Staff
Eric Altman
Executive Director
ealtman@occord.org
Before
joining OCCORD as its founding Executive Director, Eric spent fifteen
years as a leader of UNITE HERE's Strategic Affairs Department, working
to build one of the labor movement's most respected research and
strategic campaign operations. At UNITE HERE, he co-directed the
comprehensive campaign to organize hotel workers in Santa Monica and
played a leadership role in the effort to win improved working
conditions for hotel housekeepers in Las Vegas. From 1997 to 1999, Eric
worked with UNITE HERE President John Wilhelm to engage casino workers
in the national public policy debate over gambling regulation and to
make sure their voices were heard by decision makers. Eric received his
BA in Political Science from Yale University.

Robert Nothoff
Policy Analyst
rnothoff@occord.org
Rob
attended Michigan State University, where he received his Bachelor's
degree in Urban and Regional Planning. While at MSU, Rob became a
student leader and was very vocal in bringing a Chicano/Latino Studies
program to the University, implementing a Cesar Chavez library, and
served as a liason between Chicano/Latino students and the University
to ensure that their needs were being met. Upon graduation, Rob moved
to California and attended the University of California, Irvine, and
received his Master's in Urban and Regional Planning.

Alejandra Ponce de León
Community Organizer
aponcedeleon@occord.org
Alejandra
gained much of her organizing experience with UNITE HERE! Local 11 in
L.A. There she organized food and retail service workers in LAX and
Ontario Airports for two years. She graduated from UCLA with a major in
International Development Studies, and a minor on Chicana/o Studies and
Political Science. While an undergrad, she was a coordinator for
Project Day-Laborers, in which they taught English to day-laborers in
Los Angeles. Through conciencia libre, she organized forums on
maquiladora working conditions in Tijuana, the displacement of
Afro-Colombians in Colombia, and the negative effects of the Central
American Free Trade Agreement. She is originally from the City of
Orange and planning to pursue a master's degree in Public Policy.

Ana Urzua
Community Organizer
aurzua@occord.org
Ana
graduated from UC Irvine with a BA in Socio-cultural Anthropology. She
has developed research on gentrification and displacement in the city
of Santa Ana through an ethnography of the life stories of working
families. She held an internship on affordable housing preservation in
Washington DC, where she worked on tenant organizing, coalition
building, and advocacy around tenants' rights. She is a Galbraith
Scholar, having participated in the program of Inequality and Social
Policy of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Locally, she
interned with SEIU-UHW and has worked for years as a volunteer,
teacher, and organizer of El Centro Cultural de Mexico in Santa Ana.

Erica Valenica
Workplace & Immigrant Rights Program Coordinator
evalencia@occord.org
Erica
graduated from UCSD with a major in International Studies: Political
Science and a minor in International Immigration Studies. After working
closely with battered immigrant women at Casa Cornelia Law Center in
San Diego, she conducted research in both Jalisco and Oaxaca to study
the impacts of immigration on sending communities. Her most recent
publications include, "Outsiders in Their Own Town: The Process of
Dissimilation." In Four Generations of Norteños: New Research from the
Cradle of Mexican Migration and El paso del centroamericano por México.