Mission
The CFC is building power within grassroots organizations so that farmworker communities can set policies that impact agricultural workers in California.
In the spring of 2020, a small group of community-based organizations (CBOs) and allies began meeting in response to a growing number of policies referencing or aiming to serve farmworkers without including farmworkers and farmworker-serving CBOs in the policy conversations at California’s state capitol.
In late 2020, the group, known as the Farmworker Advocacy Working Group and sitting within the California Food and Farming Network, became the policy advocacy arm of the COVID-19 Farmworker Study (COFS), a collaborative research project providing critical missing information on farmworkers’ abilities to protect themselves and their families during the COVID-19 pandemic, gathered directly from farmworkers.
The Farmworker Advocacy Working Group continued to meet during and after the height of the pandemic to demand recognition of farmworkers’ essential role and to ensure that farmworker-serving organizations have a seat at the table where state policies impacting their communities are being decided. In 2024, the Farmworker Advocacy Working Group transformed into the California Farmworker Coalition.
Today, the CFC builds power within grassroots organizations so that farmworker communities can set policies that impact agricultural workers in California. Together, and rooted in farmworkers’ priorities, the group has worked with legislators to make key amendments to bills establishing a Farmworker Resource Center pilot program, ultra high heat and smoke standards, and a smoke notification program, to name a few.
The CFC represents organizations that are committed to centering the needs of California’s farmworkers in state policy, including labor, environmental justice, and Indigenous farmworker community-based organizations, advocates and researchers. The CFC receives backbones support from the California Food and Farming Network, which is building a movement centered on racial equity to transform the food and farming system through state policies and is co-facilitated by the Central California Environmental Justice Network.
Advocacy
The group submits public comment on
regulatory processes, advocates to change and pass legislation, engages agencies to ensure they serve communities, meets with legislators, legislative staff, and policy committee staff, and influences the implementation of farmworker-related policies.
Representation
Coalition priorities are identified through testimony collected in worker comités within community based organizations and campaigns are selected by worker delegades.
Resources
The CFC is a bilingual power building space for community based organizations that traditionally haven’t had a voice in Sacramento. Along with stipends to support voting member organizations’ participation, the Coalition offers policy advocacy trainings and mentorship to build the capacity of farmworker organizations to make change through state policies.
We believe that statewide policy advocacy is most effective when directly accountable to and driven by local organizing. Power for marginalized workers like farmworkers has always come from strong grassroots organizing. Yet many of the policies with the greatest impact on workers, from wage and hour laws to health and safety standards, are primarily being set at the state level, where local farmworker organizing groups need a voice. This is why the CFC focuses on state policy primarily, while committed to following the lead and needs of farmworker organizing.
While the California Farmworker Coalition has seen its influence and reach in Sacramento increase as it meets with more legislators and impacts more policies, the coalition has shifted from responding defensively to policies developed in closed rooms that fall short of the true changes workers deserve, to proactively developing solutions to the most pressing issues impacting California’s farmworkers. safety standards, are primarily being set at the state level, where local farmworker organizing groups need a voice. This is why the CFC focuses on state policy primarily, while committed to following the lead and needs of farmworker organizing.
The California Farmworker Coalition has active campaigns focused on enforcement of agricultural workers’ labor rights and is actively fundraising to support staff capacity at voting member organizations, provide expanded capacity building to farmworker advocates, and expand its Sacramento presence.
To learn more, contact CFC co-facilitator, Beth Spitler (bspitler@foodfarmnetwork.org).
While the California Farmworker Coalition has seen its influence and reach in Sacramento increase as it meets with more legislators and impacts more policies, the coalition has shifted from responding defensively to policies developed in closed rooms that fall short of the true changes workers deserve, to proactively developing solutions to the most pressing issues impacting California’s farmworkers.
The California Farmworker Coalition has active campaigns focused on health and safety enforcement for agricultural workers and is actively fundraising to support staff capacity at voting member organizations, provide expanded capacity building to farmworker advocates, and expand its Sacramento presence. To learn more, contact CFC co-facilitator,
Beth Spitler.
