Boston School Workers Blast ‘Reopening Plans’

Democracia proletaria, Parte 2 12 Workers and oppressed peoples of the world unite! workers.org Vol. 62, No. 32 August 6, 2020 $1 Boston school workers blast ‘reopening plans’ By Steve Gillis, Financial Secretary, Panther Party branches. USW Local 8751 and G. Lechat, Chisholm’s legacy unified Boston’s Harvard TPS Coalition majority-women teachers and nurses and the majority-Black bus drivers in Boston Public School nurses, teachers their demand that BPS workers be deci- and bus drivers occupied City Hall Plaza sion-makers in any school reopening on July 29, vowing to defend public safety plan. “Our expertise and knowledge have by any means necessary. been shut out of the assessment, planning The action was a response to the threat- and decision-making process,” charged ening, dangerous demands of the White Boston Teachers Union President Jessica House, Wall Street and Massachusetts Tang. Gov. Charlie Baker to “get back to school The crowd cheered USW Local 8751 and work” in September. President André François, who said that School bus drivers— whose every bus driver “applauds the [BTU’s] … 1,000-strong members of United nonnegotiable demand for union nurses Steelworkers Local 8751 work for pri- in every school. Because the school bus vate corporations Transdev and First isthefirstdailycontactfortensofthou- Student— joined BPS nurses and teach- sands of Boston’s most precious cargo, ers. With folding chairs, picket signs Local 8751 also demands BTU nurses and loudspeakers in tow, the workers be stationed at the bus yards to enforce WW PHOTO: MAUREEN SKEHAN demanded no reopening of Boston pub- safety procedures at the frontline.” Team Solidarity -Boston School Bus Drivers’ delegation in solidarity with nurses protest. lic schools until they’re safe for students, François continued, “As the pandemic workers and communities. spread worldwide, our employer and Emergency COVID-19 Worksite Standard 160,000, with nearly 5 million official Nurses raised the cry of Shirley responsible parties failed to act, and in Operating Procedures stopped [addi- infections,scientificevidencemounts— Chisholm—electedin1968asthefirst April,Local8751sufferedthedeathsof tional] infections among our members. … from summer camps and parties in Black woman in Congress— who once four drivers to COVID-19. They were Local 8751 pledges to our members and states where governments have pushed said, “If they don’t give you a seat at the active in the city’s food home-deliv- the children, families and communities for reopening— that children contract table, bring a folding chair.” In 1972 ery program to thousands of BPS chil- we serve: Not One More Death!” (USW and transmit COVID-19 at high rates. ChisholmwasthefirstBlackwomanto dren. Only the union’s forceful, on-site Local 8751 statement, July 29) (New York Times, July 31; YJ Park et al. run for U.S. President, backed by Black intervention and job actions to enforce As the U.S. pandemic’s death toll nears Continued on page 4 John Lewis & Selma legacy 3 Black Lives Matter Remembering Garrett Foster, Disabled people: anti-racist fighter 6 ‘Part of the working class’ 3 Pensacola solidarity 6 #SEIUDropTheCops 4 N.C. protests: ‘Smash the police state’ 7 Portland, Ore.: Fight is not over 7 Pandemic relief sabotaged 8 Sahara dust cloud 9 Heat waves & socialism 9 Editorial Prison uprising ignites Black August Virus, GDP & profit motive 10 Roots of Prisoners Solidarity Fidel Agcaoili ¡presente! 10 Committee 5 Jonathan Jackson Brazil 10 China vs. lies 11 Page 2 August 6, 2020 workers.org ‘Hero pay, not zero pay!’ this week ◆ In the U.S. Boston school workers blast ‘reopening plans’ ..... 1 ‘Hero pay, not zero pay!’ ........................2 6th annual Sandra Bland #SayHerName protest ...3 Disability movement: ‘Part of the working class’ ...3 John Lewis and the Edmund Pettus Bridge........3 #SEIUDroptheCops makes demands .............4 A tribute to Assata Shakur . 4 Black August to Black Lives Matter movement.....5 What is the Prisoners Solidarity Committee? ......5 Austin, TX: Remembering Garrett Foster .........6 Pensacola protests federal war on the people ......6 North Carolina: ‘Smash the Police State’ .......... 7 Essential workers protested July 30 in a flash-mob temporary store closures and route cancellations. Portland struggle far from over .................. 7 action in front of a newly remodeled Tops Market, a Neithermultimillion-dollar companyofferedmasks Negotiations delay pandemic relief package .......8 supermarket chain based in Western New York. The event or worker protections until mandated by the state. At was organized by the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) theNorthBuffalolocation,wheretheprotesttookplace, ◆ Around the world Division 1342 and the Food and Commercial Workers renovations and cosmetic changes were ongoing through- Who created the Saharan dust cloud?.............9 (UFCW) Local 1. out the pandemic. Social distancing was impossible with Record-breaking heat waves, need for socialism ...9 Demands included hazard pay, sick leave and actual a narrow temporary entrance and large portions of the enforcement of the New York state mask mandate. storeclosedoff. Brazil: From pandemic to genocide..............10 Workers at Tops Market locations, as well as the Niagara Attheiraction,theworkerspromisedthatthefightwas Workers World Party salutes Fidel Agcaoili ......10 Frontier Transit Authority, have caught COVID-19 far from over. China pushes back U.S. empire of lies . 11 on many separate occasions since March, leading to —Report and photo by Thomas Answeeney ◆ Editorial Thevirus,theGDPandtheprofitmotive ........10 Free Mumia Abu-Jamal! Build Workers World! ◆ Noticias en Español The U.S. has the high- wrong with the world’s Democracia proletaria, Parte 2 ................. 12 est percentage of its pop- largest center of incarcer- ulation in city, county, ated workers: the U.S. state and federal pris- Those who understand ons—more than any how this racist, classist, other country in the world capitalist system works and disproportionately were in the streets over Workers World people of color. That’s not the last four decades to 147 W. 24th St., 2nd Fl. even counting detention save Mumia’s life and New York, NY 10011 centers for im/migrants promote his message. Phone: 212.627.2994 who flee their homes to Workers World was there, E-mail: [email protected] escape U.S. crimes of demanding his freedom Web: www.workers.org imperialist aggression. from the get-go. Now Vol. 62, No. 32 • August 6, 2020 Here they are brutally WW’s Prisoners Solidarity Closing date: August 5, 2020 mistreated, some even Committee is promoting sufferingcruelseparation an internationalist call to Editor: Deirdre Griswold from their children. Free Mumia. 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Crissman, Sasha Mazumder, Scott Williams gest proportion of those dying from the pandemic being For a donation of at least $75 a year—or $100, $300 Copyediting and Proofreading: Paddy Colligan, people of color. or much more if possible—members receive a year’s sub- Sue Davis, S. Hedgecoke What would really show solidarity with the already scription,amonthlyletterabouttimelyissuesandfive vibrant Black Lives Matter movement here and abroad? free subscriptions to give to friends. Write checks, either Contributing Editors: LeiLani Dowell, G. Dunkel, Raising the struggle to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal so it monthly or once a year, to Workers World and mail them, K. Durkin, Sara Flounders, Teresa Gutierrez, Joshua becomes a worldwide cry. The very reasons why Mumia with your name and address, to 147 W. 24th St., 2nd Floor, Hanks, Makasi Motema, Gloria Rubac is in jail are that he used his voice and his pen to expose New York, NY 10011. 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