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Board of Directors

Deepak Bhargava

Executive Director Center for Community Change

Deepak was selected as the Executive Director of the Center for Community Change in October 2002, having been at the Center since 1994 in the position of Director of Public Policy. He has developed national grassroots coalitions on issue of public housing and transportation, resulting in significant federal policy changes. Deepak also directed the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support, a collaboration of 200 grassroots organizations and networks with affiliates in 40 states, which focuses on poverty, economic inequality, and immigration issues. Deepak previously worked at ACORN, leading the organization’s policy work on community reinvestment, fair housing and housing finance, working with the media and testifying before Congress. Deepak currently serves on the boards of the Center on Law and Social Policy, the Applied Research Center, the Center for Immigrant Democracy and the Discount Foundation. Deepak was born in Mysore, India, grew up in New York City and received his BA summa cum laude from Harvard College.

John Calkins

Executive Director, Direct Action Research Training (DART)

Miami, FL

John has done direct community organizing for the past twenty years. He was educated at Northwestern University and the University of Wisconsin. In 1965 he spent three years in Niger, West Africa in the Peace Corps, organizing purchasing and credit cooperatives. From 1969 to 1974 John worked with the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) and from 1969-1974 he was head organizer for Active Clevelanders Together. Moving to Florida in 1977, John was the head organizer for Concerned Seniors of Dade, Inc. and in 1981 became the head organizer for People United to Lead the Struggle for Equality (PULSE) in Miami. From 1985 to 1988 he was head organizer for Justice for All in Broward (JAB) in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl., and has been the Director of Direct Action and Training Center, Inc. (DART) in Miami from 1984 to the present. He is married and has three children.

Miguel Contreras

President, Los Angeles County AFL-CIO

Los Angeles, CA

Miguel was born and raised in the small Central Valley farm town of Dinuba, California, and worked as a farm worker with his parents and six brothers. Beginning in his late teens, Miguel and his family became active with the UFW and he was asked to join the staff by Cesar Chavez. Miguel worked in California and in Canada and was trained by Cesar to be a UFW negotiator. In 1977 he became an organizer for Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE), Local 2 in San Francisco and helped rebuild HERE locals in Nevada, New York and Los Angeles. He was sent to Los Angeles in 1987 to rebuild the 11,000 member L.A. Local 11. In 1993 Miguel became director of the L.A. County Fed's political arm. In 1996 he was chosen Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the Fed, and currently is President of the L.A. County Federation, AFL-CIO. He also serves as vice president of the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO.

Tho Thi Do

Secretary-Treasurer Local #2, Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union

San Francisco, CA

Tho has worked for many years as a community organizer, activist and labor organizer. Since 1989 she has worked for Local #2, HERE, first as an organizer and now as Secretary-Treasurer. She was recently elected as a Vice-President on the HERE International Union Executive Board. About her work with HERE and labor, and in her own words:

Since 1989 I have worked for the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union Local 2, first as an organizer and now as Secretary Treasurer. I consider myself an organizer because I believe in organizing to gain power and to change the imbalance of power. As the Secretary Treasurer of the Local, I help to change the union focus and resources to allocate more funding to organizing

Tho arrived in the United States from Vietnam in 1975 and graduated from High School in San Francisco in 1978. She soon began volunteering with the Vietnamese Youth Development Center, focusing on placement of youth in summer jobs where they earned a stipend. She attended college at San Francisco State University.

Tho continues to be very active in the Southeast Asian community in San Francisco. She is the Chair of the Southeast Asian Community Center in San Francisco which began as an advocacy and social services center and is evolving to encompass voter rights education, forums on political issues, and is in the early planning stage to develop their existing building into a community center. Tho is also on the Board of Directors of the Vietnamese Youth Development Center which is focusing on youth employment as well as educating and developing new youth leadership in the Southeast Asian community.

Tho is the mother of a 20-year old son currently attending art school in NYC.

Mary Gonzales

Associate Director, Gamaliel Foundation

& Regional Lead Organizer for Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations (MAC)

Chicago, IL

Mary Gonzales has been a professional organizer for twenty years. She is affiliated with the Gamaliel Foundation, an international training institute which develops faith-based organizations in urban metropolitan areas throughout the United States and in South Africa. She is currently the Regional Lead Organizer for the Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations (MAC), a Chicago metropolitan organization with 132 institutional members. MAC's mission is to build a citizens' organization powerful enough to change policies and practices in Illinois that result in the concentration of poverty and segregation by race and class. Mary is currently involved in a campaign to bring tax-base sharing, opportunity housing, and education funding reform to the Chicago region. She has trained organizers, leaders and clergy throughout the U.S., in South Africa and most recently, in Tanzania.

Ken Johnson

Southern Regional Director, AFL-CIO

Atlanta, GA

Ken has worked more than 30 years across the South on political, anti-poverty, race, labor, economic justice and worker rights issues. Born and raised in Louisiana, Ken was educated at Bard College and Yale University. From 1975 to 1980 Ken was the Regional Director of the National Rural Center and also worked at the Scholarship and Education and Defense Fund for Racial Equality, providing technical assistance to newly emerging black elected officials across the South. From the early 80's to 1995 he was the Director for the South Regional Council and Director of the Southern Labor Institute, a special project of the South Regional Council. Working on workers' rights issues, Ken worked with the Tennessee Tom Bigby Waterway effort, a coalition of community and labor groups to insure union members a part in this large scale public works project. In 1995 Ken began working for the AFL-CIO and is currently Regional Director of the AFL-CIO's Southern Region.

Michael Kieschnick

President and CEO, Working Assets Funding Service

San Francisco, CA

Michael is President, CEO and co-founder of Working Assets, a long distance, credit card, Internet and broadcasting company that donates a portion of its revenues to progressive nonprofit groups. Michael has played a key role in all aspects of the company's products, and he leads the company's political efforts by selecting the Citizen Actions that are featured in the monthly phone bill. Michael grew up in Texas, was educated at Stanford (biology and economics) and Harvard (Ph.D., Public Policy), and began working as an economist for the E.P.A. prior to serving former Governor Jerry Brown as an economic advisor. He has started numerous investment funds, has written books on capital markets and development (e.g. Credit Where It's Due with Julia Parzen), and has been a visiting lecturer at UC Berkeley, teaching a graduate seminar on financial innovation. He currently serves as board member for several nonprofits, including the American Environmental Safety Institute, Dads & Daughters, and is actively involved in coaching children's athletic teams. He lives in the Bay area with his wife and their two children.

Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins

Executive Officer, South Bay Central Labor Council & Executive Director, Working Partnerships

San Jose, CA

Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins is the Executive Officer of the 110,000 - member South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council and Executive Director of the group’s nationally recognized think-tank: Working Partnerships USA.

Though only 27 years old, Ms. Ellis-Lamkins has distinguished herself as an innovator in Silicon Valley’s high-tech driven new economy. She was responsible for the development of Working Partnerships Staffing Services: a worker-operated temporary staffing agency that today provides living wages, healthcare benefits and workplace advocacy on behalf of more than 500 of the area’s contingent workers.

As an undergraduate student at California State University – Northridge (CSUN), she was a grassroots organizer in the campaign against Proposition 209; a proposal to dismantle affirmative action programs in higher education. Phaedra graduated in 1998 and soon went to work as an organizer for Local 715 of the Service Employees International Union in San Jose. At Local 715 she was involved in winning union representation for home health care workers and other low-income employees.

Ms. Ellis-Lamkins joined the staff of Working Partnerships, USA as the group’s education coordinator. She led their Labor/Community Leadership Institute and created its first senior fellows program. In this capacity Ms. Ellis-Lamkins also created the Faith in Action training program for area clergy and lay leaders. She also served as a director of the AFL-CIO’s successful Union Summer Program in the San Jose area where she directed the efforts of 50 young union organizers in Silicon Valley.

Drummond Pike

President, Tides Foundation

San Francisco, CA

Drummond founded Tides Foundation in 1976, and serves as President of Tides Foundation, Tides Center and eGrants.org, a nonprofit focused on Internet fundraising. He is also President of Highwater, Inc., a real estate venture and historic preservation effort in San Francisco's Presidio National Park that serves as a General Partner in the Thoreau Center Partners. Drummond was a founder and Associate Director of the Youth Project in Washington, DC and served as Executive Director of the Shalan Foundation in San Francisco from 1976 to 1981. He was also one of the original founders of Working Assets in 1983.

Wade Rathke

Chief Organizer, ACORN, HOTROC, & SEIU 100

New Orleans, LA

Wade is the Board Chair and founder of the Organizers’ Forum and has been the Chief Organizer of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) since he founded the organization in 1970. ACORN is a national membership organization of 150,000 low and moderate income families organized in communities in 60 major cities. He also serves as Chief Organizer of Local 100, Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which he founded in New Orleans in 1980 and which now has 7000 members in Texas, LA, and Arkansas. Currently, Wade also spearheads a multi-union effort through HOTROC - the Hospitality, Hotels, and Restaurants Organizing Council, AFL-CIO, to unionize this New Orleans industry. Wade is President of SEIU's Southern Conference and a member of the national executive board of the union, Secretary-Treasurer of the Greater New Orleans AFL-CIO, and a member of the boards of the Tides Foundation, Tides Center, and Paradox Fund. In the late 60's, Wade organized draft resistance for SDS and welfare recipients in Springfield and Boston, Massachusetts for the National Welfare Rights Organization.

Jim Sessions

East Tennessee Workers Rights Board and Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice

Knoxville, TN

Jim was educated at Southern Methodist University, Perkins School of Theology, Drew School of Theology, and Union Seminary in NYC. He spent his early career during the 1960's as Chaplain at a number of renowned U.S. universities including Brown, Princeton and Harvard. In 1972 Jim became director of the Southern Appalachian Ministry in Higher Education until 1978. From 1978 until 1981 Jim was the Executive Director of Southerners for Economic Justice, from 1981 to 1990 he was Executive Director of the Commission on Religion in Appalachia, and from 1994 to 1999 he was Executive Director of the Highlander Research and Education Center. Jim has extensive organizing experience and has been a consultant to a variety of groups and organizations committed to social and economic justice. He has also written extensively on these issues, especially in relation to the South. He serves or has served on the Boards of over a dozen national and Southern organizations and groups such as the Southern Regional Council, the Union Community Fund, Windcall, and the National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice. He is the organizer in East Tennessee of the regional Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice and the Workers Rights Board. Jim is married to University of Tennessee Law College teacher, Frances Lee Ansley and has two grown children.

Mark Splain

Special Assistant, Department of Organizing, AFL-CIO

San Francisco, CA/Washington, DC

Mark began organizing in 1967 on the west side of Chicago, organizing against blockbusting and housing discrimination. From 1969 through 1972 he organized in Massachusetts and Rhode Island with the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO). In 1973 he helped start Mass Fair Share, a statewide organization of low and moderate income families. Throughout the early 80's Mark worked with low-wage worker campaigns that became a part of United Labor Unions (ULU) in 5 cities. ULU affiliated with SEIU in 1985. From 1985 to 1989 Mark was the Health Care organizing director for SEIU. In 1989 he was named the Deputy Director of the AFL-CIO's Organizing Institute. In 1995 he was named by John Sweeney as the Director of the thirteen state Western Region for the AFL-CIO, and in May of 2000 was named Director of Organizing. He is currently a Special Assistant in the AFL-CIO’s Department of Organizing, working with and assisting the organizing efforts of the United Farm Workers (UFW).

Andy Stern

International President, Service Employees International Union

Washington, DC

Andy began his union career in 1973 as a state social service worker and activist member of SEIU Local 668, the Pennsylvania Social Services Union (PSSU). He rose through the ranks to become the first elected full-time president of PSSU and in 1980 was named at age 29 to the SEIU International Executive Board. In 1984 he was recruited by John Sweeney to oversee SEIU's organizing and field services programs. Andy was elected SEIU International President in April, 1996, to succeed John Sweeney, and has led SEIU to become the largest and fastest growing union in the AFL-CIO with over 1.6 million members. Stern is the architect of ground-breaking efforts to help janitors, homecare workers, nursing home employees, and other low-wage workers to close the growing wealth gap and to bridge the digital divide. Andy has worked to increase labor's voice in pension fund investments as co-chair of the Council of Institutional Investors.

Pat Sweeney

Executive Director, Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC)

Billings, MT

The Regional Director of Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC) is Patrick Sweeney, former staff director of the Northern Plains Resource Council (NPRC), a third generation Montanan, and a graduate of the University of Montana in history. Pat has also been the Executive Director of High Plains News Service, WORC's weekly news and public information radio program, since its inception in 1989. He has been a community organizer on natural resource and agricultural/family farm issues in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain Region since 1972. He currently serves as Chair of the Biodiversity Project Strategy Team, is a Board Member of the Environmental Support Center of Washington, D.C. and Montana Conservation Voters, is a member of the Steering Committee for the Western Mining Activist Network, and the Advisory Committee to One Northwest.

Staff of the Organizers' Forum

Barbara Bowen

Coordinator, Organizers' Forum

Bay Area, CA

Barbara is the National Coordinator for the Organizers’ Forum.. She organized most recently for SEIU Local 250’s homecare campaign in the Bay area through 2002. She began organizing in '69 as a VISTA volunteer for NWRO in Massachusetts. She was a co-founder of Massachusetts Fair Share ('73), Director of ACORN's training institute, and ACORN Regional Director in the Northeast in the early 80's. Electoral work includes Southern Regional Director, Jackson for President Campaign (winter '83), Regional Director of Project VOTE (MD & VA, '84), and elected school board member in home district, ('94-'98). Barbara has done project work for Villers Foundation ('84), Tides Foundation ('93), and the Applied Research Center ('94-'95). Her union organizing experience includes field coordinator in the AFL-CIO Dept. of Organizing for Blue-Cross/Blue Shield Campaign ('85-'86), senior organizer, SEIU Local 82 Justice for Janitors Campaign ('87-'89), SEIU Int'l senior organizer for North Bay small locals, and the CA statewide homecare campaign ('97- spring '00). Barbara graduated from Pitzer College, Claremont, CA and lives in the Bay area with her husband and two teenage children.



Home Page Dialogues Articles People Board of Directors History Contact Us Links Mailing List	Board of Directors Deepak Bhargava Executive Director Center for Community Change Deepak was selected as the Executive Director of the Center for Community Change in October 2002, having been at the Center since 1994 in the position of Director of Public Policy. He has developed national grassroots coalitions on issue of public housing and transportation, resulting in significant federal policy changes. Deepak also directed the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support, a collaboration of 200 grassroots organizations and networks with affiliates in 40 states, which focuses on poverty, economic inequality, and immigration issues. Deepak previously worked at ACORN, leading the organization’s policy work on community reinvestment, fair housing and housing finance, working with the media and testifying before Congress. Deepak currently serves on the boards of the Center on Law and Social Policy, the Applied Research Center, the Center for Immigrant Democracy and the Discount Foundation. Deepak was born in Mysore, India, grew up in New York City and received his BA summa cum laude from Harvard College. John Calkins Executive Director, Direct Action Research Training (DART) Miami, FL John has done direct community organizing for the past twenty years. He was educated at Northwestern University and the University of Wisconsin. In 1965 he spent three years in Niger, West Africa in the Peace Corps, organizing purchasing and credit cooperatives. From 1969 to 1974 John worked with the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) and from 1969-1974 he was head organizer for Active Clevelanders Together. Moving to Florida in 1977, John was the head organizer for Concerned Seniors of Dade, Inc. and in 1981 became the head organizer for People United to Lead the Struggle for Equality (PULSE) in Miami. From 1985 to 1988 he was head organizer for Justice for All in Broward (JAB) in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl., and has been the Director of Direct Action and Training Center, Inc. (DART) in Miami from 1984 to the present. He is married and has three children. Miguel Contreras President, Los Angeles County AFL-CIO Los Angeles, CA Miguel was born and raised in the small Central Valley farm town of Dinuba, California, and worked as a farm worker with his parents and six brothers. Beginning in his late teens, Miguel and his family became active with the UFW and he was asked to join the staff by Cesar Chavez. Miguel worked in California and in Canada and was trained by Cesar to be a UFW negotiator. In 1977 he became an organizer for Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE), Local 2 in San Francisco and helped rebuild HERE locals in Nevada, New York and Los Angeles. He was sent to Los Angeles in 1987 to rebuild the 11,000 member L.A. Local 11. In 1993 Miguel became director of the L.A. County Fed's political arm. In 1996 he was chosen Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the Fed, and currently is President of the L.A. County Federation, AFL-CIO. He also serves as vice president of the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO. Tho Thi Do Secretary-Treasurer Local #2, Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union San Francisco, CA Tho has worked for many years as a community organizer, activist and labor organizer. Since 1989 she has worked for Local #2, HERE, first as an organizer and now as Secretary-Treasurer. She was recently elected as a Vice-President on the HERE International Union Executive Board. About her work with HERE and labor, and in her own words: Since 1989 I have worked for the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union Local 2, first as an organizer and now as Secretary Treasurer. I consider myself an organizer because I believe in organizing to gain power and to change the imbalance of power. As the Secretary Treasurer of the Local, I help to change the union focus and resources to allocate more funding to organizing Tho arrived in the United States from Vietnam in 1975 and graduated from High School in San Francisco in 1978. She soon began volunteering with the Vietnamese Youth Development Center, focusing on placement of youth in summer jobs where they earned a stipend. She attended college at San Francisco State University. Tho continues to be very active in the Southeast Asian community in San Francisco. She is the Chair of the Southeast Asian Community Center in San Francisco which began as an advocacy and social services center and is evolving to encompass voter rights education, forums on political issues, and is in the early planning stage to develop their existing building into a community center. Tho is also on the Board of Directors of the Vietnamese Youth Development Center which is focusing on youth employment as well as educating and developing new youth leadership in the Southeast Asian community. Tho is the mother of a 20-year old son currently attending art school in NYC. Mary Gonzales Associate Director, Gamaliel Foundation & Regional Lead Organizer for Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations (MAC) Chicago, IL Mary Gonzales has been a professional organizer for twenty years. She is affiliated with the Gamaliel Foundation, an international training institute which develops faith-based organizations in urban metropolitan areas throughout the United States and in South Africa. She is currently the Regional Lead Organizer for the Metropolitan Alliance of Congregations (MAC), a Chicago metropolitan organization with 132 institutional members. MAC's mission is to build a citizens' organization powerful enough to change policies and practices in Illinois that result in the concentration of poverty and segregation by race and class. Mary is currently involved in a campaign to bring tax-base sharing, opportunity housing, and education funding reform to the Chicago region. She has trained organizers, leaders and clergy throughout the U.S., in South Africa and most recently, in Tanzania. Ken Johnson Southern Regional Director, AFL-CIO Atlanta, GA Ken has worked more than 30 years across the South on political, anti-poverty, race, labor, economic justice and worker rights issues. Born and raised in Louisiana, Ken was educated at Bard College and Yale University. From 1975 to 1980 Ken was the Regional Director of the National Rural Center and also worked at the Scholarship and Education and Defense Fund for Racial Equality, providing technical assistance to newly emerging black elected officials across the South. From the early 80's to 1995 he was the Director for the South Regional Council and Director of the Southern Labor Institute, a special project of the South Regional Council. Working on workers' rights issues, Ken worked with the Tennessee Tom Bigby Waterway effort, a coalition of community and labor groups to insure union members a part in this large scale public works project. In 1995 Ken began working for the AFL-CIO and is currently Regional Director of the AFL-CIO's Southern Region. Michael Kieschnick President and CEO, Working Assets Funding Service San Francisco, CA Michael is President, CEO and co-founder of Working Assets, a long distance, credit card, Internet and broadcasting company that donates a portion of its revenues to progressive nonprofit groups. Michael has played a key role in all aspects of the company's products, and he leads the company's political efforts by selecting the Citizen Actions that are featured in the monthly phone bill. Michael grew up in Texas, was educated at Stanford (biology and economics) and Harvard (Ph.D., Public Policy), and began working as an economist for the E.P.A. prior to serving former Governor Jerry Brown as an economic advisor. He has started numerous investment funds, has written books on capital markets and development (e.g. Credit Where It's Due with Julia Parzen), and has been a visiting lecturer at UC Berkeley, teaching a graduate seminar on financial innovation. He currently serves as board member for several nonprofits, including the American Environmental Safety Institute, Dads & Daughters, and is actively involved in coaching children's athletic teams. He lives in the Bay area with his wife and their two children. Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins Executive Officer, South Bay Central Labor Council & Executive Director, Working Partnerships San Jose, CA Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins is the Executive Officer of the 110,000 - member South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council and Executive Director of the group’s nationally recognized think-tank: Working Partnerships USA. Though only 27 years old, Ms. Ellis-Lamkins has distinguished herself as an innovator in Silicon Valley’s high-tech driven new economy. She was responsible for the development of Working Partnerships Staffing Services: a worker-operated temporary staffing agency that today provides living wages, healthcare benefits and workplace advocacy on behalf of more than 500 of the area’s contingent workers. As an undergraduate student at California State University – Northridge (CSUN), she was a grassroots organizer in the campaign against Proposition 209; a proposal to dismantle affirmative action programs in higher education. Phaedra graduated in 1998 and soon went to work as an organizer for Local 715 of the Service Employees International Union in San Jose. At Local 715 she was involved in winning union representation for home health care workers and other low-income employees. Ms. Ellis-Lamkins joined the staff of Working Partnerships, USA as the group’s education coordinator. She led their Labor/Community Leadership Institute and created its first senior fellows program. In this capacity Ms. Ellis-Lamkins also created the Faith in Action training program for area clergy and lay leaders. She also served as a director of the AFL-CIO’s successful Union Summer Program in the San Jose area where she directed the efforts of 50 young union organizers in Silicon Valley. Drummond Pike President, Tides Foundation San Francisco, CA Drummond founded Tides Foundation in 1976, and serves as President of Tides Foundation, Tides Center and eGrants.org, a nonprofit focused on Internet fundraising. He is also President of Highwater, Inc., a real estate venture and historic preservation effort in San Francisco's Presidio National Park that serves as a General Partner in the Thoreau Center Partners. Drummond was a founder and Associate Director of the Youth Project in Washington, DC and served as Executive Director of the Shalan Foundation in San Francisco from 1976 to 1981. He was also one of the original founders of Working Assets in 1983. Wade Rathke Chief Organizer, ACORN, HOTROC, & SEIU 100 New Orleans, LA Wade is the Board Chair and founder of the Organizers’ Forum and has been the Chief Organizer of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) since he founded the organization in 1970. ACORN is a national membership organization of 150,000 low and moderate income families organized in communities in 60 major cities. He also serves as Chief Organizer of Local 100, Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which he founded in New Orleans in 1980 and which now has 7000 members in Texas, LA, and Arkansas. Currently, Wade also spearheads a multi-union effort through HOTROC - the Hospitality, Hotels, and Restaurants Organizing Council, AFL-CIO, to unionize this New Orleans industry. Wade is President of SEIU's Southern Conference and a member of the national executive board of the union, Secretary-Treasurer of the Greater New Orleans AFL-CIO, and a member of the boards of the Tides Foundation, Tides Center, and Paradox Fund. In the late 60's, Wade organized draft resistance for SDS and welfare recipients in Springfield and Boston, Massachusetts for the National Welfare Rights Organization. Jim Sessions East Tennessee Workers Rights Board and Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice Knoxville, TN Jim was educated at Southern Methodist University, Perkins School of Theology, Drew School of Theology, and Union Seminary in NYC. He spent his early career during the 1960's as Chaplain at a number of renowned U.S. universities including Brown, Princeton and Harvard. In 1972 Jim became director of the Southern Appalachian Ministry in Higher Education until 1978. From 1978 until 1981 Jim was the Executive Director of Southerners for Economic Justice, from 1981 to 1990 he was Executive Director of the Commission on Religion in Appalachia, and from 1994 to 1999 he was Executive Director of the Highlander Research and Education Center. Jim has extensive organizing experience and has been a consultant to a variety of groups and organizations committed to social and economic justice. He has also written extensively on these issues, especially in relation to the South. He serves or has served on the Boards of over a dozen national and Southern organizations and groups such as the Southern Regional Council, the Union Community Fund, Windcall, and the National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice. He is the organizer in East Tennessee of the regional Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice and the Workers Rights Board. Jim is married to University of Tennessee Law College teacher, Frances Lee Ansley and has two grown children. Mark Splain Special Assistant, Department of Organizing, AFL-CIO San Francisco, CA/Washington, DC Mark began organizing in 1967 on the west side of Chicago, organizing against blockbusting and housing discrimination. From 1969 through 1972 he organized in Massachusetts and Rhode Island with the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO). In 1973 he helped start Mass Fair Share, a statewide organization of low and moderate income families. Throughout the early 80's Mark worked with low-wage worker campaigns that became a part of United Labor Unions (ULU) in 5 cities. ULU affiliated with SEIU in 1985. From 1985 to 1989 Mark was the Health Care organizing director for SEIU. In 1989 he was named the Deputy Director of the AFL-CIO's Organizing Institute. In 1995 he was named by John Sweeney as the Director of the thirteen state Western Region for the AFL-CIO, and in May of 2000 was named Director of Organizing. He is currently a Special Assistant in the AFL-CIO’s Department of Organizing, working with and assisting the organizing efforts of the United Farm Workers (UFW). Andy Stern International President, Service Employees International Union Washington, DC Andy began his union career in 1973 as a state social service worker and activist member of SEIU Local 668, the Pennsylvania Social Services Union (PSSU). He rose through the ranks to become the first elected full-time president of PSSU and in 1980 was named at age 29 to the SEIU International Executive Board. In 1984 he was recruited by John Sweeney to oversee SEIU's organizing and field services programs. Andy was elected SEIU International President in April, 1996, to succeed John Sweeney, and has led SEIU to become the largest and fastest growing union in the AFL-CIO with over 1.6 million members. Stern is the architect of ground-breaking efforts to help janitors, homecare workers, nursing home employees, and other low-wage workers to close the growing wealth gap and to bridge the digital divide. Andy has worked to increase labor's voice in pension fund investments as co-chair of the Council of Institutional Investors. Pat Sweeney Executive Director, Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC) Billings, MT The Regional Director of Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC) is Patrick Sweeney, former staff director of the Northern Plains Resource Council (NPRC), a third generation Montanan, and a graduate of the University of Montana in history. Pat has also been the Executive Director of High Plains News Service, WORC's weekly news and public information radio program, since its inception in 1989. He has been a community organizer on natural resource and agricultural/family farm issues in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain Region since 1972. He currently serves as Chair of the Biodiversity Project Strategy Team, is a Board Member of the Environmental Support Center of Washington, D.C. and Montana Conservation Voters, is a member of the Steering Committee for the Western Mining Activist Network, and the Advisory Committee to One Northwest. Staff of the Organizers' Forum Barbara Bowen Coordinator, Organizers' Forum Bay Area, CA Barbara is the National Coordinator for the Organizers’ Forum.. She organized most recently for SEIU Local 250’s homecare campaign in the Bay area through 2002. She began organizing in '69 as a VISTA volunteer for NWRO in Massachusetts. She was a co-founder of Massachusetts Fair Share ('73), Director of ACORN's training institute, and ACORN Regional Director in the Northeast in the early 80's. Electoral work includes Southern Regional Director, Jackson for President Campaign (winter '83), Regional Director of Project VOTE (MD & VA, '84), and elected school board member in home district, ('94-'98). Barbara has done project work for Villers Foundation ('84), Tides Foundation ('93), and the Applied Research Center ('94-'95). Her union organizing experience includes field coordinator in the AFL-CIO Dept. of Organizing for Blue-Cross/Blue Shield Campaign ('85-'86), senior organizer, SEIU Local 82 Justice for Janitors Campaign ('87-'89), SEIU Int'l senior organizer for North Bay small locals, and the CA statewide homecare campaign ('97- spring '00). Barbara graduated from Pitzer College, Claremont, CA and lives in the Bay area with her husband and two teenage children.

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