For simultaneous interpretation equipment to enable full participation of all DWU members of different linguistic backgrounds, and an LCD projector for visual presentations in both member leadership training programs and for public education.

New Technology Infrastructure

www.domesticworkersunited.org

$5,000

Domestic Workers United [DWU] is a membership-based organization of Caribbean, Latina and African domestic workers organizing to build the power of the domestic workforce, raise the level of respect for domestic work, establish fair labor standards in the domestic work industry of New York City and help build a movement to end exploitation once and for all. In the coming year, DWU will continue to build an actively engaged membership base of domestic workers, fight for a Domestic Workers Bill of Rights in New York State, and continue developing leadership from among its membership. In order to achieve these goals, DWU requests support from the Progressive Technology Project for the purchase of simultaneous interpretation equipment and an LCD projector.

DWU’s membership represents different linguistic backgrounds – primarily English and Spanish, and Brazilian Portuguese and French. DWU has over 1,000 members, with about 200 that attend events regularly and 60 that are actively organizing in committees and attending regular meetings. Our members are from the Caribbean (Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Lucia, Trinidad), Africa (Democratic Republic of Congo, Ivory Coast, Tanzania, Zambia), and Latin America (Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico). The purchase of simultaneous interpretation equipment, which we have needed to borrow with some difficulty over the past number of years, would enable DWU to build our multilingual capacity to be able to organize effectively across languages and facilitate full dialogue, participation, and leadership of all members.

Indeed, the cornerstone of DWU is the power of our membership. In addition to our general meetings and events, we have structured programs that support the development of worker-leaders. An LCD projector would enable worker-leaders and organizers to make effective visual presentations during these trainings.

Finally, an LCD projector would also provide critical technology for DWU’s fight for a Domestic Workers Bill of Rights in New York State. Our public speaking engagements – educating employers and legislators – raise consciousness around domestic work. Specifically, we are building the movement of support for domestic workers rights in New York through the promotion of research from our recently released, unprecedented report titled, “Home Is Where the Work Is: Inside New York’s Domestic Work Industry.” We are currently planning a statewide speaking tour as well as a national meeting of domestic worker organizations in the spring of 2007 to bring national attention to the statewide initiative and support the development of the national domestic workers movement.

Founded in 2000, DWU has already created significant change in the domestic work industry through collaboration with existing domestic worker organizations, the building of a grassroots membership base of over 1,000 workers, the establishment of the first Nanny Training Course, a job skills and leadership skills course for nannies by nannies that has graduated over 300 workers, the passage of groundbreaking legislation in New York City in support of dignity for domestic workers, and convening two conventions of domestic workers where over 400 workers collectively shaped a statewide campaign for a Domestic Workers Bill of Rights.

The domestic work industry, particularly in global cities like NYC, is expanding, providing the lifeline of care that enables employers to go to work. By all estimates, this industry will continue to grow. Yet, working conditions have improved little since the turn of the century. Once a field for predominantly African American women, it is now dominated by immigrant women fleeing the widespread devastation left by the globalization process in the global South, in search for a means to support their families. For many immigrant women, domestic work is one of few options available for wage labor. Virtually every domestic worker is isolated in her working conditions. DWU receives on average three calls per day of domestic workers who’ve suffered some form of mistreatment or violation.

DWU is a membership-based organization of Caribbean, Latina and African domestic workers organizing to build the power of the domestic workforce, raise the level of respect for domestic work, establish fair labor standards in the domestic work industry of New York City and help build a movement to end exploitation once and for all.

DWU’s organizing model is comprised of 5 key result areas. The requested technology – simultaneous interpretation equipment and an LCD projector – will advance our organizing in the following ways:

Basebuilding – This is the cornerstone of our organization, because we believe that our power as an organization comes from the membership. This year, DWU has engaged in a thorough planning and goal setting process to increase our membership in numbers and participation by 10%. Members are recruited into general meetings, monthly “hang outs,” the Nanny Training Program, and our ongoing actions and activities. DWU’s membership is growing and becoming more diverse, as our Latina membership, in particular, expands significantly. In order to effectively build our power as an organization of and for all domestic workers, we need to ensure the full participation of all members and to facilitate communication across the languages spoken by all members without any hindrance.

At our recent biannual retreat (October 2006), DWU’s Steering Committee – comprised of 12 full-time domestic workers and three organizers – identified multilingual capacity building a priority issue for the organization. We reviewed our current capacity and assessed what has worked and what still needs improvement. We also developed a collective understanding of what a multilingual space means to us and identified organizational commitments for realizing this vision.

Thus far, DWU has relied on borrowing or renting simultaneous interpretation equipment. This situation has presented challenges for us in terms of availability, cost, and knowledge of equipment handling (managing noise interference, battery power loss, etc.). In spite of these issues, we have found that a simultaneous interpretation system offers the best option for meeting our goal of ensuring members’ full participation and dialogue.

Specifically, as our membership grows, we envision having “bi-directional interpretation” taking place at our monthly general meetings, which on average have 40 members present. This means that everyone would wear headsets, and simultaneous interpreting would be happening in English and Spanish, for example. At our retreat, we realized that our current set-up is such that only our Latina members wear headsets, thereby unintentionally creating a separation from the rest of the group, which is English-dominant.

The awareness of this unintended effect – rooted partly in the limited number of receivers available to us and partly in a slow but gradual consciousness-raising process around how language functions in organizing generally – led us to initiate discussions at the Steering Committee level about language and power in the United States (see below).

Leadership Development – We have three structured programs annually that support the development of worker-leaders in DWU. The first is the Leadership Training Program [LTP], held in the summers for three consecutive Saturdays, to provide organizing skills and political education training for members who want to evolve their role in the organization. The second is the Advanced Leadership Training Program [ALTP], which is held in the early fall, for LTP graduates to focus on training members in the development of strategy and analysis of conditions for the low-wage workers movement. Finally, there’s the Organizer-in-Training program [OiT], which is a stipend program for worker members that combines training, focused discussion, and concentrated time in the field to do outreach and basebuilding work.

For these programs, we will be incorporating sessions on developing our analysis of language and power and the impact on building the racial justice, women’s and labor movements of which DWU is part and committed to helping strengthen. Our analysis is emerging from a desire to intentionally use language to build among all domestic workers and our allies. Our use of simultaneous interpretation equipment and understanding of the important role it plays is one critical part of this larger effort.

Grassroots Campaigns – Our current overarching campaign is for a Statewide Bill of Rights for domestic workers in New York. In the next two years we will continue building towards the passage of the Bill. This year, in the summer and fall, we will be bringing a team of lawyers and members to Albany to negotiate with legal staff for the legislature about their concerns with the Bill. In addition, we are building the movement of support for domestic workers rights in New York through the promotion of research from our recently released, unprecedented report titled, “Home Is Where the Work Is: Inside New York’s Domestic Work Industry.” We will be doing a statewide speaking tour and preparing to host a national meeting of domestic worker organizations in the spring of 2007 in order to bring national attention to the statewide initiative and support the development of the national domestic workers movement. An LCD projector would enable us to make effective visual presentations of our important research, thereby continuing to shift the debate around domestic work by providing research and data about the industry and workforce that has never existed. This data, in addition to the ongoing organizing, is making it impossible for the struggles of domestic workers to remain invisible and unrecognized.

Alliances – Our key partners include the five local domestic worker organizations that comprise the Domestic Workers Justice Coalition: Andolan Organizing South Asian Workers, Unity Housecleaners, Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees, Women Workers Project of CAAAV and Damayan Migrant Workers Association. Through this coalition, we are building a movement for domestic workers rights in New York State and working toward establishing fair labor standards. Like DWU, these groups, each with their independent membership base of domestic workers, represent different linguistic backgrounds. The affiliate organizations participate in DWU’s overarching campaign for a Domestic Workers Bill of Rights – it’s underlying and collectively-generated political analysis and frame emerge from discussions and leadership training programs. Being able to provide simultaneous interpretation with the necessary and adequate equipment would facilitate meaningful discussion among more members and strengthen these organizational relationships.

This is important for DWU’s work, because DWU is a movement-building organization and seeks to build a movement for domestic workers and broad social change. A movement is made of strong relationships between organizations and coordinated strategies. There is a constant relationship of mutual support between the groups around their autonomous areas of work. DWU’s work does not overlap with that of the other organizations, and is not a coalition or an umbrella, rather there is an incredibly strong working relationship and commitment to movement-building among us.

Organizational Development – Currently, we are working to strengthen our structure and processes through a series of organizational development discussions at the Steering Committee level. Among discussions focused on future staffing plans, dues paying structure, and other questions related to the operations, governance and structure of the organization, we are also seriously addressing the issue of making the leadership of the organization more representative of its growing membership base. Our own simultaneous interpretation equipment will enable DWU to maximize the leadership potential of the emerging core of Latina members. Specifically, with the infrastructure that such technology will help us to set up, we will be able to create the conditions for meaningful and effective transition and integration in the Steering Committee – the governing body of DWU.

Because DWU already has experience with the use of simultaneous interpretation equipment and LCD projectors, we will train ourselves on the use of the equipment we purchase and train our member leaders and volunteers.

The DWU Steering Committee evaluates the effectiveness of DWU’s work twice a year, and then conducts an evaluation with the general membership annually and at the end of every major project. DWU evaluations assess campaign progress, whether we’re building on past lessons, how much power we have collectively to have an impact, member leadership development, engagement of new members, retention of old members, and the level of unity among members. Evaluations are made based on our long-term goals (build power of domestic workers as a workforce; raise the level of respect for domestic work; establish fair labor standards in the domestic work industry; help build a movement to end racism, sexism and exploitation once and for all) and annual objectives for each of the five areas in our organizing model.