Lisa Gallatin appointed MTA executive director-treasurer
Lisa Gallatin appointed MTA executive director-treasurer
Gallatin brings "an outstanding background not only in the labor movement, but also in the effort to bring social justice to our society."
Longtime labor activist Lisa Gallatin has been appointed executive director-treasurer of the Massachusetts Teachers Association.
MTA President Merrie Najimy and Vice President Max Page announced the appointment today. Gallatin, who currently serves as chief of staff for the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, “brings to the MTA an outstanding background not only in the labor movement, but also in the effort to bring social justice to our society,” they said.
Before joining the AFL-CIO, Gallatin was the longtime executive director of the Boston Workmen’s Circle Center for Jewish Culture and Social Justice and the Boston director of SEIU District 925, where she also worked as a field representative/organizer.
Gallatin shares a vision for the MTA as a strong, member-driven organization.
Gallatin will begin her work at the MTA on Tuesday, April 16. She assumes her new role at a historic moment, when the MTA and other unions are joining parents, students and our many other allies in the Fund Our Future campaign, part of the ongoing effort to win the schools and colleges our communities deserve.
Earlier in Gallatin’s career, she was the founder and executive director of the Coalition on New Office Technology, an organization of 35 union locals and women’s groups aimed at empowering and advocating for women office workers, and the co-founder and executive director of the Office Technology Education Project, which spearheaded a nationally recognized curriculum on office and computer health and safety. Earlier, she was a clerical worker at the Harvard School of Public Health, where she was a rank-and-file leader in a union organizing effort. Gallatin holds a B.A. from Washington University, where she majored in economics.
Gallatin succeeds Ann Clarke, who recently retired. Clarke served the association for more than four decades, first as a staff attorney, then as general counsel, and finally as executive director-treasurer. She had held the latter post since 2010.
“We are both very excited about having Lisa join the association,” said Najimy and Page, “and we are confident that her appointment will help us continue along the road of being a strong organizing union and a major player in the Red for Ed movement.
“As Lisa told us during the process that led to her selection as executive director-treasurer, ‘I believe deeply that a robust labor movement, unfettered voting rights, and access to quality public education are three essential pillars of a democratic society.’ It is clear to us that she shares our vision for the MTA as a strong, member-driven organization.”