Celebrate Black History Month- Honor Front Line Workers

 By Lee Saunders and Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II

You cannot add jobs by subtracting jobs.

AFSCME President Lee Saunders and Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II address delegates to AFSCME’s 42nd International Convention in Las Vegas on July 20, 2016. (Photo by Tessa Berg)

That is the simple truth behind desperately needed aid for states, cities, towns and schools. Over the last year, some 1.3 million public service jobs, many of them held by African Americans — including nurses, teachers, EMTs and sanitation workers — have evaporated because of holes the pandemic blew open in state and local budgets.

One of the most effective ways for Congress to crush this virus and get our economy moving again is to help states, cities, schools and towns bring these workers back and hire more of them. It would also be a way, during Black History Month, to remain faithful to our past and continue advancing the cause of racial justice.

For generations and to this day, public service jobs have been a sturdy ladder of opportunity for African American families climbing their way to the middle class. At a time when systemic discrimination blocked so many pathways, African Americans were hired in the public sector as postal workers, teachers, librarians and more.

These jobs came with security and stability — not just a decent income, but good health care benefits, a pension and very often a union card that provided surefire rights and protections. To this day, one in five African American workers have public sector jobs, helping close the racial wealth gap. Among those employed in the public sector, white households have about twice the wealth of Black households. That is troubling to be sure; but, by comparison, in the private sector, that gap becomes a chasm — Black households have only about a dime of wealth for every dollar held by white households.

Through their work in public education, public transit and public health, millions of African Americans have been able both to provide for their families and strengthen their communities. But now, those jobs are on the chopping block. Without federal aid, more layoffs loom, dragging down the entire job market with it. How do we know? The same thing happened a decade ago.

With the nation in the throes of the Great Recession, politicians of both parties responded by drastically cutting spending. Austerity became the watchword. Right-wing activist Grover Norquist, who once famously said he wanted to shrink government to the size he could drown it in the bathtub, had his day in the sun. States and communities nationwide slashed public services to the bone, and African American families took the biggest hit. In 2012, 200,000 fewer African Americans held public sector jobs than just four years earlier.

Ten years later, inexplicably, we are in danger of making the same public policy mistakes again. It is devastating enough that African Americans are disproportionately contracting COVID-19 and dying at higher rates than the population at-large. But because of the gutting of public services, we are also being pummeled economically. In just a year’s time, between September 2019 and September 2020, the number of Black people on the nation’s public payrolls shrunk by 211,000. This is one of the critical, yet often unspoken, reasons the pandemic has raged out of control. Giving pink slips to the very people who can bring the virus to heel is the worst possible crisis management strategy.

And things will get worse if Congress does not step in. Who will get shots into arms if more public health professionals are axed? How will laid off Americans get the unemployment benefits they have paid into when states shed more claims processors? How will small businesses survive when basic services like sanitation, clean water and road maintenance — normally so dependable that they are never included in any business model — erode even further?

In the immediate term, we need Congress to come through with emergency aid to save these jobs and services. But in the long term, to vanquish the virus, build a prosperous economy for all and ensure that people earn a living wage as well, it is time to bury for good the fake news of austerity: that somehow a race to the bottom will take us to the top.

This is the moment to remind people about the power of government action, especially but not exclusively during moments of crisis. When it is run competently, when public services are performed by dedicated and compassionate people, government can affirm human dignity, provide basic needs and improve lives on a grand scale.

Let’s get public service workers back on the job and bring back real investment in the essential services that sustain us all.

Lee Saunders is President of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. The Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II is the President & Senior Lecturer of Repairers of the Breach, Architect of the Moral Monday Movement and Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call For Moral Revival.

"Not Doing This Is a Choice": Biden Drags His Feet on Canceling Student ...

Bretón Vrs. the Sacramento Teachers

 Sacramento Bee opinionnaire  Marcos Bretón offers up one of his frequent attacks on the Sacramento teachers’ union in today’s Bee https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/article249152435.html.

It is the usual anti union diatribe filled with paragraphs cut and pasted from prior columns.  He purposes to deal with the issue of opening schools in Sacramento.  If you ignore all the hyperbole, you get down to the dividing issue – when should Sacramento City Unified re open schools.

There is substantive agreement between the district administration and the union except for one issue. 

Should teachers be given vaccines prior to returning to work.  That is the issue.

Bretón has one side; the union argues teachers should have vaccines first.  That's all.  The remainder in innuendo and name calling. 

Below  is an alternate view- with data citations. 

Re: Opening schools

David Dayen, The American Prospect  Feb.15, 2021

Last Friday the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finally released a long-awaited set of guidelines for how to safely reopen schools. It really says what the data has said for a while: schools are generally safe when community transmission is low, less safe when transmission is high, and only really safe when following mitigation guidelines, which include masking, social distancing, frequent hand washing and things like not coughing out loud without covering your mouth, sanitation, ventilation, quarantine and isolation for the sick, and contact tracing. Many observers have put the lack of school reopening on teachers and particularly teachers unions, but the polling shows a different story, which plays directly into the above paragraph. If you ask parents whether they want to return their kids to in-person instruction, you see a significant disparity cut by race and class. In general terms, whiter, richer parents are more likely to want to return their kids to school; poorer parents and parents of color do not. And the difference is that, for the whiter and richer parents, their communities have not been as ravaged by COVID, and their schools can actually undertake the mitigation measures.

Black and Latino communities have seen a disproportionate level of death and suffering during the pandemic. Whether community transmission is high right now or not in their area, the accumulated impact makes it feel high. (In truth, community transmission has been high pretty much everywhere in the country since late fall, and only now is coming down to a manageable level.) But just as important, these parents have been battling their school districts for a basic level of quality in the places they send their kids for many years. These schools are simply not equipped for the kinds of adaptations necessary to minimize risk from COVID. That’s where the Biden relief package comes in. It should be considered, especially by those concerned about the size or unnecessary nature of the plan, as a make-good for decades of disinvestment. It’s as much an infrastructure package as anything. There are public schools in America without soap in the bathrooms. There are public schools in America, a shocking number of them, with no working air conditioning system. Lots of schools have no on-site nurses, and janitorial staffs are often inadequate. Countless students are jammed into too-small rooms with bursting class sizes. The Philadelphia Public Schools came up with the idea to put window fans on boards and have that serve as ventilation for one of the largest and poorest school districts in the country. Students and staff are headed back in the Philly schools next week.

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By contrast, this white person’s school district in Brookline, Massachusetts, where the median household income in 2019 was $121,949, is presumably not indicative of these realities. Some of the CDC guidelines will be difficult no matter what school people find themselves in. It’s hard to get kids to physically distance or keep masks on or cough into their elbow. And the latest anger from the open-the-schools set, that six feet of distance is "impossible" in schools, is mostly a cri de coeur against regulation itself, as usual for the libertarians leading the charge. (See this dystopic potential solution to the distancing problem, rather than, you know, distancing.)  But it’s clear that some schools cannot come close to providing a safe environment, really even under normal conditions let along during COVID. They don’t have the possibility for distancing, the ventilation, the medical personnel, or the sanitation measures needed. That’s why there’s $130 billion in the American Rescue Plan, which can be put toward making these necessary adjustments. It includes an "Equity Challenge Grant" intended to reverse historical inequities in schools and the impacts on students of color.

That could easily be put toward investment. How about getting an air filtration system with the highest-quality filters (a pretty low-cost option!) in every school in America? How about money for staffing nurses at every school, and ensuring a clean environment in every school? This could be an opportunity, not just to reopen, but to level the playing field in the built environment of our public school system. There’s a concern that states and cities will take the new money and drop out their share of funding for these schools, leaving them in worse position once the one-time funds are exhausted. Congress could work to try to prevent that, and should. Jared Bernstein, now on Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, championed an infrastructure program during the last recession called FAST, or Fix America’s Schools Today. He reasoned that upgrading the nation’s schools would create lots of construction jobs while improving learning long-term. A $50 billion program would produce about half a million dollars per school building in the U.S., with a focus on weatherization, better air quality, mold and asbestos abatement, plumbing updates, boiler and window replacement, and outdoor learning improvements. The American Rescue Plan can be a version of FAST, with effects not only for the pandemic but the future. And this is an area where we ought to be investing anyway. The concerns from the Larry Summerses of the world that we’re just "throwing away" temporary emergency spending (we’re not) are unfounded, because school upgrades are among the most necessary infrastructure spending options we can take. It’s long overdue.

 

 

$225 Million In New Revenue: 10 Facts About the SCUSD Budget

$225 Million In New Revenue: 10 Facts About the SCUSD Budget: Fact # 1:  Since the 2012-2013 school year, the District has run a surplus every year except one:  2017-18 (2012-13 to 2018-19 Projections & 2012-13 to 2018-19 Actuals).  The District was told by the Sacramento County Office of Education it needed to make budget cuts to offset the costs of our contract settlement. Instead Superintendent […]

See the above for 10 facts.

Fact 11. SCUSD receives over $6 million per year in supplemental funds for serving English Language Learners. The money comes from LCFF.  They are not spending the money on English Language Learners.  See prior posts on LULAC complaints filed. 

SCTA’s 5-Point Framework to Reopen Sac City Schools

SCTA’s 5-Point Framework to Reopen Sac City Schools: The Sacramento City Teachers Association presented a “framework” outlining necessary steps required to bring students back to school this school year.  SCTA’s recommendations were influenced by the “Classroom Learning and Safe Schools for Employees and Students (CLASSES):  A Pathway to Bringing Students Back to School”  plan developed by the California Teachers Association in conjunction with the […]

How to safely re open schools

 

Yesterday, the CDC released robust, science-based guidelines to keep students and educators safe from the coronavirus in K-12 school buildings. Here’s the reality: these strategies and requirements aren’t being met in many of our schools.  We need to protect students and educators with proven safety measures, and we need the funding to do it. Urge Congress to pass the American Rescue Plan, with $210 billion to ensure safe and just schools for all students from kindergarten to college.

Write Congress ›

These funds will help reduce class sizes and modify spaces to comply with social distancing, modernize HVAC systems, hire more school custodians, nurses, and counselors, facilitate social distancing on school transportation services, and put in place testing, tracking, and tracing programs.   Most schools, especially those attended by Black, Brown, Indigenous, and poor white students, have been underfunded for decades. They have severely outdated ventilation systems. Too many schools do not have in place the basic protections that the CDC has said are universally required. And, no school budget had “COVID-19 response” written into it. State and local leaders cannot pick and choose which guidelines to follow and which students get resources to keep them safe. Too many schools do not have in place the basic protections that the CDC has said are universally required. But that changes if we come together—educators, families, and communities, across race and across place—to demand action from our leaders.  Help get our students and educators the resources they need for safe and just learning. › Students and educators have been failed by too many politicians who have ignored health and science, divided communities, and failed to act. But now, with a partner in the White House and a pro-public education Congress, we have the opportunity to open school buildings right, to do it safely, and to do it as quickly as resources allow.   Congress must invest in America and provide the funding and resources that our students, educators, and families need. The new CDC guidance is a good first step, but now it’s time for action. If they are applied universally in every community and the resources are put in place equitably for all students, our school buildings will be safe for in-person learning. In solidarity, Becky Pringle President National Education Association P.S. Check out this article on NEA Today to learn more about the new CDC standards for K-12 schools.  Take Action ›

antiracismdsa: Defend DACA, TPS, the Immigrant Community

antiracismdsa: Defend DACA, TPS, the Immigrant Community:   By Greisa Martinez Rosas, Javier H. Valdes, and Marisa Franco The first two weeks of Joe Biden’s presidency brought relief to millions of ...

Senate Impeachment Trial: January 6 Video Montage

Reopening schools during the pandemic is proving to be a complex assignment

Should California Schools Reopen?

 

It’s been a month since Gov. Gavin Newsom introduced his Safe Schools for All Plan, in which he aims to reopen schools for in-person learning by February or March.

However, with the Feb. 16 deadline to open schools looming, there’s no telling how many districts have actually signed on to adopt the plan. Education leaders and teachers have openly criticized it, and negotiations over details appear to be at a standstill. Parents, eager to get their children back to in-person learning this year, have organized a campaign to safely reopen schools once case numbers decline.

The debate echoes what’s going on across the country, as President Biden’s push to open schools in his first 100 days has been met with caution from teachers’ unions, who want to tamp down expectations that students will be back in classrooms before the end of the school year.

Here’s what we know about the state of reopening schools so far.

Mr. Newsom’s plan is in danger of failing.

This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that schools could be opened safely, but the message came with a caveat: It’s safe only if other precautions are made to stop community spread. That means tightening, not loosening, restrictions, as Mr. Newsom did this week.

“Prioritizing schools is going to mean limiting some of those other activities, and deciding that we want to undertake some of those sacrifices to keep schools open, because we’ve decided as a society that schools are important relative to other things,” Dr. Oster said.

The governor’s plan calls for schools to reopen once the rate of infection falls to 25 positive cases per 100,000 county residents.

Although cases in California are declining, hospitalization rates are still higher than they were when the strictest lockdown measures were announced. Currently, most of the state’s population falls under the most restrictive purple tier.

In addition, the plan’s $2 billion grant fund, which breaks down to $450 per pupil, falls short of what’s needed for schools to operate safely, some say. It’s largely because the plan calls for increased virus testing of students and staff, which individual schools would have to pay for.

Leaders of four of the state’s largest school districts criticized the plan in a letter, saying it fails to address the needs of urban school districts, all of which have students who live below the poverty level. They also asked that public health funds, not money that was already slated for education, be used to pay for the additional safety measures and mentioned the lack of clear consistent guidelines coming from leaders.

Parents and legislators are adding to the pressure to open schools.

This month, lawmakers advanced Assembly Bill 10 as emergency legislation that if passed, would require public schools to reopen within two weeks of moving out of the purple tier.

It was created in response to the fact that some school districts didn’t reopen for in-person instruction, despite being eligible last year.

The bill calls for schools to open their doors once they reach the red tier, which means having a significantly lower number of cases than what the governor’s plan calls for.

Advocates of the bill point to the fact that low-income families have been struggling to access the technology needed to sustain virtual learning, leading to a deepening socioeconomic divide. Private schools, like the one Mr. Newsom’s children attend, have been open for in-person learning for months.

Also backing the bill are parents, who recently organized into a group called Open Schools California and have started a public campaign to reopen schools.

They cite studies that show low transmission rates of Covid-19 in schools and anecdotal evidence from their own children, who they say have been hurt by distance learning.

Teachers are demanding more leadership and protection.

Many teachers and school staff members say they won’t go back to in-person learning in the current climate, with cases still at extremely high levels and more variants emerging.

Another sticking point are vaccines, which many say are nonnegotiable for returning to classrooms. The California Teachers Association stipulated the need for vaccines and said no to reopening schools while in the purple tier in a letter to the governor on Wednesday.

Mr. Newsom has said that teachers will be included in the priority list for next month’s shots. However, there are not enough vaccines to go around as it is.

“The virus is in charge right now and it does not own a calendar,” said members of the C.T.A. “We cannot just pick an artificial calendar date and expect to flip a switch on reopening every school for in-person instruction.”

California Today. New York Times.

 

CTA Co Sponsors Ethnic Studies

 California could be the first state in the nation to require all students to take ethnic studies to graduate high school if lawmakers are successful in ushering CTA co-sponsored AB 101 through the Legislature and to the governor’s desk.

Authored by Assemblymember Jose Medina (D-Riverside), AB 101 would make the completion of an ethnic studies class a California high school graduation requirement at a time when educators, students and elected leaders say it’s needed most.

“We are poised to lead the nation in educational equality and equity,” Medina said at a press conference today. “The time for ethnic studies is now!” 

Supporters are hoping this is finally the year the requirement becomes a reality after numerous disappointments, including last year when Medina’s AB 331 passed the Legislature and was vetoed by Gov. Gavin Newsom. CTA State Council delegates last weekend voted to co-sponsor AB 101, which would go into effect for students graduating in the 2029-30 school year and require each school to offer an ethnic studies course beginning in 2025-26.

Riverside science educator Pia VanMeter said ethnic studies are far too important to be left as an option.

“When students learn to appreciate diverse histories and experiences, it makes them well-rounded individuals,” said VanMeter, a member of Riverside City Teachers Association. “They also become more self-aware, empathetic, understanding and civically engaged citizens of the world. This lesson has always been our mission as educators, regardless of what subject we teach.”

 

 

As Romney Says Covid Relief Bill 'Not Well-Timed,' Progressives Urge Biden to Abandon GOP Outreach, Move Swiftly on Bold Package

As Romney Says Covid Relief Bill 'Not Well-Timed,' Progressives Urge Biden to Abandon GOP Outreach, Move Swiftly on Bold Package

Teaching & TikTok: kindergarten teacher goes viral on socia...

SCUSD Ordered. Cease and Desist.

Awards Attorney Fees to SCTA

Today (November 2), the California Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) unanimously upheld a PERB Administrative Law Judge’s (ALJ) decision that ruled that the Sacramento City Unified School District violated the law and must reimburse SCTA’s attorney fees in defending teachers from SCUSD’s illegal actions.  You can view the decisions here.

According to the decision, SCUSD contended that it did not violate the law or the contract, “even if–as the [Sacramento County] Superior Court, arbitrator, and ALJ all found–it violated the CBA when it refused to arbitrate the salary schedule grievance.” This decision now adds the full PERB to that list who have rejected out of hand the SCUSD contention.

The PERB decision is the latest SCUSD legal loss. 

This case began when the District backtracked from its agreement to implement a new salary schedule, then took the unprecedented step to sue teachers to try to stop the enforcement of the contract. 

PERB has issued more unfair labor practice complaints against SCUSD in the last 3 years than any other school district in California. 

PERB includes in its decsion orders that SCUSD must:

“CEASE AND DESIST FROM:”

“Interfering with the right of bargaining unit employees to be represented by their employee organization.”

“Denying SCTA the right to represent bargaining unit employees in their employment relations with the District.”

The decision also requires SCUSD to take other actions, including:

“TAKE THE FOLLOWING AFFIRMATIVE ACTIONS DESIGNED TO EFFECTUATE THE POLICIES OF THE ACT:”

“Make SCTA whole for losses it suffered as a result of the District’s unlawful conduct . . .”

“post at all District locations where notices are customarily posted, copies of [this Notice including] by electronic means customarily uses by the District to regularly communicate with employees in the bargaining unit.”

 

Martin Luther King, Economic Justice, Workers’ Rights, and Multiracial Democracy

by Thomas Jackson

In 1968, a united black community in Memphis stepped forward to support 1,300

municipal sanitation workers as they demanded higher wages, union recognition, and respect for

black personhood embodied in the slogan “I Am a Man!” Memphis’s black women organized tenant

and welfare unions, discovering pervasive hunger among the city’s poor and black children. They

demanded rights to food and medical care from a city and medical establishment blind to their

existence. That same month, March 1968, 100 grassroots organizations met in Atlanta to support

Martin Luther King’s dream of a poor people’s march on Washington. They pressed concrete

demands for economic justice under the slogan “Jobs or Income Now!” King celebrated the

“determination by poor people of all colors” to win their human rights. “Established powers of rich America have deliberately exploited poor people by isolating them in ethnic, nationality, religious and racial groups,” the delegates declared.

So when King came to Memphis to support the strike, a local labor and community struggle became intertwined with his dream of mobilizing a national coalition strong enough to reorient national priorities from imperial war in Vietnam to domestic reconstruction, especially in America’s riot-torn cities. To non-poor Americans, King called for a “revolution of values,” a move from self-seeking to service, from property rights to human rights.

King’s assassination—and the urban revolts that followed—led to a local Memphis settlement that furthered the cause of public employee unionism. The Poor People’s March nonviolently won small concessions in the national food stamp program. But reporters covered the bickering and squalor in the poor people’s tent city, rather than the movement’s detailed demands for waging a real war on poverty. Marchers wanted guaranteed public employment when the private sector failed, a raise in the federal minimum wage, a national income floor for all families, and a national commitment to reconstruct cities blighted by corporate disinvestment and white flight. And they wanted poor

people’s representation in urban renewal and social service programs that had customarily benefited only businesses or the middle class. King’s dreams reverberated back in the movements that had risen him up.

It is widely believed that King’s deep dedication to workers’ rights and international human rights came late in life, when cities burned, Vietnamese villagers fled American napalm, and King faced stone-throwing Nazis in Chicago’s white working-class inner suburbs. But King began his public ministry in Montgomery in 1956, dreaming of “a world  in which men will no longer take necessities from the masses to give luxuries to the classes.” He demanded that imperial nations give up their power and privileges over oppressed and colonized peoples struggling against “segregation, political domination, and economic exploitation”—whether they were in South Africa or South Alabama.

 

King’s commitments to economic justice and workers’ rights are becoming more widely appreciated today as we continue to confront all of the unresolved challenges King confronted in his day.

Beyond Civil Rights

Around 1964, King announced that the movement had moved “beyond civil rights.” Constitutional rights to free assembly, equality in voting, and access to public accommodations had marched forward with little cost to the nation, he said. Human rights—to dignified work, decent wages, income support, and decent housing for all Americans—would cost the nation billions of dollars. In other speeches, however, King recognized that human rights and civil rights were bound up with each other, part of a “Worldwide Human Rights Revolution.”

The practical experience of building a movement had already made these connections. In

Montgomery’s struggle to desegregate bus seating, for example, King heralded the American “right to protest for right,” but discovered that it was inseparable from the human rights to work and eat.

Why? Hundreds of African Americans were fired or evicted or denied public aid for expressing

themselves politically, and King was intimately involved in campaigns for their material relief.

This pattern continued throughout the 1960s. The southern struggle for rights became a struggle

against poverty long before Lyndon Johnson’s wars in Vietnam and on poverty.

Similarly, in New York City in 1959, King joined A. Philip Randolph and Malcolm X in supporting the white, black and Puerto Rican workers of New York’s newly organized Local 1199. Over 3,000 hospital workers— laundry workers, cafeteria workers, janitors and orderlies—struck seven New York private hospitals. At the bottom of the new service economy they were legally barred from collective bargaining; excluded from minimum wage protections and unemployment compensation; and denied the medical insurance that might give

them access to the hospitals where they worked. Harlem’s black community rallied to their defense. King cheered a struggle that transcended “a fight for union rights” and had become a multiracial “fight for human rights.”

Today We Continue the Struggles

King’s commitments to economic justice and workers’ rights are becoming more widely appreciated today as we continue to confront all of the unresolved challenges King confronted in his day. Joblessness is still pervasive under the official unemployment statistics, and wages remain too low to lift millions of people out of poverty.

Conservative politicians and globalizing corporations have relentlessly chipped away at union rights and workplace safety. Tattered safety nets have become even shoddier for poor people who are not capable of earning. Forty-seven million Americans are, medically, second-class citizens. Unequal landscapes of wealth and opportunity in housing and schools still make the words “American apartheid” a dirty but accurate epithet. And again, in a different part of the world, our military wages a war of empire cloaked in robes of democratic idealism. On the right, complacent religious leaders preach family morality and personal responsibility, while neglecting our collective moral commitments to materially supporting “the least of these.” But across the

country too, citizens are uncovering stones of hope and finding new democratic determination. We have come a long way, but we have a long way to go, as King would say. Lost ground and shattered dreams are bearable, he would have preached, as we continue the struggles for multiracial democracy, economic justice, and human dignity that were begun long ago, under even more challenging circumstances than we face today.

Thomas F. Jackson is Associate Professor of History at the University of North Carolina Greensboro, and author of the prizewinning From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Struggle for Economic Justice (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007)

Democratic socialists A. Philip Randolph and

Bayard Rustin worked closely with King

Trump Radicalized the Republican Party and His Supporters