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PROPOSED RESOLUTION
CONGRATULATING JORGE RAMIREZ ON HIS RETIREMENT FROM THE CHICAGO FEDERATION OF LABOR
WHEREAS, this June, Jorge Ramirez will be retiring from his position as president of the Chicago Federation of Labor (CFL) and as vice president of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO); and
WHEREAS, Jorge Ramirez was elected president of the CFL, an organization with 320 affiliates representing workers from pilots to doctors to zookeepers, in 2010, having previously served as secretary-treasurer. Prior to joining the CFL in 2006, Ramirez was elected vice president and served as executive director of Local 1546 of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, representing nearly 30,000 members in Chicago and throughout Illinois; and
WHEREAS, since 2008, Ramirez has served on the Cook County Health and Hospitals System Board of Directors as Vice-Chairman. In 2012, he was named to the Chicago Infrastructure Trust board and the Cook County President's Council of Economic Advisors. He currently serves as a member of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Labor Advisory Committee, the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau Board of Directors, the Navy Pier, Inc. Board of Directors, the Chicago Cook Workforce Partnership and is co-chairman of the City of Chicago Labor Management Cooperative Committee (LMCC) and on the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's Board of Directors; and
WHEREAS, Jorge also serves as co-chairman of the Chicago Manufacturing Renaissance Council and member of the National Manufacturing Renaissance Campaign design team and a director of the Lincoln Academy of Illinois. Ramirez also serves on the Mercy Home for Boys and Girls Board of Regents, the United Way of Metropolitan Chicago Board of Directors and a number of other boards and commissions; and
WHEREAS, in 2012, Jorge was named one of Chicago Magazine’s 100 most powerful Chicagoans, a great testament to his influence and dedication to the Labor movement and residents of the Chicagoland area; and
WHEREAS, as the son of Mexican immigrants, Jorge understood the struggles his father, a meat packing worker in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood, and his fellow workers endured to unionize their workplace in the 1960s. Their fight for a living wage and better conditions motivated Jorge in his career serving working men and women in organized labor.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the President and the Cook County Board of Commissioners, on behalf of the residents of Cook County, do hereby congratulate Jorge Ramirez on his retirement as President of the Chicago Federation of Labor and offers its most heartfelt gratitude for his tireless efforts to achieve better conditions for all working men and women; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that this text be spread upon the official proceeding of this Honorable Body, and a suitable copy of the same be tendered to Jorge Ramirez to memorialize this occasion.
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