You wouldn’t know it from listening to the discussion of immigration policy on the presidential campaign trail, but for immigrants with permanent residency, getting citizenship is not easy, not cheap and not a no-brainer.
Go inside the classroom and hear from an instructor who’s helping to train the new green workforce.
James Eleby turns discarded scrap wood into new tables at a Brooklyn factory. Learn how he got a foothold in the green economy.
It isn’t that green jobs don’t exist. It’s that instead of new jobs materializing, existing jobs got greener.
Some hoped the Green Jobs/Green New York program would produce as many as 14,000, but it appears to have generated but a few hundred. People who worked with the initiative said abundant paperwork and an under-developed market were part of the problem.
New York charted a new path to energy efficiency, using “on-bill financing” so low-income homeowners could get retrofits they couldn’t afford up front. But utility companies, lenders and ratings companies all made demands and decisions that made the approach a poor fit for households of limited means.
Some borrowers report positive experiences—and significant savings—under the Green Jobs/Green New York program. But others had a frustrating time with the loan program’s rules and processes.
A few years ago, from New York’s City Hall to the state house to the Obama administration, everyone was excited about the prospect of creating thousands of green jobs. The result differs from the rhetoric.
When the Green Jobs/Green New York bill was signed in 2009, there was talk of delivering both energy efficiency and economic justice. But prospects for real progress were narrowed by negotiations over the law.
The changing relationship between employees and employers is sometimes billed as a family-friendly boost. In fact, it’s largely an affront to basic economic justice—which is why some workers are fighting back.
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