The Call (3/28/10)

As a community-minded citizen and homeowner of Boston, my career in human services since 1984 has been dedicated as an emollient to the human cost of poverty in economically deprived neighborhoods of Boston. I am a political supporter and volunteer for State Senator Angelo Scacia because of his belief and corresponding voting record that “government is here to help people.” As a social worker employed by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts I have been an active member of local 509 International Service Workers Union organizing committee, working to expand the union to unorganized services such as nursing homes. However, the solace of doing something meaningful was always undermined by good manufacturing jobs in Boston continually being outsourced to parts of the world with lower labor costs; undermined by good service jobs continually allocated to non-union vendors. Despite the best efforts of leaders like Senator Scacia, the government offered little help as more and more Bostonians were falling into poverty. Then the call came I had been waiting for my entire adult life.


After fighting poverty on the losing end for twenty years I had signed up to find out more about the Eastern Service Workers Association of Boston at a literature table in front of a West Roxbury supermarket in late 2004. A few weeks later I received a follow-up telephone call. Rather than asking for money the member on the other end of the line was offering opportunities to “lend a hand in their winter survival campaign.” Since that day I have been involved as a member, a supporter, a volunteer teacher, advocate and administrator, and sat on the ESWA advisory committee. Without exaggeration I can say I have received countless golden opportunities to address the economic injustices that had plagued me for so long. Some of the highlights include delivering a petition signed by over 900 citizens to the Massachusetts Energy & Communications Commission attacking egregious rate-hikes, and a strongly worded attack I delivered on ESWA's behalf at a state house hearing on the disastrous “mandatory health insurance” reform bill. These opportunities in and of themselves do not explain how ESWA has given meaning back to my life that only builds with every day fighting poverty.

What makes Eastern Service Workers Association special is its unique approach designed not to make underpaid service workers and other poverty-stricken folk dependent as do government programs. Rather it provides a means wherein disadvantaged workers and their families may gain control of their lives with ESWA’s budget savings benefits that include weekly fruit and vegetable distributions and city wide clothing distributions. More to the point it provides the people our government has abandoned a way to make their voices heard and grievances addressed. Boston's Eastern Service Workers Association is an organization that has not only been there to support the city's struggling service workers and their families during historically difficult times; not only helping them help themselves keep their heads above water during the economically challenging present; but E.S.W.A. on this day is surging into the future to make itself relevant to the challenges that we all surely will be facing in the years ahead.