By Durham Dispatch
On May 7, around 150 people gathered at Lyon Park Community Center to launch Durham Rising, an alliance of labor unions and progressive organizations pushing for an improved relationship between Duke University, its workers, and Durham. The new coalition has absorbed and expanded the demands of the earlier Duke Respect Durham campaign. Three of five proposals from Durham Rising call on Duke to make voluntary payments in lieu of taxes (PILOT) to local government.
Durham Rising includes the Durham Association of Educators (DAE), UE Local 150, Duke Graduate Student Union (DGSU), and Union of Southern Service Workers (USSW). Progressive organizations such as Siembra NC, Duke Respect Durham, and Durham for All have also joined the campaign.
The town hall was led by Mama Cookie, a USSW leader, and Christy Patterson, DAE’s vice president. Mama Cookie, whose labor activism earned her an official “Mama Cookie Day” on April 3 in Durham, said, “Duke has unions, but they twist them. The people in those unions want to speak out but they’re afraid to speak out. If Duke hears anything, they’re fired.”
Labor organizing has intensified at Duke in recent years. DGSU won its NLRB election in August 2023 and has since fought for $50,000 PhD stipends and other demands. Separately, in mid-April 2025, Duke facilities workers with AFSCME Local 77 held protests outside Cameron Stadium and Duke Facilities Management over alleged contract violations, according to an email from UE Local 150.
Under a ‘Dignified Work’ plank, Durham Rising is demanding a $25 hourly wage and respect of union rights for all Duke workers. The coalition argues that, as Durham’s largest employer, the university is able to establish the baseline for local labor practices.
Patterson asked the crowd, “What’s the percentage of the land? [Duke owns] eleven percent of the land in Durham and they don’t pay taxes!” She added, “And our public schools are under attack. We are struggling to fund our most vulnerable populations but they sit on the land and don’t pay taxes. I want to pause there and give a huge shoutout to Duke Respect Durham.”
Duke Respect Durham began campaigning for PILOT in late 2024. Many of the group’s most active organizers are members of NC Triangle Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). Duke Respect Durham, and now Durham Rising, argues that PILOT would compensate for Duke’s property tax exemption.
Durham Rising doesn’t claim to oppose property tax exemptions for all educational institutions. The coalition website makes no mention of NC Central University, which has a modest endowment of $89 million. The campaign’s view is that Duke, with its $11.9 billion endowment, is so incredibly wealthy that continued use of the property tax exemption is a form of neglect toward Durham.
The Assembly has estimated that, “If Duke weren’t exempt from many property taxes, its bill would likely fall somewhere between $11 million and the $50 million the PILOT campaigners calculated”. In that article, the newspaper estimated that Duke paid around $2 million in 2024 property tax. DAE joins Durham Rising in a position of newfound strength. The teacher’s union increased membership from 15 percent to 50 percent in 2024, according to remarks by its officials. In April 2025, the school board agreed to a “meet-and-confer” policy, the closest DAE can get to union recognition. An anti-worker law, NC General Statute 95-98, deprives public sector workers of collective bargaining rights.
Nahshon Blount, a USSW member and Duke housekeeper, spoke at the town hall, saying, “We will not let you pay us poverty wages. Behind the curtain, Duke is running on the back of low-wage workers. We are tired of living paycheck to paycheck, not knowing where our next meal will come from.” He said that Duke workers “need a seat at the table” and demanded “a union for all in this city”.
Durham Rising coalition demands
Dignified Work: Duke must pay $25/hr, implement fair labor standards and benefits, and respect the rights of its workers to form unions. Duke must hold contractors to the same standard.
The Public Schools Our Students Deserve: Duke must contribute to a PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes) to support public schools and educator salaries.
Affordable Housing: Duke must build adequate affordable housing for students and graduate workers and contribute a PILOT to address the housing crisis
Public Infrastructure: Duke must contribute a PILOT to support Durham’s city services and the wages of city and county workers.
Respect, Safety, and Protection: Duke must protect students, faculty, workers, programs, and services amid federal funding cuts, threats to freedom of speech, and deportation threats from ICE under the Trump administration. USSW is a cross-workplace union for low-wage workers in the service sector. Its members can be easily spotted at political events in bright red shirts and easily heard due to their spirited chanting. Only two percent of workers are unionized in North Carolina. In a region that is extraordinarily hostile to organized labor, USSW is a bastion and training ground of progressive workers hoping to improve pay and conditions at their workplace.
Ananda Ghosh, a DPS special education teacher, gave remarks at Lyon Park. He spoke about working with an instructional assistant (IA) and said, “She built really loving strong relationships with the kids, she was really amazing. But she had to work two other jobs to make ends meet and eventually she just had to quit.”
He continued, “When I’m down an IA, I’m not able to take my students to dance class, where they learn that they’re more than just how many words they can read or how many digits they can add up. It’s where they learn that their body is free.”
According to a recent DAE statement, the 2025 budget approved by the school board would cut over 100 DPS staff. To combat this type of austerity, Durham Rising includes a ‘The Public Schools Our Students Deserve’ plank that encourages Duke to direct part of a potential PILOT to DPS. This type of arrangement would not be unique. In 2020, the University of Pennsylvania agreed to make an annual $10 million PILOT to Philadelphia Public Schools after years of grassroots campaigning.
Ghosh noted an interesting challenge that Durham Rising will face in dealing with the university, saying, “Out of thirty-seven Duke trustees, at least six are billionaires. Zero are working class. Only one lists a residence in Durham.”
Source: durhamdispatch.com, May 16, 2025. To sign Durham Rising’s petition go to bit.ly/durhamrising.