Tenant Union Focus Campaign
We contacted tenants from our previous outreach efforts. We are helping one tenant draft a letter to property management and gathering information from a second tenant. We distributed flyers at multiple buildings and identified several targets for door-to-door canvassing.
Unionization Efforts
@NoraG, @Techify, @HipGnosis, and I spoke about developing a toolkit for workers organizing around ICE raid workplace training. The strategy would use a partnership with North Valley Labor Federation who offers employers free(?) training. If we put the toolkit behind a contact form, it would allow us to identify potential leaders and organizers among workers without triggering unionization suspicions. The campaign would help us create connections with workers interested in organizing, regardless of how the demand turns out, and establish follow-up opportunities for expanding organizing efforts.
Focus This Week
- General Meeting: Thursday at 6PM-8PM (Calendar)
- Tenant Union: Return to identified buildings for Tenant Association development.
- Know Your Rights: Make decisions on expanding current initiatives and broader campaign focus. We have a meeting on Friday to discuss future direction on this work.
Upcoming Events
- August 7th 6PM-8PM | General Meeting (Calendar)
August 8th 6PM-8PMRESCHEDULED | New Member Orientation (Calendar)- August 8th 6PM-8PM | Meeting at Migrant Center
- August 9th 10AM-12PM | Community Assembly (Calendar)
- August 16th 12PM-2PM | Organizing Conversations Workshop + BBQ (Calendar)
Tenant Union Events
- August 16th 10AM-12PM | Tenant Union Workshop (Calendar)
Campaigns, Side Quests, and Committee Action Items
Tenant Union
Research for Tenant Association Complaints
- Database Update: The tenant union database development continues (update here). This version tracks complaints across changes in landlords, property management, and tenants.
- Information Organization: We need a system for cataloging state, local, and county codes referenced in our letters and communications. This would build institutional knowledge about effective (or not) legal strategies rather than starting fresh with each case.
Action Items:
- Create standard operating procedures for property management follow-up after sending tenant letters.
- Finalize the tenant union handbook. We have stalled on this for months.
- Print flyers with our phone number for the next workshop. Post at bus stops (been told this is an effective strategy).
- Develop better building ranking criteria. @ckposadas, @SeanHun, and I previously relied mostly on subjective vibes and that will just create confusion in the future.
Know Your Rights
Updates
Read the complete summary from our previous group meeting here. I’ll summarize further below:
Current Limitations: Valley Watch Network’s rapid response system lacks capacity. Their San Joaquin County Signal chat has 16 members (more now I believe), but still insufficient for the geographical area. It appears only videotaped arrests receive attention, leaving many detainees without support.
Proposed Enhancements:
- Educational Materials: Create guides for identifying ICE vehicles/agents and safely recording encounters
- Dual-Track Rapid Response: Non-emergency sightings report to Valley Watch; active arrests text us for zip-code-specific alerts through solidarity.tech
- Facility Monitoring: Establish permanent presence at Stockton ICE facilities to track detainees and assist families
- Accompaniment Support: Develop materials for community members to accompany people to appointments
Outreach Strategy:
- Door-to-door canvassing with tracking system we need to develop
- Partner with churches, schools, and workplaces for material distribution
- Hold public meetings at Odd Fellows (hybrid format)
- See if there is interest in establishing community patrols at grocery stores and schools
Next Meeting: August 8th 6PM at the migrant Center
Action Items:
- Harpreet: Put all materials online
- Create ICE encounter recording script based on VWN video
- Design business flyers
- Finish KYR training materials
- Create text alert system
- Present this at General Meeting as a proposal for making this our second Focus Campaign
WCU Community Assembly
Goal:
At the last General Meeting, we voted to host monthly forums where working class people can share their ideas, concerns, coordinate, and learn from each other. Continue the discussion about these meetings here.
Action Items:
- August 9th 10AM-12PM | Community Assembly (Calendar)
WCU Article: Why Liberals Lose
Goal:
Write quarterly articles that allow WCU to offer a unique perspective or contribute meaningfully to local/left discourse (details here).
The current discussion and link to the current draft is linked here. Both @Englishpete08 and I feel like the article is not ready yet for posting. So at the General, we will be asking to delay voting to approve the article and set up one more meeting to finalize a good draft.
Reading Group
@Englishpete08 held a reading group on the article Looking Backward to Counter Mysticism and Despair by Adolph Reed, Jr.. You can watch a recording of the reading group meeting here and read a rough summary of the discussion here.
Organizing Conversation Training
We held our first Organizing Conversation last month. Thank you to @Englishpete08 and @Sauc3_L1oron_217 for attending. Overall, we thought the flow of the event went well.
Review latest draft and discussion here.
Action Items:
- August 16th 12PM-2PM | Organizing Conversations Workshop + BBQ (Calendar)
Unionizing Workplace Materials
Goal:
Develop resources for workers aiming to organize their workplaces.
Work in progress on union explainer materials; see docs here.
Action Items:
- Add useful material here.
- Suggest edits on the union explainer document.
Union of Unions Outreach
Goal:
Create a database of local unions and establish connections for mutual support.
Some have been contacted (see list here), but no response yet.
Action Items:
- Continue updating union database following these directions.