This Thursday,
The proclamation describes Opportunities, Inc. as "an industrious environment to promote vocational skills and social independence for people with special needs." And the proclamation says Opportunities Inc. offers
...service choices both on-site and in the community for maximizing their clients' employment aspirations and independence with more than 450 participants obtaining and maintaining competitive jobs each year.Check out Opportunities, Inc.'s website. Very nice. There they tell us "Opportunities, Inc. provides services to individuals for the purpose of maximizing their success and enhancing their abilities to be independent, contributing members of the community." And you see pictures of disabled people.
There's more to the story.
Robert Heussner, a 66-year-old Vietnam veteran, works there, but he'll probably lose his job. As blue cheddar noted, Heussner wrote a letter to the editor of the Daily Union describing Opportunities Inc., as a 19th century sweatshop.
What we do is package cans of cat food from Nestle Purina in Jefferson, millions of cans a week. It is all done by hand on five, fast-paced, assembly lines. It’s grueling work...Oh, and most of the workers aren't disabled.
We'll let blue cheddar take it from there:
Heussner describes a workplace where minimum wage workers have no hope of advancement out of their “temporary” status, where one single fan fails to cool hot workers on an assembly line below, where there’s no holiday pay even for Christmas, and a public free clinic has to fill in for health benefits because the employer won’t give them. During Thursday’s “Gala” event “temporary” employees who have worked there for years will stay home with a little less money. It’s an unpaid day off.
Walker promised Wisconsinites he’d deliver 250,000 jobs during his term. Ladies and gentlemen, these are the kinds of jobs Walker celebrates. Are these the sort of jobs Wisconsin needs? Are these the jobs his voters had in mind?Read the whole thing here.
