Job Announcement: Bay Area Chapter Coordinator

August 6, 2008.   

CISPES Bay Area Chapter Coordinator

Type: Part time (20-25 Hrs. /week).
To start on September 1, 2008 (flexible)
Application deadline: August 19, 2008

Organizational Background
CISPES has been working in solidarity with the social justice movement in El Salvador since 1980. In recent years, CISPES has been building a cross-border movement against U.S.-imposed free trade policies, corporate globalization, and police/military repression of the social movement. We also continue to build support for a just economic and social alternative in El Salvador and work as part of the larger social justice movement in the United States.

Chapter Program and Coordination
We organize annual speaking tours, cultural and educational events, and fundraisers to raise awareness of the on-going struggle in El Salvador. We also mobilize an Emergency Response Network to protest and put pressure the U.S. and Salvadoran governments. Each year, we take a delegation to El Salvador so that activists can see firsthand the importance of solidarity work, understand the interdependency between local and global issues and to meet with various organizations with whom we work in solidarity.

Primary Job Responsibilities:

  • Coordinate the creative implementation of the CISPES national program at the grassroots local level (30% of job responsibility)
  • Develop strategies to recruit new volunteers and work with volunteers to build their leadership abilities and organizing skills (30%)


  • Take a lead on and coordinate regular fundraising activities (writing grants, planning events, donor mailings, sustainer program, biannual phonebank) (25%)

Secondary Job Responsibilities:

  • Organize regular CISPES committee meetings (5%)
  • Update database information and email lists; coordinate communication through mail and email (action alerts, newsletters) (10%)
  • Represent CISPES in local coalitions and the media (5%)

Qualifications:

  • Previous experience with grassroots organizing and/or solidarity work
  • Interest in and experience doing grassroots fundraising work
  • Political beliefs that are compatible with the goals of the organization
  • Strong communication and organizational skills
  • High level of initiative and self-motivation, as well as working as part of a group
  • Willingness to work flexible hours
  • Commitment for at least one year

Preferred:

  • Bilingual Spanish/English Speaker
  • Knowledge of Bay Area grassroots political and organizing environment
  • Experience working with diverse groups of people, especially youth of color and immigrant communities

Salary:
This position is a 20-hour a week part-time position. Compensation is $12,260/year plus excellent health and vacation benefits.

To Apply:
Please send a resume and a letter explaining why do you want to work with the solidarity movement, why CISPES, and what you will bring to the chapter.
By mail: Bay Area CISPES Hiring Committee
3012 16th St. #205
San Francisco, CA 94103
By email: bayareacispes@yahoo.com
You can also call (415) 503-0789 and come by our office to drop your resume and cover letter.

***CISPES is an equal opportunity employer: People of color, women, gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, transgender, gender-variant people, and people with disabilities are encouraged to apply.

National and International Context (Read more at www.cispes.org)
Through national campaigns, CISPES raises awareness in our communities about the effects of U.S. policy and militarism in Latin America, especially now that the International Law Enforcement Academy (ILEA) is training National Civilian Police in El Salvador to return to their old repressive tactics against social movement to ensure the successful implementation of CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement). Over the past three years, we have built a national campaign to shut down the ILEA and to mobilize against rising state repression, including disappearances and politically-motivated assassinations against social movement leaders, especially youth.

We believe that El Salvador will be part of the new Latin American left that is emerging right now, but to achieve that the people of El Salvador need very active international solidarity. The grassroots social movement in El Salvador is incredibly strong and the possibility of electing the first president from the leftist FMLN party (Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional) is very real.

CISPES has recently launched a campaign to stop U.S. intervention in the upcoming 2009 elections in El Salvador, which will include building an Emergency Response Network to mobilize nonviolent direct action, Congressional pressure on representatives throughout the Bay Area to pledge neutrality and respect for Salvadoran self-determination, and several broad-based delegations of elections observers in 2009.

Local Organizing in the Bay Area
The Salvadoran immigrant community in the Bay Area continues to grow and faces increasing repression through ICE raids and threats to the Sanctuary City ordinance. Bay Area CISPES is active in local coalitions that fight for immigrant rights and for an end to the economic policies that force people to migrate. CISPES is committed to prioritizing the leadership development of Salvadorans and other Latin@s and to ensuring the ability of immigrants to participate in our organizing regardless of immigration status.

Being active in our community is necessary to strengthening the larger solidarity movement. Bay Area CISPES wants to continue to build accountable relationships of solidarity with marginalized and oppressed people in our community, for example, residents of Mission, Excelsior, and Bay View Hunter’s Point districts who are resisting corporate land theft and forced displacement, as the same forces are at work in El Salvador and across Latin America.
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