As CLUE, we educate, organize, and mobilize the faith community to accompany workers and their families in their struggle for good jobs and dignity in the workplace.
La misión de CLUE es “educar, organizar y mobilizar a la comunidad de la fe para acompañar a los trabajadores y sus familias en la lucha por conseguir buenos empleos, dignidad y justicia.”
CLUE’s mission is to bring together clergy and lay leaders of all faiths to join low-wage workers and other economically-disadvantaged communities in their struggles for justice. CLUE and its network of leaders and congregations partner with activist community organizations and unions to increase workers’ capacity to influence their working conditions, to attain worker-friendly public policies, and to pressure commercial/industrial developers to agree to a community benefits package in exchange for permits and subsidies.
To further the work of economic justice in our region, CLUE collaborates with over 600 religious leaders and 1200 lay people throughout the Los Angeles and Orange County areas. These congregations represent a broad range of ethnic and denominational constituencies, including Christian Evangelicals, Muslim leaders and mosques, all of the Jewish denominations, historic African-American churches, Spanish-speaking Pentecostals, and Korean congregations.
The religious community brings three essential assets to the broad-based collaborations which advance economic justice.
Founded in 1996, CLUE is one of the oldest interfaith-worker-justice organizations in the country. At that time, religious leaders joined the effort to pass a living wage law mandating that businesses with Los Angeles city contracts to provide adequate wages and health benefits. After the legislation passed, CLUE was formed with the purpose of organizing the religious community to support low-wage workers in their struggles for a living wage, health benefits, respect and a voice in the corporate and political decisions which affect them.
CLUE's many accomplishments began with key support for the successful 1997 Living Wage campaign in Los Angeles. CLUE took a leadership role in the battle to keep Wal-Mart out of Inglewood; played a central role in the passage of statewide legislation increasing funding for staffing for nursing homes; provided strategic support for striking grocery workers that brought the owner of Safeway back to the bargaining table; created dramatic actions in support of hotel workers in Santa Monica and Los Angeles that were crucial to victory; and played an important role in the public policy and corporate campaigns of healthcare workers and janitors.
In 2005, CLUE Orange County was founded to support workers in their ongoing struggle for basic dignity in the workplace. After 10 years of successful, dynamic projects to eliminate barriers and improve conditions for Orange County’s low-wage families, CLUE-OC joined forces with CLUE-LA to form the current structure of CLUE.
Today, CLUE continues its work alongside the employees of car washes, grocery stores, hotels, industrial production companies, and many other local businesses whose ethical standards so immediately affect our communities. To learn more about our current and recent work, visit our campaign page.
As CLUE, we educate, organize, and mobilize the faith community to accompany workers and their families in their struggle for good jobs and dignity in the workplace.
La misión de CLUE es “educar, organizar y mobilizar a la…