Home-Based Child Care Workers Seek Union [View All]

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

NEW YORK (AP) — Jennie Rivera works 10-hour days taking care of children in her lower Manhattan apartment and has never had a paid vacation or earned more than $13,000 a year.

Rivera hopes that will change now that she's cast her lot, along with thousands of other child-care providers here, with the powerful New York City chapter of the American Federation of Teachers.

New York is one of 11 states where workers like Rivera — not day-care center employees or nannies but child-care providers working out of their own homes — are permitted to unionize. Organizers argue improving conditions for these poorly paid workers will translate into better child care options for working parents.

The lopsided pro-union vote during September and October — with 8,382 workers voting to join the United Federation of Teachers, and just 96 voting no — was hailed as the largest successful unionization campaign in the city since the 1960s.

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