SF Immigrant community reacts with outrage to Governor’s vetoes
Groups unite around vetoes of Trust Act, Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights and farm workers’ heat protection bills
WHAT: Immigrant groups respond in outrage to Governor’s vetoes of Trust Act, Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights, Farm Workers Heat Protection Legislation
WHERE: State Building, 455 Golden Gate Avenue
WHEN: Thursday October 4, 2012 at 11:00AM
WHO: Immigrant community leaders, domestic workers, farm workers, and DREAM students. Confirmed speakers include Assemblymember Tom Ammiano, D-SF; Fiona, Dreamer and member of ASPIRE, Fr. Richard Smith, San Francisco Organizing Project, and representatives of the UFW and the TRUST Act and Domestic Worker coalitions.
Participating organizations include: Asian Law Caucus, ASPIRE, Causa Justa::Just Cause, California Immigrant Policy Center, Filipino Advocates for Justice, Mujeres Unidas y Activas, SF Organizing Project, The Women’s Collective, United Farm Workers, and more.
VISUALS: Live chickens, representing farm animals that are given more protections than farm workers themselves. Colorful puppet of The Jetson’s domestic worker Rosie Robot, to show contrast with domestic workers that are not robots, but human beings that deserve sleep and meal breaks. Vibrant TRUST Act banners and signs.
SAN FRANCISCO – Community leaders will gather in front of the State Building at 455 Golden Gate Ave. alongside several labor and community organizations to unite against the governor’s vetoes of key legislation to extend protections to the immigrant community: the Trust Act, the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights and the farm workers’ heat protection bills. The protest comes as anger about the vetoes continues to simmer across the state,capturing national attention.
The TRUST Act (AB 1081 – Ammiano) would have limited unfair, costly detentions of immigrants in local jails for extra time, for deportation purposes- people who would otherwise be released. By vetoing TRUST, the Governor failed to heal the impact of an out-of-control detention and deportation program that has undermined public safety and deported 80,000 Californians to date – 7 in 10 of whom had no convictions or had only minor offenses.
The Governor also vetoed the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights (AB 889 – Ammiano), which would have ended the outdated exclusion of domestic workers from basic labor protections by extending rights such as overtime pay and meal and rest breaks to the childcare providers, housecleaners, and caregivers who care for California’s families and homes.
Governor Brown also rejected two farm workers’ heat protections bills: The Humane Treatment for Farm Workers Act (AB 2627 – Calderon) that would make it a misdemeanor crime, punishable by jail time and fines, to not provide appropriate water or shade to workers laboring under high heat conditions. The governor also vetoed The Farm Worker Safety Act (AB 2346 – Butler) that would have allowed workers to enforce the state’s heat regulations by suing employers who repeatedly violate the law.
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