Joe Alvarez
Joe Alvarez brings a lifetime of experience on the front lines of the labor movement fighting for racial justice, civil rights, peace, workers’ and immigrants’ rights. In 2005, he left his position with labor and became a founding partner of the Alvarez Porter Group, an organization development consulting firm that specializes in work with mission-driven organizations focused on labor rights and other social justice issues.
Joe is married with two adult children and an expanding number of grandchildren. He lives in Yonkers, NY with his wife, Sally.[1]
Labor/civil rights
Joe Alvarez spent decades organizing industrial workers and labor support for the civil rights movement throughout the south. As the national political director of the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union and UNITE, he developed innovative programs promoting grassroots civic engagement and participation. And as the Northeast Regional Director of the AFL-CIO, Mr. Alvarez designed and co-led a major national, state-by-state campaign to revitalize and reorganize state and local AFL-CIO bodies. Joe’s work with unions has involved him in a number of industries, including retail, food processing, arts and entertainment, education, transportation, public sector, construction, and health care. At the AFL-CIO, Mr. Alvarez was also a leader in engaging the labor movement on fighting for immigrant rights, and was a national organizer and leader of the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride in 2002.
Alvarez has also worked with national, state, and local union federations, as well as with unions in Indonesia, Mexico, Canada, and the United Kingdom. His work among non-profits has been with organizations involved in community organizing, civil rights, housing, human rights, workers’ rights, and environmental sustainability.
In 2000, Joe A;varez helped found the New York State AFL-CIO/Cornell Union Leadership Institute, where he still teaches. He also teaches at Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Extension Division, and in American University’s Organization Development masters program.[2]
CWP
In the early 1980s Joe Alvarez and Phil Thompson wrote a letter to the Line of March, on behalf of the Communist Workers Party, on the subject of a Marxist-Leninist conference.
Potential editor, New Democrat
An October 31, 1985 list of potential editors for the New Democrat, proposed newspaper of the New Democratic Movement was found in the Communist Workers Party papers in the Tamiment Library New York.
Joe Alvarez, was on the list.
Advancement Project board member
Both Advancement Project's National Office in Washington, D.C. and Advancement Project California are governed by a 16-member board of directors. As of 2019, the board included Bill Lann Lee, Joe Alvarez, Arlene Holt Baker, Harry Belafonte, Stephen R. English, Rinku Sen, Helen Kim, Daniel Leon-Davis, Ash-Lee Henderson, Alberto Retana, Barrett S. Litt, Molly Munger, Katherine Peck, Constance L. Rice, Tom Unterman, and Jesse Williams.
Board members of the Advancement Project, as of March 2013;[3]
- Joe Alvarez
- Harry Belafonte
- Stephen R. English, Esq
- Penda D. Hair, Esq
- Gerry Hudson
- Bruce Iwasaki
- Bill Lann Lee, Esq
- Barrett S. Litt
- Pam Martinez
- Molly Munger, Esq
- Sheila Thomas
- Gerald Torres, Esq
- Zack Walker