As you know, we’re going through a transition at Massachusetts Jobs with Justice. Our dear Co-Executive Director gillian mason is heading off to Corpus Christi, TX! She's moving down South at the end of July but she'll never leave our JWJ family and our movement.

Gillian has been with Jobs with Justice since 2012 when she joined the JWJ staff as an Organizer. In 2016, she became Co-Director of JWJ with Lily Huang. She's led JWJ through challenging times, dreamed and schemed about how to build working class power, taken on bad bosses and bad corporations, and so much more.

You’re invited to say farewell to Gillian and spend time with the rest of our JWJ family to share your love and good wishes for Gillian at our Roast and Toast to Gillian on Monday, July 27th at 5pm. Join us here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/2756444364460654/

and/or donate in Gillian's honor: https://actionnetwork.org/.../support-massachusetts-jobs...
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Dear Friends,

About ten years ago, Jobs with Justice saved my life.

I was going broke from hospital bills while working as an adjunct professor. I had been sick for years, but my doctors couldn’t even figure out what was wrong with me because my insurance company wouldn’t pay for the tests they ordered. I was depressed, angry, and unsure that I could go on.

That’s when I started going to protests for healthcare reform. The feeling of being out in the streets was powerful. Suddenly I wasn’t helplessly alone — I was part of a movement to change the system that had caused me and millions of others so much harm.

I started to notice that there was one group of people who was always there standing in solidarity at every protest and event: the Jobs with Justice crew. The first time I got arrested for civil disobedience at the offices of a health insurance company, it was Jobs with Justice that showed up to bail me out. Long story short, I got involved with Jobs with Justice because this organization was here for me at the lowest point in my life.

As a staff member and eventually a Co-Director of Jobs with Justice, I have had the chance to be there for working people all over the Commonwealth at their lowest points. I have been able to fight alongside health care workers, teachers, retail workers, fast food workers, domestic workers, bank workers, community leaders, immigrant youth, student debtors, disability rights activists, LGBTQIA+ organizers, leaders in the movement for black lives, and freedom fighters of all kinds. I have had the privilege of doing that work with some of the most talented organizers I have ever met, all of whom have taught me new lessons about bravery, humility, duty, and community every day. Over the past 3 years, I’ve been able to work together as Co-Directors with my sister and comrade Lily Huang, a truly visionary leader in our movement. The past decade has been one of great victories and difficult losses — organizing fights and contract campaigns and struggles to shape policy and hold our legislators accountable — and I have been so grateful to be a part of all of it.

Fighting together for a better world with you has brought joy and purpose to my life, so it’s bittersweet for me to let you know that in the coming weeks I will be moving on to my next adventure and leaving the chilly northeast for Corpus Christi, Texas. I couldn’t be more excited to find new ways to support the amazing movement-building work happening in the South, but I will miss you all terribly.

Over the years, I’ve made a lot of asks of all of you, whether it be signing a petition or walking a picket line, but I can’t leave without making one more:

Can you make a donation today to invest in the future of Jobs with Justice? [https://actionnetwork.org/.../support-massachusetts-jobs...]

I know that our incredible Jobs with Justice staff, board, and coalition partners will take this organization to heights I never could have imagined, all under the leadership of brilliant women of color. They will no-doubt find new ways of building working class power, fighting corporate greed and white supremacist capitalism, and bringing the people most impacted by inequality into our movement. But they’re going to need your support and the resources necessary to make big change happen.

Whether or not you can give today, thank you for all your contributions to Jobs with Justice over the years — your time, your energy, your donations, and your blood, sweat, and tears. Your love is what makes our movement, and I’ll carry a piece of that love in my heart wherever I go.

In solidarity,
Gillian