about jeffrey

Jeffrey Omura is a devoted advocate for workers’ rights bringing his grassroots and labor organizing experience home to the Upper West Side and New York City. 

Recently elected to his second term as an officer of Actors’ Equity Association, the AFL-CIO chartered labor union representing over 50,000 stage managers and actors across the country, Jeffrey came to labor leadership through his work in member organizing. 

Before joining union governance, Jeffrey helped create and lead #FairWageOnStage, a grassroots movement and campaign demanding higher wages and fairer contracts for Off-Broadway stage managers and actors. Through persistent organizing and pressure, #FairWageOnStage gave Actors’ Equity the leverage to negotiate historic wage increases of up to 83%.

Shortly after, Jeffrey was elected to Actors’ Equity’s National Council where he continues to organize from the inside—negotiating higher wages,greater benefits, and more job opportunities for union members nationwide. Recent achievements include securing profit-sharing for members in the development process of new work by helping to lead and win the union’s first strike in over 50 years.

Jeffrey has witnessed firsthand how the pandemic has ravaged New York’s Arts & Culture sector and devastated  the arts community. Realizing that arts workers were being forgotten in pandemic relief efforts at every level of government, Jeffrey helped create the #BeAnArtsHero campaign to organize the industry to collectively lobby Congress for arts relief. After meeting with over 60 US Senate offices, #BeAnArtsHero organizers were crucial in securing $15 billion for the arts in December 2020’s COVID-relief stimulus package.

Passionate political activism and tenacious advocacy are lifelong commitments for Jeffrey. 

After experiencing heavy bullying in middle school, Jeffrey found sanctuary, community, and a powerful voice through arts and theater. When he was 16, Jeffrey used his voice to testify in support of anti-bullying legislation, bringing his story—and the stories of so many similar young people—before the State Legislature. 

Jeffrey went on to work on the campaigns of John Kerry, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, and more. 

Jeffrey now uses his voice as a champion for arts workers across the country, and for his neighbors on the Upper West Side, delivering meals to seniors for Goddard Riverside, picking up trash with One Block UWS, and providing holiday gifts to children with the UWS Open Hearts Initiative. 

The Arts and Culture sector and its workers are extraordinarily high-impact contributors to the social and financial landscape of New York—the Creative Economy contributes $110 billion in annual economic activity. 

The few arts advocates on City Council are term-limited, and the arts community may be left without an advocate in City government at a crucial and vulnerable time for the industry. His fellow arts workers—the entire industry—needs a champion. Jeffrey will be that leader. 

Through his work in labor organizing, Jeffrey recognizes the same challenges faced by NYC’s arts workers are reflected in his home District—challenges that can be overcome only if the City has leaders who know how to organize, galvanize, and unify.

He is proposing a bold Arts & Culture Recovery Plan alongside an equally expansive platform including—but not limited to—repairing the housing and homelessness crisis through a massive expansion of affordable housing, bolstering small businesses and revitalizing the neighborhood economy, healing community and police relations through accountability and oversight, and implementing a Green New Deal for NYC.