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    Our Twentieth Year

    EDITORIAL Ti""'= ' f ""'dIm",,,,,,,,,,d """ tJwjflattened wide expanses ofNew York City's poorest neigh-borhoods in the 1970s did more than signal the failure ofnational urban policy. They also ignited an activist community movement that started out scrappy, rebuilding abandoned tenements, organizing tenants, demanding resources from the government.

    City Limits Community Housing News, as we were once known, wasborn of that movement in early 1976 as a newsletter for the members ofthe Association ofNeighborhood Housing Developers, headed by the lateBob Schur. Early issues included updates on the politics ofhousing andthe how-to ofsweat equity, grand strategies for redevelopment, profiles ofthe personalities making change happen.Many of hose folks are still active inNew York housing, and in the intervening years the movement has evolvedinto a multimillion dollar nonprofitindustry responsible for the rejuvenation ofmany, if not most, of hose oncedecimated low income communities.Today, poverty and disinvestment stillwreak havoc in these neighborhoods,yet, at the same time, they are alive witha luminous urban culture where millions ofNew Yorkers raise and educatetheir children, pursue their businesses,live out their lives.

    CITY LIMITSCOMMUNITY HOUSING NEWS

    149 LEADSTHE WAY~ - . - - - - ..- ..-..-----.-- ..--- ..-....-.....-... ~ . - . -,.._._-_ ...._--_ .._-_ ...--_ ......_---_._--- ..-. : , :- .....-._- ...._-_ ......_... -i : : - - = - Y ~ : ~ ; S : ; : : : ~ t ~ - : ;

    In many ways, community developers, organizers and antipovertyadvocates can be credited with saving this city's skin. Andfor 20 years,City Limits has told their stories. Today we are an independent newsmagazine still devoted to the steady rebirth of New York's neighborhoods. True, we don't bear much resemblance to the old newsletter, butthen, New York doesn't much resemble the land of Mayor Beame anymore, either.

    The political challenges are as tough as ever and the prospects forovercoming poverty at least as frightening as in years past. Still, it'sgood to be here. We hope you enjoy reading the magazine this year morethan ever.

    Cover photo by Nick White

    (ity LimitsVolume XXI Number 1

    City Limits is published ten times per year. monthly exceptbi-monthly issues in June/July and AugusVSeptember. bythe City limits Community Information Service. Inc . a nonprofit organization devoted to disseminating informationconcerning neighborhood revitalization.Editor: Andrew WhiteSenior Edito r: Kim NauerSpec ial Projects Editor: Kierna Mayo DawseyAssociate Edito r: Kevin HeldmanContribu1ing Editors: James Bradley. Rob Polner.

    Glenn ThrushDesign Director: David HuangAssistan t Designer: Paul LeishmanAdvertising Representative: Faith WigginsBusiness Manage r: Winton PitcoffProofreader: Sandy SocolarPhotographers: Ana Asan, Gregory P. Mango,

    Nick WhiteIntern: Julian Camilo PozziSponsors:Association for Neighborhood and

    Housing Development . Inc.Pratt Institute Center for Communityand Environmental Development

    Urban Homesteading Assstance BoardBoard of Directors*:Eddie Bautista. New York Lawyers for

    thePublic InterestBeverly Cheuvront. City HarvestFrancine Justa. Neighborhood Housing ServicesErrol Louis, Central Brooklyn PartnershipRima McCoy, Action for Community EmpowermentRebecca Reich, Low Income Housing FundAndrew Re icher, UHABTom Robbins, JournalistJay Small, ANHDDoug Turetsky, former City limits Ed itorPete Williams , National Urban League"Affiliations for identification only

    Subscription rates are: for individualsand communitygroups, $25/0ne Year, $35/Two Years; for businesse s,foundations. banks. government agencies and libraries.$35/0ne Year. $50/Two Years. Low income, unemployed,$10/0ne Year.City Limits welcomes comments and article contributions.Please include a stamped , self-addressed envelope forreturn manuscripts . Material in City Limits does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the sponsoring organizations .Send correspondence to: City Limits,40 Prince St., NewYork, NY 10012. Postmaster :Send address changes to Citylimits, 40 Prince St., NYC 10012.

    Second class postage paidNew York, NY 10001City Limits (lSSN 0199-0330)

    1212) 925-9820FAX 1212) 966-3407

    Copyright 1996.All Rights Reserved. Noportion or portions of th is ournal may be reprinted without the express permission of the publishers.City Limits is indexed in the Alternative PressIndexand the Avery Index to ArchitecturalPeriodicals and is available on microfilm from UniversityMicrofilms International. Ann Arbor,MI 48106.

    CITY LIMITS

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    JANUARY 1996

    THE GRID ,

    FEATURESleeping RoughGiving a hand to the down and out: is it selflessness that drives benevolence-or aish appetite for virtue? At a homeless shelter in London, a reporter explores the tensionbetween charity and need. By Kevin Heldman

    PROFILEStreet Corner LaborMiguel Maldonado and the Immigrant Workers Association organize in the isolatedof esquinas: day labor pick-up sites where workers compete with each other, confrontcontractors who don't pay and face the hostility of the community.By Julian Camito Pozzi

    PIPELINES

    Perception vs. RealityPolicymaker 's paradox: researchers now know most people use city homeless shelters asa last-ditch, short-term resource in hard times. But officials have had to shape a system tofill someone else's needs. By Andrew WhiteA Better BootstrapRaise them up-with money in the bank! Savings incentives for the poor are one versionof the new welfare future. Question is, how do you sock money away when you can barely afford to pay the bills? By Kim Nauer

    COMMENTARYCityviewMiddle Oass Instability By Michael LeoThe PressRanking Rudy By Jam esReviewSins of the Fathers By GeoffreySpare ChangeOf Progress and Pain By Rob

    DEPARTMENTS

    Briefs 6 ,7 Editorial 2Mall Mania Letters 4 , 26Some Bull, Lots of Doze Professional 2 8Student Union DirectoryJob Ads 2 9

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    BMoCholceMy husband and I are very puzzled asto why we were not interviewed for yourarticle about the death of my son , JaySharav ("Live Free or Die," December1995), Is it not a fundamental tenet ofgood journalism to get aU sides of a story,especially when there are different pointsof view? Are parents, in this case grievingparents whose gifted but disabled son diedas a result of a dysfunctional pubbc systemof care, disqualified from being heard?

    their patients, Readers should be informedabout this cover-up,You failed to mention that CommunityAccess had no viable emergency procedures that would have gotten Jay to thehospital in time to save his life. Jay wasleft to die on the stairwell outside his"intensive supportive" apartment. Why

    did the agency fail to provide the superintendent with a weekend telephonenumber in case of an emergency? Whydid a Community Access case manag...-......- ,....,. '.-,- Omitted from your article is theCommission on the Quality of CareMedical Review Board 's opinionabout the care Dr. Robert Levineprovided to our son, What did theyopine about the doctor 's apparentfailure to follow the "Physician'sDesk Reference" ClozariJ guidelines? What did they opine about er fail to show up that morning, aspromised the day before?These are the factors that contributed to our son's death, not thesmoke screen discussion about"choice" or "empowerment." What choicedid Jay have when he was left to die without dignity? The commission's attempt toside-step the issue of accountability by thestate and its licensed providers, or to softpeddle the facts, does not alter those factsor the fatal outcome of negligence. In adeceptive and particularly offensive statement, the commission 's report states: "Ageneration ago, a man like [Jay Sharav]would have spent his years confmed to astate institution," thus implying that disabled persons are somehow better off dead

    LETTERSthe lack of medical follow-up , or the doctor's failure to diagnose and treat neuroleptic malignant syndrome? The board 'sopinions and deliberations are kept secretunder the same "confidentiality" excusethat is used by New York City's ChildWelfare Administration, Thus, doctors areshielded by a state agency from having tobe accountable for the wrongful deaths of

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    as a result of the currentmismanaged system than alive a generation ago ,Vera Hassner SharavManhattanThe editors reply: In our article, we deliberately did not seek to delve into the question of responsibility for Jay Sharav 'sdeath. That question is important andshould be addressed by the press. But it iperipheral to the article we sought to writeWe intentionally left out most of thedetails of the case and decided not tospeak with the Sharav family, as well asthe psychiatrist and others. In hindsight, asfar as the Sharav family is concerned, iwas a callous decision and we regret it.What we addressed in the article wasthe issue that Vera Sharav calls a smokescreen: the movement for consumerchoice in mental health care. We agreewith her assessment that consumer choicehad bttle to do with the foul-ups that led toJay Sharav 's death , and said as much inour article. In that sense, the issue isindeed a smoke screen for some of theplayers involved,However, the Commission on theQuality of Care chose to make consumerchoice a focus of its report on the Sharavcase, catalyzing a conflict that raised corequestions about the philosophy of manycommunity-based mental health care organizations including Community Access . Itis a topic of immediate concern to thousands of advocates, consumers and theirfamilies in New York, given the amount ofpublicity given to recent calls for a morecoercive mental health system, And it is atopic that needs to be explored further byjournalists and the public.Vera Sharav 's points about examining[Colltillued 011 page 26]

    CITY LIMITS

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    financed ...On Staten Island, housing and child care are n .. n . ' ; r l ~ J " I I I I a transitional fadlity for homeless families...In Brooklyn , a young,moderate-income couple is approved for amortgage on their firsthome . .n Harlem , the oldest minority-owned flower shop has anopportunity to do business with Chemical Bank. .And throughoutthe state ofNew York, small business and economic developmentlending generates jobs and revenue for our neighborhoods .

    This is the everyday work ofChemicalBank's Community DeveloptnentGroup.Our partnership with the community includes increasing home

    ownership opportunities and expanding the availability of affordablehOUSing, prOviding the credit small businesses need to grow andcreating bank contracting opportunities for minority and womenowned businesses.

    In addition we make contributions to community-basedorganizations which providevital human services, educationaland cultural programs, and housing and economic developmentopportunities to New York'smany diverse communities.

    CHEMICALBANK -helping individuals flourish, businesses grow andneighborhoods revitalize. For more information please contact us at:CHEMICAL BANK, COMMUNl1Y DEVELOPMENT GROUP, 270 Park Avenue,44th floor , New York, NY 10017.

    Community Development GroupJANUARY 1996

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    BRIEFS ,

    Short Shots

    MALLMANIAIt's a deal sealed in concrete. After nearly a decade of

    wrangling over the future ofthe Atlantic Terminal site inBrooklyn's Fort Greene neighborhood, local activists areapprehensively watchingworkers complete the steelframe of what will soonbecome the area's first suburban-style retail mall. AtlanticCenter, as it will be called, isscheduled to open next fall.located east of the busyFlatbush-Atlantic Avenueintersection, the 365,000-square-foot building is slatedto house a massive Caldor discount department store, aPathmark supermarket andseven other discount chainsincluding an Old Navy clothingstore, Office Max , The SportsAuthority and Marshalls.Although the Caldor chain,which has agreed to rent 40percent of the mall, has filedfor bankruptcy protection, themali's developer, Forest CityRatner, is not publicly worried."Caldor is still one of theanchors," says spokespersonJoyce Baumgarten.Ted Glick, a longtimeactivist with the ATURACoalition, which fought toblock an earlier version of thedevelopment, says that manyresidents welcome theprospect of new jobs andcheaper retail prices. Still, henotes, some have discoveredthat the mali's entrances willface south and west, leavingFort Greene residents facing ablank back wall that, they fear,will attract loitering and crime .

    The Fifth Avenue Committee,

    CUNY STUDENTS NEmMOTIVATION? Try this.Georgia state universitiesoffer free tuition toGeorgia-resident studentswho maintain a "8" average or better. As a result,grades are up and universi-

    ties in neighboring statesare losing their Georgianstudents so fast, theyaren't sure what to do.Quality incentives work, itseems.GOT ACIVICS QUES-TION? Ask an immigrant.Polls show most Ameri(ans

    a neighborhood group, is planning a campaign to convincethe mali's retailers to hire localresidents and implement training programs so workers canrise quickly to managementpositions, says ExecutiveDirector Brad lander. "I feellike this can be one minimalcommunity benefit from thiswhole thing," he says.KimNauer

    have no idea that nine justi(es sit on the Su preme(ourt, or that the(onstitution is thesupreme law of the UnitedStates. Immigrants have toknow these things to passthe federal citizenshiptest. (an you name the 13original states?

    SOME BULL,LOTS OF DOZE

    In Bronx School District 10,the School ConstructionAuthority (SCA), a quasi-stateagency created in 1988 to takeover the Board of Education 'sproperty development role, isadopting its predecessor's reputation for working at a snail'space.

    PS 20, a l,200-seat schoolunder construction since 1991in the Norwood section of theBronx, was slated for completion in September 1993.The target date has been pushed backfive times. As of today, studentsaren't expected to move in untilSeptember 1996.At the outset of construc-

    tion, the work site remainedidle for months after it was discovered that the fill poured tosupport the school's foundationwas too soft. The SCA thenspent months trying to fire thegeneral contractor, KorenDiResta Inc., putting the projecton ice for months . After thecontractor was dismissed inthe spring of 1994, more delaysensued due to problems whichthe SCA blames on fumblingsubcontractors. All the while ,children in a nearby schoolhave been forced to attendschool in shifts to alleviatesevere overcrowding .When Norwood parents

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    STUDENT UNIONA small collective of CityUniversity of New York (CUNY)students on public assistanceare proof positive that the bestway out of poverty is througheducation.After witnessing a succession of federal and state cutbacks to both public universities and welfare funding,Hunter College students havebegun organizing to fight back.Driven by their determinationto maintain their welfare benefits and continue going toschool, a dozen women havestarted the Welfare RightsInitiative (WRll. an organization challenging the notion thatpeople on welfare, especially

    heard rumors recently thatanother promised deadlinewas in jeopardy, they gottogether with parents fromanother school also plagued bythe same contractor's construction delays, PS 15, and putthe heat on SCA. With organizing help from the NorthwestBronx Community and ClergyCoalition, parents invited SCAPresident Barry Light to anOctober meeting . Light senttwo subordinates who admitted that there would be stillmore delays.A month later, Lightannounced at a school boardmeeting that PS 20 would notbe ready until the end ofMarch . That effectively pushedthe school's opening to nextSeptember, because childrencannot be moved in the middleof a term .Since his appearance, Lighthas yanked his Bronx staff outof the borough , replacing themwith their Brooklyn counterparts. That might help if theSCA's troubles were limited tothe Bronx. A 1994 investigationof the SCA, initiated by StateSenator Roy Goodman (RManhattan) who sponsored thelegislation that created theagency, documents similarfoul-ups in school districtsaround the city. Goodman'sstaffers are working on a follow-up report and will not comment on their latest findingsuntil it is completed.JANUARY 1996

    students, drain taxpayer dol lars .Of the 240,000 studentscurrently in the CUNY system ,27,000 are on public assis tance. At Hunter, approximate ly 1,200 of the 22,000 studentsenrolled depend on HomeRelief or Aid to Families withDependent Children in order tostay in school. WRrs eventualgoal is to form akind of studentunion . Problem is, finding thetime to organize is tough, saysMelinda Lackey, an adjunctprofessor at Hunter Collegeand director of the initiative."Many [students) have fami lies to support and are the pri mary caregivers and bread -

    Meanwhile, Bronx parentscontinue to organize anddemand accountability fromthe agency . Gail Walker, aNorwood parent, co-presidentof District 10's Presid ents'Council and a member of thecoalition's new education com mittee, says this may be thebeginning of a long-term campaign to improve the loca lschools. "Issues like this arereally bringing parents togeth er," she says. "This is just thejumping-off point." Jordan Moss

    Resour(esYOU'VE BEEN EVICTED,but no doubt your Internetaccount is still intact, right?So log on to Tenant Net(point your WWW browser tohttp://ursula.blythe.org/TenantNetj) and find valuable answers about tenants'

    winners," she says. "Studentsin this program have poverty toovercome . They don't knowfrom one week to the next. insome cases, if they are goingto be in schooL"Lackey and two other professors at Hunter College'sCenter for Family Policy sponsored the initiative last fall.Attempting to shoehorn organizing into these mothers' busyschedules, WRI was structured as part of a course inorganizing last fall. Studentsplanned their first "studentspeak out" on welfare issues,with . guest speakers includingManhattan Borough PresidentRuth Messinger and Councilman Stephen DiBrienza. Nextsemester, the students are eligible to take a four creditinternship, where they will

    have time to reach out to otherstudents and their neighbors .The hope is that they canrecruit dozens more to join theorganizing effort, Lackey says.Ladon James, a WRIleader, is a 25-year-old sociology and urban studies major atHunter. She is also the singlemother of two boys . In thepast, she says, she supportedherself and her family throughodd jobs . Now that she hasgone back to school full-time,however, she and her two children live on an AFDC grant of$560 a month. It is barelyenough to get by, she says .That is why it is important tofight for the benefits, Jamesexplains. "Through my education," she adds,"1 will move upand out of poverty."

    Jeremy Quittner

    rights and housing regulations, as well as regularupdates on housing newsand resources. "These aretrying times for tenants,"begins the page. No lie. Butat least we can still surf the'Net.

    SOME GOOD NEWS, however slim : the city's economyis growing, ever so slowly.Retail sales are up and jobgrowth was extraordinary inSeptember and October,according to (omptrollerAlan Hevesi. Still, he pointsout in "the State of the(ity's Economy" issued last

    month, the intensity of therecession that hit in 1990put the city in a deep hole-and we're a long way fromclimbing out.

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    s

    PROFILE ,

    Miguel Maldonado,center, is on thestreets by dawnmeeting with Latinoday workers .

    :M

    Street Corner LaborLatino day laborers are exploited by fly-by-night contractors.The Immigrant Worker sAssociation is demanding afair day swages for a fair dayswork. By Julian Camilo POZ2iAaint-spattered station wagonpulls up to the corner ofRoosevelt Avenue and 65thStreet in Queens. The driverleaves the engine running. Like iron filingsaround a magnet, immigrant tradesmensurround the car. In heavy Spanish accents,they shout out their prices, beginning at$80 for the day. But the driver is looking

    for someone who will work for $40. Whenhe doesn't budge from his offer, angry tension fills the workers' voices. One man inthe crowd lifts the ladders roped to the topof the car and drops them with a disrespectful bang.Finally, a young man gets in the car andshuts the door. The others open it again.From the passenger seat, the young mansmiles sheepishly at the crowd, and persuaded by their pleas, steps back out ontothe street. The vehicle pulls away empty,bearing a few new workboot scuffmarks.

    "Fo rty dollars for a day's work!" says anindignant Salvadoran man . "That is whatwe have to fight against!"Day laborers, as they are called, arerarely this unified. The incident at theRoosevelt Avenue esquina, or day laborpick-up site, was as unusual as it was spontaneous, but it may have had somethingto do with the growing presence of

    Miguel Maldonado and his year-oldImmigrant Workers Association (IWA).Supported by the Center for ImmigrantRights, Maldonado has spent three yearsstanding on street corners, speaking withimmigrant day laborers and attempting tochange the rules in one of the city's mostexploitive labor markets. "To coordinate,empower and educate workers so they canresolve their problems themselves ....That'swhat we hope to do," he says.Understaffed and underfunded , theIWA, according to Latino day laborers, is

    the only organization willing to do thiswork. There are other immigrant rightsgroups, like the Chinese Staff and WorkersAssociation and Latino Workers Center, buttheir turf is primarily in the city's sweatshops and restaurants. Maldonado has chosen to focus on construction companies andcontractors, many so shadowy they don 'thave addresses or phone numbers.Calnful Employment

    It is daunting organizing work. Forimmigrants searching desperately for apaycheck--especially those without visasand green cards-the street corners offer arare chance at gainful employment. Here,at least, the work is a dignified mix of highskilled tradesmanship, like plumbing andcarpentry, along with lower-skilled jobs,like painting.To get a day job, however, the men mustcompete aggressively against one another.On a typical day, only one in 20 men getswork. And there is no guarantee that, at theend of the day, the employer will pay.Maldonado has a stack of dozens of bouncedchecks in his backpack, written to laborersby contractors who have disappeared, leaving behind empty bank accounts."It's an uncomfortable life, every dayenduring the insecurity of waiting," saysone worker, Jose Romero . "We don't knowwho they are, we can't speak English withthem , and they make us work like animals."Meanwhile, residents of the neighborhoods surrounding the esquinas are doingsome organizing themselves-to move theworkers out. Neighbors intimidate bothworkers and contractors with photo surveillance of corner activities. Whenevertraffic gets heavy, they call the poLice. Andin some of the worst cases, local residentstaunt the workers, making racist remarksand threatening their lives.Still, no one is looking for pity, Maldonadosays as he gazes down the boulevard, rubbinghis cold hands slowly. 'The problems won't besolved by immigration experts or sociologists.They won 'tbe resolved from the outside or thetop. This has to come from the participation ofthe workers."The esquina is a New York institutionbegun in the 1940s by Italian immigrantsand carried on by the Irish and Greeks.Today, Latinos from different countriesstand on the same corners as their predecessors, typically in front of hardwarestores frequented by contractors. All in all,there are about a half dozen Latino

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    esquinas that Maldonado knows about. Hevisits some of them daily and othersmonthly, depending on the strength of theirrelationship with the IWA.With a black mustache and a smile thatcuts deeply into his brown cheeks,Maldonado has the look of a fox who hasoutwitted the hounds. Arriving from theDominican Republic 17 years ago with adegree in economics, he found, like manyother undocumented immigrants, that theonly work available was in a garmentsweatshop. His first organizing effortbegan in 1982 as a protest against a bosswho was three weeks delinquent in payingwages. He got the money-and he gotfired. He then worked as a shop steward ina Liz Claiborne warehouse, and from there

    began a job at the local needleworkersunion as an organizer. He lost the union jobwhen he tried to organize the organizers.Maldonado says his early experiencesconvinced him that immigrant workers knowlittle about their rights and arereceptive to organizing. However, in taking onthe esquinas, Maldonado is venturing into virtually uncharted territory-for both unionorganizers and federal labor investigators.UnscrupulousContractorsAny worker, documented or not, canfile wage claims against a contractor underthe Fair Labor Standards Act, explainsJoanna Bowers, an investigator for theU.S. Labor Department 's Wage and FairLabor Division. Employers, she notes,don't have the right to break wage lawssimply because they hire undocumentedworkers. She says her division would bewilling to pursue cases against theesquinas' more unscrupulous contractorsregardless of the immigration status of thecomplainant.However, labor officials also admit thatthe department's investigative unit isextremely short-staffed. There are only 12investigators in New York City, five ofthem bilingual . Given the lack of manpower, investigators prefer to pursue largescale cases against the city 's garmentindustry employers. Sadly, day labor casesare simply too time-intensive, says John R.Kelly, assistant district director of theLabor Department 's New York City office."We 'd have to get someone undercover at 6:30 a.m. to stand on the corner, waitfor [the contractors) to come by, then follow them with a van and confront them,"Kelly says, adding wearily that, even then ,JANUARY 1996

    liThe problemswon't be solvedby immigration

    experts orsociologists.This has tocome from

    the workers."there 's no guarantee that aworker will stepforward to testify against the contractor incourt. "I could have spent this timecollecting thousands of dollars for workersfrom employers I can easily identify."Maldonado is well aware of this. Hemaintains that real change in this underground economy will not be driven bysome dramatic Labor Department investigation. lnstead, he is looking for small,pragmatic ways to improve the lot of theworkers here.

    For the time being, his focus is on educating workers to overcome their languagebarriers and their slim knowledge of theAmerican labor and immigration systems.Based in a sparsely equipped office at theSixth Street Community Center inAlphabet City, the organization is staffedby volunteer unemployed workers andfunded by donations from the workersthemselves.One key staff member is a broad-shouldered, 38-year-old Peruvian named CesarMonzon. His story is much like those ofthe other day laborers. Monzon came tothe United States hoping to find work thatwould support his family. Struggling withthe language barrier, he worked l2-hourdays, seven days a week at a fish processing plant in Brooklyn. Every week he senthome a little money. But after a month ofbeing paid below the minimum wage withno overtime and no benefits, he quit andbegan looking for work at the esquinas.Monday through Sunday, he waits from4:30 a.m. into the late afternoon for jobs. "Iwake up every morning and I go [to theesquinas) knowing I have to work. I am

    fighting to bring my family here. I ask Godthat he help me, that he won 't abandon me."Storefront SltH

    For Maldonado, the next goal of theIWA s to move the workers into storefrontsites near their esquinas. Provided he canfind the funding to pay the rent,Maldonado believes that that this ideacould go a long way toward solving manyof the problems that plague day workers.By bringing the workers indoors, heexpects to ease tensions in the neighboringcommunities. He hopes to reduce thedebilitating competition by forcing contractors to pick up workers at one siteinstead of letting them roam the block forthe best deal. And an office would giveworkers some chance of screening contractors. The IWA is compiling a list oflegitimate contractors so workers can havesome assurance that they will get theirmoney at the end of a day's work.Maldonado says he has already foundseveral buildings suitab le for the localcenters. The main problem is convincingthe laborers that this idea will work. "Inthe esquinas, the price is fixed by desperation and ignorance," he says. "If youneed to pay rent tomorrow or if you'vejust arrived from a small village, you'llwork for even $40 a day."

    Complicating matters is an inherentmistrust among workers of differentnationalities. This is clear when one visitsthe different esquinas and begins talkingwith the workers. The South Americansblame the Mexicans for undercutting theirbids. In turn, the Mexicans blame theGuatemalans, saying they are willing towork for even less . The contractors takeadvantage of this. ''There's no friendship,no bonds," says Fernando Reyes , a 29-year-old worker from Honduras. "There isjust a tendency to group by country."Maldonado maintains that the workerswill have to overcome their fear of organizing if they hope to make any lastingwage gains. "[They have to learn) whenthey arrive here they're not Peruvian ,Mexican or Salvadoran. They are just onemore worker, and that's how they're goingto be treated ," he says. "Sometimes the[workers) drop the ball, and that's whatI'm here for, to pick it up and throw it backto them." .All of the quotes in this article have beentranslated from the Spanish.

    e

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    Perception vs. Reality

    : !: ;'C