Q: Tell Us About Where You Work and What You Do
I work for the Criminal Section of the Office of the Public Defender in Ocean County. I’ve been at OPD my entire career, which is over 16 years now, split between Morris and Ocean Counties.
I’m an Assistant Public Defender (3) and represent clients charged with criminal offenses, not civil offenses. I’ve always wanted to be a Public Defender because I think being able to have a trained, experienced lawyer if you can’t afford a private attorney is one of the pillars of democracy.
Q: Where are you from?
West Virginia. My mom is from Bayville, NJ. My mom met my dad in West Virginia and I was raised there. My first job after Law School was at OPD in Monmouth County, when I briefly lived with my aunt in Keansburg NJ.
Q: When Did you Become a Shop Steward?
I’ve actually been a Shop Steward at two OPD offices. I became a Shop Steward in Morris County almost nine years ago, and then when I transferred to Ocean County, we were down a Shop Steward and it felt only natural to represent my coworkers here.
Q: What do you do that makes you an effective Shop Steward?
Listening! People come to you and want to know you take their concerns seriously, even if it’s not a workplace violation or anything we can grieve. And that goes hand in hand with good communication and collaboration skills to work through issues with management.
I’ll give you a recent example: my coworker and I felt that a case should be transferred to another Public Defender, for very good reasons, but management said no. I spoke to my Union Staff Rep Craig, and we emailed the person in charge, and got them to authorize the case transfer as soon as management saw this wasn’t just one or two Public Defenders advocating for this, but us organized as a Union.
Q: What issues are most important to your members?
Our pension stability for one. In 2019, we had a major demonstration at the state house to fully fund the pension. Thousands of members took time off to rally for our pensions. It really shows you that when you have a united group of people you can really enact change.
Then there’s also the issue of telework. Reading and writing briefs happens more when you’re away from the office and can do deep work.
Our department is lucky to be able to have two telework days, so when the PD announced a planned change to go from two days a week to one, our organizational power as a Union came up big. The other Stewards and I met with the Local and wrote a ton of letters explaining to management how this time to do deep work is essential. Within a few weeks, management announced the news that they were preserving both telework days, and said “I heard you and your Union.”
Q: Are you noticing any trends in Union membership within OPD?
Almost all of the younger folks want to be active, especially because they realize there aren’t a lot of strong union workforces outside the public sector. Younger folks in the Union also were really excited and turned out in big number for the rally for healthcare in June, and to No Kings Protests in the spring.
Q: What do you like to do for fun?
A lot of yoga. Yoga changed my life. I was a totally Type A person, getting flustered when things didn’t go my way. Yoga helped me let got of concerns and just be in the present moment, learning to let go of your expectations of outcomes. That’s big for me and it carries over into my work. I can accept that having certain emotions doesn’t mean I am that emotion or those emotions. It helps me to take a beat to think before I respond.
I also do cross fit, and serve on the board of a nonprofit called Warrior Strong. It offers health and wellness services to military vets and their families, like HIIT (High-Intensity Interval Training) and Yoga. I help plan events, find corporate sponsors and raise money.