In August, TCWC formed a partnership with Workers Defense Project (WDP), a membership-based organization that empowers low-income workers to acheive fair employment, to launch a worker-owned cooperative with its members. Soon after, TCWC formed a recruitment committee with WDP members Brenda Jimenez, Eva Marroquin and Toni Ceballos, who expressed interest in starting their own business in the housecleaning industry, in which they have experienced a range of abuses over the years.
Jimenez, Marroquin and Ceballos have since participated in TCWC’s “What is a worker-owned business?” workshop, walking away with a deeper understanding of the nature and benefits of worker cooperatives and the desire to bring more members into the process of starting a worker-owned green cleaning cooperative through the full-length certification course at our Cooperative Business Institute. These three women have taken on increasing leadership in the process, from co-facilitating the “What is a worker-owned business?” workshop to building awareness and interest in the co-op model with other members of WDP to create a founding team of workers to launch their own cooperative.
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