Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday announced the creation of a new city office focused on helping New York City workers learn about their rights, connect with worker organizations and organize around workplace issues.
Mamdani signed an executive order establishing the Mayor’s Office of Worker Power, which his administration described as the “first office of its kind in the nation.”
The office will bring City Hall and city agencies together to focus on worker outreach, education, research, policy and partnerships with worker organizations, according to a press release.
Tony Perlstein, a longtime union and community organizer, will serve as the office’s executive director, the release said.
Perlstein is a former longshoreman who most recently served as a director in the United Auto Workers’ organizing department, the release added. He previously served as the union’s national co-director of education.
According to City Hall, the new office will bring workers and union leaders together, holding hearings on important labor issues and connecting workers with organizations that support them.
Research produced by the office in tandem with other city agencies will focus on “pressing issues facing workers,” City Hall said.
The office will also focus on “emerging challenges, including new technologies, worker misclassification, immigration-based exploitation and climate risks to worker safety,” connecting workers with information about their rights at “everyday touchpoints, including workforce centers, libraries, IDNYC offices, schools and community events.”
Mamdani said the office intends to help to give workers a greater role in shaping city policy.
“Every day, working New Yorkers show up, do their jobs, and keep this city running,” he said in a statement. “Too often, they have no say in the conditions they work under.”
“The Mayor’s Office of Worker Power will make sure workers have a seat at the table before exploitation becomes a crisis and violations become routine,” he added.
His administration said the office builds on its efforts to strengthen worker protections, including a crackdown on deceptive tipping practices for app-based delivery workers.