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Spring Fundraiser
How Much Do You Need to Be In Top Tax Bracket? See Video
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Press Conference for "Fair Share Plan"
Employee Free Choice Act Gets Support.
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THE TIME IS SHORT
WFP Fights for Affordable Housing in Yonkers
The Yonkers Affordable Housing Ordinance, adopted to comply with a Long Term Housing Plan Order of the U.S. District Court
in 1988, is set to expire with the lifting of that order on December 31, 2008, and WFP is working with other housing advocates
to make sure the City Council extends the life of the original ordinance and that it covers the entire city. Council President
Lesnick and Councilmember McDow have submitted strong legislation drafted by WFP that would achieve those ends, but on November
24, Mayor Philip Amicone submitted an alternative proposal, and while there is certainly room for compromise between the two
proposals, we believe the Mayor’s version would substantially weaken the ordinance.
The Lesnick-McDow proposal calls for developers of 10 or more units to set aside 20% at below market rates, although it
allows for 10% in high- density areas. The Mayor’s proposal calls for 10% set asides city-wide in developments
of 20 units or more.
The Lesnick-McDow ordinance targets residents earning between 50% and 100% of area median income; the Mayor’s proposal
raises income levels to 60% to 120%.
The Mayor’s proposal also allows developers to meet the set-aside requirement by building units off-site while the
Lesnick-McDow ordinance calls for on-site construction of affordable units.
The Mayor’s proposal allows developers to make payments of 33% of the cost of building a market-rate unit to a Yonkers
Affordable Housing Fund in lieu of actually building affordable units; the Lesnick-McDow legislation allows no such buyout.
The size of the payments proposed by the Mayor are so low as to encourage builders not to build the units, and they are insufficient
to cover the actual cost of production of an affordable unit elsewhere.
In the next few weeks the Council will seek to reconcile the two proposals in order to assure that the Yonkers Affordable
Housing Ordinance does not expire and that developers, who stand to reap huge profits and who are being helped with city aid
and tax abatements, are required to provide affordable housing for working families in Yonkers. Whatever ordinance is finally
adopted will have a far-reaching impact on the future of Yonkers and its residents.
There is a crisis in workforce housing in Yonkers! As long ago as 2004, 21,143 families in Yonkers were paying more than
30% of their income for rent or more than 50% for home ownership; 3,300 families were living in overcrowded conditions. The
situation is worse today!
Get involved in the deliberations on this important legislation. Let the Council and the Mayor hear your voice on behalf
of working people.
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 Buy Union Made for the Holidays
(The WFP)..."Its field operation [is] second-to-none" -Daily News
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Fair Taxes! There's a Better Way.
Calculate Your Property Taxes Under The Fair Tax Plan
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"I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change
all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled
again
Don't get fooled again
Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss."
Peter Townsend, 1971
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"After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq
without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war-torn country or in the greater conflict
against extremism."
- LT. GEN. RICARDO S. SANCHEZ, the retired former top commander of American forces in
Iraq.
Our Veterans Need Help!
The food pantry at Montrose Veterans Hospital has asked for help. Many men and women have served our country
or are currently serving our country and they now need help to feed themselves and /or their families. We are asking you to
help them by bringing food to the Westchester-Putnam Central Labor Body 595
WEST HARTSDALE AVENUE. WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK 10607. TELEPHONE: (914) 328-7988 which they can
give to the Montrose Veterans Food Pantry. Or if you know where the pantry is, maybe you can deliver it yourself. They
need all kinds of non-perishable food but especially:
Hot and cold cereal
Peanut Butter
Canned meats, fish,etc.
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"I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war
is largely about oil" ------------------Alan Greenspan, September, 2007
"We proposed a bold initiative, an initiative that takes equities out of the system, so people are treated fairly. "
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George W. trying to make sense.
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Bill Clinton Endorses Paid Family Leave
and Public Unions.
"I think it would be a good thing if there were more
unionization among public employee workers, hotel and restaurant workers, all the service jobs that cannot be outsourced.
Many of us who access those jobs are above average income. I think about it every time I give a speech to a charity banquet
in New York City. I think about how wealthy those of us are who are there participating in the charity, and I wonder how much
money do people make who have to clean up after us after we leave and who serve and prepare the food while we’re there.
So that’s a strategy that we ought to embrace.
And then we need to, finally, get back on this paid leave
issue. I think there’s more support for it than ever before, and there’s lots of evidence that it increases productivity.
Any time you can create an environment where people at work are not worried sick about their parents or their kids, they’re
going to do better at work."
We wonder if he reconsiders giving us NAFTA?
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So maybe that’s why when Bush touts the nation’s low unemployment rate, few people outside Wall
Street cheer. They are too busy working several jobs to make ends meet.
The Mobility Agenda, a special initiative of Inclusion, a virtual think tank affiliated with the Center for Economic and Policy Research, finds that since 2001, there has been a sharp decline in wages for workers at the bottom third of the wage
scale. Worse, reviewing the evidence on economic mobility, the authors of Understanding Low-Wage Work in the United States conclude:
In the U.S. labor market, it is not possible for everyone to be middle class, no matter how hard they work.
Moreover, it has been getting harder to do over time.
The typical American full-time worker ended last year making
$659 a week, or $34,268 a year, just 1.9 percent up from the typical paycheck a year earlier. At the other end of Corporate
America's pay spectrum, the ten CEOs at the top of the annual USA Today
pay list — published this past spring — averaged $34,268 every four minutes
The portion of national income earned by the top 20 percent of households grew to 50.4 percent last year, up from 45.6
percent 20 years ago; the bottom 60 percent of U.S. households received 26.6 percent, down from 29.9 percent in 1985, according
to the Census Bureau. Meanwhile, average pay for corporate chief executive officers rose to 369 times
that of the average worker last year, according to finance professor Kevin Murphy of the University of Southern California;
that compares with 131 times in 1993 and 36 times in 1976
“The majority of the American people (55 percent) think the war in Iraq is a mistake and that we should get out.
The majority (65 percent) of the American people want single-payer health care and are willing to pay more taxes to get it.
The majority (86 percent) of the American people favor raising the minimum wage. The majority of the American people (60 percent)
favor repealing Bush's tax cuts, or at least those that go only to the rich. The majority (66 percent) wants to reduce the
deficit not by cutting domestic spending, but by reducing Pentagon spending or raising taxes. The majority (77 percent) thinks
we should do "whatever it takes" to protect the environment. The majority (87 percent) thinks big oil companies are gouging
consumers and would support a windfall profits tax. That is the center, you fools. WHO ARE YOU AFRAID
OF?"-------------------------Molly Ivans, talking to the Democrats.
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"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and
could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration"...........Abraham
Lincoln, April 1860
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George W. Bush is Listening! So Use Big Words.
The means of defense against foreign danger historically have
become the instruments of tyranny at home. .......
James Madison, a real President.
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