has been to raise wages and protect health and retirement benefits. Molloy currently pays significantly less than other nearby universities.”

Since the strike on December 10th Molloy has met with 32BJ to bargain, but remains stubborn on issues like wage increases. Given that, there is still an open call to action for community supporters to call the university administration at 516-323-3200 and tell them that Molloy custodians deserve fair wages and that one job should be enough!

Until next time, thank you for your support of LIJWJ and solidarity with our local workers.

Faith Conference Sneak Peek, UBP Launch, and More!!

Repairers of the Breach – LIJWJ Faith Conference in December!

This December we hope you’ll join the LIJWJ faith community, including co-sponsors the Poor Peoples’ Campaign, NYS Council of Churches, and Abraham’s Table, for an engaging and thought-provoking conference – “Repairers of the Breach”: How Faith and Community Partners Can Build a Just Long Island Economy. Repairers of the Breach is open to all clergy, congregants, and individuals from all faith traditions (and secular folks too!) interested in participating in discussions on the intersection of faith, solidarity, economics, and movement building.

Repairers of the breach seeks to be interactive and inclusive, featuring discussion and response panels to delve into topics with dynamic conversations with audience engagement. The day will start out strong with an opening plenary entitled “Creating a Just Economy: Interfaith Perspectives on Principles of Economic Justice.”  

Moderator: Jean Dougherty, St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church, Smithtown

Interfaith Panelist:

  • Cristian Murphy, Sisters of St. Joseph, Brentwood
  • Rev. Angela Shannon, Assistant to Bishop of Metro NY
  • Rabbi Lina Zebarini, Kehillath Shalom Synagogue
  • David Sprintzen, Ethical Humanist Society of Long Island
  • Reverend Dr. Madelyn Campbell, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Huntington
  • Isma Chaudhry, Islamic Center of Long Island

Worker Panelists:

  • Miguel Alas Sevillano, Workplace Project
  • Claire Leon, 1199 SEIU Delegate

This discussion will address the core principles of economic justice in each of the represented faith traditions. The panels will tackle the questions of “How does your tradition define economic justice?” and “What are the core principles of economic justice found in your tradition?” Answers to these questions, and possible even more questions from the discussion of them, will inform and help develop subsequent discussions throughout the day.

Stay tuned for more info and a registration link! In the mean time SAVE THE DATE!!

Unemployment Bridge Campaign Launch!

Save the date and join the LI Fund Excluded Workers (FEW) Coalition on Tuesday November 19 to launch our 2024-25 Unemployment Bridge Program (UBP) campaign!

750,000 workers in New York are not eligible for Unemployment Insurance simply because of the way they are classified. Freelancers, cash economy workers, formerly incarcerated people and undocumented workers are left out in the cold when they lose work through no fault of their own. Meanwhile, executives making six or seven figures ARE eligible to collect benefits even if they have millions in the bank.

If you agree these injustices are unacceptable – that our communities’ most vulnerable workers deserve the MOST support rather than the least – then please join the LI FEW Coalition on November 19 and beyond to get excluded workers badly needed support they deserve and have worked hard for!

Vote YES on Prop 1 this Election Day!Working people are immeasurably and infinitely diverse. Each person possesses their own unique identity. Each identity is a complex cocktail of things like gender, ethnicity, religion, economic class, lived experience, ability, and a long list of other constituent parts that relate to and interact with each other.  

Alongside this diversity are universals that apply to every single person. These universals include the right to have control over who you are, and what’s best for your body. Caring and just societies by definition should include these rights as a fundamental pillar in their structure. Those who have authority over our current society like to project it as caring and just, yet certain protections over our identities and bodies are not enshrined as fundamental rights. A ballot measure you can vote on this Election Day, Prop 1, would help provide protections not available currently.

NYCLU is an excellent resource to understand the current holes relating to identity and bodily autonomy rights in NY’s constitution, and how Prop 1 can fix them. The protections included in Prop 1 strengthen the position of all workers, union and non-union, by further reducing the way bosses can legally discriminate against them.

In solidarity,

Long Island Jobs with Justice

Mental Health Walk Recap, Important Election Day Reminder, and Faith Conference!

Mental health??? In this economy?! It can be a challenge to find the nurturing your mind needs, but a supportive community can go a long way to help. One place you can count on finding a supporting community every fall is at HAFALI‘s annual Mental Health Walk. HAFALI hosted their latest walk last weekend in Baldwin with the theme of mental health in workplace.  LIJWJ and some other folks from the LI Fund Excluded Workers (FEW) Coalition joined to support.


Mental health is often stigmatized, which can make being open about the challenges of mental health difficult to do. This is probably most true in workplaces. Workers, especially immigrant workers, are treated like invisible commodities whose thoughts and feelings always take a back seat to productivity. For the Haitian community that HAFALI serves, xenophobia is applied as an additional layer of pressure as workers just try to do their jobs amongst the hateful rhetoric being spread about them.

In spite of all this, coming together for the mental health walk brought light and the bond of solidarity to all who attended, and will hopefully provide additional strength in the days ahead.

Vote YES on Prop 1 this Election Day!Working people are immeasurably and infinitely diverse. Each person possesses their own unique identity. Each identity is a complex cocktail of things like gender, ethnicity, religion, economic class, lived experience, ability, and a long list of other constituent parts that relate to and interact with each other.  

Alongside this diversity are universals that apply to every single person. These universals include the right to have control over who you are, and what’s best for your body. Caring and just societies by definition should include these rights as a fundamental pillar in their structure. Those who have authority over our current society like to project it as caring and just, yet certain protections over our identities and bodies are not enshrined as fundamental rights. A ballot measure you can vote on this Election Day, Prop 1, would help provide protections not available currently.

NYCLU is an excellent resource to understand the current holes relating to identity and bodily autonomy rights in NY’s constitution, and how Prop 1 can fix them. The protections included in Prop 1 strengthen the position of all workers, union and non-union, by further reducing the way bosses can legally discriminate against them.

Repairers of the Breach – LIJWJ Faith Conference in December!

This December we hope you’ll join the LIJWJ faith community, including co-sponsors the Poor Peoples’ Campaign, NYS Council of Churches, and Abraham’s Table, for an engaging and thought-provoking conference – “Repairers of the Breach”: How Faith and Community Partners Can Build a Just Long Island Economy. Repairers of the Breach is open to all clergy, congregants, and individuals from all faith traditions (and secular folks too!) interested in participating in discussions on the intersection of morality, economics, and movement building.

The workshop lineup is packed full of topics and questions that cut to the core of why LI is the way it is, and what needs to be done to undo the centuries of harm to marginalized groups that have taken place here. Each workshop will be facilitated with a panel of faith and community leaders immersed in their fields of expertise. They include:

  • Interfaith Perspectives on Principles of Economic Justice
  • Exploring Our Working-Class Roots
  • Congregational Properties – Knowing Our History, Shaping Our Future
  • Congregational Properties: Repurposing For The Common Good
  • What Can I Say? Preaching the Just Word
  • Changing the Narrative by Changing the Narrator
  • Voices of Worker Power
  • Congregations as Engines for Wealth Creation
  • Using My Faith Tradition to Envision a Just Long Island Economy
  • The Future We Believe In: Faith-based Advocacy and How We Can Do It
  • Our Moral Imperative – Act for Justice Now

Stay tuned for more info and a registration link! In the mean time SAVE THE DATE!!

In solidarity,

Long Island Jobs with Justice

Upcoming Events and Save the Date for a LI Faith & Community Justice Conference!

Join the Haitian-American Family of Long Island (HAFALI) for their annual Mental Health Walk this weekend at Baldwin Harbor Park! HAFALI is an inspiring local community organization supporting LI’s over 20,000 Haitian residents, and was honored by LIJWJ at our 2023 awards dinner. It’s a great chance to enjoy the fall weather, get to know other folks, and restore yourself with the warmth of community!

It’s time to prioritize mental health. Support HAFALI’s efforts in promoting mental wellbeing while raising funds to support our community!

Nuns on a Bus

Today October 2 meet up with the righteous Nuns on the Bus on their “Vote our Future” Tour!

“NETWORK’s Nuns on the Bus & Friends is hitting the road! On this two-and-a-half-week, nonpartisan, nationwide “Vote Our Future” Tour, Nuns on the Bus & Friends will call on Catholics and all people of good will to be multi-issue voters and to protect the freedoms that promote a future of flourishing for all of us.

RSVP here for Brentwood!

RSVP here for Baldwin!

Repairers of the Breach – LIJWJ Faith Conference in December!

This December we hope you’ll join the LIJWJ faith community for an engaging and thought-provoking conference – “Repairers of the Breach”: How Faith and Community Partners Can Build a Just Long Island Economy. Repairers of the Breach is open to all clergy, congregants, and individuals from all faith traditions (and secular folks too!) interested in participating in discussions on the intersection of morality, economics, and movement building.

The workshop lineup is packed full of topics and questions that cut to the core of why LI is the way it is, and what needs to be done to undo the centuries of harm to marginalized groups that have taken place here. Each workshop will be facilitated with a panel of faith and community leaders immersed in their fields of expertise. They include:

  • Interfaith Perspectives on Principles of Economic Justice
  • Exploring Our Working-Class Roots
  • Congregational Properties – Knowing Our History, Shaping Our Future
  • Congregational Properties: Repurposing For The Common Good
  • What Can I Say? Preaching the Just Word
  • Changing the Narrative by Changing the Narrator
  • Voices of Worker Power
  • Congregations as Engines for Wealth Creation
  • Using My Faith Tradition to Envision a Just Long Island Economy
  • The Future We Believe In: Faith-based Advocacy and How We Can Do It
  • Our Moral Imperative – Act for Justice Now

Stay tuned for more info and a registration link! In the mean time SAVE THE DATE!!

LIJWJ End of Summer Round Up

Ramping Up to Pass the Unemployment Bridge Campaign in the 2024/25 NY Legislative Session

Another year has gone by with the NYS legislature failing to pass the Unemployment Bridge Program (UBP), and another year of excluded workers going without critical support they need when out of work. Cash workers, freelancers, and formerly incarcerated friends and neighbors are being failed by our current system. They work just as hard as traditional employees but are left out in the cold simply because of the way they are classified as a worker.

Fortunately, your local coalition pushing for UBP, the LI Fund Excluded Workers Coalition (FEW) has powerful worker leaders speaking up like freelance photographer Julie Flores. Julie was an honoree at LIJWJ’s recent awards dinner, and has been volunteering for the LI FEW Coalition since the 2022/23 legislative session. As a photographer Julie has documented the struggles of excluded workers like herself, and as an advocate has hit the ground from LI to Albany speaking about the injustices of our unemployment system.

Since the summer Julie has been interviewed by You’re Our Unity, has had some of her photography exhibited at the Heckscher Museum (and will continue to until 1/19/25!), and been featured as a worker voice for the National Employment Law Project (NELP). Julie and her work truly represents the resilience and drive of excluded workers who make some of the most essential parts of our economy run.

To keep up the fight for excluded workers, the LI FEW Coalition will be holding campaign launch events later in the fall. Stay tuned for announcements and please join us to get these workers a well deserved benefit!

Bosses Steal (a lot) Update – Chipotle

CEO musical chairs! Starbucks has gotten a new CEO, and if this guy’s record from his former company (Chipotle) is any guide, then things are not looking up for Starbucks’ corporate culture. Newsday recently ran a story on how Chipotle has paid back nearly $1 million in unpaid wages to current and former New York workers. Chipotle maintains that the wages went unpaid because of a computer system error, and that they have paid the workers on their own initiative. This may well be true, and it is good that the company is paying workers what they’re due, but we can’t help but notice how casually this is being handled.

According to our friends at 32BJ SEIU, Chipotle’s corporate culture is similar to other large chains like Starbucks, which makes Niccol a natural match for the company. It is discriminatory, lacking in transparency, lacking in accountability for managers, and has inadequate staffing policies, among other things. These conditions are very familiar to Starbucks workers who’ve been in the midst of collective bargaining with their corporate monster employer the last few months to resolve these same issues.

Chipotle and companies like it are given unequaled grace when they make mistakes. Workers on the other hand perform their labor in an authoritarian environment where simple mistakes can result in termination or other forms of discipline.

Chipotle took in nearly $10 billion in revenue in 2023, which makes the nearly $1 million returned to NY workers barely a blip on their balance sheet. But a worker who loses hours or their job because of simple mistakes can be financially devastated when not extended the same leeway Chipotle enjoys with state authorities.

To catch the latest updates on LI wage theft cases and everything else LIJWJ is up to, be sure to follow us on social media @lijwj on Instagram and on Facebook!

Care Can’t Wait

LIJWJ’s own Diane Cantave joined friends from the National Domestic Workers Alliance for a stop of the Care Can’t Wait bus tour last month. “Care Can’t Wait is a coalition of organizations, stakeholders and advocates committed to building a comprehensive, 21st century care infrastructure — that means robust investments to expand access to childcare, paid family and medical leave (PFML), and home- and community-based services (HCBS), and ensure good jobs for the care workforce.”

America has a huge deficit among the wealthiest nations in terms of the healthcare services supported by government. To bring badly needed services to the people and families that need them, Care Can’t Wait is fighting on the federal level for the investment of $400 billion in Medicaid Home and Community-Based Services, passage of the Child Care for Working Families Act, and passage of Paid Family and Medical Leave legislation.

We’re proud to support our friends in 1199 SEIU in the push for these badly needed policies!

We Are Long Island Organizing Hub Fall Event Schedule

The We Are Long Island (WALI) organizing hub is developing into and invaluable resource for organizers, activists and advocates in our region. WALI’s calendar is a smorgasbord of homegrown and locally organized events! Just in the next few weeks there are community fundraisers, trainings, and information sessions covering a wide range of issues impacting many of LI’s diverse communities.

Some of the public events on the WALI calendar, there’s a lot more for hub members!

Get more involved transforming LI into a place safe and welcoming for all and, just as importantly, connect with others looking and fighting to do the same. Join the hub to get full access or get to know WALI first and sign up for an open public event! Also be sure to follow them on Instagram!

A Worker Centered Awards Dinner for the Books!!

We had a blast at our 2024 Awards Dinner! Thank you to our honorees, sponsors, and supporters from LIJWJ’s community, faith, and labor coalition! It was an evening of celebration, laughter, and worker power. There were also emotional moments as the serious challenges our communities face were brought into the spotlight. But the solidarity in the room was palpable, and has given us fresh confidence that we will win all the struggles now before us no matter how challenging.

We can’t thank our honorees 1199SEIU, Gender Equality NY, Gladys & Julie Flores, the Sisters of St. Dominic Amityville, and the Elmont Cultural Center enough for being the friends you are and joining us for the dinner. Also thank you to Adlib Steel Orchestra for the amazing steelpan music!  

If you weren’t able to join us it’s not too late to show your support! Our Givebutter page is still open for donations, as well as our normal donation page. We have another year of workers’ struggles that need to be won ahead of us, and every bit of support counts!!

Countdown to Our 2024 Awards Dinner!

We’re fast approaching our 2024 Awards dinner, and we’re just over halfway to our $40,000 fundraising goal! If you’re planning to join us then please reserve your tickets online here or via mail here now! We need your help through ticket purchases and/or donations to keep our work of supporting orgs and folks like our honorees in their fights for justice. Speaking of honorees, we have more honoree spotlights!

Honoree Spotlight – Gladys & Julie Flores

Mother and daughter team Julie and Gladys Flores are some seriously inspiring individuals. If you’ve followed us for a while you’ve seen their faces at many actions and events, and Julie’s artwork documenting the struggles of excluded workers in NY.  

Gladys is an immigrant from Guatemala, a beautiful country in Central America. As any other immigrant she came to build a small fortune and to later go back to live the good life. Things did not workout according to her plan. Doing an array of different jobs, she learned quickly that workers need to speak out if they want to be respected. Landing a job with a unionized employer opened the door to learn about employees’ rights, and how to reinforce those rights at the workplace. Becoming a union organizer with 1199SEIU has given her the opportunity to organize many retail stores and represent their workers. She enjoys long walks, dancing, reading and willing to discuss and help social justice issues over a great cup of coffee.

Julie was born and raised on LI and graduated from Columbia College Hollywood in 2010 with a B.A. in Filmmaking, focusing on editing. She’s been interested in photography since high school, and started with 35mm black and white film. She learned how to develop and print photos in a darkroom and loves the beauty of film photography. At the beginning of 2023, Julie was invited to share her story as an exclusive worker. She was nervous to share her story because she felt her ‘story wasn’t important to tell.’ Yet, that day changed her in many different ways. Julie’s confidence has grown, helping her to get over the working trauma she’s experienced. She’s learned her worth and the power of her voice. She wants to help others learn their worth, know their rights, and the power we all have.

In August 2023, Julie’s first photo book, “La Muralla,” was released featuring photos taken at the southern border in 2022. Julie has also just released a zine about the Fund Excluded Workers Campaign fighting to get unemployment benefits for the 750,000 New Yorkers ineligible for traditional UI because of how they’re classified.

People like Gladys and Julie are the foundation of our movement, and through their work have empowered thousands of Long Islanders to fight for justice. Join us in celebrating them at our Awards Dinner on July 30!

Honoree Spotlight – Gender Equality New York

Our Awards Dinner features five incredible and inspiring honorees this year. The one we’re spotlighting today is Gender Equality New York.

“Gender Equality New York, Inc. (GENY) is a statewide, incorporated non-profit whose mission is to support transgender, gender non-binary, and intersex (TGNBI) New Yorkers and their families. Our leadership group, made up of active community advocates, believes that justice and equality for this vulnerable community can only be won by an organization built by and of community members who bring their lived experiences and passions to spearhead this needed and important work. GENY is committed to gaining equal rights and ending discrimination as we work to achieve economic, educational, racial, and social equality for our communities. Our mission is to educate, advocate, connect, and empower in order to bring equality and justice across New York.”

GENY is another organization LIJWJ works with closely as a part of the We Are Long Island collaborative. Trans rights are constantly under siege, and locally Transphobia has been on the rise with the passage of a Trans athlete ban in Nassau County. But GENY’s tireless work educating, advocating, connecting and empowering continues to fortify the Trans community and pushes towards a day when justice is won.

Adlib Steel Orchestra

When LIJWJ throws a party, we always look to artists from our local communities for entertainment first. This year we’re super excited to have Adlib Steel Orchestra perform at our Awards Dinner!  

Based in Freeport, “the Adlib Steel Orchestra was founded in 1989 by a group of Trinidadians who wanted to preserve their culture in the United States. It was incorporated in New York in 1995 as the Adlib Youth and Cultural Organization, with the emphasis shifted to providing young people the opportunity to learn and perform on the steelpan, as well as exposing them to other aspects of Caribbean culture…Adlib has an active program teaching people of all ages how to play the steelpan (referred to by some as the steel drum). The unique note placement sequence on a tenor pan makes it an ideal tool to learn the fundamentals of music theory. Many of Adlib’s students go on to play for the band, and some play the steelpan and other musical instruments in their schools.”

Steelpan music has its roots in centuries of cultural resistance and perseverance by enslaved African peoples. Originating from African talking drums, one of many traditions European colonizers violently tried to erase, modern steelpan emerged in Trinidad and Tobago in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  If you haven’t experienced a steel orchestra performance, now’s your chance!

Be sure to join us to connect with others, celebrate the work of GENY, Gladys & Julie, our other honorees, and experience some amazing steel pan music! It’ll be an energizing, movement-strengthening, and worker-centered evening. Help us reach our $40,000 fundraising goal by getting your tickets now using this link or by sending us this form!