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Who We Are

The Workers’ Center of Central New York is a grassroots organization focused on workplace and economic justice.

It is part of a nation-wide network of innovative workers’ centers affiliated with the Chicago-based Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ). It operates in and around the city of Syracuse, a city with one of the highest rates of poverty in the country, driven by deindustrialization and deunionization, the entrenchment of widespread joblessness and the proliferation of low-wage jobs. Through community organizing, leadership development, popular education and policy advocacy, the Workers’ Center of Central New York empowers low-wage workers to combat workplace abuses and improve wages and working conditions throughout the community.

The Workers’ Center facilitates worker empowerment and leadership development through trainings related to workers’ rights and occupational health and safety, orchestrates campaigns to combat wage theft and to promote employer compliance with the law, and engages in organizing and coalition-building to push for policies that will increase wages and workplace standards and promote human rights.

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Workers' Voices

Antonio Salinas

“Hello, my name is Antonio, I’ve worked in New York for six years at a dairy and I’ve also worked at an apple farm. I’ve worked with tractors, cut trees, fed and milked cows and taken care of calves.

…I dare to raise my voice today because this is how I can help improve things for other farmworkers. So that the leaders of New York do something to make the injustices stop, because we are not animals. We are human beings, and we need dignity and respect.”

Paige

Paige was working at the front desk at a hotel in Oswego. When she decided to leave her job due to poor treatment of workers by management, she was told that because her plastic name tag was missing, she would lose her entire last paycheck. Paige fought back.

“I knew that what they were doing was wrong and there had to be something that could be done. It wasn’t even so much about the money – just that it’s not fair. I didn’t do anything to deserve that.

…Know that there is someone out there who can help you, and if you feel that something is wrong, it probably is. Don’t do it out of spite, but because it’s right. You should be treated with respect.”