This coming January the great Democratic team will begin solving our
Nation's problems and healing its injuries, and I'm pleased to be playing my
bit locally. Yes, our attention is focused on national and state problems,
but there is much to be done here in our county and its townships, and like
my fellow Democrats, I'm eager to do my part here in Isabella County.
About Joel Welty:
Upon graduation from high school, in Lakewood, Ohio, the United States Army
placed me in an infantry division. It was the last year of World War II,
and I was trained to take part in the invasion of Japan.
When the Emperor of Japan backed
down, without an invasion, I was sent to Europe.
Here I had a chance to inspect the
cities that where bombed into ruin. Being there was more sickening, and
grisly, than any photographs. The site of the ruins caused me to then hate
war and to despise those who start them.
With the help of a scholarship and the GI Bill, I was able to attend Fenn
College (now Cleveland State U) for my freshman year.
I then attended Oberlin College
(Ohio) for sophomore, junior and senior years.
I graduated from Oberlin with a
major in History and minor in Economics.
Growing up, my father had quit school after the eighth grade because
his father had passed away, and he had to work in order to help support his
mother and five siblings. So my
completion of college was very important to my mother.
While at Oberlin I was a volunteer. I
helped organize two student cooperative dorms and dining halls, which have
now expanded to serve about a third of the student population. I also served
on the board of directors of the Oberlin Consumer Cooperative. Following
graduation, I returned to Oberlin to manage the Co-op Bookstore.
I worked for Akron Co-op Enterprise, becoming manager of CO-OP label
products and the non-food departments. I served as liaison
between the Optical Co-op department and the labor unions in Akron, speaking
before union meetings and writing a regular column for the labor paper.
In 1959 I came to Detroit and organized the Co-op Optical Service, again
working closely with labor unions. For a while I worked for Michigan Credit
Union League as Stabilization Specialist until the League assigned me to
manage Great Lakes Cooperative Association, a spin-off of the League. There
I had the honor and privilege to organize several new cooperatives.
I have also served on the Foundation for Cooperative Housing.
I first served as the Director of
Property Management, managing 9,000 townhouses in Michigan and Indiana.
I then served the Foundation as the National Information Officer,
training the boards of directors of housing cooperatives across the country.
I wrote "Welty's Book of Procedures
for Meetings, Boards, Committees and Officers", an innovative
parliamentary manual. I also wrote manuals for the co-op leaders.
I now serve on the Michigan Alliance of Cooperatives, still as a volunteer,
organizing new co-ops. Our chief projects are 1) a non-profit
wind power cooperative to provide, install and service small scale wind
turbines to generate electricity at people's homes and small businesses, 2)
an affordable housing co-op protected against speculation in prices of
homes, and 3) with Luther von Moon's expertise, a hydroponics grow range to
be located in a vacant factory or other vacant building. As in
these cases, many national problems can find local solutions in local
programs. I am pleased to work on these projects with fellow volunteers
Nancy White, John Barker, Bob Newby, Bob Franke, Erin Swystun, and
associates from other communities.
Among my other volunteer activities, I chair the Seventh Generation
Committee of the Michigan Sierra Club. I am past president of the Unitarian
Universalist Fellowship of Central Michigan. And I am Entertainment Chair
of the Great Lakes Humanist Society. I urge young people to get active in
politics; they will have to live out their lives in the world we are
creating today.
I've been married to Ellie for fifty-six years; we have one child,
Stephanie, the Chief Financial Officer of Northwest Pipe Corporation, living
with her husband and two daughters in Vancouver, Washington.
