A trusted messenger network for low-wage labor

CWOP’s structure was innovative: the program involved formal partnerships between the state and a network of community-based organizations (CBOs) throughout the state. The state provided extensive resources, support, and guidance to a “trusted messenger network” of community-based organizations (CBOs) tasked with educating vulnerable workers, who experienced significant barriers to accessing information.

As the COVID crisis evolved, DIR and its CWOP CBO partners evolved with the needs of the worker populations. As such, the program has been renamed the California Workplace Outreach Program (CWOP) and has expanded from COVID-19 workplace protections to supporting workers in navigating a broader set of issues in the workplace like health and safety violations (e.g., heat) as well as wage theft, employer retaliation, paid sick leave entitlements, and workers’ compensation. During the 2023 - 2024 funding cycle alone, the program distributed more than $25 million to 76 CBOs organized into nine coalitions, representing six regions across the state, with a focus on engaging workers in seven key high-risk industries: Agriculture, Food Processing, Food Services, Grocery/Retail, Janitorial, Warehousing/Logistics, and Manufacturing as well as Car Wash, Garment, Hotels and Lodging, and Residential Care. In the 2023 - 2024 funding cycle, CWOP recorded roughly 5 million “touchpoints” with workers across California. 

In 2023, the Possibility Lab launched a project to understand and evaluate the CWOP program and explore the benefits and challenges of the CWOP model. We used a mixed method approach consisting of four interrelated data collection efforts. First, we conducted individual and group interviews with 36 CBO staffers from a total of 19 CBOs. We then fielded an online statewide low-wage worker survey with 1,901 low-wage workers in California. The survey included two embedded survey experiments to examine the impact of different outreach messengers and messages on workers’ attitudes and actions. Finally, we partnered with CWOP CBOs to field a CWOP-engaged worker survey (N=170), which was distributed directly to the subset of highly vulnerable workers on CWOP CBOs’ existing contact lists. In fielding three distinct data collection efforts—one with two different embedded experiments—the research is able to triangulate across multiple sources to gain a better understanding of the myriad stakeholders and beneficiaries of this complex program.