The New York State Immigrant Action Fund web site aims to put the power to change our treatment of immigrants directly into your hands. This site will give you the information and tools you need to make life better for immigrants in our state.
The site is brand new.
But while our organization may be in its infancy, it mobilizes the talent and knowledge of some of the most experienced immigrant analysts and activists in New York State.
The centerpiece of our new site is our Congressional Report Cards. We will soon have a report card for every member of the New York delegation in our nation’s capital. These report cards give you an immigration insider’s view of how your Senators and Congressperson are protecting and advancing immigrant rights. And we don’t hold back, either with praise or criticism.
You’ll learn how they voted on immigrant issues, what new legislation they are sponsoring, and what they are saying about the future of America as a nation of immigrants. And we’ll tell you how to get in touch with them to let them know how you see things.
We won’t just look at what is going down in D.C. Albany budget battles impact on everything from schooling for immigrant kids to care for elderly refugees. State funding for citizenship programs and protection for trafficking victims have both been jeopardized by revenue shortfalls.
We won’t forget that a lot of the action is at the local level.
New York City’s government has more elected leaders from more diverse immigrant communities than ever before. We’ll give you the skinny on how well the mayor, the comptroller, the City Council, and the rest of city government are advancing New York’s interests by developing one of our greatest assets, our immigration dynamo.
And, one-in-three New York immigrants lives outside the City. We will cover the county, city, and town politics across the state that directly hit at the lives of our newest residents. We will look at how the political culture of Suffolk County helped make it the anti-immigrant hate crime capital of New York. We’ll examine fiscal fights in Westchester to preserve innovative services for immigrants. And we will look at the politics behind the treatment of farmworkers in our rural counties.
Our site will be updated every time there is breaking news on immigrant issues. There will be something new every week, from blogs about who are the state’s most anti-immigrant elected officials are, to on-line petitions for you to sign, rallies to attend, and ways you and your friends can swell the web 2.0 network calling for change.
