About Our Bloggers

Morra Aarons-Mele - F. Paul Bland, Jr. - Jeff Blum - Kim Bobo -Natasha Chart - Tula Connell - Katie Corrigan - Phillip Dine - Phil Duran - Cynthia Estlund - Chai R. Feldblum - Kim Fellner - Charlotte Fishman - Melvina Ford - Richard B. Freeman - Bruce Goldstein - Jason Gooljar - Steven Greenhouse - Mark Harbeke - Tom Jackson - David Kusnet - Anne Ladky - Art Levine - Dr. David Madland - Lewis Maltby - Cyrus Mehri - Jen Nedeau - Nathan Newman - Richard Renner - Jason Rosenbaum - Bob Rosner - Robin Runge - Paul Secunda - Ellen Simon - Diane Stafford - Paul H. Tobias - Ilona Turner - Karla Walter - Michael Whitney

left Morra Aarons-Mele specializes in work redesign and management training for the flexible workplace. Before focusing on organizational change, Morra worked for ten years on online campaigns for politics, advocacy groups, and corporations. Through her work as an Internet strategy consultant, she became committed to helping employers and employees create and manage programs that increase flexibility and self-directed work. Morra returned to graduate school and internships to learn this new field. Morra writes weekly columns for BlogHer.com, the Huffington Post, and guardian.co.uk. She is also a frequent media commentator for CNN. Morra has a degree in Political Science from Brown University and a Master’s from the Harvard Kennedy School. Morra is active in local politics, and represented Washington, DC’s ANC for Ward 2B. She is married to Nicco Mele and lives near Boston.
F. Paul Bland, Jr. is a Staff Attorney for Public Justice (formerly Trial Lawyers for Public Justice), where he handles precedent-setting complex civil litigation. He has argued or co-argued and won more than twenty reported decisions from federal and state courts across the nation, including cases in four federal Circuit Courts of Appeal and six state high courts. He was named the “Vern Countryman” Award winner in 2006 by the National Consumer Law Center, which “honors the accomplishments of an exceptional consumer attorney who, through the practice of consumer law, has contributed significantly to the well being of vulnerable consumers.” He is a co-author of a book entitled Consumer Arbitration Agreements: Enforceability and Other Issues, and numerous articles. For three years, he was a co-chair of the National Association of Consumer Advocates. He also has won the San Francisco Trial Lawyer of the Year in 2002 and Maryland Trial Lawyer of the Year in 2001. Prior to coming to Public Justice, he was a plaintiffs’ class action and libel defense attorney in Baltimore. In the late 1980s, he was Chief Nominations Counsel to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1986, and Georgetown University in 1983.
Jeff Blum has extensive experience in grassroots organizing. He founded and directed Pennsylvania Citizen Action, where he helped lead successful campaigns to reform the state’s public utility law, create a toxics right to know law and expand access to generic drugs for senior citizens. He has also worked for the Peoples’ Coalition for Peace and Justice, Massachusetts Fair Share, People for the American Way (where he co-coordinated the campaign to establish AmeriCorps) and was Transportation Policy Director for Citizen Action. Blum also served as President of Maryland Citizen Action, founder and member of the Advisory Board of the Jewish Fund for Justice and as a member of the board of Citizens for Tax Justice. He is on the executive committee of America Votes and is an advisor to Progress Now. In Pennsylvania, he ran for state Senate in 1990 and was the Northeast Pennsylvania Regional Director of the Clinton/Gore Campaign in 1992. He has a BSN from Boston University and attended the University of Chicago and the University of Warwick, England. He and his wife, Ellen Cassedy, reside in Takoma Park, Maryland, and have two children.
Kim Bobo, Founder and Executive Director of Interfaith Worker Justice, writes the “Dispatches from the Workplace” column for the online magazine Religion Dispatches. She is the author of Wage Theft in America: Why Millions of Working Americans Are Not Getting Paid — And What We Can Do About It (forthcoming in December from the New Press) and the co-author of Organizing for Social Change, the best-selling manual on progressive activism in the U.S.
Natasha Chart has been blogging about the environment, social justice and various other political topics since 2002. She currently writes at MyDD.com and works as an online marketing consultant in Philadelphia.
Tula Connell got her first union card while she worked her way through college as a banquet bartender for the Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee they were represented by a hotel and restaurant local union — the names of the national unions were different then than they are now). With a background in journalism — covering bull roping in Texas and school boards in Virginia — she started working in the labor movement in 1991. Beginning as a writer for SEIU (and OPEIU member), she now blogs under the title of AFL-CIO managing editor.
Katie Corrigan is the Co-Director of Workplace Flexibility 2010 where she, along with Chai Feldblum, is responsible for overseeing the strategy, legislative lawyering, policy research, media, and constituent outreach components of the effort.
Phillip Dine, a Washington-based journalist, is one of the few remaining labor reporters and his labor coverage has twice been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. His book, “State of the Unions: How Labor Can Strengthen the Middle Class, Improve Our Economy, and Regain Political Influence” (foreword by Richard Gephardt) has been called “one of the best books in years on the labor movement” by the AFL-CIO; “excellent, inspiring and very readable” by Sen. Edward Kennedy; and “a playbook for a comeback for organized labor” by the Boston Globe.Dine designed and taught a college course on the media’s coverage of labor, did graduate studies in industrial relations at MIT and spent two years researching labor unions and immigrant workers in France and Germany. His op-ed pieces have been published in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Baltimore Sun and Newsday. More information is available at http://www.philipdine.com and Dine can be reached at philipmdine@aol.com.
left Phil Duran is a graduate of the University of Minnesota Law School. Phil is the Staff Attorney at OutFront Minnesota, the state’s leading advocacy, direct service, and public policy agency for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBT) Minnesotans and their allies. His work at OutFront Minnesota focuses on legal information, referral, and education; state legislative research and analysis; state administrative agency and local government public policy; school-related issues; and direct representation in selected public-assistance and human rights matters.Additionally, Duran serves on the board of the Minnesota Lavender Bar Association, which raises GLBT issues within the legal profession in Minnesota. He also is a past member of the executive council of the Minnesota State Bar Association (MSBA), and served on the steering committee of the MSBA’s Diversity in the Legal Profession Task Force. He currently serves on the MSBA Diversity Committee, MSBA Task Force on the Rights of Unmarried Couples, and Minnesota Supreme Court’s Gender Fairness Implementation Committee.
Cynthia Estlund is the Catherine A. Rein Professor at the NYU School of Law. Recent work chronicles the crisis of workplace governance – the decline of collective bargaining and the failings of both regulation and litigation – and charts a potential path forward. Her book Working Together: How Workplace Bonds Strengthen a Diverse Democracy (Oxford U. Press 2003) argues that the workplace is both comparatively integrated and intensely cooperative and social, and explores the implications for democratic theory and for the law of the workplace. Other writings focus on freedom of speech and procedural fairness at work; affirmative action; and the significance of property rights in labor law.
Chai R. Feldblum is a Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C., Director of Georgetown’s Federal Legislation Clinic, and Co-Director of Workplace Flexibility 2010.
Kim Fellner is the author of Wrestling With Starbucks: Conscience, Capital, Cappuccino (Rutgers University Press, July). She works in the labor movement.
Charlotte Fishman is a San Francisco attorney with over 20 years of experience handling plaintiff-side employment discrimination cases in private practice, government (California Department of Fair Employment and Housing), and the non-profit sector (Equal Rights Advocates). In 2005 she founded Pick Up the Pace, a legal advocacy and public policy organization dedicated to overcoming barriers to women’s advancement in the workplace. In addition to blogging for Today’s Workplace, Ms. Fishman writes frequently for a wide audience on cutting edge employment discrimination issues. Her work has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, Common Dreams, Women’s E-News, Academe, Inside Higher Ed, Women in Higher Ed, Mothers Movement Online, and Workplace Fairness, among others. She is a regular columnist on legal issues affecting women for the San Francisco and Los Angeles Daily Journal. In recent years, she participated in significant employment discrimination cases before the California and United States Supreme Courts as amicus curiae, including Yanowitz v. L’Oreal, Burlington Northern v. White and Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. Ms. Fishman obtained her B.A from Barnard College in 1968 and her J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1979. She is currently drafting an amicus brief in support of the respondent in AT&T v. Hulteen.
left Melvina Ford is the Executive Director of the EJC (DC Employment Justice Center). Prior to joining the EJC as Director of Legal Services in 2005, Melvina was a senior associate at the law firm of Tydings & Rosenberg LLP, in Baltimore, Maryland, where she practiced in the firm’s Litigation Department with an emphasis on labor and employment law. Melvina, however, is not a newcomer to nonprofit advocacy. Before re-entering private practice, Melvina served as the Legal Projects Manager for the Women’s Law Center of Maryland, where she coordinated the Center’s litigation efforts, represented the organization before the Maryland General Assembly and wrote and updated Center publications, such as Sex Discrimination in Employment, a guide to federal and Maryland employment laws for women. Melvina graduated from the Georgetown University Law Center, and she is a member of the Maryland, Virginia, and District of Columbia bars.
Richard B. Freeman holds the Herbert Ascherman Chair in Economics at Harvard University. He is currently serving as Faculty Director of the Labor and Worklife Program at the Harvard Law School. He is also director of the Labor Studies Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Senior Research Fellow in Labour Markets at the London School of Economics’ Centre for Economic Performance, and visiting professor at the London School of Economics.Professor Freeman is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of Sigma Xi. He has served on five panels of the National Academy of Sciences, including the Committee on National Needs for Biomedical and Behavioral Scientists. He has published over 300 articles dealing with a wide range of research interests including the job market for scientists and engineers, the growth and decline of unions and many more. He is currently directing the NBER / Sloan Science Engineering Workforce Project (with Daniel Goroff). In addition, he has written or edited over 35 books, several of which have been translated into French, Spanish, Chinese and Japanese.
Bruce Goldstein joined Farmworker Justice as a staff attorney in 1988, then served as Co-Executive Director starting in September 1995, and was named Executive Director in July 2005. He received his bachelor’s degree in 1977 from the New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University, and his law degree from Washington University in St. Louis (1980). He has worked at the National Labor Relations Board, at a legal services office in East St. Louis, Illinois, and in private law practice concentrating in labor law, personal injury and civil rights.At Farmworker Justice, Bruce has focused on litigation and advocacy on immigration issues and labor law, with a special emphasis on the H-2A temporary foreign agricultural worker program. Bruce’s activities on “guestworker” issues have included litigation against private employers and the government, advocacy in administrative agencies and Congress, training of lawyers and paralegals, building nation-wide coalitions, advising grassroots organizations, and testifying before Congress. Bruce has also sought to address the problem of “farm labor contractors” and other labor intermediaries used by farming operations, often in an attempt to avoid responsibility for complying with labor laws.
left Jason Gooljar is a progressive liberal blogger currently employed in the progressive movement and living in the DC metro area. A native New Yorker, Jason first got involved with political and civic issues in 1998 during his senior year in high school. At the time he was an intern and learned about the workings of local government in Westchester County, NY. Since then, he has worked as a paid staffer on two state senate campaigns and one gubernatorial campaign in NY. He was also a member of the first class to be trained in online organizing by the DC-based non-profit the New Organizing Institute in the winter of 2006. Jason holds an Associates degree in Multimedia Development and Management. His future goals include going back to school to study political science or a public policy-related area. While Jason always had an interest in politics, it was witnessing the 2005 TWU Local 100 transit strike in NYC which really galvanized him to focus on labor issues. In addition to labor issues Jason’s other areas of focus when he’s blogging is corporate abuse and consumerism. You can find him online at www.jasongooljar.com.
Steven Greenhouse has been covering labor and workplace issues for The New York Times since October 1995. He joined the Times in 1983 as a business reporter, covering steel and other basic industries. He then spent two-and-a-half years as Midwestern business correspondent based in Chicago and then five years as the paper’s European economics correspondent, based in Paris. He then spent four years in Washington D.C. for the Tomes, covering economics and foreign affairs.He has a bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University in Connecticut and a master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He also has a from the New York University School of Law. His first book, The Big Squeeze:Tough Times for the American Worker, was published in April by Alfred A. Knopf. For more information on the book, see his website, stevengreenhouse.com.
left Mark Harbeke’s role is to ensure that content on Winning Workplaces’ website is up-to-date, accurate and engaging. He also writes and edits their monthly e-newsletter, Ideas, and provides graphic design and marketing support. His experience includes serving as editorial assistant for Meredith Corporation’s Midwest Living magazine title, publications editor for Visionation, Ltd., and proofreader for the National Association of Boards of Pharmacy. Mark holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Drake University.Winning Workplaces is a not-for-profit providing consulting, training and information to help small and midsize organizations create great workplaces. Too often, the information and resources needed to create a high-performance workplace are out of reach for all but the largest organizations. Winning Workplaces is changing that by offering employers affordable consulting, training and information.
left Tom Jackson has authored eleven books in the field of careers and the quality of working life. He has created, developed and executed hundreds of popular programs, software, lectures, corporate initiatives, and consultancies on career transition, performance enhancement, resumes, job search, and entrepreneurial development. His own life is a testimony to self-direction and to moving with shifting values: from pilot, to consultant, to computer pioneer, from author and lecturer, and to entrepreneur. His theories are born from his own hero’s journey and his inspired work with tens of thousands.Tom’s books combined have sold well over a million copies. He has presented hundreds of workshops, lectures, and speaking engagements at conventions and colleges, from the state universities in California, up to McGill in Canada, over to William and Mary College and Duke University, out to the University of Michigan, and down to Austin, Texas. With his interviews on “Good Morning America,” “Regis & Kathie Lee,” “Nightline,” and other TV shows, he has pushed human technology to people at every level and profession. His work introducing outplacement and career counseling to hourly workers opened a new chapter in how unions serve their membersFor the last ten years, Jackson has worked in the application of breakthrough thinking applied to personal and corporate cultures. The Breakthrough MethodTM has inspired major changes in the way fresh ideas are translated into extraordinary results. This work is woven throughout the new book. Jackson has been a pioneer in the development of interactive capability and skills development software and web sites, and continues to stay close to this field. Currently Tom is studying the revolutionary shifts in the nature of careers, jobs and work itself, and the implications for workers at all levels.
left David Kusnet was chief speech writer for President Clinton during the 1992 campaign and the first two years of the administration. Before that, he was a speech writer for Democratic presidential nominees Michael Dukakis (1988) and Walter Mondale (1984). From 1974 through 1984, he was on the staff of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), coordinating communications in organizing campaigns, contract negotiations, strikes, and other efforts. He was a reporter for suburban newspapers in New York and Connecticut from 1972 through 1974. Kusnet joined EPI in 1995 and is also a freelance writer and consultant to labor organizations, government agencies, and nonprofit groups. (Biography available at the Economic Policy Institute).
Anne Ladky is Executive Director of Women Employed, a 35-year-old organization whose mission is to improve women’s economic status. Women Employed is widely recognized for its groundbreaking work to ensure enforcement of affirmative action requirements, outlaw sexual harassment, and promote family-friendly policies. Today, Women Employed focuses on women in low-paying jobs; its priorities are to improve workplaces by fighting for paid sick time, fair schedules, and better pay; and expand access to and improve the quality of post-secondary education and training. Ladky was a founding member of Women Employed, joined the staff in 1977, and was named Executive Director in 1985. She is a nationally recognized expert on women’s employment issues, equal opportunity, and workforce development. For more information on Women Employed, visit www.womenemployed.org.
left Art Levine is a contributing editor of The Washington Monthly who has also written for The American Prospect, Alternet, In These Times, Salon, The New Republic, The Atlantic and numerous other publications. He’s written investigative articles on unionbusting and other corporate abuses, and recently completed Cornell University’s Strategic Corporate Research summer program. He blogs regularly for Huffington Post, and co-hosts a weekly Blog Talk Radio show, “The D’Antoni and Levine Show,” every Thursday at 5:30 p.m. ET.
Dr. David Madland is the Director of the American Worker Project at American Progress. He has written academic articles and books as well as op-eds and commentaries on a range of economic issues, including retirement, economic insecurity, health care, campaign finance, taxes, and public opinion. He has a Ph.D. in Government from Georgetown University and received his B.S. from the University of California at Berkeley. Madland’s dissertation was about the political reaction to the decline of the defined benefit retirement system.Prior to joining American Progress, Madland helped lead a range of advocacy campaigns as a consultant to labor unions and environmental organizations. Previously, he worked for Congressman George Miller (D-CA) on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce as well as the Resources Committee. He was Political Director of the environmental organization Save the Bay, Policy Director for the taxpayer watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense, and Research Director for Michela Alioto for Congress.
Lewis Maltby is a nationally recognized expert and prolific writer on human rights in the workplace. Maltby is the founder and president of the Institute. As a senior private sector executive, Maltby learned that human rights and corporate efficiency are not only compatible, but mutually reinforcing. He left the corporate world in 1988 and founded the National Workplace Rights Office of the American Civil Liberties Union. In 2000, Maltby and his ACLU staff realized the need for an independent organization to fight for human rights on the job and created the National Workrights Institute.
Cyrus Mehri is a founding partner of the law firm Mehri & Skalet, PLLC. Mr. Mehri served as Class Counsel in the two largest race discrimination class actions in history: Roberts v. Texaco Inc. which settled in 1997 for $176 million and Ingram v. The Coca-Cola Company, which settled in 2001 for $192.5 million. Both settlements include historic programmatic relief, featuring independent Task Forces with sweeping powers to reform key human resources practices such as pay, promotions and evaluations. Trial Lawyers for Public Justice named Mr. Mehri a finalist for “Trial Lawyer of the Year” in 1997 and 2001 for his work on the Texaco and Coca-Cola matters respectively.In 2002 Mr. Mehri and Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr. released the report, Black Coaches in the National Football League: Superior Performance, Inferior Opportunities. The report became the catalyst for the NFL’s creation of a Workplace Diversity Committee and the adoption of a comprehensive diversity program. The NFL now has a record number of African American head coaches. Mr. Mehri graduated from Cornell Law School in 1988, and clerked for the Honorable John T. Nixon, U.S. District Judge for the Middle District of Tennessee. Mr. Mehri is a frequent guest on radio and TV and is guest columnist for Diversity, Inc.
Jen Nedeau is the Women’s Rights blogger for Change.org, a new blogger network of progressive causes that will be launching in mid-September 2008. Jen grew up in San Francisco, but left the West Coast to attend The George Washington University, where she obtained a B.A. in Journalism. She once pursued a career in political journalism where she wrote for the Washingtonpost.com and Stateline.org, but now works in marketing. She is a member of Women in Politics and Technology and Women Who Tech, in addition to being on the DC Advisory Board for the New Leaders Council. She currently resides in Washington, DC.
Nathan Newman is a lawyer, policy analyst and longtime labor activist, having started as a union organizer twenty years ago and has since worked as a policy researcher and labor lawyer. Currently, he is Policy Director for the Progressive States Network, a nonprofit that supports state legislative campaigns for economic and social justice. Newman has a Ph.D. in Sociology from UC-Berkeley and a law degree from Yale Law School and has been published in a range of academic and popular journals, including Working USA, The American Prospect, the Employee Rights and Employment Policy Journal, MIT’s Technology Review and he is a regular columnist for the Progressive Populist. He is also the author of the 2002 book, Net Loss: Internet Prophets, Private Profits and the Costs to Community. He can be contacted at nathan@nathannewman.org.
Richard Renner is a leading advocate for whistleblowers, with a long record of service for labor organizers and civil rights. He is a member of the Executive Board of the National Employment Lawyers Association (NELA) and a former Co-Chair of NELA’s Whistleblower Committee.

Prior to joining Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto in 2008, Mr. Renner worked for 27 years as a lawyer in Ohio. Mr. Renner advocated for consumers, tenants, the unemployed, and victims of domestic violence as a legal services attorney. In 1995, he joined with Alfred Tate to form the Dover, Ohio law office of Tate & Renner. After Mr. Tate died later that year, Mr. Renner began representing environmental whistleblowers, successfully trying or settling many cases.

As an Adjunct Faculty at Kent State University, Tuscarawas Branch, Mr. Renner taught Mathematics and Environmental Law from 1998 to 2000.
Jason Rosenbaum is a writer and musician currently residing in Washington D.C. He is interested in the intersection of politics and culture, media consolidation issues, and making sense out of our foreign policy disasters. He currently works for Health Care for America Now and he is also the webmaster for The Seminal..
left Bob Rosner is a best-selling author and award-winning journalist. His web site, workplace911.com, contains a comprehensive archive of strategies for surviving today’s workplace. He is a fan of Workplace Fairness and can be reached via bob@workplace911.com.
left Robin Runge, Esq. is the Director of the Commission on Domestic Violence at the American Bar Association, where she manages all aspects of Commission programming with the mission of improving access to justice for domestic violence victims by mobilizing the legal profession, including: fundraising, budget management, staff recruitment and management, program development and policy development. She speaks nationally, provides trainings, and writes articles on various aspects of domestic violence and the legal response to domestic violence including the employment rights of domestic violence victims. Robin has been a domestic violence victim advocate for sixteen years and practiced employment law for five years with a focus on women’s rights in employment, specifically the Family and Medical Leave Act, Title VII, the Americans with Disabilities Act and employment protections for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Robin is a nationally-recognized expert on the employment rights of victims and speaks and provides trainings regularly on these issues. She has co-authored several articles on employment law and domestic violence, and has worked on state and federal legislation providing job-guaranteed leave from work, unemployment insurance and anti-discrimination in employment for domestic violence and sexual assault victims.Previously, Robin was Deputy Director and Coordinator of the Program on Women’s Employment Rights (POWER) at the D.C. Employment Justice Center and the coordinator of the Domestic Violence and Employment Project at the Employment Law Center, Legal Aid Society of San Francisco. Robin currently serves on the advisory board of the Corporate Alliance to End Partner Violence (CAEPV) and the Women’s Information Network as well as a member of the Board of Directors of the District Safe Housing Alliance (DASH). She was also appointed to the Washington, DC Mayor’s Commission on Women in 2006. Robin is currently an Associate Professorial Lecturer in Law at The George Washington University Law School teaching Public Interest Lawyering and an Adjunct Professor at The American University Washington College of Law where she teaches Domestic Violence Law.Robin is a member of the California Bar and District of Columbia Bar. She graduated from The George Washington University Law School where she received the West Publishing Award for Clinical Achievement in Family Law and the Baer Award for Individual Excellence. She received her B.A. in History and French, cum laude, from Wellesley College. Robin is from Collinsville, Illinois, outside of St. Louis, Missouri.
left Paul Secunda joined the Marquette University Law School as an associate professor of law in the summer of 2008. He teaches employment discrimination, employee benefits, labor law, employment law, civil procedure, and seminars in special education law, global issues in employee benefits, and public employment law. Professor Secunda is the author of nearly three dozen books, treatises, articles, and shorter writings. He is also the author, along with Rick Bales and Jeff Hirsch, of the treatise, Understanding Employment Law, along with Sam Estreicher and Rosalind Connor, of the case book, Global Issues in Employee Benefits Law, and of the Teacher’s Manual to the 14th Edition of the Cox, Bok, Gorman & Finkin Labor Law casebook.Professor Secunda is a frequent commentator on labor and employment law issues in the national media and has written numerous columns and op-eds for the National Law Journal and Legal Times. He co-edits with Rick Bales and Jeffrey Hirsch the Workplace Prof Blog, recently named one of the top law professor blogs in the country, which is part of the Law Professors Blog Network.
Ellen Simon is recognized as one of the foremost employment and civil rights lawyers in the United States. She has been listed in the National Law Journal as one of the nation’s leading litigators. Ms. Simon has been quoted often in local and national news media and is a regular guest on television and radio, including appearances on Court TV. Ellen has been listed as one of The Best Lawyers in America for her landmark work representing individuals in precedent-setting cases. She also received regional and national attention for winning a record $30.7 million verdict in an age-discrimination case – the largest of its kind in U.S. history. Ellen has served as an adjunct professor of employment law and is an experienced and popular orator. Ellen is Past-Chair of the Employment Rights Section of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America and is honored to be a fellow of the International Society of Barristers and American Board of Trial Advocates. In additional to work as a legal analyst, she currently acts as co-counsel on individual employment cases, is available as an expert witness on employment matters and offers consulting services on sound employment practices, discrimination awareness and prevention, complaint investigation and resolution, and litigation management. Ms. Simon is the owner of the Simon Law Firm, L.P.A., and Of Counsel to McCarthy, Lebit, Crystal & Liffman, a Cleveland, Ohio based law firm. Ellen has two children and lives with her husband in Sedona, Arizona.
left Diane Stafford is the workplace and careers columnist at The Kansas City Star. A veteran journalist, she has held several reporting and editing positions at The Star on both the business and metropolitan desks. Currently, she writes columns that appear in The Star on Thursdays and Sundays as well as other business and economic news articles throughout the week, accessible at www.kansascity.com. Her daily “Workspace” blog also is available at www.workspacekc.typepad.com. She is the author of “Your Job: Getting It, Keeping It, Improving It, Changing It,” a career advice book. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in communications from Stanford University.
Paul H. Tobias is senior partner in the firm of Tobias, Kraus & Torchia in Cincinnati, Ohio where he now specializes exclusively in the rights of individual employees. He has specialized in labor and employment law for 50 years. He is the author of 15 published articles and three book chapters in the field of labor and employment law; has taught a labor law seminar at the University of Cincinnati (1975-1977); and has made over 150 presentations to Bar Associations and other groups concerning employee rights.Tobias is the founder of the National Employment Lawyers Association (NELA: Advocates for Employee Rights) and served as its first Executive Director, Chairman and Editor of the newsletter “The Employee Advocate.” He is the Co-Founder and former Chair and Executive Director of the National Employee Rights Institute (NERI, now Workplace Fairness). He is the author of a three volume work: “Litigating Wrongful Discharge Claims” (Callaghan/West 1987) and co-author of “Job Rights and Survival Strategies - A Handbook for Terminated Employees” (NERI 1997). He has recently been the leader of groups of lawyers studying employment and labor law procedures and issues on five trips abroad to other countries. Tobias is on the Board of Governors of the National College of Labor and Employment Lawyers and is founder of the Ohio Chapter of the College. He is a founder of the Senior Lawyers Division of the Cincinnati Bar Association. Tobias is a graduate of Harvard College (AB 1951) and Harvard Law School (LLB 1958).
Ilona Turner is a staff attorney at the National Center for Lesbian Rights, a national legal organization committed to advancing the civil and human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people and their families through litigation, public policy advocacy, and public education. Prior to law school, she was the lobbyist for Equality California, the state’s leading LGBT political organization, where she helped win the passage of groundbreaking legislation that significantly expanded the rights of domestic partners under California law and prohibited discrimination based on gender identity and expression in employment and housing. She received her J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.
Karla Walter is a Policy Analyst with the American Worker Project at American Progress. Karla focuses primarily on the improving the economic security of American workers by increasing workers’ wages and benefits, promoting workplace protections, and advancing workers’ rights at work. Prior to joining American Progress, Karla was a Research Analyst at Good Jobs First, providing support to officials, policy research organizations, and grassroots advocacy groups striving to make state and local economic development subsidies more accountable and effective. Karla earned a master’s degree in Urban Planning and Policy from the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Michael Whitney is a progressive Internet strategist and web producer who got his start in online politics as one of the co-founders of Generation Dean, the youth outreach organization of Howard Dean’s presidential campaign. Now he coordinates the new media efforts of the workers’ rights advocacy group American Rights at Work, where he’s worked since 2004. Michael says, “Rush Limbaugh called me “clueless” once. He went into rehab two days later. I win!”

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