16 minute read
Union Matters
By ARIAMA C. LONG
Report for America Corps Member, Amsterdam News Staff
The Amsterdam News and Bill Lynch Associates honored several members of the labor community this Tuesday at its seventh annual “Tying Communities Together” Labor Awards Breakfast at the new 1199 SEIU offices, located at 498 7th Ave. in midtown Manhattan.
At every table, swag bags with new thermos cups, lunch containers, face masks, and other goodies that bore the newspaper’s signature red with black logo were placed for guests as they arrived.
New York Amsterdam News Publisher Elinor Tatum, former Assemblymember Michael Blake, and recently confirmed New York State Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin spoke at this year’s awards ceremony.
Benjamin said that his father was a 32BJ member, and it was because of unions that he and other families were afforded the opportunity to break into the middle class. “When you talk about the American dream, you can’t do that without talking about labor,” said Benjamin.
After an arduous and socially distanced year in 2020, many said that the breakfast felt like a mini family reunion and delighted in seeing old friends in person. People caught up with one another, or enjoyed the featured chicken and waffles breakfast, as light instrumental jazz played in the background.
This year’s honorees were musician Harry Belafonte, 32BJ President Kyle Bragg, Council on School Supervisors and Administrators President Mark Cannizzaro, and American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, and unofficially Billy Lynch, whom many spoke of highly throughout the morning.
“The teachers, the principals, the cleaners, are so important every day of the week. My daughter is in those schools, and if it wasn’t for all the people you represent my daughter would not be safe,” said Tatum. “She is my world and she represents the world of every other mother and father, aunt and uncle out there.”
In Weingarten’s remarks, she said it was important to have a moment of gratitude for all the essential workers on the ground that the union leaders in the
room represented. “[Essential workers] during the height of COVID, during the surges, the ups and downs, all of whom showed up for others,” said Weingarten. She said above all it was about the members and communities’ voices, agency, and safety. Hon. Brian Benjamin AFT President Randi Weingarten Bragg, who was elected after the untimely passing of former 32BJ President Héctor J. Figueroa in 2019, said he worried for employees and union members facing down the barrel of unemployment or losing their livelihoods because of the pandemic’s vaccine mandates. “They exposed themselves to a deadly virus to do hard and necessary work,” said Bragg of the city’s essential workers as he accepted his award. “The job that they were not able to sit at home at a computer while the rest of the country was remote. They were and continue to be the backbone of our economic survival and the lynchpin of our continued recovery.” (Bill Moore photos) Cannizzaro said that Council on School Supervisors and with the great leadership Administrators President Mark Cannizzaro and talent present at the breakfast, he thought that a solid sit down together could solve most of the school system’s COVID problems as the city is currently grappling with lawsuits over the vaccine mandates in the new school semester. “That’s probably what needs to happen. And I think Randi said it quite well, we have a responsibility and we’re going to take that seriously and make sure things happen for kids,” said Cannizzaro. Belafonte couldn’t join in person, but his daughter, Gina, sent an acceptance video on his behalf.
32BJ President Kyle Bragg
Ariama C. Long is a Report for America corps member and writes about culture and politics in New York City for The Amsterdam News. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting: https://tinyurl.com/fcszwj8w
COVID-19 vaccine mandates seem discriminatory, classist
Dear Amsterdam News,
I am writing to express my concerns about the vaccine mandates being implemented. Before you toss my letter in the trash as the ramblings of some Trumpist anti-vaxxer, I would like to make it clear that I’m in favor of vaccines that have been developed with the use of rigorous safety and effectiveness testing. I swear by the pneumonia vaccine and I’m considering the shingles vaccine. However, the current COVID-19 vaccine strikes me as discriminatory and classist (elitist also comes to mind). For example, the mandate for NYC educators and transit workers has no testing and mask options. I would like to note that despite the possible risk, many educators returned to in-person teaching during the height of the pandemic. They followed the safety protocols recommended by the CDC in order to keep themselves and their students as safe as possible. This was very effective. Unfortunately, many transit workers were not as fortunate because they were not advised to wear masks until after many of them were already infected. We know that masking up along with other safe hygiene practices is effective against this or any other virus. Educators, transit workers, nurses, and many other middle- and lowincome employees were designated essential workers and lauded as heroes.
Educators were instrumental in reopening schools to meet the demands of parents who wanted or needed their children enrolled in in-person learning. All of us who were designated as essential workers masked up, put on our brave faces, said a prayer and went out daily: we confronted our unseen nemesis, the COVID-19 virus, in order to provide for our families and to support those in our communities who needed the services we provide. Our willingness to confront the danger presented by COVID-19 in order to support the children, parents, and community members we serve resulted in accolades for many state officials. In NYC, our efforts were especially favorable for Mayor Bill de Blasio. Fast forward three months, we are now faced with the prospect of losing our livelihood if we do not comply with mandatory vaccinations. May I point out what has been patently obvious since polio? No vaccine developed since the polio vaccine has led to the eradication or near eradication of a virus. No vaccine eradicates a virus. There is no exception to that fact. The COVID-19 vaccine is no exception to that fact. The COVID-19 vaccine does not eradicate the virus or its variants. It is actually less effective than the pneumonia vaccine which is effective for 5 years. The COVID vaccine is barely effective for 6 months. Everyone I know, myself included, who had and survived COVID-19 also had the pneumonia shot, the flu shot, or both. We know the efficacy of this vaccine is limited. We also know the efficacy of masking up is just as good. I must therefore ask why are educators and other essential workers in the inner city of NYC being mandated to take the vaccine or lose their livelihood? Why are they not being offered the option to mask up and get tested regularly? Testing and masking up should be an option for those who do not want to be vaccinated at this time. If we could keep students and staff safe during the height of the earlier pandemic by following the CDC protocols, why can’t we do so now, especially since most educators are vaccinated?
Additionally, why is the vaccine mandate without the testing option being implemented primarily in areas of New York (the inner city) where most of the employees impacted are people of color? Why is the mandate not being enforced in predominantly white as well as more
affluent sections of the state? Why are educators in Long Island, Westchester, and upstate New York offered a testing and mask option? Moreover, the NYPD and the FDNY have a predominantly white work force and those employees are also offered a testing option. New York state teachers are similarly situated to New York City teachers but New York state teachers are not facing termination if they do not take the shot. This form of inequity has existed in this country for far too long. Employees in the inner city of Los Angeles are facing the similar disparate treatment. There needs to be equity in the dissemination of these mandates. This is most definitely separate but not equal.
Impasses at every turn It took 20 years to end the “Forever War” in Af-
EDITORIAL ghanistan but the residue, particularly the evacuation of 140,000 Americans and Afghan citizens, presents a new timeline for who’s responsible for the fiasco of the evacuation. The finger-pointing escalated this past week with the testimony of the generals before Congress and their claim of keeping a contingent of troops in the war-torn country, one that is refuted by President Biden.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin then weighed in placing the blame on the State Department, adding, “A number of things kind of came together to cause what happened to happen.”
To compare the destructive war with the error-filled evacuation is odious since each had its own distinct messiness. That the war even occurred has to be figured into this equation of senselessness.
Placing blame for any of these events is pointless and appears to bring a fresh baggage of disruption when so many issues are exceedingly pressing at the moment.
Most immediate is the debt ceiling that could shut down the government if Republicans continue to block efforts to raise the debt limit.
Another shutdown of the government would be catastrophic for those dependent on Medicare, Social Security, and the ongoing struggle to stabilize the nation in the wake of the pandemic.
And speaking of the pandemic, a decision has apparently been reached after a three-judge panel from the Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the city’s vaccine mandate can move forward. And Mayor de Blasio stated that the vaccine requirement goes into effect Oct. 4.
No matter where we turn nowadays an impasse looms, but we hope the current ruling removes one troubling obstacle for our teachers and students.
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not represent those of the New York Amsterdam News. We continue to publish a variety of viewpoints so that we may know the opinions of others that may differ from our own.
ARMSTRONG WILLIAMS
Watching the imagery, the public discussion, the official explanation, and the now collapsing narrative from the White House of the pictures of a Haitian immigrant being run down on horseback by a Federal Border Patrol Agent has been difficult, and plucks at raw nerves and memories of generations of Black Americans. A Black man running with what appeared to be boxed lunches in plastic bags (meals being provided for the unmanageable crush of human beings in Del Rio, Texas), brought into precise focus the incompetence, the feckless “leadership,” and the almost total absence of responsible leaders running the Biden administration, from the president on down through the federal executive departments and the Pentagon. My first thoughts were a scene from the movie “Django Unchained,” where they are catching runaway slaves, or worse, a real-life memory of the events on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in March of 1965, when the last charge of the Alabama Light Cavalry was undertaken with mounted sheriffs and dogs to run down Black folks peacefully protesting the horrors and injustices of segregation and systemic racism in America. All these historical images of horror, whether captured in the film “Django Unchained,” or the real-life horror of events on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in 1965, were reflections of the Democratic Party of America. Joe Biden’s party. Few white people know who Edmond Pettus was. Former Confederate General Edmond Pettus, former Democrat Senator Edmond Pettus, and former Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon Pettus. For all their effort, projection, and political spin, the Democratic Party cannot wash off their rich and racist history. Joe Biden has brought it all back into focus.
When focusing on the unimportant, instead of the important, challenging situations can quickly turn into unmanageable situations. Combined with weak, politically driven leaders at the top, the formula for disaster is firmly in place. In just nine months, the Biden administration is collapsing before our eyes. When there are incompetent political hacks at the top, the promotion process generally looks for and selects supervisors that mirror the leadership’s abilities and political bent. Secretary Mayorkas remains mostly silent on the growing chaos at the border. He snapped at a Republican senator in the recent hearing when asked a question about the border chaos that he supposedly works on 18 hours a day. Really, doing what exactly? Maybe the picture of that unknown Black man being run down on horseback will wake the nation up, and force profound changes and immediate accountability and replacement of so many incompetent people managing the president and supposedly running these federal executive departments and the Pentagon. Political decisions and reckless policies are costing innocent people their lives under Biden. The tragic and preventable deaths in Afghanistan were impossible to conceal, but make no mistake, many people are dying in this border chaos. Dying from dehydration and exhaustion, drowning in the rivers, and at the hands of criminals and monsters mixed in with the hapless people simply trying to come to America for what it used to stand for.
Think back a few weeks about how the truth surfaced in Afghanistan after the bombing of Abby Gate and the tragic loss of our Marines and Soldiers in the blast. The NYTimes investigative report on the drone strike was thorough and well documented. That press piece resulted in the CENTCOM commander being forced to speak out and address the calamity. Although he made some comments, sort of apologizing and verbally taking responsibility for the mistake, nothing happened. No one resigned, and no one was fired. Fast forward to the events of the past few days in Del Rio, Texas. The discussion triggered immediately after the picture of a Black man, from Haiti, being grabbed by a mounted Border Patrol Agent while running provoked a narrative of a whip being used. The image is burned into the minds of Americans now. It doesn’t matter that there was no whip. The image itself stands alone. An event so offensive and symbolic that it may trigger America’s gag reflex. The core issues playing out at the border are simply wrong and immoral on multiple levels. The image brought the chaos into precise focus. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki is doing her part providing misinformation and aggressive counternarrative messaging. Her goal is to manage the narrative for damage control and political advantage. Ms. Psaki, for all her legendary skills at spin, cannot put this issue to rest.
With all this noise, what is really happening at the border and why is it happening? There is no policy in place to control our borders. Protection of our southern border has simply been suspended deliberately by President Biden. Horses are patrol tools given to the Border Patrol to cover difficult and hostile terrain faster and safer than on foot. You can see better when mounted in difficult terrain. They are not crowd control tools. Running down a Black man on horseback who is fleeing with two emergency food bags is an image that cannot be explained, managed, or erased. The optics are horrible, and must be addressed head on; with actions, not with political spin. The Biden administration opened the border and created and nurtured the chaos and flood of humans. Now it is quite literally out of control. A stampede of human beings. The Border Patrol is ordered to change the imagery of the chaos and make this go away. Remember the foolish order from the FAA to close the air space to drones so the public couldn’t see the chaos? Change this image! They have no plan, not enough properly equipped people, and no competent leadership. In the end the mission falls to the GS-6 agents on the ground who are desperately trying to do “something”, anything, in order to regain some semblance of order and control. These young Border Patrol agents on the ground, God Bless them, are the federal workers who will be thrown under the bus to protect Secretary Mayorkas and President Biden. Mayorkas and his leadership team should be relieved and fired, immediately.
CHRISTINA GREER PH.D.
Each week we hear a new story about someone who has died in New York City’s sprawling jail on Rikers Island. My heart breaks when I think about the number of innocent people waiting for their time in court. I am enraged thinking about the scores of people who have committed petty crimes who are left for months or even years while waiting for due process. Even those who have committed serious crimes should still be treated with dignity while awaiting sentencing.
Mayor de Blasio was elected in 2013 and promised to end the “tale of two cities” in New York. Part of that declaration was to decrease the number of Black and Latinx individuals who have been targeted by police solely based on the color of their skin and the neighborhoods in which they reside. Sadly, over the course of the mayor’s tenure, we have not seen substantive change in many of those communities.
Initially, the mayor supported an idea of community jails, that is, instead of warehousing thousands of individuals on Rikers Island, those awaiting sentencing would be able to stay in local jails in their own neighborhoods where they’d have access to their families and a sense of dignity. This plan stalled and we are now witnessing the deterioration of a facility and an overall disregard for human life while jailed.
Part of the obstacle in implementing community jail programs throughout the city stems from the age-old NIMBY problem, that is, “not in my back yard.” Many New Yorkers initially supported the dissolution of Rikers and the building of smaller jails until the proposal included their own neighborhoods.
We must ask ourselves why so many people are housed in Rikers in the first place. Is jumping a turnstile or some other petty offense a punishable crime whereby someone needs to sit in jail for days, weeks, months, or even years because they cannot afford bail? In essence, we have created a system where our most economically vulnerable populations are filling the jails in a system that clearly does not work.
It is my sincere hope that Democratic nominee and presumed mayor-elect Eric Adams will make Rikers a priority once his tenure begins. As a former police officer who has spoken quite eloquently about disparities in racial profiling and arrests, Adams must move quickly to solve this crisis. To date, 12 people have died in Rikers this year alone.
We must also pressure our city council members to assist the incoming mayor with solutions to jails in New York City. What we have now is a 21st century version of a “debtors prison” and as my grandmother used to say, “If we can put a man on the moon, we can surely figure this out!” It is high time we do so, far too many lives are at risk.
Christina Greer, Ph.D., is an Associate professor at Fordham University, the author of “Black Ethnics: Race, Immigration, and the Pursuit of the American Dream,” the co-host of the podcast FAQ-NYC.
