In 1995, labor, community, and faith leaders came together with a vision for an inclusive regional economy where working people, and low-income communities of color can thrive.
This vision was rooted in the ability to build worker power, organize diverse communities across our region and create a model of shared governance in which working families have a voice — and Working Partnerships USA was born.
Since then, we have been steadfast in our commitment to build the power of organized workers and communities to inspire a democracy that works for all. We’ve been at the forefront of organizing cutting-edge policy campaigns to define a new economy based on shared prosperity and mutual accountability.
We have led campaigns to improve the lives of workers and their families through groundbreaking living wage and minimum wage victories, including our 2012 victory to increase the minimum wage in San Jose for more than 75,000 low-wage workers.
We pioneered the Children’s Health Initiative to become the first county to provide universal coverage to all children regardless of documentation status.
We developed the campaign to pass a measure to generate $50 million annually to support funding for safety net programs for Santa Clara County.
Through Silicon Valley Rising, we drove one of the nation’s largest private sector organizing drives and organized 10k workers in the tech sector for unions with better wages and working conditions.
We’ve also worked with our labor and community partners to hold giant technology corporations accountable to our communities and strengthen and deepen democracy in Silicon Valley — we organized to pass the Fair Elections Initiative (Measure B) in 2022. And led a campaign which resulted in the nation’s largest community-led community benefits fund addressing displacement, building thousands of units of affordable housing and a path to thousands of family support union jobs, from Alphabet Inc.
We also drive critical programs such as the Trades Orientation Program and the Fair Workplace Collaborative that open the door to good jobs and family-supporting careers and ensure that employers in our region are held accountable to treat their employees with dignity and offer fair compensation for their hard work.
