February 8, 2019
On a recent Saturday in January at Corpus Christi Church in the 7th Ward, Curiel stood in the afterglow. A workers’ forum aimed at “bringing immigrants out of the shadows” had just concluded. And it was jointly organized by the Southeastern Louisiana Building and Construction Trades Council and three community organizations focused on workers’ rights and economic justice – Step Up Louisiana, the Workplace Justice Project and the New Orleans Workers’ Center for Racial Justice, a grassroots group founded after the storm by immigrants and African Americans.
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Organizers said the goal on Jan. 26 was to educate immigrant workers about their rights and highlight what they say is a common problem that hurts unions and immigrant workers alike: the misclassification of workers as independent contractors – rather than employees – by construction contractors and subcontractors.
When you call an employee an independent contractor – when they are actually an employee – that allows you to not pay workers’ compensation, not pay social security and not pay time and a half for overtime. Not only is the worker being exploited, it’s creating an unfair playing field for the contractors that are actually doing the right thing,” said Chip Fleetwood, marketing manager with the Painters and Allied Trades International Union, District Council 80, in Kenner.
Union contractors are even more disadvantaged when bidding on jobs, because they are also paying for the health and welfare benefits of unionized workers, Fleetwood added.