From our comrades in the New Orleans Hospitality Workers Alliance, their demands of the city to meet the immediate needs of workers during the COVID-19 emergency:
List of Demands
- Immediate expansion of unemployment insurance. Change the current eligibility to include those who stay home during this crisis, who do not have paid leave. This should extend to all gig, independent contractors, and freelance workers.
- Expansion of Medicaid to all who need health care.
- Expansion and an increase of food stamps to all workers and families in need.
- Testing, ER visits, and treatment for COVID -19 must be free for all and administered at conveniently located test centers that are geographically dispersed. Expansion of testing must be done urgently
- Issue an order that no workers be fired for staying home
- Immediate closure of restaurants, retail shops and bars with a guarantee that when the establishment reopens workers will get their jobs back.
- Those who choose to keep working at essential places like pharmacys, hospitals and supermarkets should be given full protective gear.
- Order a state-wide halt to evictions, foreclosures, water, electric and internet cut offs. (Including student loan payments and credit card debt.)
- People without homes should be provided shelter and utilities necessary to protect themselves from both contracting and spreading COVID-19. (We have enough houses to shelter every person in the city, and we demand that anybody in need of housing is granted access to one of our numerous uninhabited units.)
- Establish a system for no cost food and other necessities distribution to quarantined people or areas and to sick or self-isolated households
- Price controls put into effect to shield workers from the disruptive effects the virus has on the global economy.
- Establish easily accessible centers to replace breakfast and lunch for all students. (Currently New Orleans has only set up one school each on the East and West banks. Closing the schools without many food centers will create massive hunger for Louisiana’s children.)
- Waive citizenship requirements for state and local benefits to ensure all workers have the option to stay home and effectively contain the virus.
- Immediate release of migrants in detention camps and incarcerated people not convicted of violent crimes. (These sites are overcrowded with limited access to healthcare. This will improve containment of the virus and cannot be ignored. Provide remaining prisoners with free phone calls as visits are being stopped and deposit money in their commissary accounts especially as prisoners must buy their soap, etc.)
- Guarantee replacement income for all (on top of the expansion of unemployment)
The eyes of all workers in Louisiana, who are very aware of the huge inequality between legislators and government official’s income and health coverage, are on the actions of the government. This is the time to suspend state and local corporate tax exemptions to provide resources for these measures. Suspend the city charter which gives $180 million dollars in tourist taxes to private companies, suspend the $300 million dollars in public funds that is being used for a private convention center hotel and the millions being used for the super dome renovation.
These public funds MUST be redirected towards this crisis immediately!
We hope you will carry out the responsibilities to the people of our state and work expeditiously to enact these necessary measures.
Sincerely,
The New Orleans Hospitality Workers Alliance
504.444.9096
www.NOHWA.org