Program areas at MUA
Basebuilding & Community Outreach: Over the last two years, MUA staff and member-leaders have received training and coaching on basebuilding through the Groundswell Organizing Institute and Spadework. Through this capacity building effort, MUA has created a more systematic approach to basebuilding by conducting large-scale street outreach campaigns one day per week for 4-6 months per year in Oakland, San Francisco, and South Alameda County. From January to December 2023, 26 members and 11 MUA staff reached 1,041 immigrant women and got contact information for 898, with at least 265 of those contacted participating in a MUA activity for the first time. At least 75% of these women are domestic workers. Peer-Led Services: Our ongoing services for immigrant women include peer support groups, peer counseling, life coaching, Zumba fitness, yoga, nutrition courses, parenting groups, and labor rights forums. In 2023, a total of 1,259 women participated in one or more of these activities, with at least 850 participating in more than one activity. Vocational Training and ESL classes: MUA offers monthly vocational trainings. In 2023, a total of 136 members participated in the trainings. Topics included: negotiating with your employer, creating work contracts, child development, elder care, and learning how much to charge for your labor. In addition, in August, MUA held two day-long training workshops on the new health and safety guidelines for domestic workers for a total of 53 workers, many of whom are current and future home care workers. ESL classes were offered in 5 week modules, 2-4 hours per week, eight modules per year, with at least 62 participants completing a module. The topics covered include topics that can help domestic workers assert their rights in a situation where their primary language is not available. The English classes are focused on topics such as; workplace safety and health, reporting accidents, and leaders and change makers. Growth of Grupo Mam: Mayans from Guatemala and Southern Mexico are currently the most populous group of indigenous immigrants in the Bay Area. While there are many Mayan languages, the most common one spoken in the East Bay is Mam. Just prior to the pandemic, MUA trained its first cohort of Mam speaking leaders, and those women organized our first Mam language support groups. Currently those groups are meeting twice monthly. The program now includes regular street outreach to Mam speakers, individual counseling and accompaniment for women in crisis, a weaving circle and herbal medicine garden to promote a sense of community and cultural pride, and access to other MUA training and support programs. A total of 100 Mam speaking women participated in these programs in 2023.Leadership Development: MUA offers a variety of leadership training courses to members, including courses on basic peer counseling, support group facilitation, community outreach, policy advocacy, and workers rights advocate training. Graduates of each course are then eligible to join a member leadership committee where they can volunteer to exercise their new skills as peer counselors, group facilitators, community outreach volunteers, policy campaigners, etc. These women are the backbone of MUAs peer led services and policy advocacy. In 2023, 74 members graduated from leadership training programs, and 62 participated in leadership committees. Statewide and Local Workers and Immigrant Rights Campaigns/Wins: The following key pieces of legislation or state policy were won or fought for during the grant period, in coordination through our participation in the California Domestic Worker Coalition and/or related coalitions: Domestic Worker and Employer Outreach Program (DWEOP): This pilot program, a state contract managed by MUA for the California Domestic Workers Coalition since 2019, was made permanent in the new state budget. The program provides critical information about workers rights to caregivers and their employers statewide. With strategic advocacy by MUA and our allies in the Coalition, the allocation of funding was increased from $1.1 million to $7 million per year to distribute to community-run domestic worker and employer outreach programs throughout California. SB686: The 2023 Domestic Worker Health and Safety Act.. This law would make enforceable the domestic worker health and safety guidelines created under our previous legislation, SB321 (the 2021 Domestic Worker Health and Safety Act). This includes the first ever statewide safety guidelines for home care workers. We were key leaders of this campaign. In August we co-led a major rally in Sacramento in support of this bill, with participation from over 250 domestic workers from across the state. It passed through the legislature but was ultimately vetoed by the Governor. We plan to continue this fight in 2024. Bay Area Essential Workers Agenda: In 2021, MUA joined a new pandemic-inspired collaborative working to set a policy agenda for essential workers across sectors throughout the Bay Area. In 2022 and 2023, the collaborative created a policy platform and has advocated for local public officials to endorse the platform so that essential workers are taken into account in local policies such as minimum wage ordinances, sick leave, disability leave, etc. BAEWA is now the Bay Area arm of the statewide Safety Net for All Campaign. Safety Net for All: SB227 would have created an innovative unemployment insurance system for undocumented workers, including caregivers, who currently have no safety net to turn to when they lose their jobs. As part of the Bay Area Essential Workers Alliance, we rallied and advocated to get it through the legislature; however, after Governor Newsom refused to allocate funds for the proposed program in the state budget, the legislation was tabled until next year. Medi-Cal for All: After a years long pressure campaign, this year Governor Newsom finally agreed to budget for an expansion of Medi-Cal to include all undocumented workers, including caregivers. Our members provided testimony in support of this campaign to legislators on the CIPC Immigrant Day of Action both in 2022 and 2023. Implementation of the SF Paid Sick Leave Ordinance: In 2021, the California Domestic Worker Coalition (CDWC, a project of MUA) introduced the Domestic Worker Paid Sick Leave Ordinance, which passed the San Francisco Board of Supervisors on a unanimous vote. This groundbreaking ordinance will create the first ever system in California for tracking and paying out sick leave for domestic workers. Domestic workers statewide gained the right to sick leave under the 2016 Domestic Worker Bill of Rights (also a MUA/CDWC victory); however, there has been up until now no mechanism for enforcing this right. Since the passage of the ordinance, MUA has now switched our advocacy to pushing for implementation, as the city bureaucracy has held up the creation of the new system. Enforcement of Labor Standards in Oakland: In 2018, MUA was one of various labor rights organizations that mobilize voters to pass Measure Z, a local ballot initiative which created the first ever Department of Workplace Enforcement Standards for the City of Oakland. In 2023, MUA joined the nascent Low Wage Worker Dignity and Rights Table to help strengthen the new departments ability to engage with the most invisible and marginalized workers. This campaign work is nascent and will continue in 2024.Strategic Planning Process: A 10-member strategic planning team, made up of MUA staff with significant support from two long-time consultants, worked diligently beginning in October 2021 and continuing through 2022 and 2023 to conduct a comprehensive, inclusive strategic planning process. This includes surveys, interviews and focus groups with members and allies, two day-long staff/board retreats in 2022, and a 3-day staff/board retreat in April 2023. The following major changes were implemented in 2023: An update of our mission statement, vision statement and values statement to reflect key changes in MUA, including officially acknowledging indigenous women in how we identify our membership; Confirmation of our geographic focus for the next 5 years, which will remain San Francisco, Oakland, and South Alameda County; Initiation of a 5 year plan for integrating indigenous Mam speaking women more fully within the organization and our campaigns, including the inclusion of two permanent seats on our Board for Mam speakers and the election of Mam leaders to those positions in October 2023; Clarification of political priorities, with an eye to making Gender Justice a more defined area of political advocacy, and the addition of a year-round Electoral Organizing program; Greater investment in staff professional development at every level, to create a stronger pipeline of immigrant leaders as part of succession planning; The initiation of an internal restructuring of our teams for greater integration of our programs,