There’s No Place Like Home wasn’t just the theme of this year’s annual membership meeting, as we continue facing the effects of COVID-19, the words become more meaningful to all of our lives. 

Virtual Meeting
Most of us participated in this year’s membership meeting at home. Our team worked for months to ensure that the transition from in-person to Zoom still made for a compelling meeting, during which the necessary business of voting and sharing information could happen seamlessly.

We hope that you agree that we were able to pull this off successfully. This wouldn’t be possible without the help of our Master of Ceremonies, Colin Bird-Martinez; our Board of Directors President, Jerry Lumpkins, and our translator, Bickerdike’s own Awilda Cruz Calderon. Not to mention some great entertainment provided by Mariachi Sirenas via pre-recorded video.

Mission
Our mission has guided our work since our founding in 1967. In a year during which home became the place to be, while for far too many home became an uncertainty, the work that we do is more important than ever. Our 2020 MIssion video, which premiered at our meeting.  captures that importance.

Meeting Business
Using Zoom technology, we were able to vote on the minutes of our 2019 meeting, our Corporate Resolutions, an Advisory Resolution from Elevate Energy, and the nominees for the Board of Directors.

All resolutions were approved. Our board of directors election resulted in the re-election of our two incumbents, Alfredo Calixto and Cynthia Lloyd, and the election of new nominees, Tonya Cavanero and Maureen Hellwig.  You can find all of the meeting documents, including the nominee profiles, here.

Recognitions
We recognized the work of our volunteer leaders who played a big part in our organization’s work including U.S. Census education, Get Out the Vote efforts, PPE distribution, and activities and produce distribution at our gardens. Despite the setbacks brought on by COVID, our volunteers and committees were ready to help when asked. We also gave special recognition to Hector Cuadra, who has been donating his time and graphic design skills to Bickerdike for 25 years.

Some of our staff were also recognized as they hit some big milestones in their years of service:

Raquel Torres, Tenant Organizer, 20 years
Rafael Marin, Howard Apartments Desk Clerk, 25 years
Awilda Cruz Calderon, Human Resources Manager, 30 years
and last but not least… Joy Aruguete, CEO, 25 years

 Congratulations to all, thank you for your work!

A warm thanks to our sponsors listed at the end of this post. We couldn’t do our work without their support.
We thank everyone who participated in this year’s meeting. We hope to be with you in person next year so save the date now:  Saturday, December 4, 2021! N

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Sponsors

GOLD

BRONZE

Eva Design and Engineering

Landon Bone Baker Architects

McKay Landscape Architects

National Equity Fund

Tykecia Taylor

Tact 1, LLC

US Bank