The teary blonde is a familiar image to lovers of modern art. But outside the Museum of Modern Art these days, Roy Lichtenstein's well-known print, "Crying Girl" has an added feature, a cartoon bubble that has her saying: "MoMA's base salary is below poverty level."
The image has been appropriated by the members of the Professional and Administrative Staff Association, or PASTA. The strike by PASTA workers against the Museum of Modern Art, or MoMa, is now well into its third month.
The two sides differ on the effect of the strike. Glenn Lowry, the director of the museum, said that the strike was having "no impact" on operations and that "attendance was up" since it began. The union says that is not true, and points to several canceled events, including a major fundraiser and at least one outdoor "Summergarden" concert.
Both have filed charges of unfair practices with the National Labor Relations Board. The two sides have not talked face-to-face since April.
Though under the umbrella of the United Auto Workers, PASTA is an unusual union in several ways. No similar unions even exist at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim and the Whitney. What other union would mobilize protesters, dress them in evening gowns, and have them approach guests on the way to the museum for David Rockefeller's birthday party?
PASTA represents bookstore clerks earning $17,000 as well as curators earning three times that much. Many members have advanced degrees; some have more than one.
"I have a fabulous boss and a great job. And no one works here to get rich," explains striker Cristina Grillo, who works in the publications department. "But how much of your life can you give up?" She is striking over fears that health benefits will be cut, a charge that Lowry denies.
In addition to health care, other issues in contention include wages, job security, and what people in the labor field refer to as agency shop. Starting salaries for PASTA members are the lowest out of MoMA's six unions. They want five percent a year; the museum is offering three percent. Workers are also worried about their jobs when the museum closes its Manhattan site for a major $650 million renovation in two years. Union members want their jobs guaranteed after the reopening; the museum wants flexibility pending any reorganization in the new space. Agency shop is perhaps the most difficult issue. At the moment, membership in PASTA is voluntary; about two-thirds of those in eligible jobs are members. Agency shop would compel everyone in a union job to pay union dues.
As it is, the union itself is internally divided. About half the 250 members are not on strike. Some never went out. Others, especially in curatorial positions, have returned to their jobs -- allegedly under management pressure.
Joshua Freeman, a labor historian at Queens College and the author most recently of "Working Class New York: Life and Labor Since World War II," sees the strike at the Museum of Modern Art as unusual for New York City's cultural community, and unlikely to influence it.
"However," he says, "this strike is interesting within the larger labor movement, where you see a renewed interest by professionals in unionization, like doctors and graduate students. At nonprofit institutions, it less a money issue, more one of respect."
At MoMA it is both.
"I'm in this for the long haul," says Cristina Grillo on the picket line. Then she points to a huge inflatable rat - the labor movement's mascot - that watches over the strikers ever day. In its puffy claws are signs that read "We Are On An Employee Strike" in English and five other languages.
Rhonda Zangwill is a writer, editor and teacher in New York City. She does not claim to be a critic, but she knows what she likes. She has been published in various special interest and trade journals, even some that are still in existence.
It was a typical day at Queens Family Court on Parsons Boulevard in Jamaica on May 3. At 2:00 p.m. over one hundred people were waiting in the second floor reception area for their cases to be called by one of five judges holding court on that floor that day. Family Court is where all decisions regarding children in foster care are made. Many in the crowd, mostly parents seeking return of children, had been waiting since 9:00 a.m. In Family Court there are no official start times for proceedings.
Tanya Granston, 23, arrived at 9:00 despite her lawyer's prediction that her case would not get a hearing until afternoon. She'd been waiting eight months to get her two children, LaTanya, 5, and JaQuane, 2, out of foster care, and she could hardly stand the wait another moment. Charged with medical neglect for failing to take JaQuane to an emergency room the night she picked him up from the babysitter and found a burn on his buttocks, Ms. Granston had yet to have her day in court - had yet, that is, to testify that she had taken JaQuane to the pediatrician the morning after she picked him up.
Shortly after lunch, Ms. Granston's lawyer, Ade Fansanya, approached Ms. Granston and her mother (there to lend support), looking tense. "We have a problem," he began. "ACS's attorney is not here so there's going to be an adjournment." Ms. Granston burst into tears.
This made it the eighth time since July 29th, when Ms. Granston's children were taken into city custody, that her case had been adjourned. The list of reasons for delay ran the gamut. On July 30th, the case was adjourned to give the Administration for Children's Services (ACS) time to find a kinship home for the children. On August '0th, it was adjourned because ACS had not searched for a home. On September 30th, it was rescheduled because the judge was called away. Almost a year into the case and there had been just one short stretch of fact-finding, back on November '8th, '999.
As devastating as the May 3rd setback was for Tanya, it was hardly unusual, according to lawyers, social workers, and judges who work in New York City's family courts. A new study by Pubic Advocate Mark Green substantiates the magnitude of the failure of New York City Family Courts to deliver justice on time. (Go to http://www.nyc.gov/palist.cfm and click on Reports and Investigations.) According to the report:
Because of new timelines established by the 1997 federal Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA), court delays are now a serious threat to family reunification. ASFA mandates that agencies begin proceedings to terminate parental rights when a child has been in foster care for 15 of 22 months.
Mr. Fansanya tried soothing Ms. Granston as he explained what was likely to happen that afternoon, but in fact he was exasperated himself. "If this were any other case in any other place this case would be dismissed if the petitioner were not ready to proceed," he said.
As it turned out, the hearing in front of Judge Stephen Bogacz produced one positive result, even though it was adjourned almost as soon as it began, as predicted. Mr. Fansanya won permission for Ms. Granston to have unsupervised overnight visits with the children. First he had to convince Judge Bogacz to accept a mental health evaluation of Ms. Granston prepared by the children's private foster care agency in place of a City assessment. The City's assessment, though ordered by the court, was not yet ready. After a ten minute break to allow ACS officials to read the private agency's report, Judge Bogacz granted Ms. Granston the extended visits with her children.
A 1996 study by the state's Office of Court Administration (OCA) shows how common delays are in New York City child welfare proceedings. Of 590 abuse and neglect cases reviewed by OCA, 425, or 72%, were adjourned four or more times. In over half the cases, 307, there were six or more adjournments. With 40 to 60 cases on their calendars every day, judges find it difficult to reconvene cases quickly. Generally six to eight weeks are lost every time a case is adjourned. Ms. Granston was lucky. Her hearing wasn't a victory but it was a small step forward. Her hearing was then adjourned for another month.
Peggy J. Farber is freelance journalist specializing in children's issues. Her reporting on conditions of NYC children has appeared in City Limits Magazine as well as on National Public Radio.
Images of armed federal agents in riot gear storming through the Miami home of Elian Gonzalez's relatives dominated news coverage on the weekend of April 22nd and 23rd. In one swift move, at the orders of Attorney General Janet Reno, Elian was torn from the home of his great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez and returned to his biological father. Members of the Gonzalez family, national political figures and Sunday morning talk show regulars were left with nothing to do but puzzle over questions that always come up when child custody issues are at stake. Public discourse on Elian Gonzalez and on all child welfare cases would be considerably advanced if the public understood that the Supreme Court has already ruled - repeatedly - that a child's best interests are not a matter for courts or the government to consider unless the child's parents have been found unfit.
One of its most definitive rulings comes straight from a 1982 New York State child welfare case, Santosky v. Kramer, in which the Court declared that the due process clause of the Constitution requires that parents be found unfit before states can move against the fundamental legal bond between children and parents. "You cannot talk about best interests unless you've determined that a parent is unfit. You can not presume the interests of parent and child are opposed until you decide that parent has fallen down on the job," said Bruce A. Boyer, a professor in family law at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. "And that's a principle that applies across the board."
In the eyes of the Supreme Court, in other words, when parents are fit, protecting a child's interests means keeping child and parent together.
The Elian Gonzalez case highlights another recurring theme in child welfare cases: It is difficult for adults to conceive of what the world looks like from a child's point of view.
"Six-year-olds see the world in very concrete here and now ways," explained Dr. Flemming Graae, interim director for child and adolescent psychiatry at New York Presbyterian Hospital's Westchester campus. Abstractions that adults take for granted - that people we've never met, for instance, can be members of our families - are impossible for young children to manage. From Elian's point of view, Lazaro Gonzalez and the Miami relatives may be no more relevant to his sense of safety than a group of kind strangers.
Similarly, adults charged with making decisions for children in the child welfare system often fail to recognize how children think about their worlds. Children entering New York City's foster care system awaken in beds that are unfamiliar, among strangers, cut off from everything that is customary. For many adults this would be a difficult transition. For young children - who tend to see the world in egocentric terms - placement is likely to have considerable impact, for which the child feels some responsibility. Yet child welfare officials rarely speak of placement as a profound trauma.
I ignored the Elian Gonzalez story until the morning after the raid when even moderate voices questioned the Justice Department1s actions. In contrast to early commentators, I saw the raid as a rare good use of force. A slower removal might have produced different results, like a prolonged tug of war with Elian forced to take sides. There is no need for Congressional hearings or public debate; the Justice Department handled a difficult situation well, and deserves public applause.
Peggy J. Farber is freelance journalist specializing in children's issues. Her reporting on conditions of NYC children has appeared in City Limits Magazine as well as on National Public Radio.