New York – Amy Sugimori, Director of Policy and Legislation for SEIU 32BJ, has joined the Board of Directors of the Workers’ Center of Central New York (WCCNY), a grassroots organization focused on workplace and economic justice in Central New York state.

Since 2006, WCCNY has worked with immigrant workers in Central New York to combat wage theft, carry out deportation defenses and support workers’ rights to organize. Most recently, WCCNY has been working with immigrant farmworkers in New York State’s $14 billion dairy industry to defend their rights in their workplaces, to improve wages and working conditions, and to support their quest to organize.

As part of the union’s work to support immigrant workers, 32BJ SEIU has provided tactical, political and financial support to WCCNY over the past year.

Sugimori has a long history of activism and policy work in immigrants’ rights and labor, and drives 32BJ’s work on defending immigrant rights. Prior to her current position, Amy was executive director of La Fuente, a project engaging union members in civic participation in their communities, and was an attorney with the National Employment Law Project.

“Supporting the rights of immigrant workers and their empowerment is at the core of our union’s values, which is why we have devoted meaningful resources to WCCNY’s work and why 32BJ will have a representative in their board. From fast food workers to the recent victory of for-hire-drivers in New York City, we believe in winning for all workers, and strengthening organizing efforts, especially among populations who often suffer discrimination and persecution outside the public eye, as immigrant workers in the dairy industry do,” said Héctor Figueroa, president of 32BJ SEIU. “We are looking forward to working more closely with WCCNY and its members to bring justice to thousands of immigrant workers in upstate New York.”