The top 37 metro areas in the country are poised to create new jobs, make bad jobs into good ones, and solve tough environmental problems by transforming the way they handle their trash and recycling.
As New Orleans continues to rebuild after Hurricane Katrina, a diverse array of community and worker organizations are coming together to ensure that continued development in the city brings good jobs and community benefits to New Orleans.
Construction is picking back up again, and with it, the chance to create real career opportunities for low-income people. Community and union leaders in cities across the country have united behind strategies that boost publicly-funded construction, creating more paid training slots and opening doors to new job seekers. Public investments in construction should benefit all communities, and construction career approaches ensure low-income job seekers get an edge on new opportunities on public projects.
Construction careers programs can create real job opportunity for low-income residents. That was the message delivered by Partnership Deputy Director, Kathleen Mulligan-Hansel, at a workshop organized by the Seattle City Council May 22.
Elected officials and community organizations are embracing construction careers as one solution to our jobs emergency. Urban leaders across the country have created a pipeline for disadvantaged workers into good jobs through targeted local hire policies for publically funded construction projects.
The Don’t Waste LA Coalition moved a giant step closer to transforming LA’s commercial trash system when the City Council recently voted to enact an implementation plan that puts environmental, community, and worker well being at the top of the waste management priority list. Now, the City begins developing the Request for Proposals (RFPs) and enabling ordinances, and concurrently, an environmental impact report (EIR) under California’s environmental regulatory regime.
Co-founder and current national policy director of Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) appeared in a featured segment on nationally syndicated show Moyers and Company on May 10.
Transforming the way local governments manage trash promises to improve conditions in many cities by turning bad jobs into good jobs, creating new employment, decreasing pollution, and lowering costs. Cities can move toward zero waste and capture a range of worker, community, and environmental benefits by introducing new systems for managing trash.
A couple of days after the mayor announced that the Kingsbridge Armory would be transformed into the world’s largest ice sports complex, Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter sat across the street from the vacant building in a bustling diner and tried valiantly to stay awake.
“I’m exhausted,” she said, following an appearance on Bronxnet, where she talked about her own recent announcement, which didn’t come with quite the same fanfare as the mayor’s.
Over the weekend, 2,000 people showed up at a Northwest Philadelphia church to push for higher pay for workers at the Philadelphia airport.
The battle at the airport comes down to an old-fashioned fight over money.
Across the country, Partnership affiliates are developing new leaders in the fight for economic justice in our communities. We’ve provided outlets for youth and community members to learn about and engage in their city’s decision making process. We have built relationships with more than 500 elected or appointed local leaders who are aligned on our issues. Nearly 100 of these leaders are leading the change process on the local and national levels.
