SEIU hires activist from a new school

[struggle4progress]

The union signs up an alliance builder who worked for an environmental group and is credited with forming the coalition that helped sell FasTracks to voters.

By Tom McGhee
Denver Post Staff Writer

<snip> “We are looking for folks who have a broader view about economic and social issues, because at the end of the day social justice is what we want to achieve,” said Mitch Ackerman, SEIU Local 105 president.

Martens, 46, fills the bill. When death squads were terrorizing El Salvadoran peasants in the 1980s, he joined a Chicago group that educated the public about conditions in Central America.

As part of Neighbor to Neighbor's campaign, he lobbied Congress to pressure Latin American governments for change. In 1996, he went to work organizing and lobbying for the Colorado Environmental Coalition.

And in 1998, he began building a coalition of 40 organizations that are credited with selling the FasTracks light-rail expansion to Denver voters last year. That skill at alliance-building made him especially valuable to the SEIU, Ackerman said. It and The Teamsters last week defected from the AFL-CIO. <snip>

http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_2900826