CineMontage

Fall 2016

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10 CINEMONTAGE / Q4 2016 Even with my upbringing, I was rather begrudgingly convinced to become the shop steward at my worksite. But soon afterwards, I embraced it full-heartedly. Not kidding, my nickname became Norma Rae. When I represented my colleagues at the bargaining table, it ignited something I didn't even realize was inside of me. To say it was in my blood seems so cliché, and yet what I felt then in my heart and knew in my mind at the conclusion of those first negotiations is that I was destined to do this kind of work. And so I decided then that my career would be to advocate on behalf of working people. Eventually, I was hired by that union as its Assistant Business Agent. Three years later, I responded to an ad, was interviewed by the Motion Picture Editors Guild's Executive Director Ron Kutak — and then the Board of Directors — and was hired to be the Assistant Executive Director of this Guild. Looking back, that was one of the luckiest and most fated days of my life. At the time, we were solely an editorial local with jurisdiction only in LA County, and FROM THE NATIONAL EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Destiny's Child CONTINUED ON PAGE 13 by Cathy Repola I was born and raised in a union family, specifically IATSE Local 683. I saw first-hand the benefits of working union. My father was able to support raising five children while my mom stayed at home to care for us and we had a good, average middle-class upbringing. But I had no clue growing up that I, like my dad, would end up working as a union rep. This isn't generally one of those jobs one dreams of doing as a child. Most everyone I know who does this type of work falls into it by circumstance. That is how it happened for me.

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