Diversity and Civic Inclusion

L. Mireya Reith is being honored as a Champion of Change for her efforts as an Immigration Reformer.

Arkansas is home to a large and diverse community of immigrants, boasting the country’s fourth fastest-growing immigrant population. I am proud to call Arkansas my home. I grew up in Arkansas amidst the immigration boom in my state.  As the daughter of a Mexican immigrant, I had a strong empathy and kinship with my new neighbors, and was deeply alarmed when I read those first editorials criticizing the growth of the immigrant community.  I remember as a child confronting my own racist epithets in grade school and being aware that discriminatory groups, like the Klu Klux Klan, were still organizing around us.  While my life experiences only made me more determined to demonstrate the value of diversity, I also knew that I would strive to prevent others from ever having to go through those same feelings of alienation.

I purposefully selected a career where I could champion for diversity and civic inclusion, and my early opportunities took me to five continents across the world, working in the field of democracy promotion. However, Arkansas remained my consistent home, and a family illness brought me back.  What began as volunteering and trying to find ways to use my education and work experiences soon became a renewed life mission involving my neighbors, friends, and family, a mission that was spurred with urgency as I became aware of the grave injustices happening in my state and timely windows to resolve looming barriers both at the state and federal levels.

As I began to travel to all four corners of Arkansas, I learned that many immigrants still lacked the means to become full and active participants in the state’s economic, political, and social processes; a reality that negatively impacted all Arkansans.  Instead, the swift demographic shifts, combined with a systematic lack of information, had relegated Arkansas immigrants into a second class. Among their stories was Lidia, who is an undocumented student and the eldest of her siblings.  Because Arkansas does not have in place a tuition equity policy, her parents each work three jobs, seven days a week, to pay her university tuition. Unless laws in Arkansas change, her brothers and sisters may not get to go to college, and her parents will continue to confront unbearable choices between cancer treatment for the mother and Lidia’s education.  Another story is Maria’s: she is a citizen who spent half of last year traveling ten hours to Louisiana’s detention center every weekend to fight to keep her family together and prevent the deportation of two of her brothers, who did not have the same opportunity as she did to legalize.

In 2010, I helped found Arkansas United Community Coalition (AUCC) to respond to these challenges, with a mission to empower Arkansas immigrants and their communities through organizing, coalition building, leadership development, and the promotion of civic engagement.  My fellow incorporators and I were inspired by a vision of an Arkansas that could be elevated to its full social, economic, and civic potential through the development of inclusive and equitable communities where all multiethnic groups, newcomers, and native-born Arkansans could work together to enhance their collective quality of life. Committed to grassroots organizing and guided practice strategies, in our inaugural years, we have done many amazing things:

• We launched Change Agents, Arkansas’ first organizing program geared towards immigrants. This program identified and supported 23 individuals in unleashing their potential as community organizers. AUCC’s Change Agents have traveled to Washington, DC and Maryland to learn best practices from established immigrant organizations, met with elected officials at all levels of government, including the White House, completed community surveys to assess local immigrant needs, implemented series of local workshops where immigrants have safe spaces to garner information and voice their needs,  and created active cadres of over 300 volunteers who are working on a daily basis to address immigrant concerns.
• We developed a network of organizations and volunteers committed to nonpartisan, immigrant voter registration and engagement. In 2010, this network contributed to the doubling of the Latino vote and, in 2012, it amassed 1,000 new voter registrations, made 22,000 calls, knocked 2,000 doors and hosted 2 Rock the Vote concerts, motivating the participation of almost 25,000 immigrant voters.
• We spearheaded a working group of 23 organizations – representing Latino, African-American, LGBTQ, women and faith communities – to advance prospects for the creation of a civil rights commission in the state. They have testified to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and have worked to improve relations between immigrants and local law enforcement.
• We fostered dialogue among Arkansas Latinos and public officials around the designation of a Latino majority-minority district during 2011 reapportionment processes.
• We supported local DREAMer organizations in seeking state and federal policy solutions for undocumented youth, including Arkansas’ first statewide summits, an in-state tuition equity bill campaign and an educational town hall with Arkansas’ flagship university that reached thousands locally and nationally.
• We developed community committees to host group citizenship workshops that resulted in over 400 new citizenship applications in one year.
• We joined four national coalitions (ya es hora! Ciudadañía, the Fair Immigration Reform Movement, Reform Immigration FOR America, and the Southeast Immigrant Rights Network) to facilitate Arkansas contributions to comprehensive immigration reform.

While Arkansas confronted twelve anti-immigrant measures in 2011 and still combats misconceptions about its immigrant population, Arkansas remains, as it once was, a land of opportunity.  It is a proud commitment to our state that it has inspired this pro-active movement, of which I am humbly one person within, driven by the principles of acceptance and collaboration.

L.Mireya Reith is the Executive Director of Arkansas United Community Coalition (AUCC), Arkansas’ first nonprofit working at the state level to empower immigrants through organizing, coalition building, leadership development and the promotion of civic engagment.

The Defining Moments

Rich Stolz is being honored as a Champion of Change for his efforts as an Immigration Reformer.

I cut my teeth in the immigrant rights movement nearly twenty years ago when I volunteered to help register voters and organize students against California’s anti-immigrant Prop 187. The defining moment for me was a trip down to Fresno when I and other students met with farm workers and attorneys fighting for the rights of immigrant workers and responding to raids being conducted by INS that were terrorizing families and intimidating activists.

This all happened at a time in my life when I was exploring my own identity as a Korean America – half Asian/half white – and understanding more deeply the history of the movement for equal justice and identity in the United States.  I was profoundly influenced by the strategic brilliance and courage of Cesar Chavez, the debates over pan-Asian movement building in California, the example of liberation theology in the Catholic Church in which I was educated, and the powerful non-violent movement for civil rights and equal justice for African American liberation.

Today, as the Executive Director of OneAmerica, I continue to draw on this history for inspiration. OneAmerica was born in the fight to contain the backlash against religious, ethnic, immigrant, and refugee communities following the terrorist attacks of 9/11. I am proud and committed to our multi-ethnic organizational identity, and our focus on organizing immigrant and refugee communities across Washington State to build power in low-income communities of color to change the policies and institutions that impact the day to day lives of families and workers.  I’m also proud of the amazing work we’ve done to make Washington State a more welcoming community, and to build the electoral strength of immigrant and refugee communities statewide.

Today, as we participate and lead in the campaign to enact just and humane immigration reform in Congress, I’m struck at how much the immigrant rights movement has grown in just the last decade.  Our work in Washington State with the labor movement, the business community, the faith community, the civil rights community, and the vibrant community of immigrant groups, LGBT allies, women’s groups, and environmental groups reflect the growth of this movement nationwide.

Organizing is at the core of what we do. And the grassroots leaders of today – those being honored through the Champions of Change ceremony, and the countless volunteers, leaders and advocates on whom the honorees’ own work depends – are my continuing inspiration every day.

Rich Stolz is the Executive Director of OneAmerica

Unite Here

Yvanna Cancela is being honored as a Champion of Change for her efforts as an Immigration Reformer.

It is a tremendous honor to accept the Champions of Change Award because the life and work of Cesar Chavez inspires me every day. Chavez's legacy continues on in the hundreds of thousands of workers who come together to demand justice. I am proud to call these men and women my union sisters and brothers.

When staying at a hotel, most people don't think about the housekeeper who made their bed, the kitchen worker who cleaned their plate, or the cook who prepared their meal. UNITE HERE has worked for decades to ensure these “invisible workers” and their basic needs – good healthcare, decent wages and job security – are not overlooked. The union has provided thousands of people the opportunity to provide better lives for themselves and their families. In Las Vegas, the Culinary Workers Local 226 has helped build the city's middle class. The union has focused on empowering its members to win their contracts and ultimately their future.

However, the work of the labor movement goes beyond the workplace. My work is centered on ensuring workers have a strong voice in their communities. I was lucky to land in Las Vegas as a neighborhood organizer during the 2010 elections. For most of five months, I spent every day knocking on doors and talking to voters in predominantly Latino neighborhoods. This gave me a clear understanding of local issues facing Las Vegans, including a weak education system and lackluster housing market. In my time at the union, I have been able to work with members and tackle these challenges head on.

During the 2011 Legislative session, Local 226 founded an organization called Nevada Students Unite Here. I directed a campaign to support education funding and prevent budget cuts. Our campaign led to over 8,000 contacts with students, parents, and union members who were deeply concerned with the issues. Ultimately, by working with community and political allies, we were able to guarantee that devastating cuts were not made to the education budget. It was tremendously empowering to represent our members and their families on such an important issue. As the Legislature convenes again this year, I am working on helping to pass legislation that protects underwater homeowners. I’m also focused on bills that will improve the quality of care in Nevada’s healthcare system.

The most important work I am doing involves union members and immigration reform. As the daughter of immigrants, it is tremendously important for me that comprehensive reform be made a reality. It is easy to understand why UNITE HERE has been at the forefront of the immigration debate. My union represents workers from more than 100 countries. In Vegas alone there are workers from 84 nations. These members came in search of a better future, one with good jobs and opportunities for their families. Ten years ago, my union organized the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride as part of a national campaign for comprehensive reform. We have stood by the DREAMers, hosted DACA application fairs, and will do whatever it takes to support the Administration’s push for reform. I have the privilege of speaking to workers about this issue and mobilizing them into action.

Cesar Chavez envisioned a world where all workers, regardless of their job or nationality could have dignity in the workplace. By training union members to be leaders at work and in their communities, I believe UNITE HERE is making Chavez’s vision a reality.

Yvanna Cancela is the political director at UNITE HERE’s Local 226, the Culinary Workers Union.