Heather Morgan and Jordan McGinnis on Child Welfare and Collective Action In Arapahoe County
Heather Morgan and Jordan McGinnis both work in Arapahoe County child welfare, and they also share a personal milestone: they got engaged just weeks before their coworkers voted to form a union. Their relationship, like their work, was shaped by their shared values around community service and collective support.
Heather is the county’s Truancy Coordinator, a role she’s personally overhauled “My program is the truancy prevention program,” she said. “It was created out of an identified practice gap and a need for the department—especially around working with schools and truancy court.”
When she started, the department had virtually no role in truancy court. “The bridge was non-existent,” Heather said. “The magistrate basically said, ‘You can sit in the back. You cannot say anything.’”
Today, that’s changed. “I sit in the juror’s box. I’m an active part of cases. We brainstorm. We ask, ‘What can we do?’ Those things were non-existent when I started.”
Jordan works as a Family Engagement Facilitator, leading meetings for every family involved in child protection. “This is the one place where everybody has the same opportunity to speak openly,” he said. “Families can ask questions, ask for help, and drive the case forward instead of being told what to do.”
He recently facilitated what may be a closing meeting for a family that had been involved with the system for years. “She hated us when we started,” Jordan said. “To see her show up smiling, encouraging her daughter, that’s really why we do the job we do.”
The work requires constant emotional awareness. “You have to be able to read the room,” Jordan said. “Being a facilitator takes heightened awareness of everything that’s going on, and being able to respond in the right way.”
Both came to this work through long, nonlinear paths. “All of the jobs I’ve had as an adult built off each other to get to this point,” Heather said. Jordan describes his time working in youth corrections as “the worst job I ever had,” adding, “I decided I would come to child protection and do what I could to keep kids out of that system.”
Organizing a union grew out of that same commitment. Heather had family experience with unions and saw the potential immediately, even if the work was daunting. “Starting a union from the ground up is way more work than I anticipated,” she said. “But it was still worth it.”
Jordan said he wanted people to be able to stay. “I wanted folks to make a career out of doing the hardest social work job there is,” he said. “Not feel disposable.” Their first contract delivered raises, stronger benefits, and protections around layoffs and discipline.
Just recently, they ratified their first contract, which guarantees raises and strengthens protections on the job for their colleagues who do essential work.
Heather emphasized that the impact goes beyond workers. “Turnover doesn’t just affect morale,” she said. “It affects real outcomes for families. Supporting workers trickles down into the community.”
Asked what they’d say to others considering unionizing, Jordan was blunt. “This is a lot. It will make you question your sanity,” he said. “But you are doing the hardest work for the most vulnerable people. This union will be worth the fight.”
Heather put it simply: “You already support each other at work. A union takes that support and gives it strength in numbers.”