After the Deluge-Big Easy organizers confront racial tensions

[Omaha Steve]

FULL story: http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2794/



After the Deluge
Big Easy organizers confront racial tensions
By Jane Slaughter

In New Orleans, the history of work in this country over the last 15 years was compressed into six months,” says Saket Soni, an organizer for the New Orleans Worker Justice Coalition, one of several groups reaching out to workers in the post-flood city. To give workers a voice in its reconstruction, he says, the Coalition must somehow bring together new Latino immigrants with displaced New Orleanians, mostly African Americans, who are still struggling to return to the city.

Before the levees broke, Latinos made up three percent of New Orleans’ population. Today, they’ve risen to 20 percent, as immigrants seeking work in demolition and construction have arrived from other U.S. cities and from south of the border. A study by Tulane University and the University of California, Berkeley found that nearly half the reconstruction workers in the area are Latinos.


Jose (R) from Mexico and Christian from Honduras perform "house leveling" work on a home in New Orleans damaged by Hurricane Katrina.


Before the levees broke, Latinos made up three percent of New Orleans’ population. Today, they’ve risen to 20 percent, as immigrants seeking work in demolition and construction have arrived from other U.S. cities and from south of the border. A study by Tulane University and the University of California, Berkeley found that nearly half the reconstruction workers in the area are Latinos.

As in the rest of the country, these two groups are mostly not talking to each other. According to a new report from the Advancement Project, which worked closely with the Coalition to interview more than 700 workers, “The perception is that workers of color are competing for jobs. The reality is that private contractors are competing for the cheapest labor.” Both unions and social justice organizations say they will need to confront divisive stereotypes if they are to improve workers’ conditions.