George Cheung, WA

(bio coming soon!)

Rujuta Gaonkar, OR

A Midwest native, Rujuta moved to the West coast after receiving her Master of Public Health degree, and has lived in the Pacific Northwest for the past decade, where she has focused her professional life on the intersection of public health and social justice. She was first introduced to SJF through her participation on the Board of Directors of Chaya, an SJF grantee. An active member of the Social Justice Fund since 2004, Rujuta has also served on the Basic Grant committee and Grants Oversight Committee before joining the Board. 

Rujuta recently joined the staff of the Multnomah County Health Department, coordinating a health promotion initiative with the Community Capacitation Center. In her spare time, Rujuta loves to spend time with friends and family - traveling, being outdoors and cooking (and more importantly, eating) good food.
 

Vickie Goodwin, Co-Chair, WY
Vickie Goodwin has been actively involved with Social Justice Fund NW since 1999. She was recruited to Social Justice Fund NW through member Judy Tobin and helped build Social Justice Fund NW’s presence in Wyoming through hosting and co-hosting house parties there. Along with her responsibilities as an Social Justice Fund NW board member Vickie is active in the Wyoming Democratic Party. She served as a national committeewoman from 1998 to 2004 and chaired the Converse County Democrats from 1984-2004. She is currently the state committeewoman for Converse County.

Before retiring in 2004, Vickie worked for 15 years as an organizer for the Powder River Basin Resource Council. The main issues the council dealt with included gravel pits, recycling, and refineries. Vickie is married to another social justice activist, Sissy Goodwin, a transvestite, who serves as the president of the Wyoming chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. They have two children, Travis and Kristi, 32 and 31 years old, respectively. They also have a granddaughter, Brittany who is 6. Vickie currently serves on the Three Year Grants Committee. She holds a Bachelors Degree in elementary education.
 

Eli Hastings, WA
Eli Hastings grew up goofing around beneath hor d’oeuvre plates on the carpets’ of ATR members and getting away with mischief at the summer ATR retreats his mother, Patricia Close, dragged him to. Eli graduated with honors in International Relations from Pitzer College, having spent most of his extra time organizing a lectures series on Truth, Lies and Democracy, supporting the dining hall workers fight to unionize, raising questions about the police killing of an unarmed young black man, and writing his thesis on the rise of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.  He landed a teaching fellowship and attended grad school at UNC at Wilmington, after which he published his first book, Falling Room, in 2005. 

Since 2004, Eli has worked for Montana People’s Action, Tierra Learning Center, moved to Spain, gotten hitched, founded and managed a Spanish-Nepali fair trade import company (Sathi Art), and returned home to Seattle to work in social services and the arts.  He really digs reading contemporary fiction, jogging, and also not jogging with his old golden, Kaya.

Larry Kleinman, OR
Larry is a founding member of PCUN, Oregon's farmworker union and has served as PCUN Secretary-Treasurer since 1988.  He is also an accredited to practice in the Immigration Court and the Customs & Immigration Service.  The National Lawyers Guild National Immigration Project selected Larry as its 2005 Carol Weiss King Award recipient, honoring his many years of defending immigrants and their interests.  From 1999 to 2002, Larry served on the board of SJF, was board chair from August 2000 to May 2002 and re-joined that board in 2007.  Larry is the founding board chair of the Northwest Worker Justice Project in Portland.  Originally from the Chicago area, Larry received a B.A. from Oberlin College in 1975. 

Tracy Lakatua, MT

(bio coming soon!)

David Rogers, OR
David currently serves as the Executive Director of the Partnership for Safety and Justice. He orginally came to the Northwest to work for Western States Center as a Senior Trainer/Field Organizer. He has fifteen years of organizing and social change non-profit experience, with a strong commitment to criminal justice issues. His work history also includes five years with the Peace Development Fund, and in 1997 he was a recipient of a Charles Bannerman Fellowship for Organizers of Color from the New World Foundation.