Mason Tenders District Council Political Action Committee Withdraws From Working Families Party

NEW YORK, April 25, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Today, the Mason Tenders District Council Political Action Committee (MTDCPAC), a founding member of the Working Families Party, announced that it was withdrawing from the party. "When the WFP was founded, the MTDCPAC was proud to be one of its founding supporters and contributed to creating a vision to help all New Yorkers," said Robert Bonanza, chairman of the MTDCPAC. "However in recent years the WFP has strayed from that vision and now routinely opposes issues important to the tens of thousands of workers in the construction industry, and other industries. Additionally, they now proactively support policy and legislation that could cost our members their jobs."

Mike McGuire, MTDCPAC political director and WFP board member, stated, "the WFP, in its current iteration, engages in selective application of its progressive principles. In many cases it has abandoned the working men and women of New York who have fought for decades to achieve middle-class status, especially those who build this city."

"Over the course of time we have watched the WFP horse trade one progressive issue for another, usually to the detriment of working people. Simply put, for the WFP, ideology triumphs over jobs and working families," McGuire continued. "As the death toll of construction workers in NYC has steadily climbed, WFP has chosen to back the Mayor's Mandatory Inclusionary Housing plan without even addressing the safety concerns. Workers' lives should be at least as equally important as affordable apartments," said McGuire.  

"Over the years the MTDCPAC has invested tens of thousands of dollars of its members hard-earned money in the WFP. Today we say enough is enough. The WFP has chosen to focus the Party on issues such as climate change and campaign finance reform, while not only ignoring overall job creation and economic development, but also choosing to proactively support plans that fail to create good, safe construction jobs and threaten our existing member's livelihood," said Bonanza.  

"Even prior to 2009, when the WFP participated in the misguided effort to kill 2,000 construction jobs by opposing the Kingsbridge Armory Project, the Party has ignored our calls to develop a more inclusive agenda. Our members no longer wish to be ignored. Since the WFP no longer shares the same concerns that our members do, we no longer see a need to stand with them and support their agenda in the future," concluded Bonanza. 

SOURCE Mason Tenders District Council