ROC-LA is selling shirts!

 

We're selling our new shirts! The shirts are from No-Sweat Apparel and they look awesome. And we've got a wide variety of sizes: Youth L, women's ribbed M/L/XL, Men's S/M/L/XL (E-mail Cathy to indicate size at cathy@rocunited.org). They're going for $15. You can buy one off Paypal or you can mail a check for $19 ($15 for the shirt, $4 for shipping) to us at

ROC-LA c/o MALDEF
634 S. Spring Street, #614,

Los Angeles, CA 90014

Make sure to let us know in your order what size you'd like. Please support us by rocking a ROC-LA shirt!

Report Release and Summit

Valentine's Day 2011 was an extremely exciting day for ROC-LA and all ROC affiliates. We released our first report, a comprehensive industry study of Los Angeles' restaurant industry, along with two ROC affiliates in Washington, D.C. and Miami, who also had reports for their cities. In other ROC affiliates including Chicago, NY, Detroit, and New Orleans, legislative visits to Congressional members were made to advocate for H.R. 634, WAGES Act, to increase the tipped minimum wage.  Our national day of action all took place on the same day to bring attention to the extremely low federal tipped minimum wage of $2.13. Although Valentine’s Day is the highest grossing day of the year for restaurants, many Los Angeles restaurant workers earn less than a median wage of $9.24. Can you live off $9.24 an hour or $15,000 a year while supporting a family? Despite the economic recession, the restaurant industry is growing. The National Restaurant Association recently reported earning $604 billion GDP! The living wage is possible and the industry is able to take the high road to profitability.

ROC-LA's report release at our Restaurant Industry Summit had a great turnout! 150 people showed up at Taix French Restaurant and the crowd was excited to hear about working conditions in LA's restaurants.

Our keynote speaker was Thomas A. Saenz, President and General Counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund. Our panelists included Abel Valenzuela, Jr., Director of the UCLA Center for the Study of Urban Poverty, Robert Gottlieb, Director of the Urban and Environmental Policy Institute of Occidental College, and co-author of Food Justice; and Jamie Dolkas, staff attorney at Equal Rights Advocates. We also had Jason Michaud, owner and chef of Local Restaurant in Silver Lake; Luis Hernandez, back of the house restaurant worker, and Nora Garcia, front of the house restaurant worker.

Behind the Kitchen Door: Inequality & Opportunity in Los Angeles, the Nation's Largest Restaurant Industry is the most comprehensive report ever conducted on the state of the restaurant industry in the County of Los Angeles. The report is based on over 562 surveys of restaurant workers and over 60 in-depth interviews with employers and workers, as well as government data analysis conducted with primary research support from UCLA’s Center for the Study of Urban Poverty.

Here's a link to download our full report or grab our shorter executive summary.

Some of our recommendations from the report are:

- Provide paid sick days and increase the minimum wage
- Incentivize high road practices and promote model employer practices
- Promote opportunity, penalize discrimination
- Combat sexual harassment
- Enforce health and safety laws
- Protect worker's right to organize
- Expand and improve bus services
- Expand LA's living wage ordinance to include restaurants that contract with the City of Los Angeles
- Support further industry research

On the same day, CA Assemblymember Fiona Ma reintroduced the Paid Sick Days Bill (AB 400) so workers in CA could earn and use paid sick days for personal illness, to care for a sick family member, or to recover from domestic violence or sexual assault. ROC-LA is part of a coalition to get this bill passed in the legislature and we're really working hard on this issue publicized and passed.

We had a lot of help putting the report and the summit together. ROC-LA wants to thank you all!

Here is just some press coverage of our summit. We'll keep updating this list so leave us a comment if you find any other articles.
- Daily Dish, LA Times Food Blog - New study expected to paint bleak picture of how L.A. restaurant workers are treated
- Squid Ink LA Weekly Food Blog - Behind the Kitchen Door: ROC-LA Report Reveals Restaurant Industry Inequality
- Colorlines - Don't Just Tip Your Waiter. Demand Equity for Restaurant Workers
- Grub Street - New Restaurant Labor Study Aims For The Heart of L.A.'s Dining Industry
- Notimex - Muestran en EUA complicado panorama para empleados de restaurantes
- Science Blogs
- LA Progressive - Behind the Kitchen Door

ROC-LA on Voices from the Front Line

Update: Here's a link to the audio archived interview. 

ROC-LA's Co-coordinator Mariana Huerta and ROC-United's co-director Saru Jayaraman talk about our Feb. 14th summit and ROC-LA's new report on the LA Restaurant industry. Thanks Voices from the Front Lines!

Check out ROC-LA on Voices from the Front Line tomorrow, TUESDAY, @ 4pm on 90.7KPFK. We'll be talking about our upcoming release of our report, Behind the Kitchen Doors: Inequality and Opportunity in Los Angeles, the Nation's Largest Restaurant Industry. Stay tuned! 

ROC's Affordable Health Insurance Plan

Nearly 90% of restaurant workers do not have health insurance. This leads to a large number of restaurant workers relying on emergency care as a form of healthcare.

ROC-United partnered with Aetna Health Insurance to develop an affordable health insurance plan for restaurant workers. The plan was selected by a group of restaurant workers from several ROC locals to offer low-cost access to a nationwide network of doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies and provides limited medical coverage.

Why should restaurant workers purchase this plan?

• Having the health insurance plan encourages restaurant workers to practice preventative care, which save costs in the long-run for the worker and to taxpayers. 
• Prevents chronic conditions from developing.
• This health insurance covers costly tests that workers would have to fork out hundreds of dollars otherwise. 

Single members, members +1, and families can be covered. For single members, the plan cost $35 per week with a total of $140 per month and a deductible of $100.  Co-pays are only $10 for retail clinic and $20 in-network. There are also coverage options for vision, dental, accident, hospital, and cancer.


This plan is not for workers who have chronic illnesses or need comprehensive services. However, we can help workers find other options.

Please contact ROC-LA if you have questions: infoROCLA@rocunited.org.

Restaurant Workers are Serving While Sick

Did you know that almost 87.7% of restaurant workers surveyed do not receive paid sick days, and 63% have cooked or served food while sick?

How would you like to get your food prepared, cocktail mixed, or dinner served by someone who showed up to work with a runny nose or fever? No, thank you!

ROC-LA is engaged in a fight to win Paid Sick Days for all workers in the state of California and throughout the United States. Having to work while sick not only sucks for workers, but it can create a public health hazard for consumers. Illness outbreaks due to contamination from sick workers is a reality and affects thousands of people every year.

Join us in the campaign to pass a law that will allow workers to recover from an illness or get medical attention when they are too ill to go to work. For more information about the campaign to win Paid Sick Days, check out Support Paid Sick Days.

Katie Couric recently brought up the Congress's Healthy Families Act, making an appeal to pass the law to provide workers with paid sick time off. It's a great clip so check it out: Katie Couric, CBS - Sick at Work

Tri-Prong Strategy to Raising LA's Restaurant Industry

Restaurant Opportunities Center of Los Angeles (ROC-LA) is one of seven locals under ROC-United. ROC's mission is to raise the standards in the restaurant industry and to improve the working conditions for restaurant workers. ROC-LA strives for our mission through ROC's tri-prong strategy:

• Workplace Justice Campaigns,
• building a high road roundtable of model employers,
• and research and policy.

Though ROC-LA is still young and only a year old, ROC-LA has accomplished much through ROC's tri-prong method. 

Workplace Justice Campaign -- ROC-LA models after the 9 successful campaigns of ROC-NY that won $5 million in stolen wages and discrimination claims. ROC-LA is committed to  developing worker leadership, building power and creating consequences for employers who are violating workers' labor rights. 

High Road Roundtable -- ROC-LA has developed a preliminary list of potential high road employers. ROC-LA wants to develop relationships with restaurants that treat workers right (going beyond the minimum wage) and have sustainable practices. ROC-LA is committed to promoting high road employers as a model for the industry. ROC-LA will hold our second high road employer roundtable in February with some notable high profile Los Angeles employers.

Research and Policy --  ROC-LA conducted 562 worker surveys, 33 employer and 30 worker interviews in less than one year. The report will be released at the Restaurant Industry Summit on February 14 from 8:30am to 11am at Taix Restaurant. ROC-LA's Policy Committee drives the policy work of the organization. The Committee members selected Paid Sick Days as a legislation to pursue in California. Staff and members have met with coalition members of the Work and Family Coalition in Sacramento to strategize so that we will finally win this campaign. Paid Sick Days legislation would allow workers to accumulate 1 hour of paid sick time for every 30 hours worked. For the restaurant industry, this is a serious public health issue.

ROC-LA is still a young organization, but we are growing stronger every day. With nearly 600,000 restaurant workers in LA metro, we are growing 600,000 strong to transform LA's restaurant industry.

We hope you learned a little more about ROC-LA! 

Save-the-Date! Los Angeles Restaurant Industry Summit

Join Restaurant Opportunities Center of Los Angeles (ROC-LA) for our Restaurant Industry Summit. We will be releasing our groundbreaking report, Behind the Kitchen Door, a comprehensive study of the restaurant industry in Los Angeles. At the Summit we will disseminate the report’s findings with the hope of sparking a public discourse on strengthening policy options for the restaurant industry. The summit will bring together employers, workers, academics, unions, advocates, and policy makers, and will include a panel discussion on labor and public health issues in the restaurant industry.
 

Monday, February 14, 2011
Breakfast: 8:30am-9:00am
  Panel & Discussion: 9:00am-10:30am 
Taix Restaurant
1911 West Sunset Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90026