Christine Hernandez is a proud sister of UNITE HERE! International Union, where she learned to strategize, organize and mobilize. Since moving to the Bay in 2010, she has applied these skills to advance the right to self-determination through her work in job training, food sovereignty and housing justice. In September of 2015, Christine, emboldened by desperation, took possession of a vacant property in East Oakland, to secure housing for her family of 6. In June of 2020, their continued fight and struggle for housing culminated into a rent strike and the collective purchase of a 7 unit house with family, friends, neighbors and the Bay Area Community Land Trust. 

Now with secure and affordable housing, and a first hand understanding of the significant impacts of being unhoused and the existing structures that consistently prioritize profit over people and planet, Christine is dedicated to working in collaboration, to create opportunities and expand access, so that others might also secure and maintain this basic human right. She is equally dedicated to the disruption and interference of efforts to displace and dehumanize her comrades and neighbors. Because Christine recognizes that the law has a profound impact on every aspect of life, she is committed to contributing to efforts that make the law accessible to everyone and is delighted to be advancing that objective, as an apprentice with the Radical Real Estate Law School, at the Sustainable Economies Law Center.