What I have done for the members of Local 88:
I am the current Vice President of Local 88, a
Steward in good standing since 2006, Member Action Team Chair from 2007-2009, member
of Employee Benefits team since its creation, served on the last 2 bargaining teams, Local 88 representative on the Council 75 E-Board since 2009, Local
88 E-Board since 2007 and was a Library Employee Relations Committee (LERC) representative for
the library 2006-2011, attended the Oregon AFL-CIO
convention in 2007 as a guest of Next Wave and delegate in 2009 and 2011, a delegate to the AFSCME International convention 2008 and 2010 and a delegate to the Council 75
convention 2009 and 2011. I was a member of the 30 hour
committee, that secured over $200,000 annually in benefits for the lowest paid
county employees. I am one of 30 Next
Wavers who set up a tool kit to grow the Next Wave, and a year later we had
550+ Next Wavers attend our first national conference in Chicago and also attended their 2nd conference in Atlanta in 2011. I am one of five labor leaders chosen to
participate in the Labor Education and Research
Center's (LERC) STAR
fund program, to educate union members throughout the state about the effect
climate change is having on labor, a part of this was teaching a class at LERC
summer school and giving presentations throughout the region. I helped pass a climate change resolution at
the Oregon AFL-CIO convention (2007), and
have served on the Blue Ribbon Committee on Climate Change that our resolution
created. I attended the Eastern
Conference for Workplace Democracy and the Western Worker Co-Op Conference working to join in the class struggle with
our historic allies in the Co-operative movement, and forge an alliance moving forward. I am one of the founding members of the
AFSCME Environmental Caucus (AEC), helped
staff tables, was interviewed for KBOO 3 times, and give presentations at the International, Council 75, and Next
Wave Conventions and Conferences. I have
attended several union leadership conferences, and I am a Volunteer Member
Organizer (VMO).
How we are transforming the face of unions in America:
I want to illustrate how we are tangibly strengthening our union at the
local, state, and national levels. While at the 2009 Oregon AFL-CIO
convention, we passed several important
resolutions preparing the labor movement for the future. I was the sole author of 2
resolutions the Co-Op
(encouraging unions to support Co-Op business models as a viable alternative to
the flawed corporate model) and Water
Localization (to have unions on record to oppose any
privatization of water in Oregon and support efforts to take back control of
water into the hands of the public from any private owner). The Co-Op resolution that I wrote became
more important with the announcement
on Sept. the 27th of 2009 the collaboration of Mondragon
(the worlds largest Co-Op, the size of a multi-national corporation) and the
United Steel Workers. This year (2011) the National United Steelworkers passed a comprehensive Co-Op resolution, similar to the ones we passed at the 2009 OR AFL-CIO convention. We then learned that our resolution (slightly
amended) was passed on to the Maine AFL-CIO E-Board,
and they are gearing up to include this as an important part
of the next year's organizing/education work. We helped pass and supported 3 more resolutions "Support Programs for
Young Union Members & Add a General Board Position for Youth Caucus
Members", the "Climate
Change & Sustainable Good Green Jobs", and "Building a Diverse Labor
Movement in Oregon". I also co-authored another resolution that was
passed on to the Oregon AFL-CIO E-Board meeting (for consideration on Dec. 7th) that
one was entitled "International
Union Worker Solidarity" (This resolution acknowledges and encourages
support of all labor struggles in the world). This year (2011) our local and Council are back working on moving the labor movement in the Northwest to a better, more sustainable, more equal future. Our local is supporting an additional international worker solidarity resolution at the OR AFL-CIO. Our Council has supported my work by endorsing 2 water resolutions (that I helped author with the Council 75 Treasurer). The one that supports the "Renew America's Water" campaign passed unanimously, and one that opposes the privatization of water in Oregon (specifically the proposed Nestle bottling plant in Cascade Locks) which was narrowly defeated. The other Council 75 resolution we will passed is for marriage equity for all Oregonians.
