Cochair Sally Jane Gellert
Sally Jane Gellert, a Unitarian Universalist since 1998, is a member of Central Unitarian Church of Bergen County, N.J. (on occupied Lenape land) and is active in civic education and advocacy. In 2011, Sally worked with other environmental UUs to introduce an Action of Immediate Witness (AIW) to support Tim DeChristopher. Currently participating in most of the UU Faith Action N.J.’s. issues-based task forces, she maintains Occupy Bergen County’s social-media presence.
Central Unitarian
Paramus, New Jersey
A member of InterOccupy, Sally is a founding member of the Bergen Unitarian Universalist Relief Group (BUURG). She is communications and legislative director of the Lackawanna Coalition, a rail-passengers’ advocacy group.
Cochair Terry Lowman
Terry Lowman retired recently from a long career in business, justice was always a passion. Married to Mark Kassis as soon as same sex marriage was legal in Iowa, he and Mark parented four children, two from Terry’s marriage to a Cuban woman and two adopted from Peru. They owned three restaurants, which were often venues for charity fund raising and liberal political events. Terry was born into UCC, lost god and found UU in 1989. Terry has volunteered in a number of UU related causes, from AMOS, the local congregationally based community organizing, starting Iowa’s UU state advocacy network (IUUWAN), the UU Funding Program’s Social Responsibility grant panel and summer of 2014 joining UUJEC as co-chair.
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
of Ames
Ames, Iowa
Terry is the UUJEC Liaison for State Legislative Networks (CUUSAN) and chair of the Nominating Committee. Terry is a member of UU Congregation of Miami and First Unitarian Church of Des Moines, Iowa. Contact Terry at TerryLeeLowman @ gmail.com
Administrator Rachel Bennett Steury
Rachel Bennett Steury is a member of the UU Congregation of Studio City, and currently serves as the UUJEC Communications Coordinator. She has a professional background in manufacturing, political advocacy, organizing, writing and research. She is a member of the Steelworker Organization of Active Retirees (SOAR), the A. Philip Randolph Institute (APRI), and her Community Emergency Response Team. Contact Rachel at rachel @ uujec.org.
Unitarian Universalist Church of Studio City
Studio City, California
Secretary Chris Marlowe
Kit Marlowe is a retired safety manager for an environmental engineering company. He moved from Northern NJ to Cape May, NJ. It’s a beautiful beachfront town, but poverty runs rampant about nine months a year.
Kit came to the UU faith in 1981. He serves his current church, the UU Congregation of the South Jersey Shore, as board secretary. He is also secretary of the UUJEC. He is Capital Projects Chair for Cape Hope, a local homeless aide group. He is also president of the Democratic Club in Lower Township, NJ.
Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the South Jersey Shore
Galloway, New Jersey
Treasurer Jane Bannor
Jane was elected to the UUJEC Board in 2014. She served on the planning committee for the February, 2015 UUJEC conference Escalating Inequality or Opportunity for All? and currently is the Treasurer in addition to chairing the UUJEC Finance Committee. A member of the Unitarian Church of Evanston, Jane has taken a leadership role in her church’s Peace and Justice Committee. She guided her church’s efforts to implement the Peacemaking Study / Action Issue, and she’s been spearheading her congregation’s work on the 2014 – 2017 CSAI on Escalating Inequality.
Unitarian Church of Evanston
Evanston, Illinois
Efforts have centered on raising the minimum wage and on protecting state “safety net” programs, while responding to growing budgetary issues. Working in local political campaigns and in community action efforts, Jane has seen the impact growing income inequality has had on our major cities. She hopes our denomination’s study of the issue will increase our commitment to finding a way to distribute our nation’s wealth more equitably. Contact Jane at jbannor @ sbcglobal.net
Trustee Carl McCargo
Carl McCargo has been a member of UUJEC since 2006, now serving as Chair of the GA Booth Committee, and a member of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield, Mass., since 1985, when he became a UU. He received his BA in Psychology from the University of New Mexico in 1973 and his Masters of Science in Clinical Psychology from the University of Massachusetts in 1981.
Carl worked as a civil service psychologist for the state of Massachusetts for twenty years and retired in 2005. In 1992, he was in the first group of UU’s trained as Social Justice Empowerment Trainers and has conducted many workshops nationwide. Carl is also a Jubilee World I Anti-racism trainer and has conducted workshops across the U.S. Currently, Carl is the Chairperson of the Ward-3 Democratic Committee in Springfield, Mass. When his term as Chair of the Ward Committee expires this year, Carl will devote himself more fully to Media Reform, from the point of view that our media – movies and TV – teaches our culture how to think about “the Other”, class, the poor immigrants, etc. Feel free to contact Carl at: ilike2travel @ comcast.net
Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield
Springfield, Massachusetts
Trustee Cindy Piester
Cindy Piester works nationally and internationally on climate and militarism as Outreach Director of Veterans For Peace Climate Crisis and Militarism Project. She is also a member of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF, US), WILPF’s International Environmental Working Group and Women, Peace, and Security. She was one of ten women chosen from WILPF’s many member nations to represent them as a Delegate to the COP 27 Climate Summit in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
Cindy also serves as Board Member of the Unitarian Universalists for a Just Economic Community. She joined the Board with the goal of focusing on redirecting public funds from militarism and wars towards mitigating climate change, a goal that she continues to pursue. She has also been working on military emissions and military emissions reporting.
In 2010, following several years working as part of the alternative media on behalf of peace, justice and human rights, she was the recipient of the Citizens for Peaceful Resolutions’ Earth Charter Award for Democracy, Nonviolence and Peace. In 2011, as part of a three-woman team, she released an online documentary on US committed war crimes that was a contributing factor the Center
Title
Ventura, California
of Constitutional Rights (CCR) requesting a thematic hearing the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), the IACHR refused to hear the case as was their prerogative.
Cindy is driven by the urgency of the climate crisis and the dire need for climate justice. She wrote an Action of Immediate Witness (AIW), CODE RED for Humanity last year that failed by a single vote. She hopes to submit an updated version again this year and asks for your GA votes. She can be contacted at: cindympiester@gmail.com
Trustee Dean Wanderer
Dean Wanderer is a member of the Accotink Unitarian Universalist Church of Burke, Virginia and a Unitarian Universalist since 1980. Dean graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. He also holds ajuris doctorate and two masters of law (International) and (Environmental). He retired from the Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps in 1994 and began as a sole practitioner thereafter. He has been an advocate for thirty-nine years concerning international matters for the US Navy or Department of Defense for those who face criminal charges, removal for immigration reasons, and family law matters. He has frequently represented the injured and disabled.
He is the co-chair of the Unitarian Universalists Legislative Ministry of Virginia (UULMVA) and the chair of the Immigration Steering Committee for the Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice in the Capital Region (UUSJ).
Accotink Unitarian Universalist Church
Burke, Virginia
He has personally advocated at federal and state levels of government. The priorities of the UULMVA include Economic Injustice (minimum wage increase, expansion of MEDICAID, voting rights for ex-felons and the end of predatory lending, among others). You can contact Dean at deanwanderer @ verizon.net
Trustee Dr. Dick Burkhart
Dick Burkhart is a life long UU and advocate for social and economic justice. Professionally he has a Ph.D. in mathematics and has worked in academia and industry in applied mathematics and scientific and engineering computing. In 2002 he took early retirement to become a full time activist, especially on issues, from local to global, of economic inequality, limits-to-growth, sustainability, democracy, and urbanization. He has been on the board of UUJEC since 2005, currently serving as a chair of the General Assembly Committee.
Saltwater Unitarian Universalist Church of Des Moines
Des Moines, Washington
Trustee Rev. Dr. Lucy Hitchcock
Lucy Hitchcock served as UU minister in North Dakota, Oregon, Washington, Florida and as Extension Ministry Program Director at the UUA retiring in 2008. She is a founding member of UUJEC, has served on the board off and on and has organized UU actions for the WTO protests in Seattle, FTAA protests in Miami and many conferences.
Lucy’s spiritual practice is the work of economic justice. Current commitments are to single payer healthcare, climate justice, and sustainable, regenerative agriculture here and in Senegal, West Africa. She is building a house in Pringle Creek (sustainable) Community in Salem, OR. Lucy is Chair of UUJEC’s Green New Deal Task Force and can be reached at membership @ uujec.org
Trustee Rev. Judith Deutsch
Judy Deutsch is a UU minister emerita, who moved to Corrales, NM on June 28, 2017, after having lived in Sudbury, MA. For 51 years.
Among the activities she engaged in while in Massachusetts were to serve as chair of the committee that wrote the last 3 Massachusetts single-payer bills, board member of the James Luther Adams Foundation, the governor’s appointee to the Sudbury Housing Authority, chair of First Parish’s Faith in Action Committee, health care specialist for the LWVMA, and board member of Mass-Care (Massachusetts’ campaign for single-payer health care).
Unitarian Universalist Westside Congregation
Rio Rancho, New Mexico
Since moving to New Mexico, she has become active in the Albuquerque working group against Citizens United, and involved in the group working for NM’s Health Security Act and in the UU Westside Congregation, where she hopes to get the congregation aware of UUJEC.
Judy has been a member of the NAACP since the 50’s and a member of Democratic Socialists of America since its inception. She has been a Unitarian and then a Unitarian Universalist since 1952.
Trustee Rev. Robert Murphy
Bob Murphy is the UUJEC’s constant gardener. He’s a community minister in the Southern Region who encourages environmental justice and mutual aid work. Bob lives in an assisted-living center and he’s active in community gardening, voter registration, and other community organizing projects.
As a parish minister, Bob served congregations on Cape Cod, the Outer Banks, and Florida’s Gulf Coast. He helped to create the Green Sanctuary program. Bob’s essay “Earth Day, Exodus, and Martin Luther King” brings human rights advocacy and environmental protection work together. He is a graduate of Harvard Divinity School (1995).
Bob is a minister emeritus for the Unitarian Universalist Church of Tarpon Springs in Tarpon Springs, Florida.
Unitarian Universalist Church of Tarpon Springs
Tarpon Springs, Florida
Board Responsibilities & Expectations
- Help determine UUJEC’s Vision and Mission.
- Establish fiscal policy, applying for grants, setting and monitoring operating income and expenses.
- Set the organization’s yearly priorities and program.
- Engage in a long-range planning process to set UUJEC’s future course and update it annually.
- When funds are available, select, evaluate and, if necessary, terminate the employment of any staff.
- Develop and maintain communication links and opportunities for participation in the work of the organization with the UUJEC membership.
- Draft resolutions, letters, workshop proposals, and other materials or actions for consideration by the UUJEC Board.
- Maintain contacts with related/allied groups and individuals.
- Advocate for Economic Justice: keep your congregation and state action network up to date on current economic issues
Expectations of Board Members
- Regular participation in the monthly Board of Director’s Meeting via Zoom platform on the 2nd Tuesday of every month, 5:30 P.M. Eastern Time.
- Serving an active role on at least one of UUJEC’s committees and/or issues task forces, which involves:
- Participating in periodic working meetings via Zoom, phone, and e-mail
- Developing Committee/Task Force goals, strategies, and an action plan
- Assisting in implementing the action plan
- Board Members will maintain membership status with annual contributions of record. Recommended amount: $240. Annual membership dues $40.
- Help UUJEC raise funds by assisting with grant applications, recruiting members, making telephone asks, personal contacts to individuals and congregations.
- General Assembly (GA): Attend as often as possible. Volunteer time at UUJEC’s Action/Exhibit Booth and at UUJEC-organized or -sponsored programs. Promote resolutions proposed or backed by UUJEC.
- Participate in the UUJEC Annual Meeting and Strategic Planning Retreat.
- Help organize and/or attend UUJEC-sponsored conferences or events at national or regional meetings or at other venues.
The Board understands that not all Board members can meet all of these expectations every year. We urge our colleagues to meet as many of them as possible so that we can truly continue to be a working board and build working relationships with one another. Board leadership will personally contact a Board member who is not participating actively in Board and Committee meetings. A negotiated leave of absence for a period of time can be arranged.
NB—UUJEC Bylaw: A Director who misses three monthly conference board meetings in a calendar year without prior notification to a Board member of a necessary reason, will be removed from office at the next official board meeting.