The Spoils of War

This is what was found written on a construction site wall. See article for full story:

http://www.sfweekly.com/2008-03-26/news/building-racism/full

SF weekly outlines the black/mexican contractor battle-a multiculti clusterf&*k

Lawyer Salinas adds that the alleged statements from the warehouse meeting — that the bosses wanted to fire all the blacks and that the Latinos were “at war” with them — hark back to antidiscrimination cases of eras past, before employers knew to hide their racist hand. “To prove this, the jury just has to believe this statement is true, and it’s over,” he says. “Do you think it takes a trained legal expert to see these things were based on race?”

Gee, I thought race was a social construct. So, let me get this straight, sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn’t. It isn’t when White people notice race, like when it has to do with crime,  or when it has to do with school test scores, but isn’t when one is being oppressed by the man, but becomes real again when being oppressed by The Man, another not-so-minority, or a housing giant like AIMCO. This attorney’s whole case is based in race being real, or Hyper-Real, the jury agrees what the attorney purports has happened, then they too are saying Race is real.  The Emperor’s got more  clothes than Imelda has shoes! Well, in this lawsuit anyway. After they win, it goes back to not being real again, except when speaking of the case. Cake>eat>too, much?

 According to Gonzalo Aguilar’s testimony at a public hearing last month, Cunningham said the first problem was the “fucking union,” which he said often stopped their work because many workers didn’t have union cards. Cunningham said the second problem was the “pinches negros” (which translates roughly to “fucking niggers”).

Gregory Hall, an African-American carpenter, met with company representatives on the job site to ask why black workers were not being hired even though the site was smack-dab in the Bayview, one of the city’s few majority black neighborhoods. Experienced black carpenters had constantly inquired about jobs.

The answer, according to court documents, was that the site’s bosses would give the “community” group, or African Americans, and the “core” group, meaning the Latinos, separate walls to work on. If the community group could “keep up” with the core group, then more black workers would be hired.Black workers were repeatedly told they were too slow and inexperienced.

Renovations begin on several housing projects AKA ghettos, section 8, etc. Wow those are some pretty happening renovations. People pay big bucks for new windows, doors, flooring, bathrooms, kitchens, lighting, paint.

Having wrangled itself out of trouble by making the renovations and paying millions to the city and to a nearby Boys and Girls Club as required in the 2004 settlement, AIMCO undertook the current project to update units in La Salle, Shoreview, Bayview, and All Hallows Gardens with new windows, doors, flooring, bathrooms, kitchens, lighting, and paint.

Now the housing giant is being targeted again for alleged collaboration in wrong-doing during the new construction project, bankrolled in part by $73 million in tax-exempt bonds and $42 million in federal low-income-housing tax credits.

According to this story, the contractors prefer mexicans over black, legal or not.

 Of the black workers, Cunningham is accused of saying they were “too slow” and that he wanted to fire them all.

Contractors tell blacks there’s no work, then hire mexicans. Contractors/ Managers/foremen  make mexicans give kickbacks out of their checks and work overtime..lawyers get involved. Green text indicates lawsuit money.Bummer for blacks, who didn’t move up a rung on the Darwin ladder  when mexicans moved in, they moved further down. As I wrote  years ago under rants in this blog, about illegals and the New Slavery.

Last fall, some carpenters went to La Raza Centro Legal in the Mission to inquire about their rights. La Raza contacted Bob Salinas, who had just won a $100,000 settlement for three workers who had not been paid for all their hours worked at a Chinese buffet in the East Bay. After listening to the carpenters’ stories, and doing his own investigation, Salinas decided they had grounds for a civil suit.

The suit also names Fortney & Weygandt Inc., the Ohio-based general contractor AIMCO hired to coordinate the construction and hire of subcontractors, three of which are also being sued. The suit alleges that AIMCO, Fortney & Weygandt, and the three subcontractors created a “supermanagement team” that waged a campaign of racism and exploitation.

Side story: look out employers before you hire illegals, thinking you are gettting a sweet, profitable deal. Lawsuits by illegals abound.  http://www.sfweekly.com/2008-03-19/news/working-class-struggle/full

 Usually the phrase working class is reserved to describe  poor Whites, but this is all about the illegal aliens.

Attorney Hillary Ronen filed a federal lawsuit on Serralta’s behalf, demanding that the Khans pay more than $120,000 in back wages, overtime, break time, and attorneys’ fees. The group, operating out of the offices of La Raza Centro Legal on San Francisco’s Valencia Street under the rubric Workers’ Advocacy Project.

OK, back to the construction story- so, both groups , blacks and mexicans heard about  the  big bucks to be made in these lawsuits, and said , “screw working, we can make more money suing “. I guess that is the measure of assimilation out here, getting into the class-action lawsuit game.

The 27 black and Latino carpenters who brought the suit decided they wouldn’t tolerate what they say is an extreme example of the construction industry’s “best-kept nonsecret,” as one Bayview activist puts it, where black workers are passed over in favor of largely undocumented Latino immigrants who are more easily exploited.

 As IF, like the story ends with everyone in a group hug, their gumbo and tortillas simmering side-by-side. Cut the crap, we all know that is BS. They are in this lawsuit for the money. Yeah of course they are going to act like that while they are pretending to be umm, dually-oppressed . This is about money, not this brotherly love concept. Look at Los Angeles, they sure don’t all get along down there, do they? NO, they vie for turf jobs , everything- as we all do.

Speaking of LA

59% of Los Angeles Houses for Sale Are

Foreclosures

http://patrick.net/housing/contrib/foreclosures_percent.html