Tina Dupuy Column: Confessions of a Child Janitor

My first job was cleaning the group home I lived in. True story. I participated in the Summer Youth Employment Program part of the Job Training Partnership Act passed during Reagan’s first term. It was a War on Poverty federal program considered to be an economic stimulus and a way to keep teenagers off the streets. I was in foster care and had just barely turned 14; I went to a few seminars on job skills and was given a job “super cleaning” for minimum wage ($4.25). I pulled in about $75 a week…before taxes.

I learned two things at that job: one, horizontal blinds are a malevolent plague on society; and two, Republicans don’t care about people who work.

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States & Tribes Clean Up Abandoned Coal Mines with $485 Million in Grants

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced nearly half a billion dollars in grants for states and tribes to eliminate health and safety hazards caused by past coal mining. This year’s funding – a $90 million increase over last year – will generate more than $1 billion in economic activity and support thousands of jobs across the country. 

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Plan to boost employment for disabled workers

The Obama administration wants to use the power of government purchasing to help increase the number of disabled people in the workforce, proposing to require federal contractors to set a goal of having disabled workers make up at least 7% of their employees.

Labor officials called the plan one of the most significant efforts to protect the rights of disabled workers since passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act in 1990.

"This is really a historic moment in the civil rights movement in America," said Patricia Shiu, director of the Labor Department's Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs.

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Santa Clara Inmates Build Toys For Disadvantaged Children

Inmates at the Elmwood Correctional Facility in Milpitas are pitching in on the Toys for Tots effort by Marines to help make the holidays happier for some disadvantaged Bay Area children.

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Obama :: Osawatomie :: free market not a free license to take whatever you want

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Standing for equality :: OFA volunteer

In recent years, while we have seen big movements toward equality, we have also seen some of the most open – and not so open – attacks on the community. That's why the fight for LGBT equality is more relevant today than it has ever been.

Pride celebrations are important to recognize the diversity of our community and celebrate the progress we've made, like ending the disastrous Don't Ask Don't Tell policy. But they are also a call to action and a reminder of how far we still need to go.

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Save Lives By Cleaning Up Vacant Lots

In 1999, the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society began a program of cleaning vacant lots in Philadelphia. They cleared them of trash, leveled the land, planted grass, and built low fences to make the lots feel like parks. Each one got maintenance checkups several times a year. Dr. Charles C. Branas, associate professor of Epidemiology at the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, decided to see if those greened lots improved the health and safety of residents living nearby. His research, published online in the American Journal o

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