Leticia Zavala, co-founder and co-coordinator of El Futuro Es Nuestro / It’s Our Future (IOF) has been named the runner up of the 2023 Discount Foundation Legacy Award, honoring an individual who has demonstrated “outstanding leadership and contributed significantly to workers’ rights movements in the United States and/or globally.” This award was created in partnership with the Jobs with Justice Education Fund and the Neighborhood Funder’s Group. 

The awards ceremony took place in Wilmington, NC on May 10, where the primary winner of the national award was announced as Angaza Laughinghouse, also an NC organizer and farmworker supporter. Leticia has known Angaza for many years, as both have been part of the struggle for workers rights and racial justice in North Carolina.

Lety comments, “During my early years of organizing, I learned a lot from the Black workers movement, including the inclusion of culture and music in the struggle. So it is an honor to be recognized alongside Angaza Laughinghouse as we move forward in the struggle.”

In the photo below, left to right: Juan Carlos Lino (IOF member), Melinda Wiggins (Southern Workers Opportunity Fund), Alexandria Jones (Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation), Letizia Zavala (IOF), and Angelita Morrisroe (longtime farmworker supporter).

One of IOF’s key issues this season is wage theft, and one form of wage theft is the unfair implementation of the H2A “three-quarters guarantee”.

When H2A farmworkers come to the U.S. for work, they face many limitations since their employer is also their landlord, visa-sponsor, and their only transportation. However, one right they do have is the “three-quarters (¾) guarantee.” Because unpredictable weather determines if and when workers can work, the H2A contract guarantees that the grower will give workers at least 75% of the working hours promised. The catch? The ¾ guarantee is calculated over an entire season, not week-to-week or month-to-month, leaving many workers stranded without food during periods of time with little to no work. 

While many workers arrive in early May for planting, the harvest doesn’t usually begin until a month and a half later, unless those employers cultivate short season crops like strawberries. Workers might work in planting for a week, complete any available side tasks if the grower has any, and then have no work for up to six weeks waiting for a harvest- without earning a dime to send back home- or to purchase food themselves. 

This is an extreme hardship on H2A workers. They are legally bound to their growers, so can’t leave to look for work on other farms, if things are slow on their farm. And assuming they work 14 hours a day at the height of the harvest for weeks in a row in the middle of the summer, they are unlikely to qualify for any relief under the three-quarters guarantee. 

Fortunately, local churches have responded to the need. Workers have been organizing themselves and coordinating with IOF coordinators to reach out to food banks and church pantries. Special thanks to Benson Baptist Church: they did a special appeal, collecting 23 baskets of food in one day, benefiting workers at four different camps. When they asked their members for financial support, the church collected $800! IOF will be distributing the groceries purchased with this donation in the coming days- we anticipate that over 40 workers will benefit.  Thank you Benson Baptists!

In the spirit of community and mutual aid, when IOF members receive grocery donations, they work out amongst themselves who has had work lately and who hasn’t, ensuring an equitable distribution of the food.

Big Thanks to the Hispanic Federation and National Farm Worker Ministry!

In the last few months, It’s Our Future (IOF) has distributed $25,000 benefiting over 130 farmworkers and their family members who were affected by COVID-19. This effort was a collaboration with the National Farm Worker Ministry (NFWM), which received a special grant from the Hispanic Federation. IOF worked with NFWM to help identify workers who missed days of work due to the pandemic, as well as workers who missed significant amounts of work, workers who suffered long-term health-effects of COVID, and also families of NC farmworkers who died of COVID-19. 

While mini-grants aren’t able to make up for a season of lost wages, and no amount of money can compensate for a lost loved one, financial support from $100 up to $2,000 assisted over 50 families. One worker, S, suffered a case of Covid that landed him in the hospital for many weeks, accruing over $500,000 in medical expenses; he ended up returning to Mexico with a portable oxygen tank. S has not been invited to return back to the US to work, even though he has been coming to North Carolina to work for the same grower for more than 10 years. With the mini-grant he received through this program, S invested in a traditional craft business in his indigenous community as a new way to earn a living.

Tragically, R passed away from Covid in the summer of 2021. According to his family, he was not offered sufficient medical attention from the NC Growers Association (NCGA) while he was living in their care, so he pursued it elsewhere. He died just days later. The NCGA claimed he abandoned his contract, and FLOC did not challenge the NCGA claim or assist the family in pursuing a workers’ comp case. Eventually, both groups provided some support, but the family still had to take out multiple loans to cover the cost of transferring R’s body back to Mexico. When R’s family received the mini-grant from IOF/ NFWM/ Hispanic Federation, they were finally able to finish paying off their debts, 19 months later. 

We are so grateful for the partnership with the Hispanic Federation and the National Farm Worker Ministry to help ease the burden on these families. 

Photos below: R; R's family