Photo: Dwayne and his daughter Karen. Dwayne Paige is proud of the work he does as a janitor at the
Photo: Dwayne and his daughter Karen. Dwayne Paige is proud of the work he does as a janitor at the Franklin County Courthouse. “I’ve had judges tell me the lobby is the cleanest they’ve ever seen it,” he says. After working at the Courthouse for years, Dwayne is a full-time janitor making only $10 per hour. That’s barely enough to make ends meet for the proud father, who is married and has a 16-year-old daughter to help care for. With his wife unable to work due to a disability, Dwayne’s hard work is the family’s main source of income. But Dwayne wonders if his curious, hard-working daughter will ever be able to go to college like she dreams of doing. “I will move Earth for her if I can,” he says, “but getting a quality education for her could cost a lot.” He knows it’s not right for janitors across Columbus to be subject to poverty wages, but cleaning contractors like Scioto, who Dwayne works for, aren’t providing good jobs. Someone has to clean Columbus’ gleaming buildings, which are home to profitable Fortune 1000 companies like Nationwide Insurance, Huntington Bank and JP Morgan Chase – so why can’t janitors have a fair, livable wage? The injustice is even more apparent when considering that eleven Fortune 1000 CEOs headquartered in Columbus took home a combined $134 million in pay in 2011, while full-time janitors only make about $18,000 a year. “I feel like there are a lot of people being done wrong,” Dwayne says about the city’s poverty wages. Dwayne is no stranger to hard work – he’s worked all sorts of jobs since he was first employed at age fourteen. But he knows Columbus can do better, and he’s willing to fight to raise standards for himself and his coworkers. “If you want something, you have to fight for it. You have to stand up and be a voice.” -- source link
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