Smita Rane asked us to imagine traveling to a foreign land as a student, tourist, or worker. We broke into small groups imagining how we each might cope with challenges in countries we were assigned to. One example \u2013 a group imagining they were students going to Morocco decided they needed some familiarity with language and hand gestures; customs (cultural do\u2019s and don\u2019ts); appropriate dress; how to act and not inadvertently offend; find a mentor; how to move around the city during the day and night; seek out students studying the same thing \u2013 preferably someone who had traveled to the U.S. and understands the culture you come from; connect with local people; learn about local cuisine; establish yourself as a person willing to learn; have someone teach you about local currency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After we had a chance to share our experiences in the small\ngroups, Smita introduced our speakers: Lynn Harter, Carol Rogers, and Brenda\nTippins, all from the Eastern Farm Workers Association (EFWA). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lynn Harter<\/strong> is\nthe Operations Manager of Eastern Farm Workers Association and has been a\nfull-time volunteer since 1993, first working with Women\u2019s Press Collective\n(WPC) in Brooklyn, NY. Women\u2019s Press is an all-volunteer run organization\nproviding printing and publishing resources to all volunteer run,\nnon-government funded organizations. Lynn started working with EFWA in Upstate\nNew York in 1995, helping oversee the move of EFWA\u2019s office central from rural\nWayne County to the city of Syracuse. Lynn Harter began with a brief synopsis\nof the history of the EFWA, which started in 1974 in Upstate New York. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The first effort like this was started on Long Island in\nSuffolk County in 1972. It is one of 22 organizations in the U.S. EFWA is\norganizing the largest growing section of the labor force in U.S. today which\nis a group called \u201cunrecognized workers.\u201d This group includes home health\naides, food service workers, janitorial workers, and people working for temporary\nand day labor agencies. We estimate unrecognized workers make up 100 million\nworkers in the U.S. today. In a nation where the richest 1% own 35% of all the\nwealth, and the bottom 90% are left to compete for less than 30% of the\nresources, the weight of this falls on the shoulders of impoverished working\nwomen. Any time you step into our office, or any of our sister offices, you\nwill find that the local leadership of these organizations happens to be women.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n Eastern Farm Workers Association is 100% volunteer run; we\nhave absolutely no paid staff. In over 33 years of organizing we have never\ntaken a single dime of government funding. We have done that on purpose because\nthe only way working people have ever been able to fight for better living and\nworking conditions is by building an organization of their own. So we have\ncreated an effort that is completely and wholly run by low-income workers. At\nthis point in our country we are dealing with the worst working and living\nconditions, some would say we have actually turned back the clock, because most\nworkers in the U.S. today have no ability to collectively bargain for wages and\nconditions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve started organizing farm workers because farm workers\nwere excluded from the National Labor Act (the Wagner Act), passed in 1935. It\nwas a law that established collective bargaining rights for certain groupings\nof workers in the United States. Farm workers, domestic workers, and\nindependent contractors were excluded from those provisions which always had\ndubious benefits. We found that the unrecognized labor force (those who haven\u2019t\ntraditionally been part of labor unions) have been used to tear down the wage\nscale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Permanent workers are replacing temporary workers, non-union\nworkers replacing union workers. It is a pattern being seen across the country\nin almost every industry today. We are also seeing a great deal of affect from\nthings like free-trade agreements. Wayne County, the largest apple growing area\nin New York State, has the most farm workers in any county in New York State. The\nfarmers there, some of whom have been farming for over 200 years, are finding\nthat they are getting less and less for their produce due to consolidation (an\nexample is Mott which is now owned by Cadbury). Workers are typically paid $.03\n– .06 per pound for juice apples, and that is 95% of the apple crop grown in\nWayne County.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we started the EFWA, most farm workers were\nAfrican-Americans from the southern states. Most people, when they think of a\nfarm worker, think of Latino workers. We\u2019ve seen the farm labor work force\nchange three times over in our 30 years of organizing. The original group of\nfarm workers dates back to children of sharecroppers from the South. They found\nthe same conditions as migrant farm workers that their parents experienced in\nthe South. Many were trying to escape the racism of the South in the hopes of a\nbetter life. It\u2019s why many of those folks became the most active and vocal\nmembers of EFWA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because farmers are receiving less profit selling their\nproduce, they are seeking cheaper and cheaper sources of labor. The majority of\nfarm workers changed to Jamaican and Haitian. In the last 15 years it has\nalmost completely become Latino workers (people from Guatemala and Mexico)\nbecause food is being produced in these countries extremely cheaply and\nimported into the U.S. as the result of free trade agreements. Large\ninternational corporations can take advantage of this, and at the same time the\ndesperate poverty in those countries have driven workers to seek work here. In\nthe city of Chiapas one can earn only $1 a day cleaning homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lack of benefits and low wages are experienced by people\ndoing service jobs as well. Another result of free-trade policy is that this an\narea that used to be mostly manufacturing, and even those jobs have just about\ndisappeared. In rural areas like Wayne County (where some of the better jobs\nused to be working in the canneries), African-Americans have moved into year\nround, better paying jobs, but even some of those jobs have been eliminated. Many\npeople then moved into service jobs cleaning homes, cleaning offices, taking\ncare of the elderly, washing dishes, often for not much better pay these days\nand have no benefits (sick time, vacation, health insurance, etc.). These people,\nwho have never had benefits available to them, are very easy to exploit,\nespecially when issues of race and language are involved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brenda Tippins<\/strong> is\nan EFWA member and volunteer. She is a new member of the association but has\nquickly become an active member. Brenda\u2019s mother was a migrant farm worker, and\nas a child Brenda traveled with her mother from farm to farm. Brenda has done\ncleaning work as well as other jobs while raising five children and also more\nrecently caring for her grandchildren. Brenda reported: \u201cWhen I was little I\nnever knew why my mother would keep pulling me out of school. She used to work\nin the fields and take us with her. She used to tell me she was going to do one\nrow, my brother the next row and I had to do the next one. And so I did, I was\nfive years old. So we used to pick beans, apples, tomatoes, bell peppers. The\nliving conditions were bad. The worst part was the dirty old mattresses. I\nremember my eye being swollen because a tick bit my eye when I was sleeping. When\nwe used to go state to state, they would put the mattresses on back of truck\nand we used to make stops so we could pick up food along the road so we could\neat. Another terrible part was the outhouses, we had nothing else. We used pick\nup and move every six months.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynn Harter<\/strong>\ncontinued saying that even though the Eastern Farm Workers Association has\nchanged somewhat, when they visit the farm worker camps they still see that a\nlot of the conditions haven\u2019t changed. \u201cWe see everything from good to\nextremely bad. Many farms still have an outhouse, they don\u2019t have an inside\ntoilet. I\u2019ve seen outhouses falling apart and wonder if the health department\nreally comes to inspect these places. This is what many farm workers have to\ndeal with today. The dilapidated state in which we see our communities today,\nthe state of housing here in Syracuse that people are forced to live in because\nthey don\u2019t have much money is just an extrapolation of those conditions that\nwere once isolated to farm workers, and are being experienced more and more by\npeople of limited means. That\u2019s why we started organizing farm workers and have\nsince expanded our membership. People who sign up to be a member are eligible\nfor benefits, emergency food and clothing, medical and dental care, and legal\nadvice.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Carol Rogers<\/strong> is\nthe Administrative Assistant at EFWA. She is originally from Western\nMassachusetts, and was met on a door-to-door membership canvass in 1998 by\nvolunteers with Western Massachusetts Labor Action, a sister effort of EFWA. In\n1999 Carol became a full-time volunteer with Western Massachusetts Labor\nAction. In 2004 she came to Syracuse to work with EFWA. She told her story\nrecounting, \u201cPeople explained the condition farm workers are living in. I\nlearned that I could donate my time and really help people. They seemed\ndifferent from other organizations. The cost for joining the organization was\n$.62 per month. I became a part-time volunteer even though I did not have\ntransportation. A young man came every morning. I got trained. I learned how to\ntype. I learned how to work on a computer. Then they asked me if I wanted to be\na full-time volunteer, and I asked what is that? They said 24\/7. I said okay\nbecause I was bored at home. I knew with this organization I would never be\nbored. We are always doing something, going places, have speaking engagements,\nwe are always busy.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynn Harter<\/strong>\ncontinued the conversation explaining that another activity EFWA does is\nOperation Camp Crew, which actually visits the migrant camps. Most farmers are\nout on the farms where they work, closer to the fields than the towns and are\npretty spread out in the four-county area EFWA covers. On Saturdays they canvas\npeople in Syracuse that work low-wage service jobs. They go to the migrant\ncamps on Sunday afternoons. The spirit of it is self-help in terms of what EFA\ndoes. Members are asked to help out as much as they are able to. Members see\nmembers helping members. It helps build the benefits program, and also builds\nstrength in the organization because members oversee the benefits program\nthrough the Benefits Council. Members actually have input into where the\nbenefits program is going and also bring problems to the organization, where\nthey take on fights against government policies. They have dealt with\neverything from how immigration laws continue to manipulate the labor force and\nprevent workers from being able to command a living wage from the market place.\nShe also described the use of HUD funding, and how it has been used to tear\ndown low-income housing and contribute to the homelessness problem in the\ncountry. On their canvasses they found people who have had, or were threatened\nwith utility shut-off, and they do utility advocacy for people who did not\nreceive help from the low-income energy assistance program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Eastern Farm Workers Association also run budget savings\nprograms, a savings program called Benefits Program Plan II, which helps people\nwith limited income bridge the gap between income and expenses. They know their\nbenefits program is not a solution and don\u2019t pretend they are going to elevate\nanyone up or out of poverty through the benefits program, but it helps low-income\nworkers change in the long term. EFWA\u2019s priorities right now are building\nmedical benefits. They have monthly general medical sessions with volunteer\ndoctors who see members free of charge. EFWA is still in need of many more\ncanvassers, advocates, and drivers to get workers to appointments, organize\ntheir medications, and follow through so farm workers can actually get their\nmedical care. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Between spring and the Fourth of July, more and more migrant\nworkers are coming to the area to living conditions that have not changed in\ndecades. Others have living conditions that are okay, but their working\nconditions are not good, which is why the camp visits are so important. <\/p>\n\n\n\n EFWA has a method of systemic organizing which is the hallmark\nof what they do. It is reproducible. It\u2019s a \u201csee one \u2013 do one – teach one\u201d\nmethod, so anybody can learn it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lynn invited WTB women to pick up information about EFWA and\nencouraged women to volunteer to help out in any way they could. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A lively question and answer session concluded the program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Eastern Farm Workers Association activists said that the only way working people have ever been able to fight for better living and working conditions is by building an organization of their own. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6137,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[23],"class_list":["post-7804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-programs","tag-advocacy",""],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7804"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7804\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8961,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7804\/revisions\/8961"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wtb.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}