City Announces Naming of Immigrant Heritage Plaza

NEW YORK, NY: The Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs

(MOIA) Commissioner Manuel Castro, NYC Parks Commissioner Sue Donoghue, NYC Department of Transportation (DOT) Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez and diverse immigrant communities today announced the naming of the historic Immigrant Heritage Plaza located south of Bowling Green Park.

"I am incredibly proud of the collaboration between city agencies, Bowling Green Association, and all our community partners for the naming of Immigrant Heritage Plaza,” said Manuel Castro, Commissioner of the NYC Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs. “This plaza will serve as a reminder of the countless contributions that immigrants have made to our city throughout its history, and as a source of inspiration to future generations of immigrants and New Yorkers.”

“We’re proud to rename this plaza “Immigrant Heritage Plaza” in collaboration with our great partners at our sister agencies, and the Bowling Green Association,” said NYC Parks Commissioner Sue Donoghue. “The renaming of Immigrant Heritage Plaza sends a strong message about the impor- tance of immigrants to our city’s past, present, and future.”

“Our streets and public plazas are sacred areas where we not only move about, but where we celebrate our city’s rich cultures. That is why I am proud to support Commissioner Castro of the Mayor’s office of Immigrant Affairs for the historic naming of Immigrant Heritage Plaza,” said NYC Department of Transportation Commissioner Ydanis

Rodriguez. “We will continue doing our part to ensure we’re protecting, honoring, and representing the immigrant communities of New York City.”

Originally known as “Public Place” within Bowling Green Park, Immigrant Heritage Plaza, will also receive a commemorative plaque.

In 2022, the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs hosted over 15 events at Bowling Green Park to celebrate the heritage of immigrant communities in New York City, including the African Union countries, Mexico, Ecuador, Colombia, Haiti, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, St. Vincent and Grenadines, Pakistan, The Philippines, The Dominican Republic, Peru, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and more.

Building from these events, Immigrant Heritage Plaza will honor all immigrants who built New York City, beginning with the first immigrant who arrived, Juan Rodriguez. Juan Rodriguez originally from the Spanish colony of La Española (today the Dominican Republic and the Republic of Haiti) arrived in the Hudson Harbor in 1613 on board a Dutch ship.

Nearly 40 percent of all current U.S. citizens can trace at least one of their ancestors back to New York City. Immigrant Heritage Plaza will serve as a place of celebration and reflection of immigrant roots for Americans across the country and recently arrived New Yorkers.l

Read more stories at www.theimmigrantsjournal.com

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Labor Violations/ continued from page 1

This new process expands on other worker-friendly policies adopted by the Biden administration. In October 2021, Secretary Mayorkas issued a memorandum ordering DHS to halt large worksite raids and instead to focus its efforts on targeting unscrupulous employers.

Taken together, these policies represent some of the strongest efforts by any presidential administration to protect vulnerable immigrants from labor exploitation.

They also undermine a key argument from the anti-immigrant right, which has often accused liberals of supporting immigrants because they want an exploitable underclass of workers. By offering workers a clear benefit to report labor violations, the program will protect all workers while going after the employers who are committing far more serious legal violations. Rather than pitting immigrants and native workers, this policy aligns the interests of all workers together to fight off those who exploit labor.

How does this process work?

The process for obtaining deferred action for being the victim of a labor violation is similar to the process for seeking a U Visa for victims of a serious crime. To become eligible for deferred action, a worker will have to first report the violation to the Department of Labor (DOL),

National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), or any state or local labor agency.

Once the complaint has been filed, the worker must then submit a request to the labor agency for a “Statement of Interest” expressing that the agency believes the worker has been cooperating with the labor agency in investigating and prosecuting the labor violation and deserves prosecutorial discretion for their support.

DOL, which has already prepared an FAQ for individuals seeking statements of interest, indicates that it will “assess each request on a case-by-case basis,” considering five separate factors. Other agencies are likely to follow suit. The factors are as follows:

DOL’s need for witnesses to carry out investigation and enforcement of the violation.

Whether immigration prosecutorial dis- cretion supports DOL’s interest in holding violators accountable.

Whether the workers are being retaliated against.

Whether immigration enforcement against the workers might impede DOL’s ability to enforce labor laws. The likelihood that employers might use immigration enforcement (or the threat of it) to undermine DOL’s ability to enforce the laws in a given area.

If the agency agrees with the worker’s request for a Statement of Interest, then it will prepare the Statement along the guidelines established in the new process and submit it to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), along with sending a copy to the worker.

After the worker receives this copy from the labor agency, they must then submit a written request for deferred action to USCIS, along with the Statement of Interest. The worker must also submit evidence demonstrating that they satisfy the criteria for the program, biographic information, any additional evidence in support of a favorable exercise of discretion, and an application for employment authorization.

Finally, once USCIS has received all this information, it will determine whether to grant the worker deferred action. If granted, the worker would receive a work permit and permission to remain in the United States for a set period of time (typically two years).

Will this protect workers?

Many immigrant workers, both undocumented and those here on temporary work visas, decline to report labor violations out of fear of employer retaliation that will affect their immigration status. Corrupt employers have often evaded serious consequences for their malfeasance due to this fear.

Even when workers did come forward, ICE would sometimes deport them anyway, even mid-investigation. This happened infamously in 2019, when an undocumented worker injured in the Hard Rock Hotel collapse in New Orleans was deported weeks after the disaster, even though he was actively working with labor agency investigators.

The Biden administration is aiming to make sure that situations like that don’t continued on page 7