SAN FRANCISCO -- Today, Bishop John Bryant, the Presiding Prelate of the Fifth Episcopal district of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, in an address to more than 200 pastors and lay leaders, expressed “outrage that the building owners of San Francisco like Morgan Stanley Real Estate, Shorenstein Properties, Hines, and Building Owners and Managers Association (SF BOMA) and their security contractors are perpetuating unacceptable and unjust double standards among mostly African American security officers, Latino and white service workers in their buildings.” To see Bishop Bryant’s statement in its entirety, visit www.StopTheDoubleStandards.org

Bishop Bryant urged all AME Church pastors and lay leaders to “fully support the security officers’ struggle for justice.” The AME Church Bishop’s statement comes as security contractors left negotiations yesterday without agreeing to any future dates to resume talks. It’s been more than three weeks since San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom called on building owners “to assert a greater role in fostering a quick resolution between the security guards and security guard companies.”

Bishop Bryant’s call to action reverberates similar appeals to building owners by the Congressional Black Caucus, the California Legislative Black Caucus, the NAACP, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the A. Philip Randolph Institute and other members of the Stand for Security Coalition. More than 4,000 security officers have been working under an expired contract for more than 100 days.

Double Standards in Commercial Real Estate

While the real estate industry enjoys an historic economic boom, security officers are being denied the respect of wages you can raise a family on and the peace of mind that family health care brings, while the other service workers in the high-rise commercial buildings earn decent wages and full family health care.

Commercial landlords agree to compensate janitors, parking attendants, building operating engineers and other workers -- who are largely Latino and white -- with full family health care, wages you can raise a family on, bereavement pay, pensions and more – while only the predominately African American security officers are being left behind. Well over half of the San Francisco Bay Area security officers are African American and mostly people of color.

Building owners and security contractors agree that all other building service workers:

·                     Earn at least $5 per hour more than security officers.

·                     Have access to quality, affordable family health care with portability of benefits through a health care trust fund jointly controlled by labor and management.

·                     Receive bereavement pay.

·                     Receive a pension.

·                     Get respect on the job.

For more info, visit www.StopTheDoubleStandards.org