FW: National Employment Law Project Update: Justice for Low-Wage and Immigrant Workers

[Guest guest]

FYI….

NELP Program Update:

Justice for Low-Wage and Immigrant Workers

NELP works with community

groups, worker centers, unions, policymakers and government agencies to

advocate for low-wage and immigrant workers. Whether it's helping to grow

living wage jobs, making sure that rights are enforced in the workplace, or

strengthening core standards like the minimum wage - our goal is to restore

justice for all workers in cities and states across the country. Here are

some recent updates:

Living wage jobs and economic development

NELP is working with local advocates to attach wage standards to economic

development projects that are subsidized by city and state taxpayer funds.

NELP testified in support of landmark legislation in

Pittsburgh that requires prevailing wages on subsidized development

projects. In New York City, a bill that requires living wages on large,

city-subsidized development projects was introduced into the city council

on May 25th; NELP is supporting the campaign coalition and recently joined with Good Jobs

New York and the Fiscal Policy Institute to release a policy brief on the quality of the jobs created by city

subsidies.

Research on workplace violations, part II

Last fall, NELP joined with UIC's Center for Urban Economic Development and

UCLA's Institute for Research on Labor and Employment to release Broken

Laws, Unprotected Workers, a landmark study on workplace

violations. Since then, the researchers have released separate studies

documenting wide-spread wage theft in America's three biggest cities: Working

Without Laws (the New York City report), Wage

Theft and Workplace Violations in Los Angeles and Unregulated

Work in Chicago. NELP authored the New York City report and

released it at a January forum at CUNY's Center; click here for the presentation.

State and local policies to fight wage theft

In conjunction with a training of worker activists co-hosted by the

National Immigration Law Center and Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance,

NELP released three updated fact sheets on workers' rights in April: Workplace

Health and Safety, Misclassification

of Employees as Independent Contractors, and Hoffman

Plastics: Rights and Remedies for Immigrant Workers. In March, the

Washington State Legislature approved HB

3145, which gives the state new tools to fight wage theft; NELP was part

of the coalition advocating for the bill and testified in support of it.

And in February, NELP provided public

testimony on wage theft to a Workers Rights Board hearing in Washington

DC.

Federal policies to fight wage theft

Last year, NELP convened the Just Pay Working Group, a national

gathering of worker centers, unions, legal services providers, academics,

private bar experts and public enforcement officials, and in April, the

group released its comprehensive policy blueprint, Just

Pay: Improving Wage and Hour Enforcement at the United States Department

Labor. Our proposals for the USDOL include targeting high violation

industries for investigations; cracking down on misclassification of

workers as independent contractors; revamping intake of worker complaints;

strengthening worker protections; and consulting worker advocates and

stakeholders.

Independent contractor misclassification

As states continue to push forward to combat independent contractor abuses,

NELP has provided testimony and technical assistance to support independent

contractor reforms in Nevada, land,

Ohio, Kentucky, Vermont, and Virginia, among others. At the federal level,

NELP provided technical assistance to legislative staff to develop the newly-introduced

Employee

Misclassification Protection Act, which would provide notice of rights to

workers classified as independent contractors and require employers to keep

records of their wages and hours; NELP has also advised on legislation

to close the " safe harbor " tax loophole for employers with

misclassified independent contractors.

Recent opinion pieces

See our recent op-eds in the Daily News ( " Catch

the City's Wage Thieves " ); the Nation ( " Economic

Recovery Starts with Good Jobs " ), and the Huffington Post, ( " Wage

Policy from the Grassroots " ).

Litigation round-up

In April, NELP and allies filed a class-action

lawsuit against McMillan's Home Care Agency in New York City, charging

that workers were consistently underpaid and never paid overtime, despite

routinely working upwards of 60 hours per week. In a case co-argued by

NELP, the Washington Supreme Court recently

held that evidence of a plaintiffs' undocumented immigration status is

so unfairly prejudicial that it ought to be excluded from court

proceedings. NELP submitted an amicus brief in the landmark Fifth Circuit

Court of Appeals ruling

that held that immigration status is irrelevant to an injured worker's

claim under the Longshore Workers' Compensation Act.

Finally, all of us at NELP want to send a huge congratulations to

Domestic Workers United, for their great victory in passing the Domestic

Worker Bill of Rights in the New York State Senate; we look forward to

celebrating with everyone when the bill becomes law!

This email was

sent to: tcp2@...