Legal Services Accomplishments

Our Legal Services Programs provide high quality legal services in immigration law, worker's rights, senior law, including tenants's rights.Our Immigration Law Program provides legal advocacy in obtaining legal residency, work permits, or citizenship where eligible. Our Senior Law Program provides legal advocacy to immigrant and disabled seniors in the areas of public benefits, tenants' rights, consumer fraud, estate planning and various kinds of abuse.  Our Workers Rights Program advocated on behalf of over 755 day laborers, domestic workers and other low wage immigrant workers who have been cheated out of rightfully earned wages or otherwise exploited by unscrupulous employers. LRCL took on 128 cases and recovered $143,370 in unpaid wages for workers.        

Organizing Accomplishments

National Domestic Worker Alliance:  This past year the Women's Collective helped found a new national alliance of domestic worker organizations.  This unprecedented multi-racial and multi-lingual alliance of domestic workers held a national domestic worker conference in New York City this past spring. Social Security No-Match: We worked with our civil liberties and labor movement allies to stop the implementation of new "Social Security No-Match" regulations that would have had devastating effects on immigrant and Latino workers and their families.  A federal judge issued a preliminary order in Oct 2007, stopping the government from enforcing this new rule that would use Social Security records for immigration enforcement.  The order prevents any implementation -- until the court makes a final ruling after trial -- of a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) rule punishing employers if they do not take action after receiving Social Security "no-match" letters.  As of April 2008 this ruling still standsNational Day Labor Organizing Network (NDLON): A historic agreement between NDLON and the AFL-CIO, which we helped to broker, led the AFL-CIO to oppose the Sensenbrenner bill and other anti-immigrant legislative provisions coming out of Congress.  NDLON:  We helped to organize in a regional conference in July 2007 and the national conference in Washington, DC in August 2007. We sent a delegation of 3 domestic workers and 3 day laborers to this national conference, where we led and facilitated several workshops.  We will continue to coordinate regional conferences over the next few years.LRCL has participated in Black/Brown Unity meetings, which have included representatives from the Black Alliance for Just Immigration, People Organized to Win Employment Rights (POWER), the CLEAR Project, and St. Peter's Housing Committee.  These organizations have been begun to develop a collective political agenda to pursue in San Francisco, issues include; repeal of the failed gang injunction, alternative community-based responses to violence, and environmental justice to end toxic pollution in neighborhoods of color.  

Day Labor Program and Women's Collective Accomplishments

The Day Labor Program provided day laborers and domestic workers with 1254 dignified living wage jobs this past year that pay $15/hour, with a 3 hour/$50 minimum for men and 3/$60 minimum for women. The Day Labor Program has offered 12 1-day mini-courses in sheet rocking and construction measurements and a total of 115 students have participated.The Women's Collective has offered 6 "Cleaning with Safety and Dignity" trainings with a total of 120 participants. The courses were led by a new team of facilitators made up of members who completed a training for trainers last fall. The Women's Collective:  A highlight of the year was the much anticipated release of "Behind Closed Doors: Working Conditions of California Household Workers", a report co-authored by the Collective with Mujeres Unidas y Activas and the DataCenter. The Day Labor Program is strategically providing technical assistance and support for day labor centers throughout the Bay Area in California. We strengthened leadership, political, and technical capacity of centers and projects in Berkeley, Concord, and Graton.  

Accomplishments of La Raza Centro Legal in the last fiscal year

Legal Services Day Labor Program and Women's CollectiveOrganizing