Aquilina Versoza, Pilipino Workers Center of Southern California: Could Worker Co-ops Transform the In-Home Care Workforce?

Van Ton-Quinlivan

Welcome to WorkforceRX with Futuro Health, where future-focused leaders in education, workforce development, and healthcare explore new innovations and approaches. I’m your host, Van Ton-Quinlivan, CEO of Futuro Health.

As regular listeners to the podcast know, we often explore solutions for growing and strengthening the direct care workforce, which includes those who provide childcare and services in the home for the elderly and disabled.

Today, I’m excited to delve into the potentially transformative employee -owned cooperative model for this workforce with Aquilina Versoza, a founder and executive director of the Pilipino Workers Center of Southern California.

Aqui is a long -time advocate for improving wages and working conditions for this critically important workforce and has helped establish the co -op model in California. In addition to her work at the center, Aqui is president of the board of directors of the National Domestic Workers Alliance and is a fellow at both Rutgers University and MIT in programs focused on equity and justice for workers.

Thanks very much for being with us today, Aqui.

Aquilina Soriano Versoza

Well, it’s a pleasure to be here. I’m very excited to share all of the work that we’re doing and to get into a discussion.

Van

Well, let’s get started by having you give us an overview of the Pilipino Workers Center. Tell us more about your mission and your members and what makes you wake up every day to do this work.

Aquilina

Yes, well, the Pilipino Workers Center (PWC) just celebrated our twenty-seventh anniversary on May 1st. We were founded because we wanted to actually support the leadership of Filipino workers to make their conditions better. And quickly we saw that home care workers and caregivers, especially working on the private side of the industry, were suffering under very poor working conditions and that many from our community were going into home care work.

So, we started to build programs and campaigns and advocacy that is all focused around transforming the long -term care industry and to build better working conditions for the workers in the industry, including making sure that workers have the same rights as other workers. So we have policy campaigns like the California Domestic Worker Bill of Rights campaign that we won in 2013 that ended seventy-five years of exclusion from overtime protections for nannies and caregivers. And then we also support workers to uphold their rights or protect their rights so that the law is the reality that they can experience. So we’ve helped on the enforcement side doing education around ‘know your rights’ as well as working together with local government agencies to help win back wages for workers.

But we also saw that this wasn’t enough to actually shift conditions in the industry and that we needed to build more strategies for creating good jobs, which is how we then came to the home care cooperative development because even if a worker won their back wages, oftentimes there wasn’t an alternative good job to move to because wage theft is often more of the business model amongst a lot of agencies that our community are working for.

So, the cooperative development is a way to create the good jobs that we want to see in the industry and we’re still advocating for more investment in care overall so that everyone can both access the care that they need as well as pay their workers what they deserve to have good working conditions.

Van

Aqui, just to make sure that our audience understands, especially if they don’t come from the healthcare or home care environment, when you talk about poor working conditions –and you alluded to it in terms of wage theft and overtime protection — I was wondering if you could just like describe for us the condition of a typical worker.

Aquilina

Yeah, absolutely. So, in California, we have a public side of the industry where wages are set at a county level. But on the private side of the industry, it is kind of the Wild West. Very typically our members who are Filipino immigrant caregivers are often receiving $5 or less per hour with no overtime, no job security, no benefits, and some that are even earning just above $2 an hour with no overtime and minimum wage. Often this is because they’re working around the clock in either live -in or 24 -hour shifts where they’re paid a single daily wage, but they’re on call and responding 24 hours a day. And there are no benefits and no job security. Even the imbalance in power that the workers experience, often they’re not even able to take the paid time off that they are afforded by the law as well because if they call in, sometimes they’re just let go.

Van

That paints a very vivid picture of what it was like or is like for many workers on the private side of home care. So then fast forward…you wanted them to have an option to go to a better opportunity. So, tell us more about the worker owned co -op called Courage Home Care. What problem were you trying to solve there?

Aquilina

Well, we wanted to solve the place where both workers could go to have the good wages and a good working condition where they actually have voice in the running of the business and to also include immigrants no matter their status in this model so that they can also share in experiencing the good jobs that we’re creating because there is a large number of immigrant workers who are filling this need in our society and currently, because of the illegally low wages, they’re subsidizing the care that we need in our society.

The model that we’re creating with the LLC is overcoming the barriers for immigrants to be a part of cooperatives and is creating a new model in the industry that shows that we actually can provide good jobs with above minimum wage conditions, benefits, and that really provides workers not only with the compensation, but actually with the dignity that they deserve in the workplace as well.

Van

I see all the benefits to the worker of joining the co -op model. Can you talk a little bit about the mechanics? How is it that you’re able to do this and restructure their working arrangement?

Aquilina

So the way that we have the cooperative structured is that the caregivers, the workers, are all member owners and they are earning as member owners, not as employees. They are participating in the regular operations of the business, mostly meeting on a monthly basis — maybe more if needed — to be able to make the decisions that impact the cooperative. They also work together in care teams versus just being sent out on assignment.

The legal structure we’re using is key because traditional cooperatives under the IRS designation require owners to have social security numbers, which has excluded many immigrants from being able to participate in cooperatives. This LLC model for immigrants has actually been around for a few decades now, pioneered by both domestic workers as well as dreamers who were graduating college, but also then facing the barriers to building a livelihood for themselves. So, this is something that we brought then to home care specifically to create this model.

Van

So, if there’s a worker that wants to join the cooperative as a worker-owner, is there a limit to the number of individuals who can join this cooperative?

Aquilina

There is. Under that LLC model, we can grow to approximately twenty-five worker-owners per LLC. So this is a big constraint because if we can only create a very limited number of jobs, it’s good that we can do it, but it’s less impactful in terms of the industry itself. So we currently are in the process of building a new scaled model of home care cooperatives here in California. The way that we’re doing it is that we’re building a sort of cooperative franchise or franchised cooperatives in a way, but not actually using the legal structure of our franchise.

What we’re doing is building a tiered model where local LLC cooperatives will be member owners of a secondary cooperative and the secondary cooperative, or the ‘central cooperative’ will provide the shared infrastructure, back office support, marketing and shared governance for all of the cooperatives, which will be one brand as well and will build a standard of care across all of the local cooperatives. In addition to these functions, the central cooperative also has a Home Care Cooperative Academy that is focused on helping the formation of new local cooperatives of this structure.

It’s not just providing general information and training around building cooperatives or home care cooperatives, but it’s actually bringing a model that’s based on best practices that’s built-in already to the shared infrastructure. In that way, it’s more like a franchise so that workers can more easily be trained into the model and get into actually delivering care into the jobs and being financially viable much quicker.

We’re currently in the process this year of establishing the central cooperative, incorporating the existing LLC cooperatives like Courage into the structure and by the end of the year, we’ll be in the formation process for three new local LLC cooperatives. So this is our work to actually build a bigger model. In five years, we have the vision that every metropolis of California will have a cooperative option, both for workers as well as consumers or individuals who want to access care through our cooperative. But currently right now, we also still have room for people to join Courage.

Van

This is so fascinating. I have a clarification question. So all the sub co -ops underneath this central co -op…would each one of those have a limit of twenty-five?

Aquilina

Yes.

Van

I see. So you’re growing. And then is there a concentration in geography? Of course I’m asking because Futuro Health held a big grant with the California Department of Aging to upskill in -home workers and those hundreds and hundreds of individuals, for example, may be interested in an opportunity like this, so I’m curious.

Aquilina

We’re still deciding finally where the first three cooperatives will be, but definitely we’ll be expanding in the greater Los Angeles area. There is a cooperative HSC up in San Francisco, but there are other organizations who will be supporting the growth of new local co -ops as well in the Bay Area. We have groups in San Jose, in San Francisco, in Oakland, and we’re also looking at San Diego. The Pilipino Workers Center has a big membership base in San Diego and growing also in Orange County, plus a couple partners in Orange County. So, these are all areas that are kind of ripe for growth in the next couple of years.

Van

So, in terms of the training that is provided centrally, it’s about the mechanics and the know -how to provide your own governance and to run your own twenty-five person cooperative. Is there also training with regards to the occupation and the profession?

Aquilina

Yes. We’re pairing that with workforce development training. PWC was part of the Cal Grows program last year to provide workforce development training. But also this year, we’re partnering with Los Angeles County to actually roll out a more intensive workforce development training that integrates with the cooperative model. So we’ll be training cohorts of twenty workers in cohorts over nine weeks where there’ll be training for two days a week. One day will be classroom training and one day will be paid on-the-job training through the cooperative.

The curriculum that we’re using grew out of the CHCA — the home care cooperative in the Bronx – and they’re a real gold standard in home care. So, we’re developing that curriculum. And we’re also partnering with the Alzheimer’s Association of Los Angeles to build out the curriculum for building a deeper expertise around Alzheimer’s and dementia care for the cooperative workers.

So, in doing on -the -job training through the cooperative, in this program, they’ll not only get the training in the actual skills for home care, but they’ll also start to get the skills of actually being a cooperative owner as well. We’re also including ‘know your rights’ in case not everyone is gonna go into the cooperative right away. We want to infuse the cooperative and the workforce development training with the values that we have around valuing care itself and how central it is to our health systems and the quality of life that we live. And so part of that is like infusing the curriculum and the core cooperative with our views on aging and how we understand that the role of caregivers is not just about maintaining minimal survival.

Of course, you need to support the activities of daily life, but this is such an opportunity. Our elders are living longer and there’s more growth in the population of seniors. We’re really thinking about how can caregivers impact quality of life positively for the individuals that they are supporting and also influence families to help on quality of life, whether it’s bringing in design and modified equipment that helps with some of the pain points on independent living that an individual might have or building-in preventative or goal -oriented care that could help to maintain or grow mobility or social connections, cognitive goals.

We work with so many folks in coalition as well, and many of the workers themselves are seniors also, so we know that doing this kind of work and framing our work in that kind of way is not only good for those that we’re supporting, but it actually creates much more satisfaction for the caregivers themselves.

Van

I can certainly see that. Just for a moment, let me take a step back and just congratulate you on such an innovative model that supports both the healthcare workforce needs of seniors and their families and then also supports the individuals who take on these very difficult roles.  I’m excited that you have figured out a model for expansion with these sub-cooperatives

When you create one, Aqui, is there capital investment that must be set aside in order for you to set up another twenty-five? Is that mechanic of scaling something that you have to plan around?

Aquilina

Yes, absolutely, and we are finalizing the financial model of it. But there is definitely seed capital needed as you grow a new cooperative because there are just basics that are needed. There also needs to be a member administrator who is trained but also is paid for the work that they’re going to be doing as a member administrator. So within the model, we’re actually doing a lot of fundraising right now because for the initial building stage, we are very confident that in a few years the local cooperatives will be generating enough income to be able to support the secondary cooperative so be self -sustaining however we’re not sure that it’s going to be able to actually pay for the growth of new cooperatives. We may still need to be doing either investment or fundraising to raise the minimum capital needed for each new cooperative.

So, there is some need for that, but because there is already so much structure built in the secondary cooperative or the central cooperative and the model that’s built out, it’s actually going to give us economies of scale to be able to have smaller investments needed, both in money as well as expertise. So, it creates much more accessibility.

Van

I’m sure, I’m sure. Like, if once you get to ten or twenty of these secondary co -ops the cost of adding another co -op probably goes down because you’ve figured out some technology-leveraged way to be able to support so many sub entities. That’s very exciting. So, where do you think you’ll be in one year?

Aquilina

In one year from now, we are actually targeting to have the two local cooperatives integrated into the secondary cooperative and the secondary cooperative as well as the academy to be fully built and established as entities. In addition, we have three new local cooperatives already launched and serving clients and we’ll be starting to recruit for the next round of three additional local cooperatives to form towards the end of 2025.

Also, just to mention, what’s significant about this model as well is we’re designing it so that it can operate in the private industry as it is now, but we’re also engaged in advocacy that our public system needs to be investing more in public benefits around long -term care. We need to expand what we have as well as create new public benefits that create coverage for everyone. In our model of the cooperative, we’ll be able to connect to the new jobs that we create with the new benefits. In this way, it also solves an issue of both inclusion of immigrants as well as the workforce issue, because we have this growing demand for home care or long term supports and services, but we have a big gap in the workforce to meet the needs of everyone to have the care that many will want, especially home care, to be able to age in your own community, in your own homes.

By 2030, California will have a shortfall of between 600,000 to over three million home care workers. This is largely because of the working conditions and the inability of the industry to attract new people into this job. So, it’s really important that we’re creating the good jobs to attract more people into the workforce.

Van

So, let’s say I’m a family that has a need to hire a worker to care for my loved one from Courage Home Care. How do I go about finding someone to provide that care?

Aquilina

Well, currently if you are in the Los Angeles area, you can find Courage Home Care on our  website but you can also call PWC as well. You can access care through Courage right now in LA, and in the Bay Area and San Francisco there is Home Services and Companions that was incubated and started by Dolores Street Mission that is already running.  Then, hopefully, in about a year there’ll be three more options as well to be able to access cooperative care.

But it’s really just important, I think, to know as a consumer that the conditions that your home care worker is working under also impact the quality of care that they’re able to give. And the current model that has workers working around the clock for very low wages impacts how they’re able to bring themselves to the work and impacts the care as well.

Having cooperative care where you have teams who are working together to provide the best care, who are accessing regular training and learning opportunities is also really important for quality care as well.

Van

Yes. And I can see for the workers, it would be much less isolating to belong to a team, belong to a co -op, and all that would lead to my greater work satisfaction.

So, let’s close up by asking you your thoughts on the future of care. What makes you excited about the future of care?

Aquilina

Well, many people describe the growth of our senior population as an impending crisis and many people experience it as crisis because of lack of supports. But we also really see it as an opportunity for us to be with our elders, to have intergenerational spaces and communities and we’re really excited about building this model to bring our values around care and this possibility to home care. This doesn’t have to be a crisis if we really invest and understand the value of care and the care providers. We’re just very excited about how we can bring this model of care, of cooperative care, that will impact so many — especially women and women of color, who are largely the ones doing this work —  in how they’re able to do their work.

Many of them come to this as a passion, also as a colleague, not just as a job. So, how they can be recognized for the important work that they’re doing and the impact that they have on lives and how we can be a part of a larger momentum to really value care so that everyone is able to get the care that they need, have real options around the care that they want…that’s all built on a foundation of valuing the caregiver themselves and providing good working conditions where the caregiver can also access the care that they need and they want when they need it as well.

Van

Well Aqui, I really enjoyed spending this session with you. I learned so much as I’m sure our listeners will have as well. You’re doing such important work innovating in workforce development. So, thank you for your leadership in this area.

Aquilina

Well, thank you so much for having me on. I appreciate it.

Van

I’m Van Ton-Quinlivan with Futuro Health. Thanks for checking out this episode of WorkforceRX. I hope you will join us again as we continue to explore how to create a future -focused workforce in America.