November 28th, 2023
Wage Empowerment Workshop
For months, Work With Dignity and Political Ed Committee members have been working towards a workers’ rights & organizing training focusing on wage theft, which is one of the biggest problems we’ve seen workers struggle with in Southern Maine in the past few years. It’ll cover common types of wage theft + how we can protect ourselves…
Read MoreOctober 27, 2023
The Fight Against Israeli Apartheid Is A Fight For Freedom For Us All
SMWC stands with Palestine and all people around the world who are taking to the streets, airwaves, and halls of power to demand an immediate ceasefire in Israel/Palestine, and an immediate end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. Demanding a ceasefire comes from an immediate need to stop the loss of life, both Palestinian and Israeli. The…
Read MoreFebruary 7th, 2022
Portland to consider reinstating hazard pay for workers
The Portland City Council will discuss bringing back hazard pay on Monday. That would effectively raise the minimum wage for workers in the city. Hazard pay only took effect for a few days at the beginning of the new year but ended with the city’s state of emergency. The new amendment up for debate Monday night…
Read MoreFebruary 4th, 2022
Pandemic calls for us to rethink impossible expectations of teachers
The role of the teacher in this crisis environment has been impossibly expansive: All at once, a teacher may have to serve as a student’s content expert, surrogate parent, social worker, mentor and tech support professional. Before vaccines were available, teachers were at a higher risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19. Yet teachers continued to assume…
Read MoreFebruary 1st, 2022
Workers hold rally to call on Portland to reinstate hazard pay
Portland City Councilors are being asked to reinstate hazard pay for minimum wage workers. The hazard pay ended last month when the council terminated the COVID-19 pandemic state of emergency. In 2020, Portland voters approved a new minimum wage that included a hazard pay provision for essential workers during a state of emergency.
Read MoreFebruary 1st, 2022
Portland council will consider whether to restore hazard pay for workers
The Portland City Council will consider whether to bring back emergency hazard pay for workers while the city’s mask mandate remains in effect. “It’s not a perfect solution. It’s not a permanent solution,” said Councilor Victoria Pelletier, who is sponsoring a hazard pay amendment to the mask ordinance. “But it’s at least something so that…
Read MoreJanuary 12th, 2022
USM center will build on historian’s legacy by strengthening labor education
Nine pizza workers recently walked out of a Portland pizza shop because of onerous working conditions; Bull Moose is planning to sell its stores to its employees in an ESOP, and Bates College has filed with the National Labor Relations Board to interfere in an attempt by workers to unionize. These were all stories in the Portland Press Herald on…
Read MoreApril 2, 2021
SMWC is hiring an Executive Director! (Extended Deadline)
About the Southern Maine Workers Center The Southern Maine Workers’ Center (SMWC) is a membership organization committed to creating a people-powered movement that improves the lives, working conditions, and terms of employment for working and poor people in Maine— particularly low-wage workers, young people, immigrant workers, and people of color. SMWC conducts transformative grassroots organizing…
Read MoreFebruary 4, 2016
Answering This Moment: Poor White Folks & Organizing in Maine
The below is a reflection from a Health Care is a Human Right member who was prompted by a fellow organizer with Put People First! Pennsylvania to write this piece. We hope it will spark conversation & critical thinking across our membership, and among white people in Maine more broadly. My father grew up in…
Read MoreSeptember 28, 2015
A SMWC Love Letter to Lew
DEAR PEOPLE OF LEWISTON, What a week y’all just had! The Good Food Bus got rolling, bringing much needed fresh, local, and affordable foods to people of Lewiston, Auburn, and Bath. The Tree Street Youth Center began its first week of enrichment classes. The 21st Century Lewiston High School leadership program is now 50 students…
Read MoreJune 15, 2015
Joining Our Voices For Justice: One Member’s Story
On Sunday, May 31st Health Care is a Human Right organizers were invited by a new member-organizer and congregate of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Sanford to participate in a special service and discussion focused on health care justice. Reverend Sue Gabrielson focused her powerful sermon on a 1992 resolution by the UU General Assembly…
Read MoreMay 1, 2015
A Belief In Caring For One Another: Building the HCHR Movement with Faith Communities
Health Care is a Human Right (HCHR) organizers from Portland were blessed to spend last weekend (April 25-26) learning and building community with members of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Ellsworth. On Sunday, Cait Vaughan and Barrett Littlefield were joined by more than 15 participants for a practical training in using the SMWC health care…
Read More