Barry, Jay, and Hunter

Below are three interviews with attendees of the 2024 US Worker Co-op Conference, held in Chicago earlier this year. Watch previous interviews here and here and here.

Chris interviews worker-owner Barry Feldman of ChiCommons worker co-op at the September 2024 USFWC Worker Co-op Conference in Chicago, Illinois.

CONNECT WITH CHICOMMONS AT
-https://www.chicommons.coop/

Transcript

Chris: All right, so Barry, I know you liv e here in Chicago, but where are you from? Is there anything deeper to talk about?

Barry: I live in Rogers Park. I took the red line and the green line to get here today

Chris: Alright, and what's your role in the co-op?

Barry: I'm a worker owner in ChiCommons.

Chris: Nice, nice. Coming to the conference is a big commitment. What are you seeking out of the conference?

Barry: Connection and meet people, find out what they're doing, and how ChiCommons might be able to help, and how people might be able to help us.

Chris: Is this your first worker co-op conference? What has been the best or most useful part of the conference so far?

Barry: Well, the conference is just starting, and we had our Chicago pre-conference meeting just ending. And well, it was great to meet people, and we have a little mini-unconference. And so as part of this group, with Sharon and Marquette of Success and some other people, and we talked about the importance of listening and how that connected with accountability and success and presence.

Chris: You said "unconference," U-N conference, right? OK. I did see that, I think, in the programming. I wanted to know what that was about.

Barry: I can't tell you that much about it, but an unconference is a way of spontaneously organizing a series of workshops.

Chris: Thank you. Is there anything going on in your org that you are proud or excited by?

Barry: I'm proud and excited about a lot of things going on in ChiCommons, but they're happening slowly. We're developing our process. We're figuring out both the ideal way of trying to do things and practical ways of approaching the ideal.

Chris: Yeah, one thing that I think I should mention is that ChiCommons was unique in Chicago for trying to put in the effort of holding down peer support for cooperatives. And that was going on for a while, and I'm saddened that it didn't continue, but that's so awesome. And ChiCommons used to be commended and recognized for putting in all that work across such a large amount of time. And you know, a lot of times the crew was small, but ChiCommons brought in interesting people. I would still be participating if it was continuing, so I really like what ChiCommens is trying to do.

Barry: Well, thank you, Chris, and say, I mean, ChiComm is still involved, that we kind of maybe modulate a little bit how we're involved, but you know, like, Steve Ediger was very active in organizing the Chicago pre-conference for the USFWC, and there are various other ways that we continue to contribute.

Chris: And uh... What are you working on

Barry: Yeah, well I'm doing a number of things right now. We're sort of finishing up the startup of the Wild Onion Market Food Co-op in Rogers Park, helping with the IT there and various related systems. And then in the background, what I'm particularly focusing on is trying to figure out ways to use latest developments and technologies for co-ops, to discover quicker ways of building custom software that meets people's needs and co-op's needs.

Chris: But thanks so much, man.

Chris interviews Jay Lucien of Cooperation Milwaukee co-op federation at the September 2024 USFWC Worker Co-op Conference in Chicago, Illinois.

CONNECT WITH COOPERATION MILWAUKEE AT
-https://www.cooperationmke.coop

Chris interviews worker-owner Hunter Silvestri of Commonplace Cooperative worker co-op at the September 2024 USFWC Worker Co-op Conference in Chicago, Illinois.