Join Rosalinda Guillen and Edgar Franks, two of the Pacific Northwest’s strongest voices for food and social justice for the people who grow our food, providing an update on the real impact of the current crises of our times. Their knowledge and expertise are based on real-life experience, in the fields and farms, organizing those who are some of America’s most “essential workers” of all.
Bonus – Rosalinda Guillen, as the executive director of Community to Community (C2C) is also a winner of the 2020 James Beard Leadership Award. The award recognizes her visionary work for creating a healthier, safer, and more equitable and sustainable food system. Watch this 3-minute video interview and highlights of her and C2C’s work here.
BIOS
Rosalinda Guillén – (she/hers) Rosalinda is a widely recognized farm worker and rural justice leader and advocate. She grew up in LaConner Washington where she began working in the fields of Skagit County at the age of ten. As part of her organizing and advocacy work on behalf of farm workers and the development of sustainable social justice practices in agriculture, Rosalinda regularly meets with agricultural worker organizations such as Familias Unidas por la Justicia and directs a network of farm worker women doing on the ground outreach to farm worker families in Whatcom and Skagit Counties. Additionally, she represents farm labor on the WA State Agricultural Seasonal Workers Services Advisory Committee that provides oversight on the federal h2a labor program as well as WA state based farm workers.
Edgar Franks – Edgar is the Political and Campaign Director of Familias Unidas por La Justicia (FUJ), an independent farmworker union of indigenous families located in Burlington, WA. FUJ represents over 500 Triqui, Mixteco, and Spanish speaking workers at Sakuma Bros. Berry Farm.
Edgar has been one of the main organizers that have supported the strikes of apple warehouse workers in Yakima. He also has been organizing with H2A and domestic workers since 2013. Before joining Familias Unidas, Edgar served as the Civic Engagement Program Coordinator at Community to Community Development, working to engage allies to develop strategies that ensure the voices of farmworkers are represented at all levels of the political process. Edgar sits on the governance board of the Washington Climate Alliance and the Labor Network for Sustainability.
FUJ formed on July 11th, 2013 with the hopes of securing a better future for hand harvesters in the local berry fields of Whatcom and Skagit County. Nearly four years later, September 12, 2016, FUJ won a historic secret ballot election ushering in a new era for farmworker justice in WA State. FUJ is the third independent farmworker union formed in WA in 30 years and the first union led by indigenous workers.
