FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE THURSDAY, AUGUST 14, 2003 WWW.USDOJ.GOV CRT (202) 514-2008 TDD (202) 514-1888 WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Department of Justice today announced the award of nearly $675,000 in grants to eleven nonprofit groups serving communities throughout the country, to conduct public education programs for workers and employers about immigration-related job discrimination.
The grants, which range from $40,000 to $85,000, are being awarded by the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC) of the Civil Rights Division. Recipients will assist discrimination victims; conduct seminars for workers, employers and immigration service providers; distribute educational materials in various languages; and place advertisements in local communities through both mainstream and ethnic media.
Awarding grants to professional and community-based organizations, as well as to local governments, enables us to educate workers and employers about their rights and responsibilities under the immigration laws, said J. Michael Wiggins, Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. Our grant recipients, who are well known and respected in their communities, will work with us to assist employers in preventing discrimination and to protect workers rights. The mission of OSC is to educate both legally authorized workers and their employers about the anti-discrimination provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act, enforce legal protections against citizenship and national-origin discrimination, and document abuse in hiring and firing.
OSC grant recipients are: * New York City Commission on Human Rights (based in New York), in conjunction with the New York Immigration Coalition, will provide education in all five boroughs of New York City. These workshops will focus on employers, service providers and immigrant workers from Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, Haiti and India. Additional workshops will be conducted in Westchester County, Rockland County and the city of Buffalo, to reach immigrant populations outside New York City; * Asian Pacific American Legal Center of Southern California (based in Los Angeles, California), in partnership with the Asian Law Caucus of San Francisco, will educate workers and employers in Los Angeles and San Francisco, cities with two of the nations largest Asian Pacific-American communities; * International Rescue Committee (based in San Diego, California) will provide anti-discrimination education to refugees, asylees, and other immigrant workers; * Catholic Charities of Dallas (based in Dallas, Texas) will serve workers and employers in northern Texas, Arkansas, New Mexico and Oklahoma; * Catholic Charities of Houston (based in Houston, Texas) will educate employers, as well as Hispanic and Asian workers in southwestern Texas, including key communities along the Mexican border; * Georgia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce (based in Atlanta, Georgia) will provide education services to employers and Hispanic workers throughout Georgia; * Illinois Department of Human Rights (based in Chicago, Illinois) will focus on employers, immigration service providers, and workers in its statewide education program; * Catholic Charities of St. Petersburg (based in St. Petersburg, Florida) will provide educational workshops to workers and small businesses through its network of service providers. Special emphasis will be placed in two counties that have a high concentration of Croatian, Serbian, Haitian, and Cuban immigrants; * Legal Aid Services of Oregon (based in Hillsboro, Oregon) will educate agricultural workers with a statewide media campaign and group presentations; * Hogar Hispano/Catholic Charities of Arlington (based in Arlington, Virginia) will educate employers, as well as Asian Pacific, Arab, African and Hispanic workers in the Metropolitan Washington, D.C. area; and, * National Immigration Law Center (based in Los Angeles, California) will conduct a national program to educate immigration service providers and pro bono attorneys through a series of workshops and conference presentations around the country, as well as regional seminars in Phoenix, Arizona; Miami, Florida; and Orange County, California.
For more information about protections against job discrimination under the immigration laws, call 800-255-7688, 202-616-5594 or write to: Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division 950 Pennsylvania Ave., NW Washington, D.C. 20530 Email: osc.crt@usdoj.gov Website: www.usdoj.gov/crt/osc
Source: US Department of Justice
