Overview
Greetings! I’m reaching out about an opportunity at Firelands – an org doing impressive work in organizing rural working-class power in Washington state. They’re looking for a collaborative and strategic leader to be their Director of Organizing and join a growing, vibrant organization advancing multiracial worker power. This is a 32-hour/week position with a salary range of $85,061 – $89,341plus generous benefits. Position can be based anywhere in Western Washington, but requires weekly in-person meetings in Aberdeen. An overview of the position and more info about us is below. Full position description at this link: https://bit.ly/Firelands_Organizing_Director
ABOUT FIRELANDS
Firelands Workers United/Trabajadores Unidos organizes with working-class power in rural timber counties in Washington State. We are working families in Grays Harbor and Pacific counties in rural Southwest Washington and the Olympic Peninsula joining together across race and language to fight for good green jobs & workers rights, affordable & healthy homes, healthcare, childcare, fair taxes, healthy forests, immigrant rights, and more. Our coastal, forested region is full of natural beauty and can-do people, but over the decades, big corporations have exploited our lands and labor and eroded union jobs. Public disinvestment via a regressive tax code has led to high poverty rates and the decay of our housing and other public goods. While some politicians in our region have backed these schemes, people are fed up with the rich and powerful calling the shots. Rural working families in Washington deserve better and we are organizing for a different future.
Since forming in 2019, Firelands has played an outsized role in winning nationally-recognized statewide policy campaigns, from expanding healthcare access to transformative tax reforms to tenant protections to defending billions in public resources for schools, childcare and climate jobs. At the national level, we are recognized for our leadership in bilingual popular political education and public narrative strategy campaigns.
We are committed to multicultural organizing with working-class rural people, building a culture of solidarity across our differences. Firelands is made up of a growing base of over a 1,000 members who are cannery workers, mill workers, healthcare workers, domestic workers, retired veterans, students and more. Our members are majority Latino and we are growing our base of members who are white, Black, Asian, and Native. We organize in Spanish and English. We host joyful events drawing 500+ participants; we run deep listening canvasses; we host leadership cohorts which have developed over 60 volunteer organizers. We collaborate with other workers’ groups that share our commitment to dissolving the “jobs vs. environment” story in rural WA and creating local union climate jobs. We also engage in numerous WA state coalitions including the State Power Table, as well as collaborating with national campaigns and organizing with Peoples Action. To learn more about Firelands read our 2024 Annual Report and our 2025 Legislative Agenda.
Organizing is the heart and soul of our work and our organizational structure reflects that. With a 32-hour work week, a values-aligned and equitable pay structure that recognizes organizing as the center of Firelands, and one-on-one outside resilience coaching for each organizer, our team of 11 is dedicated to making our organizational culture energizing and sustainable. Our Organizing Team of six began as members and today are powerful and committed organizers with a keen understanding of their rural and working class communities, both immigrant and lo-born. Since our founding, Firelands has retained 100% of full-time staff. We work hard, laugh hard, rest and pace ourselves for individual and organizational health, and learn continuously with evaluation and feedback. We see hope as a disciplined, mutually-supported practice. Join us!