Once again, I write to you on behalf of the Malibu Community Labor Exchange (MCLE Center), a project that I hold close to my heart. At times like this I wish I had the power of a President Josiah Bartlet of “The West Wing.” As President, I would help the Labor Exchange by whatever means available to that high office. But the reality is that it takes more than the magic of television to sustain a real world project.
For those who don’t know, the Labor Exchange is a hiring site for skilled and unskilled workers. The center serves 60-75 persons per day – over 4,000 registrants of all races and ethnicities, living at or below poverty level. Last year, more than 8,000 day jobs were facilitated at the center and since 1993, scores of very poor and homeless individuals have found regular work that began with a day job from the Labor Exchange.
Malibu volunteers who share the belief that no community, city, or nation can ignore the existence of poverty opened the Labor Exchange in 1993. The City of Malibu provides a $15,000 grant that covers approximately 15 percent of the center’s budget. However, the board must still raise $65,000 annually to keep its doors open. And for the last three years, in spite of being strapped for funds themselves, they continued to support a project that was not their financial responsibility but a moral imperative – that is the Malibu Emergency Cold/Wet Shelter. This season alone, the project provided local homeless with 30 rainy nights of shelter and hot meals donated and cooked by local volunteers. But the cost of the project, primarily insurance, has put the MCLE in a serious financial deficit.
The shoestring staff is made up of one full-time person, my friend, Oscar Mondragon, former board member of the United Farm Workers. Many of the Labor Exchange Board Members, including its executive director, have worked gratis for 10 years. The Labor Exchange has been honored by the L.A. County Commission on Human Relations, the Staples Center, and locally, with a Dolphin Award.
Please make a generous tax-deductible contribution or enter the Rotary sponsored $10,000 Reverse Raffle (see entry form this page). The proceeds will go directly to this fine community-based project, the Malibu Community Labor Exchange, so they can continue to deliver to Malibu’s working poor, the opportunity, respect, and hope that every human being deserves.
Martin Sheen