Noticias del Centro Latino de Maine

“Community without Borders”

Immigration, Trade, Workers’ Rights, Community

“Comunidad Sin Fronteras”

a talk by David Bacon

Monday April 19th 7:00 PM
@ The North Star Music Café
225 Congress St. Portland

Join us for an evening with renowned photojournalist, author, and labor organizer, David Bacon.

David will talk about how “the development of illegal status can be traced back to slavery and what the human costs are of treating the indispensable labor of millions of migrants-and the migrants themselves-as illegal.” In his book David makes a “case for a sea change in the way we think, debate, and legislate around issues of migration and globalization.”

David spent twenty years as a union organizer, and is the author of a number of books, most recently, Illegal People. His work has appeared in TruthOut, The Nation, The American Prospect, The Progressive, the San Francisco Chronicle, and other publications.
(For more about David, check out his website: dbacon.igc.org/)

(Co-sponsored by: El Centro Latino Maine, Maine Fair Trade Campaign, Maine Migrant Health Program, Maine People’s Alliance, Mano en Mano, PICA – Power in Community Alliances, Social Justice Committee of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Bangor, and University of Maine Central America Service Association, Maine Civil Liberties Union)

For More information Contact:

Daphne Loring (Maine Fair Trade Campaign) 207.777.6387 | daphne@mainefairtrade.org
Blanca Santiago (El Centro Latino Maine) 207.749.8823 | centrolatinomaine@gmail.com

Download a Flyer here: PDF

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Publicada: Martes, abril 13th, 2010   Deja un comentario

El Centro Latino de Maine

May 1st 2010- March for Immigration Reform!

Save the Date!

May 1st March for Immigration Reform!

We march for unity and dignity for all Maine families and workers!

What:
March through downtown Portland. Followed by a concert of local bands from throughout our communities.
Activities for children and food vendors will be available. We welcome all families across Maine to join us.

When:
2:30 March begins
3:30 Concert and Rally

Where:
Downtown Portland, Location to be announced shortly

Why:
We need Comprehensive Immigration Reform this year.

Unjust raids and deportations must end.
Worker’s rights must be protected.
Families must be reunited and kept together.

Communities across the country are mobilizing, we must join them.
May is our only shot this year to have a bill introduced.

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Publicada: Domingo, abril 11th, 2010   Deja un comentario

El Centro Latino de Maine

Illegal People: How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants

Event Poster (PDF)

Hello Everyone,

Please circulate this flyer about PICA’s event featuring David Bacon on April 17th (PDF).

It’s an all day event on Saturday, April 17th at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Bangor. Child care and interpreting services will be provided and the event is free. Transportation can be arranged via carpool with others driving to Bangor that day.

Questions, please call me.

Blanca (207.749.8823)

In Illegal People Bacon explores the human side of globalization, exposing the many ways it uproots people in Latin America and Asia, driving them to migrate. At the same time, U.S. immigration policy makes the labor of those displaced people a crime in the United States. Illegal People explains why our national policy produces even more displacement, more migration, more immigration raids, and a more divided, polarized society.

Through interviews and on-the-spot reporting from both impoverished communities abroad and American immigrant workplaces and neighborhoods, Bacon shows how the United States’ trade and economic policy abroad, in seeking to create a favorable investment climate for large corporations, creates conditions to displace communities and set migration into motion. Trade policy and immigration are intimately linked, Bacon argues, and are, in fact, elements of a single economic system.

In particular, he analyzes NAFTA’s corporate tilt as a cause of displacement and migration from Mexico and shows how criminalizing immigrant labor benefits employers.

Bacon powerfully traces the development of illegal status back to slavery and shows the human cost of treating the indispensable labor of millions of migrants-and the migrants themselves-as illegal. Illegal People argues for a sea change in the way we think, debate, and legislate around issues of migration and globalization, making a compelling case for why we need to consider immigration and migration from a globalized human rights perspective.

“Incisive investigation . . . Bacon’s timely analysis is as cool and competent as his labor advocacy is unapologetic. In mapping the political economy of migration, with an unwavering eye on the rights and dignity of working people, Bacon offers an invaluable corrective to America’s hobbled discourse on immigration and a spur to genuine, creative action.” – review, Publisher’s Weekly,

“Bacon, an award-winning photojournalist, labor organizer, and immigrant-rights activist, follows the lives of undocumented workers at the Woodfin Suites Hotel in California and a Smithfield meatpacking plant in North Carolina, who travel back and forth from Mexico to the U.S. He ties together interviews, personal histories, and political analysis to provide a vivid image of what life is like for workers with little rights or protections in an increasingly globalized economy.” review, Vanessa Bush, Booklist

“David Bacon is the conscience of American journalism: an extraordinary social documentarist in the rugged humanist tradition of Dorothea Lange, Carey McWilliams, and Ernesto Galarza..” – Mike Davis

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Publicada: Miércoles, abril 7th, 2010   Deja un comentario

El Centro Latino de Maine

El Centro Latino de Maine’s Spring Events

El Centro is hosting 3 important, interesting and fun events this Spring. Come join us on:

April 19th for a talk with David Bacon at the North Star Music Cafe at 7pm
April 21st at Sacred Heart Church for the film “El Norte” at the Sacred Heart Church in Portland
May 8th for a Dance Party at Bubba’s on Portland Street at 7pm

Download the flyer: Immigration Talk, Film & May 8 Dance Party Fund Raiser (PDF)

Donations gratefully accepted at all events to benefit Somos Familia/We are Family: a fund that helps individuals and families in paying visa fees.

Hope to see you at all 3! Please post and distribute widely to your email list and get the word out to everyone.

In solidarity,
Blanca

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Publicada: Martes, abril 6th, 2010   Deja un comentario

El Centro Latino de Maine

Update from MCLU on LD 1611

Hello everyone,

Wanted to get an update out about where we stand. As reported previously, we had a powerful democratic caucus earlier in the week in which a number of strong and diverse voices stood up to speak in favor of the Nutting/Schatz report and in favor of legislative reform.

On a positive note, the halls this week were literally buzzing with legislators talking and thinking about prisoners’ rights, and how we treat the members of our community that we incarcerate. It was a great feeling – and it has everything to do with all of you on this email, and the many, many more who contributed their stories, their lobbying efforts, and their support.

The goal has always been to pass; or at least have an up and down vote, on legislation (as opposed to a Resolve to do a study).

A solid, vocal core group of legislators, including Ben Pratt, Jim Schatz, Diane Russell, Jon Hinck, Sharon Treat, and others have been wonderful advocates of having a vote on Nutting/Schatz. But it’s extremely unusual, procedurally, to make this happen (nearly impossible), and the bottom line is that the Chair of the Committee decided what report is offered to the House. Since Anne Haskell is the chair, as you can imagine, she will be offering her report, which is the Resolve directing the Department to study itself. If her Resolve passes the House and gets through the Senate, we will try to amend it with an amendment we’ve prepared.

The Amendment it designed to address the 21 million dollar fiscal note slapped on Nutting/Schatz (yes, I said 21 MILLION dollars), to address allegations that the definition of SMI is so broad it covers almost anyone, yet try to retain real change.

This stripped down legislation would

  • Narrow the definition of serious mental illness (SMI) to that which is in Madrid v. Gomez
  • Require exclusion of prisoners with SMI from solitary
  • Retains some data collection/reporting about what goes on in the SMU to increase our access to information/increase transparency.
  • Strikes all of the 45 day/procedural due process language.

Our push with legislators is still to get ACTUAL legislation (not a study or a resolve) through the House and onto the Senate floor.

SO WHAT NOW?

  1. Encourage legislators to pass actual legislation on this vital human rights issue. Phone calls would be great, emails work too.
  2. Contact focus should be on YOUR legislator, and the CHAIRS of committees (listed below, with more important ones highlighted. Contact info attached to this email)
  3. You can thank Tuttle, Treat, Smith, Hinck and Martin for their support, Thank Adam Goode, Ben Pratt, Andy O’Brien, Sean Flaherty, Diane Russell, Peter Stuckey, Peter Lovejoy as well for their hard work and support – telling them to hold strong to pass legislation.
  4. Contact Senators. Let me know if you need any contact info. I can get that around first thing tomorrow morning. We’ve been very focused on the House, so contacting Senators at this stage would be very helpful.
  5. Mobilize any lists you have access to and tell them to contact their representative and senator and ask them to support passage of legislation
  6. Come to the State House Monday morning – we expect the vote in the morning, including floor speeches, and potentially a vote in the Senate (they’re trying to finish session next Wednesday). There were a number of folks against the bill in the halls today, and we had some, but it would be great to have supporters of LD 1611 present Monday to show support for our brave allies in the House and Senate. It will be 3rd floor of the State House – 9:45 until ? We will have stickers, wear black.
  7. Floor speeches – If anyone has a strong urge – we’d be happy to take written advocacy pieces between a paragraph and a page and a half – impassioned about any topic, to pass along to allied legislators. If you have time/interest in doing this, get in touch with Emily and I and we’ll work out topics so there isn’t overlap with what we’ve already written.
Rep. Wendy Pieh
Rep. Emily Ann Cain
Rep. Nancy E. Smith
Rep. Anne M. Haskell
Rep. Patricia B. Sutherland
Rep. Anne C. Perry
Rep. Herbert E. Clark
Rep. SharonAnglin Treat
Rep. Charles R. Priest
Rep. John L. Tuttle, Jr.
Rep. Pamela Jabar Trinward
Rep. Leila J. Percy
Rep. Robert S. Duchesne
Rep. Stephen R. Beaudette
Rep. Thomas R. Watson
Rep. Edward J. Mazurek
Rep. Jon L. Hinck
Rep. Dawn Hill
Rep. John L. Martin
Rep. John L. Martin

If I have missed anyone on this routing list – pass this along to them, or let me know.
THANK YOU ALL!!!

Alysia N. Melnick, Public Policy Counsel
Maine Civil Liberties Union

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Publicada: Lunes, abril 5th, 2010   Deja un comentario

El Centro Latino de Maine