As Executive Director of Working Partnerships USA, Maria Noel brings more than a decade of successful community, labor, and electoral organizing to Silicon Valley’s movement for a just economy. She is a fierce advocate for racial and economic justice, and her passion is grassroots organizing to build a multi-racial, feminist democracy for all.

Under her leadership, Working Partnerships USA has won campaigns resulting in better wages, working conditions, and access to union jobs for more than 15,000 subcontracted service workers employed on high tech campuses throughout the nation. Maria Noel was instrumental in crafting and implementing policy campaigns to raise the minimum wage in eight Silicon Valley cities to $15/hr; pass the first-in-the-nation Opportunity to Work policy to increase access to work hours for part-time workers; expand tenant protections including just cause eviction and rent stabilization; and ensure access to affordable, universal healthcare for all.

Maria Noel began her career working for progressive elected officials, including then San Jose Vice-Mayor Cindy Chavez and the former California State Speaker Pro Tempore. She then worked for many years as a community organizer with Sacred Heart Community Service, and eventually joined the team at the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council where she won several regional tax campaigns and ballot measures. She joined Working Partnerships USA in 2012, and as Organizing Director she grew the organization’s community organizing and electoral campaign capacity to one of the largest field operations in the region. 

She serves on the boards of PowerSwitch Action, Valley Health Foundation, the South Bay AFL-CIO and Movimiento Arte Cultura Latino Americana Board (MACLA). Maria Noel lives in Gilroy with her husband Carlos and their sons, Tadeo and Diago.