Successful Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy held in Philadelphia
The Philadelphia Area Cooperative Alliance was proud to host the biennial Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy at Drexel University July 26-28. Joe Rinehart, one of the organizers of the conference, said that Philly was chosen as this year’s location partly because “PACA has a great reputation and is doing some of the most interesting cross sectoral cooperative organizing in the United States.”
Collective notes from the conference have been compiled online so that people who couldn’t attend the conference can benefit from the information sharing. Click here to go to the site.
The opening night of the conference highlighted co-ops from the Philadelphia area. Representatives from PACA, Childspace, Mariposa, Weavers Way, Life Center Association, and Alliance Taxi Co-op were among the speakers. The event was held at the Rotunda in West Philadelphia, where the 200 attendees enjoyed good food, good conversation, and lots of inspiration. This evening event was preceded by bus tours of local co-ops and was followed by two days of keynotes, workshops, and panels on various aspects of the worker co-op movement.
Photos from the Friday Night Showcase at the Rotunda:
Tom Decker, Director of Domestic Cooperative Development at NCBA CLUSA, attended the conference and wrote a great summary of the conference events on Cooperative Business Journal Online. Check out his post here.