The Staff
Amanda Toering (Director, SpeakSpeak.org; Editor, SpeakSpeak News) is currently a freelance writer and editor. In the past, she has served as researcher for nonprofit organizations, an analyst for the Texas Legislature, and Girl Friday for the venerable Texas Observer. A native Texan, she currently lives in California. She can be contacted at amanda -at- speakspeak.org.
Eric Jaffa (Writer, SpeakSpeak News) is the editor of Move Left, a liberal blog. He is a computer programmer in Minnesota. He’s a vegetarian and in his thirties. He can be contacted at eric.jaffa -at- speakspeak.org.
Jackie Goodman (Advisory Board) was first elected to the Austin City Council in 1993, and she also has a long history volunteer involvement with Austin City government as a community activist. She has served on Austin’s City Planning Commission and City Parks Board, and has worked with groups focusing on issues ranging from environmental protection to child care. She left her post on the Austin City Council in June, 2005, a victim of term limits.
John Hocevar (Advisory Board) is an oceans specialist for Greenpeace USA. He is the former executive director of Students for a Free Tibet. John has a long history of in-your-face activism that we hope he’ll contribute to SpeakSpeak.
Jonathan Rintels (Advisory Board) is the president and executive director of the Center for Creative Voices in Media. He has written or co-written nine movies for television, including Snowbound: The Jim and Jennifer Stolpa Story, one of the highest rated movies for television of the 1990s. For two decades, he has been a member of the Writers Guild of America, a union of nearly 10,000 writers of film and television. He is a former chairman and current trustee of the Writers Guild health and pension plans. Jon is also an attorney admitted to practice in Washington, D.C. He founded the Center in Fall 2002.
Tasca Shadix (Advisory Board) has a Bachelor’s in Film Production and an MFA in Writing from the University of Texas at Austin. Like anyone with an arts background, Tasca has held a variety of jobs, including professional screenwriter, creative writing teacher, martial arts and women’s self-defense instructor, babysitter, Texas Capitol tour guide, and language assistant in Compiegne, France. While in Austin, she helped start a protest group to oppose a strip-mall development in her neighborhood, and has been interested in local-level activism ever since. She currently lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, with her husband and baby daughter.
Chris Zamarelli (Advisory Board) lives near Washington, DC, with his wife and his pet chinchilla, Pepe. A librarian by trade, he co-edits the alternative librarian culture website Library Underground and writes the Banned Bookslut column for the popular literature website Bookslut. His essay “My Life as a Librarian Exposed” appeared in the 2003 book Revolting Librarians Redux.