Good Jobs First, About us

Good Jobs First
Good Jobs First is a national policy resource center for grassroots groups and public officials, promoting corporate and government accountability in economic development and smart growth for working families. We provide timely, accurate information on best practices in state and local job subsidies, and on the many ties between smart growth and good jobs. Good Jobs First works with a very broad spectrum of organizations, providing research, training, communications and consulting assistance.

Corporate Research Project
The Corporate Research Project, an affiliate of Good Jobs First, assists community, environmental and labor organizations in researching and analyzing companies and industries. The Project is designed to be a resource to aid activism. Consequently, our focus is on strategic research, i.e., identifying the information activists can use as leverage to get business to behave in a socially responsible manner

Good Jobs First-Illinois
Good Jobs First-Illinois, our partnership project with the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, was created in 2001 in response to the state's long history of subsidy abuse and its rich history of subsidy reform efforts. Its work contributed to the Prairie State's adoption of a pathbreaking disclosure and accountability law in 2003.

Good Jobs New York
Good Jobs New York, our partnership project with the Fiscal Policy Institute, promotes policies that hold government officials and corporations accountable to taxpayers, particularly when economic development agencies give expensive subsidies to large corporations that threaten to leave New York City. Since the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, GJNY has also tracked rebuilding dollars, documenting that most federal resources have benefited big businesses, not community priorities such as job creation or affordable housing.

More about the Staff of Good Jobs First and its Affiliates
(e-mail addresses are listed with (at) instead of @ to thwart spamming)

Bettina Damiani
Project Director of Good Jobs New York
bettina(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Bettina joined Good Jobs New York with experience in community organizing, progressive public relations and political fundraising. Through her work with GJNY, Bettina was a founder of the Liberty Bond Housing Coalition, which advocates for the use of post-September 11th financing to create affordable housing for moderate and low-income New Yorkers. She has a B.A. in Communications and Peace Studies from Manhattan College and a Masters of Urban Affairs from Hunter College.

Allison Lack
Research Analyst at Good Jobs New York
allison(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Allison has experience working with various community organizations, as well as with international social and environmental justice groups. She first learned the joys of tracking and reporting wasteful spending in a prior job as a bookkeeper where she was known as the "Iron Fist." Allison has a B.A. in Environmental Analysis from Pomona College and recently received her Masters in City and Regional Planning, with concentrations in labor and economic development, from Cornell University.

Michelle Lee
Communications and Development Coordinator at Good Jobs First
mlee(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Michelle has years of experience in fundraising and development at various non-profit organizations in Washington, DC. Prior to joining Good Jobs First, Michelle was the Development Coordinator at a media monitoring organization and an environmental organization focusing on raising funds through foundation and individual philanthropy. Michelle graduated from the University of Virginia with a major in Foreign Affairs and a minor in Religious Studies.

Greg LeRoy
Executive Director of Good Jobs First
goodjobs(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Dubbed "the leading national watchdog of state and local economic development subsidies" and "God's witness to corporate welfare," Greg is a nationally prominent speaker and news media source. He is the author of The Great American Jobs Scam: Corporate Tax Dodging and the Myth of Job Creation (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2005) and No More Candy Store: States and Cities Making Job Subsidies Accountable (1994). He founded Good Jobs First in 1998 and has been writing, training, and consulting on development issues for state and local governments, labor-management committees, unions, community groups, and development associations for more than 20 years.

Philip Mattera
Research Director of Good Jobs First and Director of the Corporate Research Project
pmattera(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Phil has been doing strategic corporate research for labor, environmental, public-interest and other activist groups around the country for the past two decades. Before that he spent a decade as a business journalist. He is a licensed private investigator and the author of four books on business, labor and economics. He is a long-time member of the National Writers Union and serves as the union's chief book grievance officer.

Jeff McCourt
Project Director of Good Jobs First-Illinois
jeff(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Jeff joined Good Jobs First in September 2001. He has over 25 years of experience in organizing, research, consulting and government, with a particular focus on high-wage economic development, industrial revitalization, and sustainable development. He co-founded a successful Pittsburgh utility consumers organization in 1979. Working for the Governor of Ohio and then the Council of Great Lakes Governors, he organized successful initiatives on industrial revitalization, trade policy, and economic conversion.

Edgar Soto
Administrative Assistant at Good Jobs First
edgar(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Edgar, who joined Good Jobs First in September 2004, is a native of Peru, is bilingual and has almost three years of experience as an administrative assistant. He currently is pursuing his Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering. Among his responsibilities at Good Jobs First are coordinating online e-blasts, sending out mailings and serving as webmaster. In his leisure time Edgar likes to listen to classical salsa, jog and play soccer.

Karla joined Good Jobs First after completing her Masters degree in Urban Planning and Policy at the Universityof Illinois at Chicago. Previously, she gained policy research experience while working as a Legislative Aide for Wisconsin State Representative Jennifer Shilling. Karla also has considerable experience working on state-level political campaigns.

Julie Farb Blain
Research Analyst at Good Jobs First
julie(at)goodjobsfirst.org

Julie recently joined Good Jobs First after spending a few years at home with her two young children. Julie previously worked as the research director at the Worker Center/King County Labor Council in Seattle, WA before moving home to DC three and a half years ago. In addition to supporting union organizing campaigns and workforce development initiatives, Julie established a joint labor research training program with the Center for Labor Studies at the University of Washington. The program brought together policy students and rank and file workers on union campaigns. Julie has a BA in political science and geography from the University of Wisconsin and a Masters in urban planning from the University of Washington. Before she had kids, Julie spent her free time backpacking in the mountains of the Pacific Northwest. Now that she has kids, she has no free time.

Who We Are