Posts

Posted on

Wal-Mart No Way! Volunteers Needed! C’mon, Aspiring Extras!

Staten Island is not enough, Wal-Mart now has its eyes set on Coney Island. There’s a new community group fighting to keep Wal-Mart out of Brooklyn, Wal-Mart No Way. They’re raising money to put anti-Wal-Mart ads on teevee during the mayoral race. In fact, they’re having a fundraiser, um, tomorrow (details below). If you can attend, please do. If you can afford a donation, please be generous.

But there’s a far more fun way you can get involved in Wal-Mart No Way. They will be shooting their ad this coming Saturday afternoon, from about 4:00 pm until aboout 8:00 pm. If you can spare the time and want to wear a blue smock and scream and yell a lot, e-mail me for details.


Fundraiser to Stop Wal-Mart


Tuesday, August 2nd from 6 – 8:30pm

59 W. 12th Street #11C, between 5th and 6th Avenues

Wal-Mart wants to get into New York City – badly. They’re running television and print ads right now about how great it would be to have Wal-Marts in all five boroughs. So we’re answering with our own 30-second TV ad.

Although everyone involved in our group is volunteering their time and talent, we need your help to pay for everything from the lighting equipment to the air time on NY1.

For this event, we are asking for $50 – $100 per person, based on what you can honestly afford. You can donate here now: www.wal-martnoway.org. If you can come to the fundraiser, please RSVP to pete.sikora@gmail.com Thank you for your support – together we can, and will, stop them.

-Pete Sikora
Executive Director
www.wal-martnoway.org
Campaign of Neighborhood Impacts, Inc.

PS: If you want to donate by check, and cannot come to the fundraiser, you can mail it to: Neighborhood Impacts, Inc. 152 Fifth Ave Apt 1B Brooklyn NY 11217. Thank you again.

Posted on

“…We Got Ideas, To Us That’s Real…”

I’m back in New York after ten days in Amherst, for the summer residency of the ULA Labor Studies program at UMass. The program is fantastic. The campus is beautiful. The curriculum is vital. The faculty is brilliant. The student body is awesome.

The community of students is really the reason to enroll in this program. It’s a great mix of union staffers, elected officers and rank-and-filers (many of whom are having their tuition paid for by their employers!). THis is exactly what I wanted: the opportunity to step away from my work twice a year and see the forest from the trees; to make the connections between public sector and private, the building trades and the service sector, globalization and our CLCs and global federations.

Just one example of why I’m glad I met all these people these last two weeks: the Machinists in the program were great guys (and gals). We’re talking about seasoned activists who organized dozens of shops and negotiated their first contracts. No nonsense, take-no-prisoners, been-there-done-that kinda guys who understandably must bristle at Andy Stern and arrogant little whiteboy technocrats in suits (like me!) who come along and say that everything must change. What a waste that we’ve argued ourselves into these corners instead of working together to figure out the way forward.

My take on The Split? At least it’s finally fucking happening. No more agonizing over what-ifs. No more waiting for the other shoe to drop. No more hiring freezes. Just do it and move on, already.

SEIU is out, but that’s no surprise. Teamsters are out, but that’s not a huge surprise given their history of moving in and out of the federation. UFCW is poised to quit, and that’s a shock. That’s America’s neighborhood union, and generally pretty cautious and conservative. Unite Here is keeping mum, and my gut tells me they’re staying put.

The federation is fundamentally weakened. The previously announced staff and department cuts are definite now, and likely to be deepened. With two of their major affiliates out of the AFL-CIO, the building trades might walk out the door, too.

Meanwhile, many of the affiliated national unions within SEIU and the Teamsters (like NAGE) are mulling their own splits, to go back into the federation. Additionally, the Central Labor Councils and state feds are surely gearing up for civil wars as locals of the renegade international unions either secede and take their per capita dues with them, or else fight to stay inside the local bodies only to watch loyal locals of the loyal IUs secede in order to avoid associating with such disloyal elements.

In his infinite wisdom, John Sweeney pushed through a resolution increasing the per capita dues to Central Labor Councils while demanding that non-AFL-CIO unions be refused membership into the CLCs, so that loyal unions are taxed at a higher rate in order to keep the CLCs financially viable while the house of labor demolishes itself (I’m sure that my old boss is crossing his fingers for a Unite-Here disaffiliation so he can avoid paying per-cap to the NYC CLC).

What is so wrong with allowing unity where we can achieve it? Wasn’t the big problem (according to the NUP one year ago) the lack of central authority and vision at the federation level? So why split and defund the fed and allow every union to go in its own direction?

And didn’t the CWA (and others) agree with the NUP that the lack of collaboration at the local level hurt Labor? So why force this split on our Central Labor Councils and force the duplication of efforts of two separate labor councils in each region?

Are Change to Win even bothering with creating a new federation? Are they simply letting he renegade international unions pocket the per-cap dues that would have gone to the AFL-CIO, the CLCs and the state feds and just letting every union do its own thing — the central criticism that sparked this whole debate in the first place.

We have enough enemies. Wal-Mart, Wholefoods, JetBlue, Cintas, Marriott, FedEx. Can we focus on those bastards instead of organizing against each other? What’s so painful about a principled agreement to go our own ways for awhile, but to unite where we can and avoid raiding or undercutting each other?

Posted on

The Homeless Hilton

Mayor Bloomberg has announced plans to shut down the city’s largest homeless shelter, the 335 unit Carlton House in South Ozone Park, Queens. The mayor claims that there just aren’t enough homeless people to fill the former luxury hotel. The City’s Department of Homesless Services’ website brags, “This is the first time in DHS history that a facility has been closed solely because the capacity is no longer needed.”

Is the homeless population going down? “Oh certainly not,” protests Jeff Rabinovici, my good friend and comrade who is an outreach worker for Partnership for the Homeless, “According to the DHS’ latest accounting, it’s going up.” The number of families living in long term shelters is on the decline, due to a number of factors, including strong-arm tactics by the city. But the number of families checking into “drop-in” shelters (the nightly, first come, first serve shelters, where many of those who get a roof for the night don’t actually get a bed) is on the rise. And, of course, single homeless men are still the shelter system’s last priority, which is why you still see so many of them sleeping on the streets.

Obviously, Mayor Mike is playing an election year numbers game so that he can brag, “By investing in cost-efficient solutions, and bringing accountability and focused management attention to an issue many believed unmanageable, we have made unprecedented headway in relatively short order.” Yes, our CEO mayor has employed Arthur Anderson-style accounting in order to make the homeless problem go away!

There is an additional wrinkle. The Carlton House is operated by the city through a sub-contract with the Salvation Army. Apparently, the Salvation Army is losing many of its homeless outreach contracts with the city. The Bowery Residents Committee has been picking up many of those contracts and more by submitting low-ball bids to the city. The BRC pays its outreach workers, on average, about $5 an hour less than most other agencies (like the Salvation Army). This is the same Bowery Residents Committee that’s trying to evict CBGB’s. The BRC’s single-minded devotion to serving those who are most needy in our society is commendable. It would disappointing if such good work comes at the cost of further gentrifying the Bowery and denying their devoted, hard-working outreach workers a living wage.

There is no public word on what comes next for the Carlton House. The building began life as the Hilton JFK in the 1970’s. It turned out that people don’t want to pay for a luxury hotel room so near the roaring jets of an international airport, and so the hotel was re-christened a Best Western. The steady decline in business continued unabated, until its owners announced plans to cease operations in early 2002. The Carlton House holds a special place in my heart because the Hotel Employees union was planning to strike it (and a sister hotel) when I joined the staff. It was my first almost strike. At one point, we were going to physically occupy the building to prevent its closing. “Are you ready to get arrested?,” my boss asked me as she cackled with delight at the thought of being dragged out of there herself. Of course, I was, but it was unnecessary. The company settled, and gave the laid-off workers a massive severance package (not unlike the recent Plaza settlement).

Every time I’ve driven past the building, I remember the excitement of that fight, but also the sadness of all those lost jobs and dashed hopes. The construction of a luxury Hilton hotel in southwest Queens was the product of overly ambitious development plans, not unlike the Olympic dreams for Long Island City, or Ratner’s stadium-city of towers. The depressing site of this run-down and near-vacant hotel should serve as a warning to think twice and have a contingency plan before building more towers out yonder.

THe Carlton House should remain a homeless shelter. There is still a pressing need for such long-term housing for our city’s homeless families, and it makes the symbolism of the Homeless Hilton that much more potent. The big building plans at LIC, Atlantic Avenue, Williamsburg and elsewhere must include more affordable housing now, less those towers be relegated to homeless shelters years from now.

Posted on

The Cycle of Terrorism

What follows are my opening remarks for the Socialist Party’s Free Speech Forum In Defense of Lynne Stewart (which went very well, thanks to those of you who attended):

On behalf of the Socialist Party, I want to welcome you to our Free Speech forum in defense of human rights attorney Lynne Stewart. This forum is cosponsored by the New York City and New Jersey locals of the Socialist Party, and the party’s Direct Action Tendency. We have a really great panel tonight, with a number of crusading legal activists.

Before we begin, I want to address the terrible events of last Thursday. The Socialist Party USA issued a statement, from which I’d like to quote in relevant part:


The recent tragedy in London that resulted in murdering and maiming hundreds of working people, is a deplorable and de-humanzing act…It is our responsibility as brothers and sisters of humanity to condemn these acts of aggression and the imperialism of our governments in waging a war that results in untold victims…The murder of civilian non combatants, whether it be by individuals, groups or States, cannot be supported nor defended in the face of such brutal reality.

You know, when I first heard about Thursday’s bombings, my first thoughts were of the million-plus people who poured into the streets of London in February of 2003 to protest the war plans of their government and ours. That war against the people of Iraq was carried out by our governments, without our consent and without our support.

Why is it that the “blowback” for our governments’ actions is inflicted on those who are least likely to support it? Likewise, why is it that innocent civilians in Iraq – who were not likely to be great supporters of the Saddam Hussein regime – must suffer from the bombings, the loss of basic human services, the curfews and police checkpoints of the United States’ and Britain’s state-sponsored terrorism?

We’re caught in the middle of this cycle of violence that enhances the standing and power of demagogues and terrorists at the expense of our liberty and peace. Tony Blair’s poll numbers have gone up since Thursday, while George Bush lies (follow me here; some time travel may be required) that preventing the terrorism that resulted from his invasion of Iraq is somehow the reason that he invaded in the first place and he uses this to justify the continuation of this stupid war. Meanwhile, every day that goes by where US troops occupy Afghanistan and Iraq, every US dollar that flows into Israelli military spending, every new act of aggression means more recruits for terrorist networks like Osama bin Laden’s.

The collateral damage of this tit for tat is the spilling of innocent blood, the curtailment of our freedoms and the closing of our society. Already, we have teenage national guard troops defending Penn Station and other transportation hubs by machine gun. We have random security checkpoints and invasive searches. We have detainment and internment of “questionable” illegal aliens. We have increased domestic spying. We have criminal charges for those who dare to defend the constitutional rights of suspects. I fear what comes next.

I doubt that any of our three speakers tonight [Lynne Stewart, Shayana Kadidal and Daniel Gross] actually own a car, and if they do, I’d be surprised to see one of those “patriotic” magnetic ribbons on the bumper…but our three speakers tonight are true American patriots, defending our constitutional rights against those who would strip us of them and call out “traitor!,” “security risk!,” “terrorist!”