“I am an owner and a worker,” said Daisy Salvador, an immigrant from Honduras and one of the founding members of the Healthy Planet Cleaning Cooperative, in Spanish. “As an owner of a cooperative, I am excited to have the opportunity to build a better life for myself and my family.”
The worker cooperative — consisting of five members, all from Spanish-speaking countries — focuses on providing cleaning services in an environmentally sensitive way. It is the first under a law signed last year that provides the framework for workers to create cooperatives where they function as both labor and ownership.
The law, and cooperative trainings, were championed by the POWER Network: a coalition of local labor organizations formed by Fuerza Laboral, Rhode Island Jobs with Justice and the Center for Justice, the City of Central Falls and others. The acronym stands for People Owning Wider Economic Resources, according to the Fuerza Laboral website.
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