Meet the Speakers


 Virgene Martin, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Virgene began fighting factory farms over a year ago.  Her community joined together, and succeeded in stopping one of the two proposed hog factories from coming into their neighborhood.  Unfortunately, they were unable to stop the other one. It is now located next door to Virgene’s family farm, and despite six years with the company and official recognition for her work performance, Virgene lost her job for sticking her neck out to fight the factory farm.
 "Now that the hog factories have invaded,” Virgene explains, “everyone has to deal with the smell, property devaluations, and road deterioration.  Adair and Cass counties will never be the same.”

Inez Killingsworth, Empowering & Strengthening Ohio’s People

  Inez lives in the zip code with the highest number of subprime foreclosures in the entire nation. Hundreds of families in her community have lost their homes and Inez know this could have been prevented with government regulation of the mortage industry.   This is why she joined with people across the country to fight for a government that protects our communities.
Inez is a long time community leader from Cleveland, Ohio. She is co-chair of National People’s Action, a national network of community based organizations and has testified before Congressional Committees numerous times. She believes that the federal government should create a broad set of policy and banking reforms to keep people in their homes.

 Kurt Kelsey, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Kurt and his family farm in north Central Iowa. They have seen the damage factory farms have created in their rural community. Property values have plummeted, wells are contaminated or dried up, people’s health is suffering and everyone’s quality of life has declined. He sees stewardship of the earth and the tradition of family farmers pitted against mega-corporations whose only mission is profit. “Corporations think they can overrun all of us,” says Kurt. “That’s not right.”

Ahmed M. Rehab, Council on American-Islamic Relations

  Ahmed is the Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago.  As a civil rights activist working in Muslim communities, Ahmed knows first hand the importance of a democracy that works for all people.  Since 9/11, he has seen Muslim men’s citizenship applications held up for years, just because the FBI name check is looking for someone with the same name. 
 Ahmed believes that our strength as a nation is our diversity and commitment to each other.  He explains, “the moment we compromise that in pursuit of security is the moment we become weak, and ironically less secure.”

Erica Fernandez, Gamaliel (CAUSE)

  Erica is a seventeen-year-old high school senior who plans to attend Harvard University next year.  She immigrated to the United States from Michoacan, Mexico at the age of ten.  Erica currently lives in one of the most economically depressed areas in Ventura County, and attends one of its lowest performing high schools in the district. 
For years, Erica’s community has been a dumping ground for toxic sludge.  So when Erica heard about the air pollution the new BHP LNG project would create, she immediately became active in the fight to stop it.  Despite public perception that it was a done deal, Erica organized her classmates and neighbors, collecting signatures, holding rallies, meeting with elected officials and succeeded in defeating one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies.

Malik Whitaker, South Carolina Fair Share

  Malik is a young man with something to share. He is a talented, energetic leader who wants to make a contribution to social change and to his community. But he has had to find his own way because the network of leaders from the baby boom generation has not embraced rising young leaders like Malik.
South Carolina, lacks of organized and trained leaders who can respond to the social justice issues in the community. This lack will only grow larger as current leadership ages and the needs of the community expand. Malik believes it is crucial for young social activists to gain access to the skills and knowledge they’ll need to lead their communities—and the nation. His goal is to see intergenerational cooperation and support to achieve social justice in the 21st century.

 Irlanda Helgen, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Irlanda is an immigrant to this country and leader at Iowa CCI.  Although she was able to emigrate her successful, she believes that today’s immigration system is broken. Originally from Panama she married a US. Citizen and became a citizen in 1985. As an experienced professional, Irlanda understands that for those who don’t have access to the training and other opportunities she had, the US immigration system is an elitist system that pits the “haves” against the “have not’s.”

Marvie Chapman, Jackson, Mississippi

  Marvie has worked at Tyson poultry plant for fourteen years. The workers turn out 226,000 chickens a day under excrutiating conditions. They stand on the line for ten to twelve hours a day, in 33 degree temperatures and perform the same task over and over again. The starting salary is $6.75 per hour, but with no regular raises, someone working for ten years may only make $7.75. 
Marvie has seen how the managers use racism to divide African American, white, and immigrant workers in order to keep the wages low. Management uses preferential hiring practices and payscales/benefit programs based on race to pit groups against each other. Through intimidation and forced overtime, management esures that no one unites to organize and fight for change.  The climate of fear created by the mistreatment of one group leads to low wages and poor working conditions for everyone.

 Inhe Choi, National Korean American Service & Education Consortium, Korean American Resource & Cultural Center

  Inhe is a mother of two who came to the US when she was twelve years old with her family from Korea.  Within a week of their new lives in the US, all five family members (ranging in age from 10 to 44 years old) received green cards in the mail and five years later they became naturalized citizens.  Inhe grew up surrounded by over fifty close relatives in the Chicago area.

She benefited from a network of family who helped her keep her language, culture, and understand her roots, while learning how to thrive in this country through hard work and contributing to community. So much has changed; Inhe’s experience is no longer the norm. Inhe now struggles with what to tell her daughter, who – after reading the newspaper article about Elvira Arellano’s deportation to Mexico and her nine year old son left behind – is shocked that her own country would break up families and is worried about her nine year old brother.

 Vern Tigges, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Vern is a hog farmer from Carrol, Iowa. Vern  believes that he corporatization of agriculture has closed down family farms and hurt communities both in rural Iowa and in central Mexico. Vern is also concerned about the outsourcing of jobs and closing of businesses related to the farming industry. These closures impact the entire economy and has negative environmental consequences of rising fuel costs to transport food long distances. Vern believes that passing the National Packer Ban is crucial to protecting our shared fate.

Deborah Kathlean Thomas, Powder River Basin Resource Council

  Deborah has worked to defend the environment and public health of her Wyoming community since she was first impacted by oil and gas development in 1999. She knows that people from the Montana to New Mexico, need the government to protect their health and the quality of our air, water, and land. 
Private industry is allowed to use chemicals that are detrimental to human health and the environment without disclosing them. Many landowners don’t own the mineral rights to their land. Thus, they have no say in development on their land and in their communities. Citizens whose health is jepordized by exposure to the chemicals used in drilling fluids cannot get records of what is being used in oil and gas exploration because of petroleum exemptions.

 Judy Lonning, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom

  Judy is a leader with the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom in Des Moines, Iowa.  She has studied the effects of corporate power on healthcare, immigration, US trade policies, jobs, farming, and the environment. Judy believes that the coporations hold American politics so tightly that we can’t say America is working for all Americans. Judy describes our current government as “of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations.”

Dedra Lewis, Alliance to Develop Power

  Dedra is a leader with the Alliance to Develop Power in Western Massachusetts. Her daughter has a disease that could take her sight. Dedra had to cut her hours at work to care for her daughter. In January 2007 she lost her health insurance and enrolled in the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). For a moment she thought her daughter was safe.
Recently, Dedra learned the program was in danger of being cut and that President Bush has vetoed it twice this year. SCHIP is all that stands between Dedra’s daughter and blindness. Dedra she is fighting to keep SCHIP—not only for her daughter, but so that every family can have piece of mind and receive the health care they need.

Rev. Katrina Foster, Northwest Bronx Clergy and Community Coalition

  Rev. Foster serves the congregation at Fordham Evangelical Lutheran Church in a low-income Bronx community. She sees on a regular basis how society treats the poor. National issues such as immigration, subprime lending, and the war in Iraq are not headlines to her congregants but daily struggles.
Many of the people in her congregation do not have health insurance. Rev. Foster feels fortunate that she does, but she cannot cover her spouse and child with her health insurance. Rev. Foster is a lesbian, and the official policy of the United States—the Defense of Marriage Act—prohibits her from participating in the rights, responsibilities and benefits of marriage.

Martha L. Sanchez, Alivio Medical Center Community Liaison & Pilsen Neighbors Community Council; Gamaliel of Metro Chicago

  Martha “Marty” Sanchez is a 47 year old Mexican American woman and the single mother of two teenage sons. As As community liaison for a local health clinic, she has seen first hand the disparities of health care in communities of color in the southwest Chicago; and as a single mom and type II diabetic, she has a personal interest in increasing access to health care.  Marty has dedicated her life to fighting for affordable healthcare and social justice for all.

Debra Carr, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Debra is a leader with Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement.  Debra has been vitally involved in helping a  family member who is a single mother of a son with severe asthma. The mother is self-employed and buried under mounting medical debts for her son. She had to choose whether to make a house payment or a payment on her son’s huge medical debt. She chose his medical care, and now is in danger of losing her house. Debra says it was a choice “between life and living.”

Robin Ghormley, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Robin is a 72 year old nurse and a leader with Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement. In 1997, arthritis caused both of her knees to blow out and forced her into early retirement. As an extremely independent and mobile person, it was hard for Robin to adjust to no longer being able to rely on just herself. She had to fight with her insurance company for disability payments; even though she had a policy, they would not release payments until she could prove that she was disabled for seven months. Robin ultimately pulled through because of the assistance of her family, her community, and social welfare programs.
 

Barbara Anderson, Empowering and Strengthening Ohio’s People

  “If there is any issue right now that speaks to the fact that we are all in this together, it is the mortgage foreclosure crisis,” says Barbara. She lives in Slavic Village, a Cleveland neighborhood that has been devastated by subprime loan foreclosures. Her neighborhood is scarred by swathes of vacant houses and the value of her own home has plummeted. Barbara describes the ripple effect she sees so clearly from her own front door.
“What started as a seemingly simple transaction between a borrower and a lender/broker is leading to a family losing their home, a vacant property, declining home values, lowered tax base,” she says.

Tam Tran, IDEAS at UCLA/CHIRLA

  Tam is a leader with the Coalition for Humane Immigration Reform of Los Angeles.  She has been literally trapped by immigration laws that make no sense since her parents escaped Vietnam by boat in the mid-seventies. Their boat was rescued by the German navy and they were settled in refugee camps in Germany. That’s where Tran was born—but it didn’t make her a German citizen, because citizenship must be inherited from a German parent.
When Tran was 6, her parents immigrated to the U.S., where their only relatives lived, and asked for political asylum. The US denied them asylum and Tam is now without a country. Even so, Tran was determined to go to college although her undocumented status meant she didn’t qualify for any type of financial aid or loans. Last month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents raided the Tran family’s mobile home and arrested Tam’s parents and younger brother.

Emira Palacios, Sunflower Community Action

  Emira has lived in the United State for a total of 22 years. Despite arriving in this country as an undocumented immigrant, she has become a leader in her community. Today, she is a leader with Sunflower Community Action and a national board member of the National Training and Information Center. 
Emira has faced many difficulties and spent over $15,000 during the process of becoming a United States Citizen. She wants to live in a country where the contributions of immigrants are valued and a pathway to citizenship is created for all undocumented immigrants. 

Veronica Dahlberg, Gamaliel Ohio/ACTION/HOLA

  Veronica is the leader of HOLA, a Hispanic organization that works with 2,000 families in Lake and Ashtabula counties. Many of them are farm workers who keep the nursery industry going in Northeast Ohio.  She was a key spokesperson after ICE conducted raids in her community this spring and was quoted in local, state, and national press.  She has also been the main spokesperson for an Ohio Coalition of Immigrant and Refugee Rights which has been launched by Gamaliel Ohio in partnership with UFCW and HOLA.  Veronica has seen, firsthand, the impact of a broken immigration system and tells a compelling story of the contribution and impact of immigrants in rural Ohio and in the cities of Painesville and Ashtabula Counties. 

Cary A. Martin, Chicago Coalition for the Homeless

  Cary is a hedge funds investment attorney who holds degrees in law and finance. As a youth, she spent one year, two years living with her family in a hotel room, and eight years as a ward of the state. During high school, Cary was placed in one group home and three foster homes. Contrary to popular myth, she did not pull herself up by her bootstraps. Cary explains, “My personal success is evidence that a little bit of help goes a long way, and that even more help spread across more people will work miracles.”

Kenya Bradshaw, Concerned Memphians United

  Kenya is the first in her family to attend college. She was accepted by many top tier schools, but her choice was guided by one thing: financial aid. Today she is a graduate of the University of Tennessee in Chattanooga—and a member of “Generation Debt,” the generation of young people who begin their adult lives weighed down by student loan debt.
Kenya owes $30,000, more than the yearly salary of many entry-level jobs. She expects to spend much of her life repaying educational loans. Upon graduation, Kenya and her friends felt tremendous pressure to “take a job—any job” so they could begin repaying their loans.

 Matthew Russell, Iowa Community Action Network

  Matthew is a leader with the Iowa Community Action Network.  He returned to farming as a young adult bringing a new model to his family fair as an organizer farmer supported by Community Sponsored Agriculture.  Mathew is chair of Iowa Network for community Agriculture.  Mathew gives talks around the state of Iowa and nationally on issues of food systems, federal agriculture policy, hunger/poverty and problems with rural healthcare.

Patricia Divine Wilder, Washington Community Action Network

  Patricia has often spoken in public about the plight of small business owners like herself who cannot afford health insurance. But the story that struck her the most deeply is one she has never told until now. It’s about another small business owner, a man who died too young because he didn’t have health insurance and couldn’t afford medical tests or treatment.
He kept waiting for the pain in his back and shoulders to go away. By the time he finally saw a doctor, it was too late—his lung cancer was incurable. Six weeks later he was dead. The man was Patricia’s nephew James, and he died at 36, leaving behind a grieving wife and three young daughters. They had health insurance through the wife’s employer, but the cost was so high they couldn’t afford to cover James as well.”

Dr. Debra Greenwood, Georgia ABLE

  Dr. Greenwood owns a small business. Her company’s health insurance premiums typically increase 25% to 28% each year. Recently an insurance agent told her that insurance companies increase their rates like this deliberately—to force small businesses out of their plans. And yet, small businesses employ more Americans than large businesses.
“At my own company, I have had to find the lousiest, cheapest health insurance plan I could find—because that is all we could afford,” she says. “My own personal physician doesn’t even accept our plan, so I have to either pay out of pocket to see her, or disrupt my care by finding another doctor.”

Dr. Bret McFarlin, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

  Dr. McFarlin is an internal medicine physician who has spent the past 15 years practicing at Broadlawns Medical Center, the “safety net” hospital that serves everyone in Des Moines and Polk County regardless of their ability to pay. More than 50% of Broadlawns patients do not have health insurance.  Dr. McFarlin knows the statistics: 47 million Americans uninsured, many more underinsurd with di-allowed pre-existing conditions, and more that half of all personal bankruptcies dues to health care bills.
Dr. McFarlin also knows heartbreaking real-life stories, like the one about the 45-year-old construction worker who couldn’t afford a clinic co-payment. When his unpaid bill was sent to a collection agency, the man skipped follow-up visits and lab tests. He soon died of a recurrent blood clot—a completely preventable death that Dr. McFarlin attributes directly to our nation’s heartless and heedless health insurance system.

 Mayte Rodriguez, Somos un Pueblo Unido

  Mayte came to the US when she was 6 years old. She spent her entire school career in US schools, graduated with honor in the top 10 of her high school class. Today, she holds two associates degrees and now is just two years away from earning a bachelors degree in Education. But, as an undocumented immigrant, Mayte may not be able to achieve her dream of serving as a teacher. Mayte has been in process to legalize her status for 11 years. Until the process is complete, she cannot teach.

Like millions of people, Mayte belongs to a family that includes citizens, legal residents, and people embroiled in the long and tangled process of gaining legal status. When Congress failed to pass immigration reform or the DREAM Act in 2007, her family's hopes were destroyed. Communities everywhere were plunged into fear and uncertainty. Mayte believes that US laws can do better for hard-working families like hers and for their communities. She knows that as long as communities are separated by the veil of fear created by our broken immigration system, citizens and non-citizens alike will remain vulnerable to the civil rights violations and struggles faced by the working poor. This story is not hers alone and Mayte speaks for many young people, like herself, who grew up in America and are fighting to be accepted by the country they call home.

 Larry Ginter, Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement

 

Larry has lived and worked on a family farm in Rhodes for 68 years. He used to raise hogs, but when factory farms moved into Iowa, he could not longer afford to stay in business. About 12 years ago, Larry began to speak out. He placed a billboard on his property to protest the buidling of factory farms in his community and the Governor’s position.

The state ordered him to remove the sign and Larry called Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement. They held a rally and a press conference, put up replica signs across the state and mobilized people to call the Governor and the Department of Transportation. Eventually, the state backed off and Larry’s sign remained standing. He learned that the key to winning was to be part of a strong group with lots of people working together to get things done. 

Billy Lawless, Illinois Coalition for Immigrant & Refugee Rights

  Billy sees history repeating itself when he looks around his Irish immigrant community in Chicago. He knows we need immigrant workers to maintain the economic growth of the U.S. Yet he sees his neighbors exploited on the job, unprotected on the street, and betrayed by politicians who deferred to hate groups rather than do what was right and pass an immigration policy that would enable hard-working immigrants to become citizens. It reminds him of the bad old days 100 years ago, when Irish and Italian immigrants were persecuted in America. While Billy himself is not at risk, he sees the suffering all around him—among Irish immigrants and all other nationalities.