Advocacy group hails housing developers‘ commitments to worker protections

The program, called Building Dignity and Respect seeks to protect workers from wage theft and ensure safe workplaces.

Representatives of Hope Community and Alliance Housing say they will join the program that was partly developed by the Center of Workers United in Struggle, better known by its Spanish acronym CTUL. 

CTUL board chair Douglas Guerra says the program will improve the lives of non-union workers. He spoke in Spanish, with CTUL executive director Merle Payne translating into English.

“For years and years, we’ve seen these abuses and through this program, we’re able to eliminate the abuses and change things.”

CTUL calls the initiative groundbreaking as it aims to hold local developers to a standard where the human rights of workers are advanced. According to CTUL, when developers commit to sign on, they agree to use contractors that follow the law. 

Signers also agree to audits by the Building Dignity and Respect Standards Council, a new independent monitoring group.

Will Delaney with Hope Communities, says the organization uses union labor but wanted to be part of the program.

“We thought it’s important to still explore to make sure, so that we could have real assurance of that, and then also to send a signal to the broader industry that because this is so prevalent in housing construction, that it’s not okay.”

Workers such as post-construction cleaner Daniel Sanchez spoke of their personal experience of abuse. He filed a claim of over $135,000 in unpaid wages. Payne again translated for Sanchez.

“We’ve suffered verbal abuse, psychological abuse, and in some cases, physical abuse. But through this program, through BDR, we have the opportunity to end these abuses and create a different reality for workers.”

Payne says CTUL learned of what appeared to be a threat and took action.  

“So there was a worker who was owed wages, and when she requested her wages, her employer sent her a picture with her paycheck and then a gun sitting on the paycheck.”

He says the organization immediately contacted the employer.

“You just provided evidence of a threat if you don’t pay the worker immediately, and if we hear of any more semblance of a threat, we have a picture to turn over to the police, and you can be directly implicated.”

The employer soon paid the worker.

According to a CTUL survey, 48 percent of non-union construction workers in the Twin Cities experience wage theft. He also says 57 percent of women working in the industry say they regularly face sexual harassment, according to a 2021 survey.

Thirty percent surveyed reported that they didn’t feel they could speak out about working conditions for fear of retaliation.

A 2023 report from North Star Policy Action, an independent research and communications institute, found that several private developers who received public dollars to build affordable housing hired contractors “that have been charged with or face allegations of exploitation according to interviews with workers and industry experts.” 

Guerra also called on private developers to sign on to the program. Payne translated for Guerra.

“We are hopeful that for-profit developers are going to join this program and really step up to make a change. United Properties is one of them,” he said.

Guerra says, through Payne, that United Properties has met once with CTUL and they agreed to another meeting.

“We’re hopeful,” he said. 

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