Green Union Co-op Development Initiative 

The Green-Union-Coops Workshop brings together unions and coops to discuss the creation of Green-Union-Coops as a means to create sustainable union jobs. The green jobs initiatives promote renewable energy while lifting workers out of poverty. The promise of green jobs is an economy of workers installing solar panels, weatherizing homes, brewing biofuels, building hybrid cars and erecting giant wind turbines.
- Labor unions view these new jobs as replacements for positions lost to overseas manufacturing and outsourcing.
- Urban groups view training in green jobs as a route out of poverty.
- And environmentalists say they are crucial to combating climate change.

Incubating worker cooperatives is a means of creating jobs which are based on workplace democracy; the members of a worker cooperative make decisions democratically by giving each person a vote and distributing income equitably to all workers. Worker cooperatives are businesses which remain local, contributing to local taxes and the local community.

This workshop will connect these dots. The Apollo Alliance will present their mission, which includes:
- Launching a Green-Collar Job Initiative: Guidance for Cities
- Seeding the Growth of America’s Clean Energy Economy and
- Made in America: Strategies to Expand Domestic Manufacturing of Clean Energy Technology and Components.
Omar Freilla of Green Worker Cooperatives will speak about the connections between green jobs and workplace democracy. Local Unions will also participate.
Our hope in sponsoring this workshop is to involve the local residents of New Orleans in the reconstruction effort so that the poorest workers will benefit from the reconstruction of the city, the city will be reconstructed as a model green city, and the business of reconstruction will result in lasting job creation to uplift the local community while retaining ownership as worker owned cooperatives.

Lisabeth Ryder has worked for organized labor for over a decade in the organizing departments of the largest labor unions, SEIU and AFSCME. She has a lifetime interest in cooperatives as the consumate embodiment of workplace and economic democracy. She has volunteered her time to help facilitate relationships between unions and cooperatives, to help grow both the labor and the cooperative movements. Her other interests include community, human rights and environmental organizing. Carla Din is the Western Regional Field Director for the Apollo Alliance. Carla joined the Apollo Alliance in 2004 to advance alternative energy as a means to create high quality jobs, boost industries and revitalize communities. Prior to joining Apollo, Carla served as the Environmental Liaison for the United Steelworkers' District 11 where alliance-building led to unprecedented support for Steelworker protection by environmental groups, and Steelworker support of a Northwest energy policy endorsing conservation, renewable energy and salmon protection. Carla holds a Bachelor of Art's degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Master's degree in Public Administration from the University of Washington in Seattle. Richard Dines is a Vice-President at NCB and a longtime supporter of worker cooperatives. Omar Freilla is the founder of Green Worker Cooperatives, and his detailed bio can be found here.