Friends,

As 2024 draws to a close and we reflect on a tumultuous year, it’s clear November’s national election result was years in the making. An unabashed deference to capitalism, corporate interests, and free markets paved the way for a second Trump presidency. Working class voters, and others most concerned with the economy, felt unheard and ignored by politicians who ultimately were too cozy with Wall Street, and who failed to offer a realistic, tangible vision for an economy that works for them.

Our mainstream politics have given corporate interests a pass. Corporations have, in turn, undermined government structures, depleted coffers and rosters of the public good – education, social safety nets, affordable medicine, food quality and safety – to fill their own pockets, then blamed inflation and government incompetence for the suffering of millions. For too long, we have all been pretending that democracy and neoliberalism are compatible. They are not. The needs of working families cannot be met in a system owned by the corporations that exploit and discard them. 

By contrast, locally, voters doubled down on helping our housing insecure neighbors and addressing the root causes of homelessness by passing Measure A. With Measure US, we recommitted to children and families, and to fixing our aging public school system. And with Measures DD and LL, we overwhelmingly voted for independent redistricting for City Council and LAUSD so that our elected officials can do what they’re supposed to do – represent all of us without conflicting interests. 

These wins are the result of concerted and perennial organizing outside of the election cycle and the commitment of resources these efforts require. We know how to win. 

Organized people can beat organized money, but there are no shortcuts. As our teams reflect below on a 2024 full of challenges and victories, we know that the road ahead requires a tried and true commitment to building power in our communities over the long run. It necessitates deep organizing rooted in an unapologetic view of an economy —and Democracy— that works for everyone. It demands we build a multi-racial working class movement, led by a strong and shared vision of a better future, that can stand up to corporate interests and authoritarianism. And it means getting us all to a moment when we won’t hesitate in answering the question, “Who in our government represents the interests of working people?”

These next four years will bring unprecedented challenges, but as long as we face them together, clear-eyed and united, we’ll never be defeated. From all of us at LAANE, we wish you a peaceful holiday season.

Saludos y Adelante, 

Víctor Sánchez

The Climate Team at LAANE launched a new coalition, Angelenos for an Inclusive and Regenerative Economy (AIRE), composed of LAANE’s two teams RePower LA and Water Justice LA. This new coalition consists of almost 20 organizations throughout the LA area working together to create a water-resilient and clean energy future built by union members and prioritizing LA’s frontline communities. 

We’ve seen the onboarding of two new cohorts of Utility Pre-Craft Trainees, which means that 60 people have now entered into a pathway towards a permanent union position with LADWP, where they will do the work of transforming our buildings and our communities to be less emitting and more resilient. Also, after years of partnership between LADWP, IBEW Local 18, and us, the Utility Worker Program, which is a parallel workforce development program alongside UPCT, was officially launched in May. As of November, it has already hired 120 people into permanent union positions at LADWP. 

We also launched a parent and community base-building campaign that started in Boyle Heights, reaching 758 people, to move our LAUSD Greening plan forward.

Our coalition worked on several hard-won policy victories in 2024, including Measure RW, which secured Long Beach Hotel workers the highest minimum wage in the nation! We also hit the pavement (and the phone lines) for Measure A, which established funding for affordable housing and community services. We are also proud to have supported the expansion of the Justice Fund and Right to Counsel, which provides $2.1 million for tenant legal aid and immigrant family support. 

Our team, coalition members, and volunteers put in countless hours of hard work and dedication to achieve these wins. This commitment looks like 1,118 participants at 54 actions, 94,279 door knocks, and 71 leaders within our base, 33 of whom are new this year. We look forward to making even more progress for working families in 2025.

We’re closing out the year with a historic victory for workers! After dozens of tourism workers held a three-day fast outside City Hall, the Los Angeles City Council approved a landmark policy for an Olympic Wage for tourism workers last week that would raise the wage for airport and hotel workers to $30/hour by the 2028 LA Olympics and ensure workers have access to family health care. 

Thanks to our collective work, Los Angeles will soon have the highest living wage in the nation. Together, we’re making history as the first city to include workers’ wages as part of the plan for the Olympics and Paralympics to ensure that tourism workers and their families benefit from the massive investment in the Games. 

Our Tourism Workers Rising coalition was in constant motion this year! We joined workers and community members almost every week at City Hall, rallied with airport workers at LAX, celebrated striking hotel workers’ historic contract wins, and put in the hard work to grow our movement. The Tourism Workers Rising coalition comprises LAANE, UNITE HERE Local 11, SEIU USWW, more than 150 additional supporting organizations, and 360 small businesses.

The policy is now on the City Attorney’s desk, to be drafted and come back to City Council for a final vote in the new year. In the meantime, we invite you to support by emailing your City Councilmember to let them know you stand with tourism workers!

This year, we pushed for and won the expansion of the Fair Work Week ordinance for retail and grocery workers in unincorporated L.A. County. This will impact an estimated 5,000 additional workers, meaning more protections and just scheduling for so many of our hard-working neighbors throughout our region.

We also experienced our own Hot Labor Summer 2.0, organizing community members (including 15 community organizations from around L.A. County!) to participate in the Food 4 Less contract fight. More recently, we supported the CVS contract fight by turning out for rallies and delegations. Workers at both companies won just contracts, including significant wage increases and better working conditions. 

Mega-merger no more! The proposed merger between Kroger and Albertsons has been officially called off, marking a significant win for our local communities. This yearslong triumph was spearheaded here in Southern California by under the leadership of UFCW 770, Local 324, and the LAANE team. Together, we mobilized a coalition of local community groups and joined the national effort under the banner of the Stop The Merger Coalition.

Our coalition kicked off the year by fighting for and winning protections against co-location for LAUSD schools serving historically underserved populations. This was a huge victory in our ongoing battle against privatizers’ designs on our public schools. 

Now, we’re fighting for the district to "Put the Black Back in BSAP" and honor the commitment they made to uphold educational justice for Black students. So far, over 1337 people have signed our petition demanding Superintendent Carvalho and the rest of the School Board to do the right thing and prioritize Black student wellbeing and achievement again. You can sign the petition here. 

Since this summer, we’ve also been working diligently to incorporate community input and demands into UTLA’s bargaining platform next year. So far, we have collected and analyzed over 600 surveys, hosted two town halls, and we are engaging community organizations through focus groups! Stay tuned as 2025 promises even more for our vision of accessible, just, and opportunity-filled public schools for all students.

In February, alongside over 300 organizations nationally, LAANE received a game-changing $2 million gift from Yield Giving, MacKenzie Scott’s foundation, as a part of their first-ever open call. In May, the Annual Women for a New Los Angeles Luncheon broke attendance records and honored Los Angeles Federation of Labor President Yvonne Wheeler alongside Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsay Horvath. This month, the City of Justice Awards uplifted the work of three honorees: the co-presidents of UNITE HERE Local 11, LAUSD Board Member Jackie Goldberg, and acclaimed labor lawyer Laurie Traktman. We are so grateful to our honorees, board members, co-chairs, and supporters for making both events so successful and helping us reach our fundraising goals!

There is still time to make a year-end donation to support LAANE’s work to build an economy that works for everyone. Donate online today!