The Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan Latino organization affiliated with the AFL-CIO and the Change to Win federation. It was founded in 1972 to provide Latino trade union members in the United States with a more effective voice within the AFL-CIO, to encourage Latino participation in the democratic process, and to encourage the organization of Latino workers into labor unions. LCLAA is the voice of Latinos within the AFL-CIO, and one of seven official constituency groups within the organization. It is based at AFL-CIO headquarters in Washington, D.C. LCLAA has 26 chapters in the United States and Puerto Rico, and represents millions of Latino trade unionists. History LCLAA was founded in 1972 as part of a wave of constituency group organizing within the AFL-CIO. The AFL-CIO had chartered its first retiree organization, the National Council of Senior Citizens (NCSC), in 1962 and a civil rights organization called the A. Philip Randolph Institute in 1965. The Coalition of Black Trade Unionists followed in 1972 to give a broader, more effective voice within the AFL-CIO to black workers, and the Coalition of Labor Union Women was chartered in 1974. But it was the large influx of Latino workers brought about by the chartering of the United Farm Workers in 1966 that led to a push by Latino labor union activists for a separate organization of their own. Several years passed, however, before the growing militancy and political muscle of the emerging Latino movement moved AFL-CIO president George Meany to agree to a Latino constituency group. In 1972 the AFL-CIO brought together hundreds of Latino labor activists and members of local Latino labor committees to form LCLAA. The organization's founding conference was held in Washington, D.C., on November 16, 1973. LCLAA's first president was Ray Mendoza, a member of the Laborers' International Union of North America. Goals and programs LCLAA has three primary goals. The first is to work with unions and community groups to organize Latino workers into unions. The second is to advance the social, economic, political, and civil rights of Latinos by building coalitions with and among other unions and other national groups. The third goal is to promote Latinos' participation in the American democratic process. LCLAA engages in a wide variety of projects in the furtherance of these goals. It has a significant lobbying and legislative presence in Washington, D.C., and coordinates the