Get to Know AFL-CIO’s Allied Groups: National Day Laborer Organizing Network
This is the next post in our weekly series that takes a deeper look at our allied groups. Next up is the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON).
Name of Organization: National Day Laborer Organizing Network
Mission: To improve the lives of day laborers, immigrants and low-wage workers. To build leadership and community among those facing injustice so they can challenge inequality and expand labor, civil and political rights for all.
Leadership: Francisco Aguirre serves as president of the board. Fernando Garavito serves as vice president of the board. Maria Marroquín serves as treasurer. Felix Menendez serves as secretary. Janet Hernandez is also a board member.
History: The National Day Laborer Organizing Network was officially founded in July 2001 in Northridge, California, at the first national gathering of day laborer organizations. It began as an alliance of 12 community-based organizations and worker centers dedicated to improving the lives of day laborers in the United States. The organizing that led to NDLON dates back to the mid-1980s, with efforts to educate day laborers about their civil liberties and workers’ rights. Subsequent organizing evolved to include recovering unpaid wages, preventing workplace abuses, and advocating on behalf of day laborers with police and community stakeholders. In the late 1980s, these efforts led to pilot projects that helped establish the first day laborer worker centers. Concurrently, organizing also ensured that the right to seek work at informal street-corner hiring sites was protected.
In the 1990s, local governments significantly changed how they responded to day laborers. A few municipalities became directly involved in establishing and operating day laborer worker centers. More often, they tried to drive day laborers away, first with repressive policing tactics and later through municipal codes that banned seeking work in public spaces. Organizers during this period developed a two-pronged approach to defending day laborers’ rights. First, they sued to block anti-solicitation ordinances in state courts. Then they sought to develop leadership and community among day laborers so they could effectively represent themselves to government officials, law enforcement authorities and other local stakeholders.
Leadership development moved to the heart of day laborer organizing, while intensive community building continued to evolve at informal hiring sites. The protection of labor standards, setting of minimum wages and shunning of abusive employers signaled a new, more proactive phase in day laborer organizing. Increasingly, workers were uniting to defend their rights. As day laborer organizing matured, so did the recognition that local organizations would benefit from sharing their organizing philosophy, methods and practices with their counterparts in other cities and states.
In the mid-to-late-1990s, informal exchanges between organizers led to the sharing of effective organizing tactics that were disseminated and replicated across the country. By the end of the decade, attempts were made to create a more formal collaboration among day laborer organizations. In 1999, a part-time national coordinator was hired to support an emerging collective of day laborer organizations. In 2000, a second, full-time coordinator was hired.
NDLON was officially established in July 2001, at the first National Day Laborer Convention. More than 150 day laborers and organizers, from 12 founding member organizations, participated. They focused on deciding how the new network would be organized and structured and what it would do. Among the areas defined as programmatic priorities were protecting labor and civil rights; creating day laborer worker centers; enhancing the education and organizing of day laborers; and calling for legalization of undocumented immigrants. These areas would define and guide NDLON until the following national convention.
The second National Day Laborer Convention was held in September 2002 in Silver Spring, Maryland. A steering committee was selected to help coordinate the growth of NDLON and its activities. Additional priorities included a campaign to defeat municipal anti-solicitation ordinances and a resolution to recognize and elevate the work and contributions of women day laborers and organizers.
By 2004, buoyed by the creation of dozens of worker centers as well as several notable legal and policy victories, NDLON and its member organizations were poised to increase their influence within the labor and immigrant rights movements. NDLON continued to make significant strides in establishing itself as a national vehicle for the day laborer movement. The third National Day Laborer Convention was held at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, in July 2005. Members elected the first board of directors, setting NDLON on a path to become a sustainable and independent 501(c)(3) organization. The solidification of a regional organizing strategy, another major shift in NDLON’s organizing work, enabled it to quickly respond to attacks against the immigrant community that would only intensify in the following years.
In August 2007, members met to reflect upon their collective accomplishments, review the preliminary draft of a five-year strategic plan, and reaffirm the guidelines for NDLON’s development and growth. Among the other actions that took place were educational legislative visits, affirmations of the growing relationship with the AFL-CIO and the Laborers (LIUNA), and leadership development training, as well as the distribution of leadership development materials for member organizations.
Today, NDLON has more than 78 member organizations. These organizations are united by a shared mission and common vision that day laborers can be engaged in a civil and social rights movement to recognize their contributions and rights in the United States.
Current Campaigns/Policy Agenda: NDLON publishes a monthly newspaper, La Talacha, and a staff blog. Current and recent campaigns include Somos Más Popular Committees, ¡No Más Mentiras!/No More Lies!, Day Laborer Workforce Initiative, Desde Abajo Labor Enforcement (DALE) campaign, End S-COMM: Alto Polimigra!, Adopt a Day Labor Corner Campaign, ICE Out of Our Communities, Take Action: Support Immigrant Workers Now, and Take Action Against Raids and Concentration Camps! Read about NDLON’s litigation efforts. NDLON sells branded merchandise in its online store.