Do you work at SEA Airport? SeaTac Proposition 1 protects the rights of workers at most large airport, transportation, and hospitality businesses in SeaTac. Under Prop. 1 you have the right to:

• The second-highest minimum wage in the country: $16.34 in 2020
• Keep all the tips and service charges you earn 
• Find out first about additional hours, before new part-time workers are hired
• Paid sick and safe time 
• Also, under state law you have the right to paid family leave & meal and rest breaks for every shift you work. 

Alongside Partner in Employment, Fair Work Center has launched a series of Know Your Rights trainings for airport workers. These workers are facing layoffs, reduced hours, and an unpredictable future as a result of the pandemic crisis — which is why it’s more important than ever to enforce Prop. 1 labor standards. We are offering these trainings in English and in Somali to reach African immigrant workers, while PIE is providing these trainings in French, Swahili and Spanish. We will make sure to provide trainings in other languages as needed.

For more information and to sign up for this free training series, visit our SEA Airport Workers page.

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Congress and the Trump administration have intentionally excluded undocumented immigrants from all federal pandemic support—but Washington state is finally stepping up to provide undocumented workers with financial relief. 

After months of relentless organizing by undocumented workers and a broad coalition of 430 organizations, we’re celebrating a hard-fought win: Governor Inslee just announced $40 million in direct relief for undocumented workers. The newly-created Washington Worker Relief Fund will provide one-time cash assistance of up to $1000/person. With this fund, Washington joins California and Oregon as the only states to provide relief to undocumented workers. 

It’s about time. The Washington Worker Relief Fund will put much-needed money into the hands of thousands of undocumented workers, who haven’t seen any government relief since the pandemic took hold in March. 

Applications for individuals to receive funding are not yet open. There will be a separate sign-up process this fall to apply for funding. The Governor’s office is currently working to identify a community organization that will receive the funds and ensure that the money is equitably distributed to those who need it most. Click here to receive updates about the fund and the application process once it opens.

“The least we can do is create this worker relief fund, but it’s not the last thing we should do.” — WA State Senator & Fair Work Center board member Rebecca Saldaña  

The fund will provide cash assistance for thousands of immigrant families, but the $40 million commitment isn’t enough to meet the actual need. Washington is home to more than 270,000 undocumented workers, and they’ve been excluded from hundreds of millions of dollars in economic relief during the pandemic so far, including the $1,200 stimulus checks that went out in April and the $600 additional unemployment benefits that most workers received. 

Despite the fact that undocumented workers are overrepresented in the some of the industries hit hardest by the pandemic — like restaurants and hospitality — many are still facing a complete loss of income. Without any income support, many workers are left with no choice but to seek out some kind of work, despite being high-risk themselves or having family members who are high-risk — that’s a problem when it comes to controlling the spread of the virus and protecting the public health. To tackle this public health crisis effectively, all workers must have economic security.  

But at its current size, the Worker Relief Fund simply won’t get emergency relief to everyone who needs it. That’s why, from the start, our coalition has been calling for at least $100 million — and it’s why we’ll continue to fight to make sure the state invests another $60 million into the fund. 

Federal rules continue to bar undocumented workers from accessing unemployment insurance. These new one-time payments aren’t enough for any unemployed worker to weather this massive economic crisis. We need the Governor and the state legislature to step up and create a permanent income support system for undocumented workers.

We’ll be keeping the pressure on our elected officials and continuing to push the state to invest in a strong safety net for everyone, regardless of immigration status: all workers should have economic security, especially during times of crisis.

More than one hundred workers at the Allan Bros fruit packing house walked out on strike in May after 14 co-workers tested positive for COVID-19 and the company didn’t take the appropriate steps to keep people safe. Their call for hazard pay and COVID safety protections quickly spread across the Yakima Valley, with more than 1000 workers joining picket lines at seven different packing houses.

Read what two Yakima workers had to say about the dangerous conditions that led them to walk off the job:

Angelina

“My coworkers and I went on strike due to the hazards we’re facing at work because of the coronavirus. We have very little safety right now inside the plant. We’re not given the proper equipment to protect ourselves or our families when we go home. 

I don’t see how they’re protecting our health. I’m one of the many who was infected with the coronavirus. Some of my coworkers have two year olds, elderly people they take care of, and I wanted to be considerate of others and protect them as well. I let my immediate supervisors know once I knew I was sick with the virus. But they never told any of my coworkers that I was even sick, that they had been exposed. Nothing whatsoever, even though I gave management permission to use my name so that my coworkers could be made aware of the hazard they were put in.

I have a coworker who was removed from her job area when she complained she was sick. Immediately they put someone else there to continue her  job duties, without disinfecting the area or letting anybody else know that she might have the virus. The company does not pay you when you get sick, therefore there are people that will not report that they’re sick — and will come to work sick — because they know they’re not gonna get paid for the time they miss. 

This is something that we endure every single day. Now that the virus has become hazardous to our health, we don’t get consideration from the company. Not even just to give workers a little heads up if we’ve been exposed, so we can go home and protect our family. We’re expected to just come to work — and if you get sick, you get sick.

When I started here working at Allan Bros. back in October, I was never really trained for the job. They had the understanding that I was just gonna start working and understand the process of how it’s done. 

My job is stressful. Due to the rapid flow of the apples, at times we don’t get breaks to go to the restroom or to drink water, which is really hard on our health. There are people who have fainted while they’re packing because of the rapid work environment. There’s a particular machine that gives us a lot of back-ache and knee pain. This is a machine that’s run at such a fast pace that really it’s not friendly to humans. It’s friendly to productivity. 

They expect you to grab three or four apples at a time. Sometimes, we can’t feel our arms, we can’t feel our fingers, we can’t feel our knees. If you don’t work at this fast pace, they call attention to you. You can get in trouble for not working fast enough. 

We have tried to address these concerns with our supervisors. The machines are causing us long-term injuries, but when we report any injuries, we’re told that it’s arthritis. Some of my coworkers have had injuries for years, because of the rapid workflow that we endure during our ten-hour shifts.

I don’t see how they’re protecting us or our families. We don’t want to fear that our employer is going to retaliate against us because we speak out. When the visitors come in for inspections, they run the machines slower. When they leave, those machines run so fast that the apples go on the floor. 

I am afraid to go back to Allan Brothers. I already got sick once. I don’t see them taking any necessary measures to protect us, and I don’t trust the safety measures they’ve taken so far. I hope that with us speaking up, I hope everybody understands where we’re coming from. It’s not just a money issue. It’s our health. It’s our family. It’s everybody’s well-being, not just ours.”

Felicitas

“I started working for Allan Bros. in 2006, so it’s been about 14 years, each one of them earning minimum pay. I earn $13.50 now. I’ve always earned the minimum wage the entire time I’ve worked here. 

I went on strike because there’s a lot of discrimination at Allan Bros. If we don’t do this, it’ll never stop inside. 

At Allan Brothers, they don’t want employees who have work restrictions. They told me that if you don’t have a paper that documents medical restrictions, they can put you to work where they want. And the instant you bring a note, they’ll send you home. If you’re sent home, they don’t pay you, and people have to pay their bills.

I injured my hip while at work back in May 2018, so I’ve been working injured for the past two years. They make me do all the work as though I’m in good health, even though I told my floor supervisor that I couldn’t complete this work. One time she almost made me cry. I told her that I couldn’t do packing, because it hurts so much to bend and turn. She just told me to “keep packing.” 

This treatment is humiliation. She didn’t care about my situation. This doesn’t seem like fair treatment to me. It’s painful for me to work the bag machines. You have to quickly grab five bags, and keep turning and turning, which causes me even more pain. I push through the pain with pills and everything, but I have to continue working like this because it’s a necessity. 

I don’t think that Allan Bros. has given supervisors training in how to treat other people. They need to give the floor supervisors classes in how to treat employees with respect. I think they should be taught how to ask, “Would you help me, please?” They don’t do that.

As workers, we all have rights and we should assert our rights, because if we don’t assert them ourselves, the employers aren’t going to respect them. We have to do it ourselves. 

For me, I’ll stay on strike until they give us a good response. I’ll stay here until they tell us that they’ll give us a wage increase, until they say that they won’t retaliate against us, that they won’t humiliate us — all of that. And until there’s better safety measures. Everything they now have inside the plant, in terms of safety, they have because of all of us who went on strike. There weren’t masks, they didn’t have any kind of protection. The workers inside are already benefiting from the things that we’ve done.”