Facults, Students and Community March for Full Funding of Public Colleges

Chants for full funding for public higher education in Connecticut filled the streets of downtown New Haven this week as union members, faculty, students, immigrant rights, community groups and elected officials from across the state marched from the New Haven Green to Gateway Communkity College..

Recovery for All CT, co-sponsor of the action declared “Millions of working-class students, especially black and brown students, have relied on our twelve community colleges, four CSU universities, and UConn as a crucial path to better lives. It's time for the state to fully fund public colleges and universities for all our students and negotiate strong contracts for all our faculty and staff at the very heart of these invaluable institutions.”

Immigrant rights organization Unidad Latina en Accion organized for the march and rally “to demand major investment in all CT public colleges and universities.”

“Tuition is too expensive, students are buried in debt, and administrators want to cut services instead of investing in the education that we deserve,” they said.

AFT Connecticut members who work at the state's community colleges, UConn, and UConn Health, turned out for the march to demand that “higher education be a quality public good available to every single state resident.”

Now in the midst of tough contract negotiations, they are seeking fairness and justice on the job as well as access and equity for their students. Issues include workforce reductions, increased workloads and proposed community college consolidations.

Part of the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC), a co-sponsor of the action, AFT decried that “management and their contracted labor relations lawyers are failing to show respect for faculty and staff.”

Supporters were urged to sign a petition (https://act.seiu.org/a/firejacksonlewis) demanding that Jackson Lewis, the notorious anti-union lawfirm being employed in the negotiations, be fired by President Cheng and the CSCU Board of Regents..

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“Our unions are standing together in coalition with our students and our communities to fight for the rights of all workers in both the public and private sectors. We believe that all workers should be able to earn a living wage and for all workers to be treated with dignity and respect.,” the statement with the petition says.

Rallies Set: Sept 29 for Higher Education – Oct 2 “What is Yale For”

Public higher education professionals who seek fairness and justice on the job have called a state-wide rally and march on Wednesday, September 29 at 4 pm from the New Haven Green to Gateway Community College. They are asking for support in contract negotiations for faculty and support staff at community colleges, state universities and the University of Connecticut (Uconn) facing workforce reductions, increased workloads and other cutbacks. The march is organized by the Recovery for All Coalition and the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC).

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Rev. Scott Marks, director of New Haven Rising, issued a call to rally on Saturday October 2 at 1 pm at the corner of Propsect and Grove Streets in New Haven. On that day, Yale University is publicly launching a fundraising campaign of $6 billion. An email announcing the launch asked “What are you for?”. The movement will respond by returning to Prospect and Grove Sts where we held our street painting action and car caravan in May, to ask Yale to answer its own question. “What is Yale For?”

As our community endures a summer of heartbreaking violence, Yale University is still accepting a massive tax break from New Haven, and has not yet honored a community hiring commitment due in April 2019. The tax break means fewer city services and higher taxes for home owners. The failure in its hiring commitments means many more households suffered through this pandemic without good jobs.

 This summer, over 1,000 people left voicemails with Yale leaders to ask for a better partnership based on respect. Yale University still has not engaged the community in a way that would bring hope and justice to a city suffering from over eighty years of segregated development and the devastating, unequal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. New Haven is still forced to pay for tax breaks for buildings that were named to honor individuals who or whose family owned enslaved people and contemporary wealthy donors who gave political contributions to leaders who sought to overturn the last election. It’s time for this partnership to change. Our community deserves respect. 

CT Teachers Resist a Right-Wing Take-Over of Public Education

The national anti-racist watchdog organization People for the American Way (PFAW) has exposed a coordinated dark money campaign to fund local front groups' electoral activities. Their Right-Wing Watch project has uncovered attempts to recruit and ultimately back candidates for boards of education (BOE) across the country by campaigning against so-called "critical race theory" curricula.

Click here for more from PFAW on the race-based attempt to seize local school boards.

The campaign’s inflammatory rhetoric this summer stalled out locally with majorities of parents in most Connecticut communities rejecting the politics of division and hate. National funders have instead found fertile ground in the Nutmeg State among small but vocal minorities clinging to anti-science propaganda regarding COVID-19 safety protocols.

A local front group brought the issue to the boiling point at a “back-to-school” forum in Cheshire. State education department officials after just 30 minutes ended the event early following outbursts from a small crowd from the local "Unmask Our Kids CT" chapter.

"The highest duty of a board member is to ensure the safety and well-being of the district’s students and staff," said Jason Adler, Waterford Federation of Classroom Teachers' president. "Teaching and learning cannot occur in an unsafe environment."

Adler, a Clinton BOE member, added, "I have the pleasure of serving on a Board of Education that makes decisions based on the best interests of student learning and health. It pains me to witness friends and neighbors - good people - being sold a false narrative by shadowy figures who hope to benefit politically through strife."

"We must let science and safety continue to be our north star when it comes to the students and employees of our school systems," Adler concluded.

Union activists like Adler have once again stepped up in 2021 to run on the "labor is your neighbor" platform. They will be on the November 2 municipal election ballot in towns across Connecticut. The “labor is your neighbor” get out the vote program provides a path forward this fall to help protect schools from an extremist-funded power and defend educators' hard-fought gains and children’s future learning opportunities.

– Excerpted from “Inside AFT Connecticut”

New Haven becomes third CT city to endorse Medicare for All

In response to a community campaign seeking action to ensure high quality health care as a human right, the New Haven Board of Alders has unanimously adopted a resolution in favor of Medicare for All legislation. New Haven joins New London and Windham which passed similar resolutions earlier this year.

Recognizing the high cost of health insurance as a barrier to care for individuals and a burden for the city budget, the resolution “calls on our federal l legislators to work toward enactment of H.R. 1976, the Medicare for All Act of 2021, assuring appropriate and efficient health care for all residents of the United States.”

The resolution explains that the Medicare for All Act of 2021 “would provide universal single-payer health insurance for every person in the United States for all necessary medical care including prescription drugs; hospital, surgical and outpatient services; primary and preventive care; emergency services; reproductive care; dental and vision care; and l long-term care without premiums, co-pays, deductibles or other out-of-pocket costs, and assure patients a free choice of doctors.”

The resolution was initiated by Medicare for All CT, New Haven Rising, Connecticut Working Families Party and the New Haven Peoples Center among others. Over 500 New Haven residents wrote letters of support.

“New Haven residents have been reaching out to us non-stop since this resolution was introduced,”
said Alder Darryl Brackeen, Jr. “We kept their voices and letters in mind when passing the resolution unanimously through the Health and Human Services Committee, and the entire Board of Alders.”

The resolution points out that “recent polls show that a majority of Americans support Medicare for All.” stating that “the $3.5 trillion US multi-payer is the most expensive in the world, yet has

left nearly 30 million Americans without health insurance and over 40 million

under-insured.”

In addition to support for national legislation, the resolution calls on state legislators to support “a state-level single payer in Connecticut to guarantee healthcare to all Connecticut residents.

The text of the resolution will be delivered to Rep. Rosa DeLauro, Sen Richard Blumenthal and Sen Chris Murphy.

Labor Day: Fast Food Workers Rally for Protections; Pandemic Unemployment Benefits End

Just before the Labor Day travel rush, cooks and cashiers at the I-95 service plazas gathered at the Darien northbound plaza to raise alarms of health and safety practices by McDonalds and other companies that risk spreading COVID-19 Delta variant. 

“Workers at rest stops on I-95, I-15 and I-395 are facing conditions that jeopardize them, their families, and countless highway travelers and their home communities,” said Rochelle Palache Vice President of 32BJ SEIU, which has been supporting service plaza workers organizing for better conditions.

“Many workers have been denied knowledge of their paid sick time, and very few are earning Standard Wage, which includes benefits like health insurance,” she said.

“Now, the Delta variant is surging while bosses at giant name brands such as McDonald’s and Subway ease off masking and social distancing.”

“ We are proud to stand with these workers to let McDonald’s, Subway, Sbarro, Dunkin Donuts know that failing to assure worker health and safety means failing every customer as well. After more than a year and a half, we’re still all in this together,” said Palache.

Others speaking at the rally including State Reps. David Michel and Corey Paris of Stamford, and McDonald's service plaza worker Azucena Santiago, emphasized that as the Delta surge peaks, workers need adequate PPE and clear sick day policies for maximum personal and public safety.

Pndemic Unemployment Benefits Expire

Meanwhile, the federal pandemic unemployment $300 weekly benefit included in the CARES Act expires over the Labor Day weekend on September 4. There are 129,000 people in Connecticut now collecting unemployment insurance.

In addition, the federal High Extended Benefits (HEB) program ends on September 11.

While the number of new unemployment claims has been dropping for several months, Connecticut is in the top ten states with highest unemployment since the pandemic.

Dante Bartolomeo, Interim Labor Commissioner said that new job openings are being added weekly.

The impact of the expiration of pandemic unemployment benefits as the Delta variant surges places many families in jeopardy. For those who find a new job after extended unemployment, a $1,000 bonus is being made available through the CT Department of Revenue Services.