Our Board of Directors

Francisco Covarrubias, Chair

Francisco Covarrubias manages the community organizing collaborative and supports multiple initiatives within the CCF’s housing team, including the Program Related Investment Program, the Accelerating Permanent Supportive Housing Program, and the housing provider collaborative.

Prior to joining CCF, he directed the Tenant Organizing team at Inner City Law Center that empowered thousands of tenants to speak out against the slum conditions caused by unscrupulous landlords. Previously, Covarrubias worked on several labor organizing campaigns with workers in the service industry. He brings to CCF deep knowledge of government and constituent services, having worked for a state legislator.

Covarrubias earned a BA in sociology from Pomona College. He is a native Angeleno and enjoys exploring the many wonders of the city.

Michael Morrison, Treasurer

Michael Morrison has dedicated his entire legal career to vindicating constitutional and statutory rights of individuals. Michael’s practice areas include class actions and other complex litigation, with a particular focus on labor and employment law, civil rights, constitutional law, appellate law and sexual abuse cases.

Michael argued and briefed four cases resulting in published decisions: Macias v. County of Los Angeles (2006) 144 Cal. App. 4th 313; Blankenhorn v. City of Orange (9th Cir. 2007) 485 F.3d 463; Cinquegrani v. Department of Motor Vehicles (2006) 163 Cal. App. 4th 741; and Dalkilic v. Titan Corp. (S.D. Cal. 2007) 516 F. Supp. 2d 1177. He is a member of the United States Supreme Court Bar, assisted in drafting numerous briefs and petitions to that court, and co-authored the merits brief in Muehler v. Mena (2005) 544 U.S. 93.

Michael has extensive class action experience and success. Michael was a member of the plaintiff steering committee in the coordinated action “The Clergy Cases,” where a settlement exceeding $660 million was reached against the Archdiocese of Los Angeles on behalf of hundreds of sexual abuse victims. As class counsel, Michael handled the following notable settlements: Shoff v. AT&T (mis-classification wage and hour case resulting in $16 million settlement); Doyle v. AT&T (mis-classification wage and hour case resulting in $10.5 million settlement); Waters v. AT&T (mis-classification wage and hour case resulting in $17 million settlement); Lita v. Bunim-Murray (overtime case against reality television company resulting in $5 million settlement); Avery v. OCTA, TCA (constitutional class action against toll road agencies resulting in over $40 million in economic benefit to class members and sweeping injunctive relief); and Morrison, et al. v. Six Flags Theme Park, Inc. (race and ethnic discrimination case resulting in settlement over $5 million).

Michael also represented the Los Angeles Times' newsroom in an Equal Pay Act class action, resulting in a $3,000,000 settlement. Last year, he also was one of the lead counsel in a data breach class action filed against UKG, Inc., which resulted in a settlement of over $7 million in economic benefits.

Michael obtained his J.D. in 1999 from UCLA School of Law, where he taught civil rights to UCLA undergraduates and served, during his second year, as the special assistant to the Honorable Cruz Reynoso at the United States Commission on Civil Rights. Michael obtained his B.A., magna cum laude, in political science in 1996 from the University of California at San Diego.

Pamela Chandran

Ms. Chandran is in-house counsel at United Nurses Association of California (UNAC). Previously, she spent several years in-house representing registered nurses in the private sector and was Partner at a union-side firm. She represents unions and workers, appears frequently before the National Labor Relations Boards and in arbitration, and has extensive experience in collective bargaining. She frequently speaks at labor-related conferences, and is the union-side editor of Chapter 12 of Developing Labor Law: Recognition and Withdrawal of Recognition Without an Election. Before law school, she worked for several years for unions representing health care workers.