Thread: Day Laborers Unite in Their Cause

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longi ... -headlines

Day laborers unite in their cause

BY BART JONES
STAFF WRITER
July 29, 2005

In Fairfax County, Va., day laborers say they have a $400,000 commitment from officials to help build a hiring center to get workers off street corners.

But in Chicago, Austin, Texas and other cities around the country, some day laborers waiting in parking lots for jobs have been arrested on trespassing charges.

Those were among the triumphs and setbacks workers discussed at the third national day laborer conference -- and the first held on Long Island. The four-day meeting, sponsored in part by the Hempstead-based Workplace Project, kicked off at Hofstra University yesterday and attracted 150 workers and organizers from as far away as Seattle.

"Initially, we were totally isolated, but now we're not," said Pablo Alvarado, the Los Angeles-based coordinator of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. "We've won a lot of battles."

The goal of the conference, he and others said, is to share experiences, strengthen the national day laborer network and voice concern about Farmingville, where dozens of workers recently were thrown out from illegally overcrowded houses.

"This is a beautiful event," Maria Marroquin, a day laborer organizer in Mountain View, Calif., said in Spanish. "No one wants us, but everyone uses us" for work.

Though no official figure exists, Alvarado said the national day laborer population runs into the hundreds of thousands. Many are from Latin America, but they also include natives of Poland who gather on corners in Chicago and natives of Cameroon and Ghana who wait on corners in Maryland.

While the population is diverse, Alvarado and others said, one constant is that controversy surrounds day laborers, partly because many are undocumented.

Last night about 200 day laborers, many of them from the conference and others living in Farmingville, marched along streets there to Brookhaven Town Hall to protest what they regard as poor treatment of laborers there. Many residents emerged from their homes to watch as the laborers held candles and shouted slogans in Spanish and English, saying, "People united will never be defeated."

Several residents interviewed voiced little sympathy for the immigrants' complaints. "It's outrageous," said one woman who asked not to be named. "Learn English so we know what you want."

In Fairfax County, Va., day laborers say they have a $400,000 commitment from officials to help build a hiring center to get workers off street corners.

You've got to be kidding.

"Initially, we were totally isolated, but now we're not," said Pablo Alvarado, the Los Angeles-based coordinator of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. "We've won a lot of battles."

Pablo needs to be investigated for conspiracy to violate U.S. Immigration Laws.

"It's outrageous," said one woman who asked not to be named. "Learn English so we know what you want."

The hell with what they want. Learning English will not make them legal. Calling them 'undocumented' will not change that status either. Where was ICE for THIS event??


VicePresidunce Cheney: We don't know who they are and we don't know WHERE they are!! What a lie. They're right there under your nose claiming 'rights' they don't have.


RR