APTP Workers Union Sends Letter to Executive Director
We are excited to announce the formation of the APTP Workers Union!
On December 11, 2024, a majority of eligible staff officially requested recognition from Anti Police-Terror Project's Executive Director for our union with The Industrial Workers of the World Bay Area (IWW) as our bargaining agent.
Our union gave APTP leadership until January 8th to respond, and we hope they will follow in the steps of a growing number of progressive organizations across the country in the granting its workers voluntary recognition.
We are deeply committed to following Black Leadership. We also recognize that the Black community is not a monolith, and our union comprises Black staff, as well as brown, queer and disabled staff, all of whom deserve to enjoy the benefits of a union.
Motivated by a deep love and respect for APTP’s mission, history, and work, in forming a union, our goal is to make APTP stronger, more sustainable, and more resilient for the future.
Read our letter requesting recognition & follow this page to get updates!
Letter from APTP Workers Union Requesting Recognition
December 11, 2024
Cat Brooks
Executive Director
Anti Police-Terror Project
Re: Petition for Voluntary Recognition of APTP Workers' Union
The Anti Police-Terror Project is a Black-led, multiracial, intergenerational coalition that seeks to build a replicable and sustainable model to eradicate police terror. For over a decade, APTP has supported families and community members surviving police terror in their struggles for justice and healing. APTP's groundbreaking programs serve as examples for the entire country, and its founders and workers — who until recently were all volunteers — have worked tirelessly to run those programs with compassion, care and dedication.
We are proud of this work and legacy, and we believe in living the values we champion in our workplace. In that spirit, we are proud to announce the formation of the APTP Workers Union.
We, the majority of non-supervisorial, non-confidential APTP staff members, are petitioning APTP directors to voluntarily recognize our union and The Industrial Workers of the World Bay Area (IWW) as our bargaining agent.
We are motivated by a deep love and respect for APTP's mission, history, and work. In forming a union, our goal is to make APTP stronger, more sustainable, and more resilient for the future.
The IWW's deep legacy as a union that helped launch International Workers Day (May 1st) through rebellions called for by AfroLatina labor advocates like Lucy Parsons, makes it a union we feel aligns with our values and mission. We chose the IWW specifically because it is the most radical union in the country and the only union we can say with certainty has zero affiliations with any law enforcement entity, as well as no cooption by local politicians or the Democratic or Republican party.
When we began this transition, APTP leadership said you did not want to reproduce the harms of the Nonprofit Industrial Complex. Our union will help guard against those harms and be deeply grounded in healing justice, which is only possible if frontline workers have a voice. As we move from an all-volunteer organization to a nonprofit institution, it is vital that APTP workers have the vehicle of a union to exercise our workplace rights.
We are deeply committed to Black self determination and to following Black Leadership. We also recognize that the Black community is not a monolith, and our union comprises Black staff as well as brown, queer and disabled staff, all of whom deserve to enjoy the benefits of a union. We hope you recognize that our union is NOT an outside third party; the union is us: APTPs workforce, its beating heart, the people who make the work of our organization possible.
Through our union, we hope to bolster workplace morale; address and improve volunteer retention; ensure the personal and professional development and growth of all employees; establish clear rules and procedures that maximize fairness, honor the dignity of all staff, and foreground a principled, transformative approach to workplace conflict; give staff the voice and power to improve the organization through our collective agency; foster an environment of open, honest and healthy collaboration and discussion; run effective, functioning, sustainable and fully-staffed campaigns and programs; ensure the health and wellbeing and promote healthy work-life balances for all staff; build lasting infrastructures for organizational accountability, democracy, and transparency; and foster a workplace that honors its staff, where we can all thrive, learn, and grow together.
The majority of eligible, non-supervising, non-confidential APTP employees are requesting APTP's leadership to voluntarily recognize The Industrial Workers of the World Bay Area as our bargaining agent.
We request that you respond to this petition by Wednesday, January 8, 2025 and address your response to this email with IWW's email CC'd.
We invite management to collaborate with us on this historic step to help APTP more fully live into our values and vision. We're looking forward to working with management on a fair, constructive and timely bargaining process.
In solidarity,
APTP Workers Union
[ Published to Instagram on January 7, 2025. ]
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