Pennsylvania Chapter

Who We Are: National Domestic Worker’s Alliance – Pennsylvania Chapter

The National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA) is the home for this country’s 2.5 million nannies, housecleaners, and caregivers. Since 2018, the Pennsylvania Chapter of NDWA has been organizing domestic workers to build power, win labor protections, and create community for domestic workers. We have a strong multiracial, multilingual membership who work together to make sure that all domestic work is dignified, safe and respected!

Our Work

• We organize hundreds of multilingual, multiracial nannies, housecleaners, and caregivers across the Philadelphia region to build power, community, and recognition for domestic workers.
• We organize to win new labor laws and protections for domestic workers, including the Philadelphia Domestic Workers Bill of Rights in 2019 and the POWER Act in 2025, and work to ensure these laws are upheld and respected by employers and city government.

• We hold quarterly multiracial, multilingual all-membership meetings to build relationships, power, and develop strategy across our organization.
• We hold regular trainings on labor and immigrant rights and how to implement your labor rights at work.
• We conduct regular community outreach, meetings, trainings, workforce development and community-building events.
• We take action to support workers when their labor rights are violated by educating workers about their rights, building their skills to use those rights at work, and supporting them when they experience labor abuse through outreach, education, training, and advocacy in city government.
• We organize to ensure domestic workers have a strong voice in city government, including advocating for a just city budget, language access in government, and more.
• We organize to win justice and protections for immigrants in Philadelphia and beyond, including the Philadelphia ICE Out legislation and ensuring immigrant protections in our labor law. 
• We collaborate closely with other low-wage worker organizing groups, unions, legal service partners, and social justice organizations in Philadelphia.

Our Affinity Groups

We hold monthly in person gatherings for our affinity groups, We Dream in Black and Latinas Poderosas.

We Dream in Black is our organizing home that centers the voices and experiences of Black, Afro-Latina, and Afro-descendent domestic workers. We believe our organizing must center the lives of Black domestic workers because the domestic work industry was built on the subjugation and exploitation of Black women.

Latinas Poderosas is the space for our Latina membership to deepen our leadership, tackle challenges unique to our communities, and maintain unity and strengthen relationships between members for grassroots growth.

Our Key Achievements

• We won the Philadelphia Domestic Workers Bill of Rights in 2019, a historic labor law that provides labor protections for the first time in Philadelphia history to nannies, housecleaners, and caregivers.
• We won the POWER ( Protect Our Workers, Enforce Rights) Act in 2025, which expands labor protections for 750,000 Philadelphia workers.
• In 2026, Philadelphia City Council voted YES on the ICE Out legislative package, which is among the strongest in the whole country to protect immigrants. The ICE Out law is designed to ensure that city data, dollars, personnel, and public space won’t be used to participate in federal immigration enforcement.

• We won key recognitions for domestic workers in Philadelphia City Hall, including the following resolutions:
  • June 16 is officially recognized “International Domestic Workers Day”
  • October 13 is officially recognized as “Dorothy Bolden Day” to honor the mother of the domestic workers movement 
  • Recognition of the Washerwoman’s Strike 
  • Honoring member Mercedes Reyes for her 70 years working as a domestic worker and her organizing with NDWA-PA
• During the COVID-19 pandemic, we organized and won the Philadelphia Worker Relief Fund to provide financial support to workers excluded from state and federal COVID relief, and helped 500 domestic workers and their essential worker family members gain access to the COVID-19 vaccine.

Contact Us

Want to get involved to keep winning respect and dignity for domestic workers, or want to know more about your rights? Call 240-522-1951 or email [email protected]