--- On Thu, 3/10/11, United Farm Workers <[email protected]> wrote:
Help outraged farm workers go to
Sacramento to demand justice
It's official. Farm workers’ lives are not worth much in the courts of justice
in California. On Wednesday, a Stockton, Calif. judge accepted a plea deal
letting criminal defendants escape any jail time for the 2008 heat death of
pregnant 17-year old farm worker Maria Isavel Vasquez Jimenez.
Farm workers are outraged. They know what the decision the judge made means for
them. It means there is no justice in the fields, and that growers and
contractors can continue to do what they want and not go to jail.
Can you help them fight back? One hundred farm workers want to go to Sacramento
next Tuesday to lobby for a bill that was just passed by the Senate Labor and
Industrial Relations Committee yesterday. The Fair Treatment for Farm Workers
Act (SB 104- Steinberg) or "Majority Sign-Up Legislation" will give farm
workers a tool to enforce the laws designed to protect them, because it is
obvious the state of California cannot protect farm workers.
To do this, however, there are expenses. Transportation and food alone for two
busloads of farm workers will cost $4,734 or $45.52 per worker. Can you make a
donation to help workers get on the bus?
Rosalba Flores
explains, "I want to come and lobby on March 15 to continue to support Maria
Isavel so that we continue to seek justice in her case and for all farm
workers. I believe that the laws designed to protect farm workers have failed
Maria Isavel and continue to fail all of us. It is clear to me that the laws
are more favorable to the growers instead of the farm workers. On March 15 I
want to ask the legislators to help us so that we can protect ourselves and our
rights. We hope that you can offer a small donation so that my co-workers and I
can come to Sacramento to fight for our rights and so we can prevent tragic
heatstroke deaths like Maria Isavel’s."
Isabel Rojas
continues, "To make matters worse, it was degrading that her employers were
able to get probation for her death. She died and they get probation??!! They
should have been punished more severely. Is a farm worker's life not valued?"
Jose Alfredo
Ramos adds, "I am very interested in going to Sacramento with the union so that
we can ask those in charge to take a stand, to change the laws and make them
fair to us farm workers in California. We don't want to continue to die in the
fields when we are forced by unscrupulous farmers to work in extreme
temperatures. Just like Maria Isavel Vasquez Jimenez was left to suffer in the
heat and ultimately die."
Please help farm workers get
legislation that would make it easier to protect themselves. The state failed
Maria Isavel. They failed at least 14 other farm workers who have died of heat
illness since 2004, and they failed so many other farm workers who can’t get
water, shade or rest. We know the budget-ridden State of California cannot put
enough money into the ALRB or CalOSHA to protect farm workers and enforce the
laws on the books. And now we also know we cannot rely on the court system to
fix the problem. It's time for farm workers to have a tool where they can
protect themselves. That's what workers plan to tell their elected
representatives on Tuesday.
Could you help one worker get on the bus with a donation of $45.52? Or even
sponsor two or three workers?
https://secure.ufw.org/page/contribute/sacro311
Check out our website at: www.ufw.org and keep up with the latest news.
See the latest Maria Isabel news clips at:
http://action.ufw.org/marianews
More on SB104 at: http://action.ufw.org/sb104
Check out the UFW's Social Networking pages. Click to visit our
Facebook Fan Page, Facebook Cause, YouTube, Flickr, MySpace,and Care2
pages. Please link to us and become our "Friend" and follow us on Twitter to!
If you received this message from a friend, you can sign up for the UFW List
Serve.
Please add us to your safelist: Please add [email protected] to your address
book so that our messages don’t get trapped in your spam filter. If you have
questions about how to do this, drop us an e-mail. Privacy PolicyThis email was
sent to [email protected] Farm Workers, P.O. Box 62, Keene, CA
93531, http://www.ufw.org
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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