May 1, 2024

Dear PUSH Buffalo Board members,

The following pages summarize my experience at PUSH as the Base Building Organizer and as a labor Organizer for PUSH’s union. I’ve written this in the hopes that my experience will catalyze a change in how this organization operates from top to bottom. I am not the first employee to draw additional attention to the labor-management issues, lack of transparency and misrepresentation of the work being done. However, I want to be the last, and I believe you all are already aware of the issues detailed below, and I want to be clear that you are being called out. Not from a space of being vindictive, but from a space of genuine care for the community that I served. The ownness is on you, for your continued silence and figure heading a “community based” organization that profits off the tokenization of the same people you claim to serve.   

I came to PUSH as an Organizer in March 2022, eager to learn technical and soft skills to supplement my prior experience as a resident Community Organizer, government Budget Analyst and political Campaign Manager. Despite being familiar with pullbuffalo.com, former Organizer Kelly Camacho’s open exit letter and having heard first-hand stories from employees that came before me, I decided to give PUSH a chance. I saw this as an opportunity to be connected to my community in a meaningful way and do what I could to advance our many social justice causes. 

Union Busting

Sadly, within the first few months of employment, I realized that–not only were the stories true– they were just the tip of the iceberg. Despite the PUSH Board and management voluntarily recognizing the union just before I started, it was evident that management was working overtime on union busting in a variety of ways but particularly via my supervisor, Director of Organizing, Micaela Shapiro-Shellaby. Most of the labor organizers were a part of the Organizing team, where, spurred on by executive leadership, Micaela deliberately worked to keep the team isolated from one another and the rest of the organization to disrupt any alliances that may be forming. I also witnessed the daily abuse and mistreatment she directed towards my peers, which she eventually turned toward me after they left. Micaela single handedly decimated the Organizing team through her abusive treatment of staff, making me the most senior staff member before my first anniversary in March of 2023. In addition to driving most of the bargaining team out, Micaela and management subsequently blocked me from being assigned to the bargaining team, despite that being the request of our union group, leaving only one staff member to represent us through the last months of bargaining.

Since ratification of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in June 2023, the accurate implementation of the contract–from providing raises as dictated by the agreement to allowing staff time off to vote–has been a continuous battle, requiring staff to spend exorbitant amounts of time documenting and following up between management and CWA to get issues resolved. Currently, management is in violation of the contract on a number of issues. 

• As of my final date of employment on March 28, 2024, only one of three required Labor-Management (LM) meetings have been held and the minutes from that meeting (held in October 2023) were not completed or shared with union members.

• Reclassifications of union positions are occurring without any participation from union representatives or staff in order to dilute the labor power. At the beginning of bargaining in 2022 there were 25 staff in unit positions, 5 in non-managerial “confidential” positions, and 9 managers for a total of 39. There are currently 14 staff in unit positions (a 44% decrease since unionization), 13 managers (a 44% increase) and 1 staff in a non-managerial “confidential” position for a total of 28. These figures reflect a total decrease in workforce of 28% in just two years and a staff to manager ratio shift from 1:3 to 1:1. Eliminating significant parts of the organization like PUSH Blue and Tenant Advocacy, and unnecessary reclassifications of existing unit positions in PUSH Green and Maintenance have all contributed to the dilution of the union positions. See FTE History table.

FTE History

Lack of Fiscal Transparency

For years staff has asked for transparency about the grant funding PUSH is receiving to better understand the work required and political implications. Many staffers–particularly those in Organizing–are required to be politically astute and have a clear understanding of the implications of the work as they develop legislative campaigns and strategic alliances. Unironically, PUSH Management failed to provide the union with a budget summary at the January labor-management meeting that did not take place, showing again a lack of transparency or commitment to labor.

Member-leaders and staff are frequently shuffled to and fro with little understanding of why and in what are obvious attempts to meet participation requirements of the granting agencies or to otherwise appear successful. Frequently, staff are required to attend events (such as the annual member meeting) to appear as if there are more residents in attendance, when in fact, the membership count is well below 100 and participation is significantly less. In my last weeks of employment, I attended a climate action in Albany where half of the 25 people who went from Buffalo were either paid PUSH staff or paid Organizers from other local social justice organizations. Less than half were member-leaders.

While the PUSH Board and management regularly feast on multi-course meals from popular restaurants like Brother’s and spend thousands of dollars on “retreats” just minutes from the office at places like The Richardson Hotel–a Douglas Jemal Development–member-leaders are expected to eat pizza during phone banks and participate in 18-hour day trips to Albany while being served day old Wegmans subs. I don’t know what the almost all-white Development Committee members eat, but I do know that those members don’t typically attend actions or member meetings, while some of our most vulnerable community members–specifically Black women and elderly folks–are pressured to make public speeches and participate in physically taxing actions. Several members remarked about their dismay at not being recognized at the annual member meeting in February. Rarely do member-leaders get the recognition, respect or acknowledgment they should from management or the Board.

In addition to frivolously spending money on retreats that result in only the vaguest of directives to staff, it should be addressed that several former managers–most of whom are implicated in the NLRB lawsuits or on the PullBuffalo website that spurred the union–are being paid “behind the scenes” to advise the managers that are left. Between former Executive Director, Rahwa Ghrimatzian and her maintained representation of PUSH via NY Renews, the Rose Jade Consulting team of Emily Terrana, Harper Bishop and Nicolalita Rodriguez, and former Organizing Director, Micaela Shapiro-Shellaby there are even more managers than what is in the FTE count being paid as consultants.

This begs the questions: Who are the grants and tax deductible donations really for? Are you just moving shells around to appease your benefactors? What has PUSH won other than the CLCPA, which isn’t even being implemented as required and for which PUSH lacks the base and power to do anything to move that needle? Is all of this work just to pay the very gentrifiers that inhabit the West Side? How many staff and community members need to blow the whistle before something changes?

“The Board Has Neglected its Responsibilities”

From the Fall of 2022 through the Spring of 2023, staff were working together to organize new members onto the Board so that it might be more representative of the member-leaders on the frontlines. We were also talking to existing Board members in the hopes of gaining support with respect to the union negotiations process, which was going poorly. Much to our dismay, the board failed to step up to protect and support staff and members. Existing board members turned away from us in various ways, each failing to see how your fiduciary responsibility is tied to executive leadership’s refusal to work cooperatively with staff and resulting turnover. High turnover rates and an inability to attract experienced staff is costly, as in any organization. 

In October of 2023, new board member, Molly Sievenpiper, went so far as to collude with management to silence my concerns, potentially blowing the boards own whistle-blowing policy. She lied about the nature of our conversations and shared our private text messages from as far back as January 2023 when we were working together (or so I thought) to organize the board. I naively believed that Molly was joining because she was in favor of honoring staff, members and the missions of PUSH as a social justice organization, particularly as it relates to the philosophy of a Just Transition. 

Beyond ignoring the questionable financial and managerial decisions taking place by executive leadership, most board members also fail to connect with member-leaders at all, rarely attending monthly membership events, almost never participating in frontline activities and generally not knowing the members you are supposed to be led by. At the recent annual meeting, not only did the board fail to open elections to new members, but multiple existing board members put themselves on the ballot to be re-elected, despite having a continued lack of connection to the membership base and knowing they were in the process of leaving the board at the time.

PUSH’s Public Persona

As an organization that publicly proclaims itself as pro-union and working in the interest of residents via the Just Transition philosophy, PUSH receives significant grant funding. PUSH recently received a notable $2M unrestricted grant from the Mackenzie Scott Foundation through the Yield Giving’s March 2023 Open Call for “community-led, community-focused organizations that were working and helping people with the greatest needs in the nation.”

The continued suggestion that PUSH Buffalo is mission-driven to advance racial, economic, and environmental justice in Buffalo through the pursuance of the implementation of a Just Transition is not only a lie, but an insult to the staff–both former and current–who know this to be untrue and have experienced the negative consequences of having to uphold this fallacy daily. As the former Base Building Organizer–and one of the only people responsible for recruiting new members at PUSH during my tenure–I felt saddened, embarrassed and morally at odds with myself in the last year at PUSH after having truly come to understand the kind of organization it really is. 

I’m grateful for the relationships I was able to build with my colleagues, residents, interns and the many member-leaders that did show up because they believe in the social justice movement. Because of my love and respect for those people, I would be remiss to walk away from this organization and this board of directors without providing a thorough and public exit letter accounting my experience and incredible disappointment. You can access this letter publicly here.

Sincerely,

Courtney Friedline

Cc: Dawn Wells-Clyburn, Executive Director

Clarke Gocker, Director of Movement Building

Jennifer Ritter, People’s Action

PUSH Buffalo Development Committee

PUSH Workers United Members