The “Fight for $15” got an early, boisterous start at 6:00 am on Wednesday, April 15, when Local 79 members joined hundreds of construction workers and low-wage workers in Brooklyn to rally for higher wages for low wage workers and union protection. Protestors marched through the streets of Brooklyn, stopping at McDonald’s and at a job site of JDS, a notorious non-union developer.  After the rally, Local 79 Business Manager Mike Prohaska said that the “Fight for $15” is “at its core, about social and economic justice for all workers throughout this country.  Local 79 is committed to fight for workers to have the right to organize, to be paid a living wage for an honest day’s work, and to stop rich developers like JDS from exploiting the workers of this great City.”

The rally was part of a nationwide day of rallies and protests demanding that the minimum wage be raised to $15 an hour and to give workers the right to form a union without the fear of retaliation.