CLICK HERE FOR A LIST OF UPCOMING WEBINARS ON PAID SICK LEAVE.

In 2016, UDW caregivers helped secure a historic minimum wage increase for California workers. After years of telling our stories, rallying and marching with fellow underpaid workers, we urged the state legislature and the governor to agree on a plan to increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022. In addition to raising wages, the law also guarantees paid sick days for workers – including IHSS providers.

Under the new law, existing providers (those that began working for an IHSS recipient prior July 1, 2018) will earn eight hours, or one day, of paid sick leave after they have worked 100 hours from the implementation date (July 1, 2018). New providers (those who begin working for an IHSS recipient after July 1, 2018) will earn eight hours of paid sick leave after they have worked 100 hours from their initial hire date.

An IHSS provider can use his/her paid sick leave hours after working an additional 200 hours providing services to an IHSS recipient, or 60 calendar days from the date on which the provider earned his/her paid sick leave hours, whichever comes first. The soonest an IHSS provider will be eligible to use their accrued sick time hours is September 2018. To use your sick hours you must submit SOC 2302, located here.

We will begin to accrue sixteen hours, or two days, of paid sick leave for each year starting January 1, 2020. We will start to accrue twenty-four hours, or three days, of paid sick leave for each year on January 1, 2023. These dates are subject to change if the annual minimum wage increase is postponed by our elected leaders for fiscal reasons.

We know providers have questions about how we will use our sick days, and who will care for our clients when we do. We are working closely with the state and the counties to ensure that a good system is put in place in every county to provide clients with backup providers if we need to take any sick leave.

Paid sick leave is a basic right that nearly all Californian already enjoy. After years of demanding equal rights, we have finally been heard. Now that we’ve secured this new benefit, we’re going to work hard to make sure it works for all caregivers and our clients.

 

My name is Aurora Viramontes Rivera, and I work as a home care provider for two of my children in Orange County, California. I am overjoyed and grateful that home care workers are now eligible for overtime pay. For my family, the added income has drastically improved our quality of life.

I’ve always been appreciative that the In-Home Supportive Services program (IHSS) gives me the opportunity to provide my children with the best care possible. I’m not just their mother. I’m the caregiving professional who knows their conditions and their needs best.

Unfortunately, while I love my work, it hasn’t always been easy. Both Atzel and Alix live with disabilities, but when Atzel was initially given fewer hours of in-home care a month than his condition requires, it impacted our entire family. Thankfully my union, the United Domestic Workers/AFSCME Local 3930 (UDW), was able to help us secure 200 additional hours of care for Atzel by helping me successfully appeal the original assessment.

The extra home care hours ensure that no matter who his caregiver is, Atzel will always have the amount of care he needs. Since I am Atzel’s current caregiver, it also translates into real dollars for our family.
The changes for our family didn’t stop at extra hours. When I found out home care providers were finally going to be paid fairly for all the hours we work, I couldn’t believe it. As a professional caregiver, I know how tough our work is, but to know that our elected leaders were finally acknowledging that was great. Overtime pay for home care providers means that caregivers are receiving basic rights that most Americans probably take for granted.

My family sure hasn’t taken it for granted. I have far fewer sleepless nights. The extra money overtime provided allowed my husband and I to move our family of six out of our tiny apartment and into a roomier three-bedroom house. My kids are happier, and I have more peace of mind as I watch them play in our backyard. We also bought a more reliable car, which we use to transport our children to their doctors’ appointments.

Overtime pay means I can actually save money, and my family’s goal is to save enough to purchase our own home. For me, overtime pay isn’t about giving home care providers extra, it’s about giving us the pay we’ve worked for, that we need and our families deserve.

The Freedom Foundation, an anti-union and anti-home care organization based in Washington state, has announced its expansion into California. While the group says its goal is to educate home care providers about their rights, it is really an organization funded by billionaires who want to destroy the unions protecting workers, IHSS, and our clients.

In California, the Freedom Foundation is running television ads and encouraging home care providers to drop union membership. What they aren’t telling you is who is funding this effort, and what will happen to the IHSS program or our clients if our union goes away.

Get the FACTS about the Freedom Foundation:

• It is an out-of-state, corporate-sponsored organization that is contacting home care providers and telling them to leave our union.
• It won’t disclose its donors, but the Freedom Foundation is funded by billionaires who don’t support unions or workers rights.
• The Freedom Foundation opposes raising the minimum wage, paid sick leave, and other benefits for workers.
• The Freedom Foundation’s mission is to roll back OUR benefits, NOT to protect the rights of home care providers and clients.

You can find out more about Freedom Foundation, its secretive donors and its anti-worker policies here: www.freedomfoundationfactcheck.com

For Immediate Release
Thursday, August 25, 2016

Contact: Margitte Kristjansson, 619-548-4304

California home care providers who care for their spouse or child are ineligible for Social Security, Medicare, and unemployment benefits.

Sacramento – Today In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) home care workers met at the Capitol to deliver petitions to Governor Brown signed by over 3,500 Californians. The petitions call on the governor to sign Assembly Bill 1930, a bill sponsored by the United Domestic Workers/AFSCME Local 3930, and authored by Assemblymember Tom Lackey (R – Palmdale) with coauthors Assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez (D – San Diego) and Senator Mike McGuire (D – Healdsburg).

If a home care provider’s client is their spouse or child, they are excluded from making contributions to FICA and State Unemployment Insurance – leaving them ineligible for Medicare, Social Security, and unemployment pay. AB 1930 begins to address this injustice by convening a committee to study the economic impact exclusion from these benefits has on home care workers and their families.

“All caregivers work hard for their clients, and all caregivers deserve these very basic benefits,” said UDW Executive Director Doug Moore. “Today, we call on Governor Brown to help us in our work to fix this issue by signing AB 1930.”

“In-home care workers who care for their families are entitled to the same employment benefits that every other worker in the same program receives,” added Assemblymember Lackey.

Cathyleen Williams from Barstow worked as her son Caleb’s IHSS home care provider for nine and a half years until he passed away in March. When Cathyleen applied for unemployment insurance, she was denied because Caleb – her home care client – was her son. “No one should have to endure the death of their young child,” said Cathyleen. “But to grieve while also scrambling to make sure your bills are paid and you don’t end up homeless? I wouldn’t wish this nightmare on my greatest enemy.”

William Reed, a home care provider for his 39-year-old son with autism in Placer County worries about not only his own retirement plans, but those of his fellow spouse and parent caregivers as well. “We deal with high levels of stress, work without real respite time, or paid leave, and to add insult to injury, we can’t even count on Social Security or Medicare when we retire,” he said.

AB 1930 was passed unanimously by both the Senate and the Assembly. Caregivers are calling on Governor Brown to look at the human impact that life without access to unemployment benefits, Social Security, and Medicare has on caregivers, and sign AB 1930.

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United Domestic Workers of America (UDW)/AFSCME Local 3930 is a home care union made up of nearly 94,000 in-home caregivers across the state of California. UDW caregivers provide care through the state’s In-Home Supportive Services program (IHSS), which allows over half a million California seniors and people with disabilities to stay safe and healthy at home.

UDW caregivers stood alongside thousands of public service workers to declare we will NEVER QUIT at AFSCME’s 42nd International Convention last week in Las Vegas. “It truly was a learning experience,” said Susana Saldana, an IHSS provider for her son and first time convention delegate from Merced County. “I enjoyed meeting people from all over the country and learning best practices from fellow union members.”

UDW is a California affiliate of the national union AFSCME, and including UDW’s over 94,000 home care providers, AFSCME represents 1.6 million workers around the country. AFSCME members are public servants who work as nurses, 911 dispatchers, law enforcement officers, child care providers, sanitation workers, home care providers, and more. What we have in common is a commitment to protecting public programs like IHSS, and to winning social and economic justice for working families.

At the same time, membership in a powerful national union helps us protect IHSS. While we fight back against threats to the program here in California, AFSCME is able to help us protect home care in Washington D.C., where many decisions are made that impact funding for IHSS.

Every two years, UDW members serve as delegates to AFSCME’s International Convention. At convention, we vote in support or opposition to resolutions that set the union’s agenda and priorities.

This year, we stood in favor of a resolution to demand stronger long term care services and supports for Americans who rely on services like in-home care. And we gave strong support to resolutions demanding an increase in the minimum wage. “No one who works full-time should have to go home and struggle to provide for their families,” said UDW delegate and IHSS provider LaTanya Cline from San Diego County, in regards to the resolution.

UDW caregiver Nicanora Montenegro, an IHSS provider from San Diego, asked convention delegates to stand in support of a resolution on protecting the right to vote. “Our country has changed, but we have a long way to go,” said Nicanora. “Our vote is our voice…voting rights of people of color in particular must be protected and expanded.”

Many of us addressed the entire delegation to talk about our latest victories here in California. Placer County Chair William Reed spoke about our recent overtime pay win. “This victory was only possible because we stood together and we did not quit,” said William. “And we will keep fighting until home care workers all over the country have the same rights and benefits as all workers.”

Convention is also the time that we elect the leaders who will represent UDW as AFSCME International Vice Presidents. This year, the delegation reelected UDW Executive Director Doug Moore and Johanna Hester to these positions. During the nomination process, we thanked Doug and Johanna for their leadership through some of our union’s biggest fights, including ending cuts to the IHSS program and growing our union despite threats like the Harris vs. Quinn Supreme Court decision.

But convention wasn’t only about resolutions and elections, we also took action! Thousands of us marched in solidarity with workers who are trying to form a union at the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas. Despite winning their union election in December, Trump International has refused to begin contract negotiations and has fired and intimidated workers who are union supporters. After our march in the hot Las Vegas sun, it was announced that a settlement had been reached to pay two workers $11,200 in lost wages.

“This was epic,” said San Diego IHSS provider and first time convention delegate Noreen Woods. “To see solidarity at its finest was awesome. Thousands of AFSCME brothers and sisters showed up to support the hotel workers, and hearing that a settlement was reached showed me that we are being heard. We can’t stop fighting. Yesterday was a show of the power we’ve built through our union.”

For more photos from the AFSCME 2016 convention, click here.