A proposal designed to protect immigrants from threats by police and other city employees based on their race or immigration status is moving forward in the City Council.
Five Chicago aldermen want to surplus funds from a tax increment financing, or TIF, district located in their wards and use the money to help “alleviate the budget crisis” at the cash-strapped Chicago Public Schools.
Contract workers at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport are allegedly facing “rampant wage theft,” and they are calling on the city and state to investigate the issue.
O’Hare workers and SEIU* Local 1 officials discussed the wage theft allegations Wednesday morning and announced filings of wage theft complaints with the Illinois Labor Department and Chicago Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection.
The charges include 60 Chicago minimum wage ordinance violations and 20 Illinois Labor Department violations, according to the union.
At issue are security officers, baggage handlers, cabin cleaners, wheelchair attendants and other workers who are employed by O’Hare contractors, including Universal Security, Prospect Airport Services, and Scrub, Inc. The union recently conducted a wage theft survey of about 300 contracted O’Hare workers, finding that they collectively lost $1 million in wages last year.
Chicago aldermen who oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will introduce a resolution at Wednesday’s city council meeting urging the Illinois Congressional Delegation to reject the 12-nation trade agreement.
Alds. Susan Sadlowski Garza (10th), David Moore (17th), Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th) and Anthony Napolitano (41st) joined labor allies at City Hall Tuesday afternoon to announce the resolution, which is being proposed ahead of next week’s Democratic National Convention.
“We’re calling on the delegates at the Democratic National Convention to take this off part of their platform agenda so that they can look out for the working class, for the people that they are supposed to represent,” Sadlowski Garza stressed.