Presenters 

Aaron Dawson, Equal Exchange

 

Adam Trott, Valley Alliance of Worker Cooperatives (VAWC)

Adam Trott is in his fifth year as a member of Collective Copies, a collectively-managed worker co-op and union shop offering copying and book-binding services from three locations in western Massachusetts. Adam serves on the board of the Co-operative Capital Fund and is an advisor to the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy. He is the Collective Copies representative to the Valley Alliance of Worker Co-operatives (www.valleyworker.org) where he is participating a book-writing project on the past, present and future of worker co-ops in the region and is liaison to the Staff Project, a worker co-operative led co-op development position. Having had his co-operative start with food co-ops, and cherishing his 4 years at the Fourth Street Food Co-op in Manhattan, he is currently a member of two food co-ops and three credit unions. He may contacted at florence@collectivecopies.com.

 

Anita Malpani, Toxic Soil Busters

Youth organizing and Research Coordinator since 2008, Anita is passionate about social justice, cooperatives and supporting youth in making social change happen. Anita has been doing community-based research and action projects since 2002, in Hyderabad, India and Worcester, MA. While in India she worked primarily in the areas of women’s rights, livelihood creation and food justice. Over the past several years in Worcester, she has built considerable connections to the community through neighborhood campaigns such as the Save Our Pools coalition, Stone Soup Community Center and the Worcester Immigrant Coalition. She holds a Mater’s in International Development and Social Change.

 

Becky Rothberg, Toxic Soil Busters

 

Bill Say

Bill Say, M.A., is a Therapist and Community Development Facilitator, specializing in Process Work.  As a consultant, he specializes in Diversity Awareness Training, Conflict Resolution, and Collaborative Leadership Development.

 

Barb Hendricks, Sales and Marketing Director or the Scarborough Insurance Agency 

 

Carlos Perez de Alejo, Third Coast Workers for Cooperation

Originally from Miami, Fl, Carlos received his BA in History from Florida State University (FSU), where he began his interest in democratic business management by helping establish FSU’s first collectively-run monthly magazine. In 2006 he moved to Austin, TX and became a member of Monkey Wrench Books, an all-volunteer, collectively-run bookstore  and member of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives. Carlos has extensive experience in leadership development, popular education  and community organizing. Over the years he has facilitated trainings for a variety of community-based organizations on issues ranging from democratic decision-making to communications.  During his time in Austin, Carlos has served as a member of the Student/Farmwork Alliance, an organizer with the Workers Defense Project, and a co-founder of Refugio, a community organizing training center for low-income communities of color.    He holds an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin and has written on cooperatives, labor, and immigration for Dollars and Sense, YES!, and Z Magazine.  He is a co-founder of TCWC and facilitates co-op development trainings through the Cooperative Business Institute.

 

Chris Michael, Workers Development

 

Christina Jennings, NCDF

 

Dahl Horton, People's Food Cooperative

Dahl Horton has been doing social justice organizing in different arenas for about 13 years.  They have been a Co-manager and Buyer at People's Food Co-op in Portland, Oregon since 2007. Dahl is the Coordinator of People's Anti-oppression Committee.

 

David de Ugarte, Group Cooperativo de las Indias

David de Ugarte (Madrid, 1970). Economist, technologist, and committed entrepreneur with new models of economic democracy. Founder and theorist of the spanish cyberpunk group (1989-2007), founder of Piensa en red SA (1999-2002) and later the Cooperative Society of the Electronic Indias (2002) and the Cooperative Group of the Indias in which he works as a network analyst and designer of products and new lines of business and traditional chef. Fiction author, he wrote two novels for delivery to mobile phones: “Lía: MAD phreaker” and “Días de frontera.” Author of essays “3-11: Networks to win a war” (2004), “The power of networks” (2007), “From nations to networks” (2009), and “Files: Economic democracy in the century of networks” (2009). Director of the only collection of contemporary essays on public domain, the Plant 29 Collection.

 

Deborah Groban Olson, Attorney at Law, and Director, Center for Community Based Enterprise

“Deborah Groban Olson is an Attorney with over 29 years experience creating and advising employee-owned companies, co-operatives and ESOPs, representing unions, companies, trusts, and employees (www.esoplaw.com). She is Executive Director of the Center for Community Based Enterprise, Inc. (www.c2be.org) (C2BE), an education and technical assistance center for community-based enterprises. C2BE is developing a business services cooperative for locally-rooted, community-focused businesses that pay living wages. Olson is president of Ingenuity US, L3C, the Center’s for-profit sister. She is General Counsel to the American Ingenuity Alliance (http://www.americaningenuity.org), assisting inventors and unions to jointly improve economic leverage, create and sustain local jobs. She was the founding executive director of the Capital Ownership Group (COG), http://www.capitalownership.org), a global on-line network and think tank on using broad ownership to address globalization challenges, operating from Kent State University, and  directed its Fair Exchange Project http://cog.kent.edu/grphome.html. She is a board member of Circle Pines Center, a cooperative education and retreat center, and was founding executive director of the Michigan Employee Ownership Center. She is a member of the AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee.

 

Dee Thomas, EdVisions Cooperatives, Minnesota New Country School

Dee Grover Thomas received her Consumer Homemaking bachelor of science degree from Minnesota State University in Mankato, Minnesota.  She taught in traditional school districts for 15 years and was hired as a mentor teacher for one year at Minnesota State.  Upon returning to the classroom, Dee decided to pursue her administrative degree. Completing her degree, she worked as an assistant principal and then high school principal for three years meanwhile working with a planning committee to create Minnesota New Country School.  Dee has worked at Minnesota New Country School for 14 years, served on the Minnesota State Board of Teaching, served as the President of the Minnesota Association of Charter Schools, served on the Governor’s Finance Reform task force, attended Harvard University Leadership program, and has been an adjunct professor for MSU-M and Gustavus Adolphus College.  She owns a stained glass shop and relaxes there on weekends.

 

Democracy at Work Network Peer Advisor Apprentices

The Democracy at Work Network is a new project of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives. It trains people who work in cooperatives and collectives to share their deep, practical knowledge effectively. It also provides low-cost technical assistance from a peer perspective to existing worker cooperatives and startup projects. The presenters of this workshop are from the pilot group building the Network in its first year.

 

Dirk Prindle, Carlson Highland CPAs

Dirk Prindle, CPA - Dirk is an audit manager with Carlson Highland & Co., LLP has over 9 years of cooperative experience in serving over 100 different cooperatives.  Dirk’s experience includes the supervision and performance of audits of numerous cooperatives and non-profit organizations.  He received his BBA Cum Laude in 2000 from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.  Dirk is an active member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, National Society of Accountants for Cooperatives, Wisconsin Institute of Certified Public Accountants, Minnesota State Board of Accountancy, and several local community organizations.  Dirk is licensed to practice in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Colorado. Dirk and his wife Dana have three active boys which keeps them busy.

 

Dmitriy Kustov, Kustov Associates CPA

 

Esteban Kelly, NASCO, USFWC, Philly Stands Up, Mariposa Food Cooperative

Esteban Kelly is a store manager in the staff collective of Mariposa Food Co-op in West Philadelphia. In addition to his focus on staff and organizational development, Esteban (aka "Stevie") was instrumental in forming the Food Justice and Anti-Racism Working Group at Mariposa, which aims to increase food access while confronting institutionalized oppressions at the Food Co-op, and serving as a catalyst for dismantling broader oppressions in our communities. Esteban serves fiercely as a trainer in a dynamic, newly-formed collective called AORTA (Anti-Oppression Resource and Training Alliance).  Beyond Mariposa and AORTA, homeboy has been involved in cooperative movement building work nationally and internationally since 2003, principally as NASCO's Director of Education and Training and more recently as a member of the NASCO board and the board of the US Federation of Worker Co-ops. Through volunteer work with Philly Stands Up, a local collective, homeboy has agitated for national networking among groups working on sexual assault while centralizing a 'transformative justice' model. Additionally, Esteban is pursuing a PhD in Cultural Anthropology at the CUNY Graduate Center (in New York) mostly studying transnational gentrification through city planning in "mega cities" like Sao Paulo, Brazil. When he's not being ridiculous, homeboy enjoys eating brunch, reading comics, and speaking Portuguese with friends. He also abuses British colloquialisms and is a bit of a tea snob.

 

Esther West, Equal Exchange

Esther West has been an Equal Exchange Interfaith Program Representative since 2008 and is the Equal Exchange Education Committee Co-Chair.  This worker-owner is also Lead Co-Facilitator of the Eastern Coordinating Committee for the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy. In 2006 she graduated from Xavier University, where she majored in Theology and minored in History and Political Science. After this she taught in the border town of Nogales, Arizona and in her hometown of Cincinnati. Esther has enjoyed political internships with Get Out the Vote and Cincinnati’s City Hall, and is a piano teacher. Her family background is one of co-operatives and social justice, as her father is director of the co-op Interfaith Business Builders and her mother is a Mexican-American M.D.  Currently she resides in the historic and delightful city of Boston.

 

Gary Holloway, United Steelworkers

Gary Holloway is Representative of United Steel Workers Local 675.  His current duties include contract negotiations, arbitration, organizing, and membership training for diverse groups of workers in the oil, chemical, hotel, pharmaceutical, and solar industries.   He has participated in more than three decades of labor, community, and progressive activism, including Central America solidarity work and anti-war activities.  He is former Labor Committee Chair at the ARCO Los Angeles Refinery, and former member of the Interim National Council of the Labor Party.  He is a graduate student at Cal State Dominguez Hills with with an anticipated Masters degree in English Literature December 2010.

 

Gregory Wilson, Attorney at Law

 

Guillermina Castellanos, La Colectiva

 

Heather McCulloch, Assest Building Stratgies

Heather McCulloch is the founder of Asset Building Strategies (ABS), a national consulting firm based in California, that advances policies and strategies to support low-wealth families to build financial assets.  She’s been a pioneer in the asset-building field, working with others to initiate innovative approaches to asset building at the local, state and national levels.  Heather has authored several national publications describing trends and emerging opportunities in the asset-building field and has been a regular presenter on asset building to national, state and local audiences (for a full list of presentations and publications, see www.assetbuildingstrategies.com).  She’s currently working with the Annie E. Casey Foundation to support collaboration between leaders of the asset-building and shared ownership movements.  Heather has a master’s degree in international political economy from the London School of Economics and a bachelor’s degree in political economy from the University of California, Berkeley. 

 

Hillary Abell, WAGES

As Executive Director of WAGES since 2003, Hilary has led the expansion of WAGES’ programs in the East Bay and San Francisco and the development of a three-year expansion strategy to increase the organization’s impact throughout the Bay Area and beyond.

 

Ian McLeod, of the Social Equity Group in Berkeley

 

Jackie Davis, Ryan Smith, Kathy MacCrate & Molly Jochem, City Bikes

Jackie, Molly, Ryan and Kathy offer four different perspectives in cooperative thinking.  Three have participated at Citybikes' Apprenticeship program, one at another bike shop's apprentice program, and all have actively participated in Citybikes' programs growth and development.  They all understand the need to democratize knowledge and are honored to be participating in the 2010 National Coop Conference.

 

Jacks McNamara, the Icarus Project

Jacks is a queer artist, writer, activist, organizer, gardener, poet, and performer living in Oakland, CA. In 2002 they cofounded  The Icarus Project, a collectively run radical mental health support network and media project by and for people living with the dangerous gifts that our society commonly labels as "mental illnesses."  Jacks has organized, toured, spoken, written, schemed and plotted around healing in a mad world with Icaristas for many years, as well as working with the Bay Area Radical Mental Health Collective. They are currently engaged in  co-editing an anthology on trauma and resilience called Scarsongs, and live in collective house with a baby and a lot of plants.

 

Janice Nyamekye, Toxic Soil Busters

Janice Nyamekye, 17, a board member of Worcester Roots Project, and member of Toxic Soil Busters Coop. She recently graduated from South high community school and will be going to Fisher college in Boston, MA. Ms. Nyamekye is the public relations and outreach coordinator for Toxic Soil Busters. Ms. Nyamekye has worked and been actively involved in youth movements like South high Community Service Learning Council and Youth Access and Empowerment team.

 

Jenny Kassan, Attorney at Law, Sustainable Economies Law Center

Jessica Gordon-Nembhard, CUNY, ONE DC, Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy; the Democracy Collaborative; and the U.S. Solidarity Economy Network

JESSICA GORDON NEMBHARD, Ph.D.,  is Associate Professor of Community Justice and Social Economic Development in the Department of African American Studies at John Jay College, City University of New York.  She previously taught at Howard University and the University of MD, College Park. Dr. Gordon Nembhard is a political economist specializing in economic development policy, Black political economy, and popular economic literacy. Her research focuses on democratic community economics, cooperative businesses, worker ownership, and racial wealth inequality. She is a member of the board of directors of ONE DC and a co-founder of the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy; the Democracy Collaborative; and the U.S. Solidarity Economy Network. In addition, she is a charter member of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives; and a member of: Grassroots Economic Organizing (GEO) Newsletter, The Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund, the Association of Cooperative Educators, and the Canadian Association for the Study of Cooperatives. She was appointed to the Black Enterprise Board of Economists in October 1999.

 

John Conowall, Union Cab Cooperative

 

John McNamara, Union Cab Cooperative

Member of Union Cab of Madison Cooperative since 1988 and currently in charge of marketing, customer service, accounts receivable and chairs the strategic planning committee. Recently completed a Master degree in cooperative management from St. Mary's University (Halifax). Has served on the USFWC board since early 2007. Writes a blog about workers cooperatives called The Workers' Paradise and about coops in general at Breathing Lessons.

 

Joseph Tuck, Alvarado Street Bakery

A 28 year veteran at Alvarado Street Bakery, Joseph Tuck has been the Chief Executive Officer of Alvarado Street Bakery for almost 20 years. Under his guise, sales for Alvarado Street Bakery have increased exponentially and profits went from breaking even to a very sizable profit range. Prior to his post as CEO, Joseph held the positions of production manager and packager. Having served Alvarado Street Bakery in these capacities has provided Joseph with a unique perspective on successfully running the company from developing and standardizing “Sprouted” recipes to baking whole grain products to integrating new management systems for upper management.

 

kiran nigam, USFWC, AORTA

kiran is an educator. She is a proud founding member of AORTA. Through this trainers' alliance through she educates, trains, and consults with cooperatives and collectives on topics addressing social justice, communication, community support, and collective functioning.  She is coming to accept that she is a movement conference organizer: she worked day and night as part of the core organizing team for the US Social Forum, organized the NASCO Institute for a few years running, and is now a devoted member of the conference coordination team for the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives. Her interests include: democratic and popular education, Theater of the Oppressed, art & design, neurology, radical mental health, and food.

 

Kwah Wa'Adabisha, People's Food Cooperative

Kwah Wa'Adabisha is a member of the collective and a buyer at People's Food Coop in Portland, Oregon. He has been a part of and helped found many collectives on the East coast. Kwah has extensive training in anti-oppression work having trained with People's Institute for Survival and Beyond, in New Orleans.

 

Liz Ryder, Co-Chair of the Union/Co-op Subcommittee of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives

 

Lori Burge, People's Food Coop

Lori Burge has been working in co-ops and democratic institutions for 14 years. She is a Co-manager and Development Manager at People’s Food Co-op in Portland, Oregon. She is passionate about social and economic justice, addressing oppression and workplace democracy. She has been active in People's Anti-oppression Committee since its inception in 2005. 

 

Luis Martano, Youth in Charge

 

Luz Domingues, WAGES

 

Lydia Pelot-Hobbes, NASCO, AORTA

Lydia Pelot-Hobbs has been involved in the housing sector of the cooperative movement for the past seven years.  She currently serves on the North American Students of Cooperation (NASCO) Board of Directors.  After ten years of experience developing and facilitating various anti-oppression workshops and trainings, Lydia is excited to be a founding member of the Anti-Oppression Resource Trainer Alliance (AORTA).  She currently lives in New Orleans where she is currently a graduate student at the University of New Orleans in Urban Studies and serves as the Director of Religious Education at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of New Orleans working towards deepening intergenerational faith community.

 

Mahasin Munir, Arizmendi Cooperative

Mahasin Munir is a worker-owner at Arizmendi Bakery on Lakeshore Avenue in Oakland. She is an experienced facilitator and she loves giving facilitation trainings.

 

Marc Mascarenhas-Swan, JASEcon

Marc Mascarenhas-Swan has been working with political collectives and housing collectives for 20 years. He is a facilitator and trainer in working in political education, challenging oppression in privileged communities, and collective organizational development.

 

Margaret Lund, Cooperative Finance Consultant

Margaret Lund is an independent consultant with a wide range of experience in the community development and cooperative development finance fields.  Prior to starting her consulting work, Ms. Lund spent 15 years as the Executive Director of the Northcountry Cooperative Development Fund (NCDF), a community loan fund and multi-faceted development organization for cooperatives of all sectors across the Upper Midwest.   Ms. Lund is a past member of the board of Opportunity Finance Network (OFN), the leading national trade association for Community Development Financial Institutions and also of the National Cooperative Business Association, where she chaired a national task force on cooperative capital formation.  Currently, she serves as Vice President of the board of Health Partners, the largest consumer-governed healthcare organization in the United States and a leader in healthcare quality measures.  Margaret is a nationally recognized expert in the field of cooperative development finance, and has been featured as a speaker, trainer and panelist for a number of organizations including the National Association of Housing Cooperatives, the National Cooperative Business Association,  the Consumer Cooperative Managers Association, the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives, the Meredith Institute for Resident-Owned Communities, the Minnesota Council of Non-Profits, and the Minneapolis Urban League. She currently serves on the Board of Governors of the Democracy at Work Institute.

 

Martha Bader, California Labor Federation

Martha Bader is Project Coordinator for the Workforce and Economic Development Program (WED) of the California Labor Federation.  She has worked for the California Labor Federation (the state AFL-CIO) for the last nine years.  Her current position in WED provides support to unions facing layoffs, unions retraining for new industry sectors, labor-management partnerships that provide workforce development as an organizing strategy, and labor members of workforce boards.  Through this work, she has expanded her focus to economic development policy and incentives to promote high-road job creation in all it's forms, including through worker co-ops.  She received her degree in Economics from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.

 

Mary Hoyer, Co-Chair of the Union/Co-op Subcommittee of the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives

Mary Hoyer works with the Cooperative Fund of New England, a lending organization for cooperatives and community-based nonprofits, as well as with the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy, a regional consortium of democratically-owned and managed businesses and their supporters.  She has worked in organizational development and governance, anti-racism and anti-apartheid initiatives, public and community education, and union organizing.  She holds a doctorate from the University of Massachusetts, an M.A. from the University of Kentucky, and a B.A. from Occidental College.

 

Medrick Addison, Evergreen Cooperatives

Medrick Addison is the Operational Supervisor of the Evergreen Cooperative Laundry in Cleveland, Ohio. He was a member of the first group of worker-owners to join the coop and serves on the senior management team.

 

Melissa Hoover, USFWC, Arizmendi Association

Melissa Hoover serves as Executive Director of the United States Federation of Worker Cooperatives, the national membership organization for worker cooperatives, and is a founding director of the nonprofit Democracy at Work Institute, which will provide technical assistance resources to those starting worker cooperatives. She has several years’ experience on financial and management teams of Bay Area worker cooperatives, currently with the Development and Support Cooperative of the Arizmendi Association of Cooperatives. She also works as an independent consultant helping co-ops and small businesses strengthen all aspects of financial management, with a focus on creating effective systems and trainings.

 

Michael Johnson, VAWC

1. Born in the panhandle of Texas in 1942 of an Irish lass and a Mississippi gentleman…Grew up deeply Catholic in a bible belt with a nurse, a doctor and three brothers, on land as flat and rolling as the ocean, under an enormous vault of sky either full of sun or moon, and in the face of constant wind…Got the message that “the world doesn’t work” at 16. 2. Entered a Kansas monastery in ’63, left in ’66; entered law school in NYC in fall of ’67 and left in winter of ’67; became an ‘outside agitator at Columbia in April of ’68 and discovered that the far left can be as top/down as the middle and right...deeply involved in group dynamics and community organizing in NYC ’68-’73...bottomed out in Phoenix ’73-’76. and a member of the desegregation unit of Austin school system ’76-’80.  3. Co-founded an intentional community in Staten Island, NY in ’80, in part an experiential research center in democratic culture...still there 30 years later...immersed in the worker co-op and solidarity economy movements since 2007 with the Valley Alliance of Worker Co-operatives, GEO, and the Community Economies Collective.

 

Michelle Matos, WAGES

Michelle Matos joined WAGES in 2008. Together with community-based organizations, Michelle has developed the leadership of immigrant workers and communities of color by conducting issue-based research and facilitating grassroots leadership development, trainings and strategic planning processes for both short-term campaigns and long-term community initiatives.

 

Mike Leung, Worker Cooperative Credit Union

 

Minsun Ji, Centro Humanitario

Founder and executive director of a day laborer organization in Denver and created Green Cleaning for Life, a wokrer owned green cleaning coop in Denver.

 

Misha Rauchwerger, natural builder

Misha Rauchwerger is a permaculturist and natural builder in Sonora, CA.  He has been building straw bale and monolithic adobe (cob) structures and teaching permaculture and natural building over the last 15 years.  with 9 years of teaching experience, Misha has taught high school Physics and has been a naturalist outdoor educator.  He is currently involved with the local non-profit sustainability organization FOCUS, and as a board member, is working to create community supported cooperatives and an alternative currency system to facilitate them.  Misha has a passion for social and economic transformation and is involved in the renaissance of localization, transition, and creating the New Paradigm.

 

Moises Matamoros, SAJE

 

Ole Olson, Isthmus Engineering

Ole is a member\owner of Isthmus Engineering and Manufacturing Cooperative.  He is a licensed Professional Engineer and has a bachelors degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin Platteville. Ole sits on the Board of Directors for the following organizations: Isthmus Engineering and Manufacturing, the US Federation of Worker Cooperatives, and MadWorC (Madison Worker Cooperatives).  Ole has been working with cooperatives for 30 years. He is currently helping to organize two student-led cooperatives at the collegiate and high school levels in the Madison area.

 

Omar Freilla, Green Worker Cooperatives

Rooted in the South Bronx, Omar is passionate about creating a green and democratic economy, one grounded in environmental justice. He is the founder and director of Green Worker Cooperatives, an organization dedicated to incubating green and worker-owned businesses in the South Bronx.

 

Oscar Grande, PODER

Oscar is the son of blue-collar Salvadoran immigrants who came to San Francisco in the late sixties in search of economic opportunities. He has been a Community Organizer with PODER since 1999. PODER is a grassroots, environmental justice organization based in San Francisco’s Mission District. They believe improvements to our neighborhood must be made through collective social action to bring about social, economic and environmental justice.

 

Patricia Feraud, Toxic Soil Busters

Patricia Feraud- a young teenager who goes to school by day and fights for social justice by night. Ms. Feraud feels that many adults view teenagers as a burden-rather than tomorrow future leaders; hence, at the age of fourteen, she decided to devote her time to social justice and community service. Ms. Feraud is the youngest member on Worcester Roots Project board. She is the youth treasurer on the board and Toxic Soil Busters business and fundraising coordinator. As a member of Toxic Soil Busters, Ms. Feraud remediates yards for low income houses, organizes and encourages communities to work together and demand a voice in their city government, and empowers youth at the same time.

 

Peter Hough, MBA, Canadian Worker Cooperative Federation

Peter is the Financial Officer of the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation and the Fund Manager of “Tenacity Works” the CWCF’s revolving loan fund. As a co-op developer Peter has assisted with many co-operative start-ups, developing bylaws, conducting training programs, completing feasibility studies and business plans and providing post start-up mentoring. Peter has been an active participant in the development of the Open Index for worker co-ops and has completed three pilot diagnoses using the Open Index.

 

Poonam Whabi, Design Action Collective

Poonam came to the Bay Area in 1999 from Dubai, U.A.E. She has worked at Design Action Collective (a worker-owned visual communications shop serving progressive social change organizations) since 2005, before which she contributed her design work to various local progressive non-profit organizations. She participates in expanding the worker co-op community in the Bay Area and enjoys sharing the knowledge she has gained from her co-workers with other co-op enthusiasts.

 

Raymond Simon, Youth in Charge

 

Rebecca Kemble, Union Cab

I have been a driver and an active member in Union Cab of Madison for the past 10 years.  I believe that whatever structural form an organization takes, it will only be sustainable and healthy to the degree that relationships between people who participate in it are based on trust, open communication and shared values. The Cooperative movement consciously embraces these principles and attempts to realize them, and I am committed to furthering, deepening and embodying these principles within the movement.

 

Rob Everts, Equal Exchange

Rob Everts joined Equal Exchange in 1997 and since 1999 has shared leadership responsibilities with EE co-founder Rink Dickinson.  In the 1970’s Rob worked with the United Farm Workers under Cesar Chavez.  In the 1980’s he was an organizer for the grassroots political organization Neighbor to Neighbor which worked to end the atrocities and reform U.S. policies in Central America.  In the immediate aftermath of the signing of the peace accords in El Salvador in 1992, Neighbor to Neighbor, Equal Exchange and Oxfam America collaborated to launch EE’s first coffee from that country, Café Salvador.  After a receiving a Masters in Public Administration from Harvard’s Kennedy School and a 15 month stint with UNICEF in Costa Rica, Rob returned to the U.S. to join Equal Exchange full time.

 

Roger Van Someren, Carlson Highland CPA

Roger Van Someren is partner with Carlson Highland & Co., LLP. He works with locally owned farm supply, consumer, manufacturing and utility cooperatives, local mutual insurance companies and non profit organizations providing audit and other business services.  He also provides tax preparation services for local businesses and individuals. Roger has worked for the cooperative system for thirty two years and feels that the cooperative model is the best way for businesses to be organized and to operate.  He passed the CPA exam in 1985 and is practices in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Colorado and Iowa.   Roger grew up in on a dairy farm in Baldwin, Wisconsin. Roger and his wife Lois have three grown children and two grandchildren.

 

Shawn Berry, Woodshanti

In 1997 Shawn co-founded the Woodshanti Cooperative, in San Francisco, setting the standard for sustainable cabinetry, millwork and furniture. Woodshanti is an FSC certified manufacturer and also uses local salvaged and recycled material as well as natural finish. Shawn also offers coaching and consulting to coops and progressive small business as well as sits on the board of directors Build It Green, a leader in the green building movement.

 

Stacey Cordeiro, Democracy at Work Network

 

Ted Howard, Evergreen Cooperatives

Ted Howard is the founding Executive Director of The Democracy Collaborative, a research and policy center at the University of Maryland focused on community stabilization and wealth building. He is an architect of the Evergreen Initiative and has been appointed the Cleveland Foundation's Steven Minter Senior Fellow for Social Justice.

 

Three Stone Hearth Cooperative

Three Stone Hearth is a worker-owned cooperative and community-supported kitchen, offering nutrient dense foods to homes and families around the San Francisco Bay Area.

 

Tim Huet, Attourney at Law, Arizmendi Association

As a staff person for the Arizmendi Association of Cooperatives, Tim Huet helps launch worker cooperatives and provides support to the Association’s established member cooperatives.  He also serves cooperatives unaffiliated with the Arizmendi Association as an attorney and organizational trainer/consultant.

 

Veronica Martinez, WAGES

 

Wendy Orniston, LCSW, Arizmendi Association

Wendy Ormiston, LCSW, is a Social Worker and Conflict Communications Consultant.  She has worked in and with coops for 7 years:  is a founding member of one coop and currently works in many capacities in the Arizmendi Association of Cooperatives.  Her Organizational Development work includes Large Group Conflict Facilitation, Workshop Trainings, Mediation, and Coaching.  To strengthen organizational culture in coops, she uses Process Work techniques, whereby supported interaction with the most disturbing and intractable problems (personal and institutional) informs the next most effective and creative solutions.

 

Yilda Campos, Rainbow Grocery Cooperative