Mary Lassen
Mary Lassen worked with ACORN from 1975 until 1980, first as a trainee in Ft Smith AR, then as the NW AR regional director, then St Louis Head Organizer, and finally TX Head Organizer, based in Austin. In this interview Mary discusses her early organizing experiences with the United Farm Workers boycott team in Boston while in college; and how she came to AR to work for ACORN. She talks about coming to St Louis to open a new ACORN office and to lead a statewide ballot initiative campaign to end the sales tax on food and medicine; and about St. Louis ACORN’s path breaking work that challenged bank redlining, including the first ever analysis of racial disparities in home mortgage data, followed by the first Community Reinvestment Act challenging a bank merger. Mary also talks about helping to build a statewide presence for TX ACORN, and then her decision to leave the organization in 1980. She discussed her subsequent organizing career with Citizen Action of New York, 10 years leading the Committee for Boston Public Housing; a stint as ED of the Women’s Union in Boston; and then 13 years at Community Change, from 2008 through 2021.