Aberle, Matt – Forestry: Candidate for Assistant Director

Hello! My name is Matt Aberle and I work for the Oregon Department of Forestry as a wildlife biologist and also help on wildfire response, and I am the president of our Forestry Sublocal 629. I live in Albany but have the privilege of working across Oregon working in our many beautiful state forests. This also gives me the opportunity to meet and interact with my fellow workers in different parts of the state and talk to them about things that are important to them at work. ODF has historically had lower membership in our union than other state agencies even though we have thousands of employees. Our forestry sublocal is growing and I'm working with my fellow sublocal officers and stewards to grow our membership. Our agency faces many challenges with seasonal employment, unsafe working conditions with wildfire, and also chronic understaffing of full time positions. I'm excited for this opportunity to bring the challenges ODF faces to a higher level since, while we may have some challenges unique to ODF, many of the issues we face are also universal to all SEIU members. I believe in making our union as strong as possible and uniting all SEIU workers in improving our working conditions and also leveraging the power of our union to make an impact in Oregon as well. Outside of work I also do political organizing in my community and have helped win fights like getting Flock cameras out of Albany, and advocating for our immigrant friends and neighbors in the face of ICE terror. I believe it is essential for large labor unions like ours to also be active in righting the many wrongs in our society in addition to improving conditions for our workers, so I look forward to being able to do that as a member of the board of directors. If you vote for me I will be a strong advocate against worker exploitation and working on making a better Oregon for everyone.