Day laborers hold national conference
By
Heather Cottin
Hempstead, N.Y.
Published Aug 5, 2005 11:13 PM
Day
laborers—jornaleros—from 16 states, together with other immigrant
rights activists, met at Hofstra University on Long Island from July 27-31 for a
conference on the current conditions and struggles of these oppressed workers in
the United States.
Immigrants are reaching out to other workers.
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Participants traveled from as far away as California
and Texas, as well as Mary land, New Jersey and New York.
The conference
assembled at different locations throughout the weekend.
Buses carried
conference participants to a protest in Farmingville, L.I., which has become the
site and symbol of both racism and resistance for the U.S. day laborer movement.
Because Farmingville has become a symbol of the crisis for jornaleros in
the U.S., the National Day Labor Organizing Network (NDLON), headquartered in
California, organized this year’s national conference on Long
Island.
On the evening of July 28 the normally hushed streets of
Farmingville resounded with the voices of hundreds of day laborers and other
activists chanting “El pueblo unido jamás será
vencido!” (“The people united will never be
defeated!”)
Conference participants also traveled to New York City,
suburban Westchester County and Brookhaven in Suffolk County.
Local day
laborers charge that officials from the Long Island town of Brookhaven have
conspired against jornaleros—throwing them out of their homes and
tolerating firebombing and other violent acts of racism.
As the rallying
activists filled up the parking lot of Suffolk County headquarters, they sang
and chanted to keep up the fighting spirit. They sent a message to County
Supervisor Steve Levy, who has reportedly spearheaded recent racist attacks on
the workers: “Escucha! Estamos en la lucha!” (“Listen! We are
in the struggle!”)
Struggle and unity
The programs and
cultural events of the conference at Hofstra focused on struggle and unity.
Jornaleros number in the hundreds of thousands across the United States.
In some states, like Maryland, these day laborers have won legal
“shape-up” sites—where they wait for day job
assignments—and cultural centers. Their struggle has also won financial
support from the state.
Jornaleros in Los Angeles have made the city
provide nine shape-up centers which also provide English-language and computer
classes, and other services. “One thing that happens here is that workers
stand tall, they look at people face to face as equals, not seeking their
permission, not as oppressed people or men begging for jobs but as persons with
pride,” said Pablo Alvarado, national coordinator of NDLON. “Because
you can’t intimidate people who have pride.”
The jornaleros
and their supporters from Austin, Texas, perform guerrilla theater to teach
workers how to negotiate for their own safety and benefit.
José
Zorraquín from Seattle came from Casa Latina. “A few weeks ago, the
state gave us a van to get people to jobs, for a ride share program.” The
workers organized to get this van.
In contrast, some workers came to the
conference from states where there is abso lutely no support for day laborers.
During the Casa Maryland workshop, which presented a radical method of teaching
Eng lish and organizing, Juan from Virginia noted that in his town workers were
not able to have English classes. Nor were they able to organize for a safe and
legal gathering site with bathrooms, heat or electricity.
Edilberto, a
worker from a legal but under-funded shape-up site in Freeport, N.Y., stressed
that an organization like NDLON could help provide unity and pressure to get
more local and state support.
Zorraquín agreed. “I learned at
this conference that the people who are the most hurt are those who don’t
have a leader on their esquina [corner]. They need to be organized in unity with
other day laborers from all over the U.S. We are not terrorists, we are not
violent; all we want is work. We are not taking jobs, Latin@s are here to work
for their families.”
Racism raised its head as the conference moved
around the metropolitan area. “We encountered racism on the streets of
Farmingville when we were protesting. When we were walking, you could feel the
coldness of racist people in that town. This woman on the corner, saying,
‘Go home, don’t be bothering us,’” Zorraquín
said.
“Then when we went to Westchester to Sarah Lawrence College,
racists came to disrupt the meeting.”
But the activists were
undaunted. As they began their cultural evening with the haunting song
“Comandante Che Gue vara,” Faustino Morales, who is supporting five
children back in Mexico, said this conference “served as a unifier and
provided critical understanding from inside the centers of work for the
jornaleros.”
Morales, who has an adult lifetime of political
organizing, concluded, “The most important thing is for the jornaleros to
be unified. But we have to be unified with African Americans and other members
of the U.S. working class.”
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
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