Job Description

Senior Community Organizer

Essie Justice Group (Essie) is building grassroots power to dismantle the US incarceration system, the most egregious creator of racial and gender injustice of our time. We are a loving and powerful community of women with incarcerated loved ones. Our community includes cisgender women, transgender women, formerly incarcerated women, gender expansive people, elders, and young people.

After twelve years of building an active membership across California and beyond, Essie is deepening its base-building and leadership development strategies with the 1 in 4 women with incarcerated loved ones to propel bold decarceration agendas across the nation. We seek to transform the criminal legal system and create a Black feminist future rooted in care, equity, community safety, and liberation. Essie is waging ever more ambitious campaigns to divest from state-sponsored punitive control and invest in structures that support the self-determination, freedom, and dignity of Black women and gender nonconforming people. In a period of continued organizational growth, Essie seeks a people-oriented, adaptable, and highly motivated Senior Community Organizer to join us in building and implementing campaigns to upend systems of control and confinement.

The Senior Community Organizer brings clarity to organizing strategy, rigor to tracking member engagement, and deep care to building a strong and connected membership base. They recruit women with incarcerated loved ones into Essie's political home and steward their continued participation through meaningful organizing opportunities, leadership pathways, and campaign involvement. Building strong, relational connections with members, they get to know individuals' strengths, stories, and interests in order to support their leadership in committees, advocacy efforts, and public actions. They track participation trends, analyze engagement data, and use these insights to strengthen retention and organizing strategy. Working cross-functionally, they manage organizing projects, create member- and partner-facing materials, and help ensure our organizing work advances Essie's campaign priorities and builds the political power of families impacted by incarceration.

Core Responsibilities

• Recruit women with incarcerated loved ones to join our membership and use effective techniques in relational organizing to continuously engage and create a political home for our members.
• Implement campaign tactics (direct actions, press conferences, rallies, meeting with electeds, etc.) in a way that is aligned with the overall campaign strategy.
• Analyze trends in member participation, campaign outcomes, and community engagement to make actionable recommendations for program improvement and growth.

Who We're Looking For

• 3-4+ years of experience in organizing (community-based, issue-based, electoral, and/or labor); previous experience in decarceration advocacy a strong plus.
• Commitment to supporting the leadership of women and gender expansive people with incarcerated loved ones and our families.
• Excellent time-management, organizational, and event-planning skills.
• Effective writing, editing, and verbal communication skills.
• Track record as a collaborative team player who excels in managing multiple projects and is comfortable working in a fast-paced and non-traditional work environment.
• Adept with Mac operating systems, Google Suite, and MS Office Suite (especially Excel, PowerPoint, and Word).
• Commitment to the beliefs and values of Essie with a demonstrated passion for progressive politics, specifically in gender justice, race justice, and ending mass incarceration.

The Position

The Senior Community Organizer is a full-time, salaried, exempt position. This position is supervised by the Director of Organizing Programs. The salary for this position is between $75,000- $80,000 depending on experience, with full medical, dental, and vision benefits, optional 401(k), a substantial vacation package, and a monthly personal wellness stipend. The position is based at Essie's Los Angeles office.

To Apply

Please address a personal, specific, and thoughtful cover letter to the "Essie Hiring Committee" and submit along with a resume through our hiring portal. Your resume tells us what you can do; your cover letter should tell us who you are and why you want to work with Essie.

Essie Justice Group provides equal employment and advancement opportunities to all staff members. Employment decisions are based on merit, qualifications, and skills. Essie does not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, national origin, immigration status, socioeconomic status, ancestry, age, size, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, familial status, veteran status, disability, AIDS/HIV status, medical condition, prior conviction, arrest history, traits historically associated with race, including, but not limited to, hair texture and protective hairstyles, or any other characteristic protected by law.

Essie values and specifically seeks applicants who are people with incarcerated loved ones; formerly incarcerated people; people of color; women; queer, transgender, gender expansive, and gender fluid people.

This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, performance assessment, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.

Essie Justice Group is a non profit organization of women with incarcerated loved ones taking on the rampant injustices created by mass incarceration. Our award-winning Healing to Advocacy Model brings women together to heal, build collective power, and drive social change. Essie is Great Place to Work-Certified™ by Great Place to Work.

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