When: Monday, April 7 @ 3:00pm – 5:00pm
Where: SEM II A1105 @ TESC
What: Hosted by Abolish Cops and Prisons; In the wake of the current work and hunger strike involving 1,200 detainees at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington, immigrant rights organizers from across the Pacific Northwest will be joining us for a panel discussion concerning the connection between immigration, migrant labor, and incarceration. This panel comes at a time when detainees at the Northwest Detention Center are struggling for human rights and dignity. Each panelist has their own experience organizing around these issues and will bring a unique perspective to the panel.
OUR PANELISTS:
Maru Mora Villalpando – Latino Advocacy and the Dignity Campaign
Maru Mora Villalpando is a bi-lingual statewide community organizer and trainer and Director of Latino Advocacy with more than ten years experience primarily focusing on immigrant rights and racial justice issues. She was one of the lead organizers for the 10th Annual March for Immigrant rights in Seattle, WA where thousands of people demonstrated their support for immigration reform. Ms. Villalpando has been instrumental in grassroots organizing efforts ranging from national health care reform to advocating for changes to the presence of ICE in local police jails through the Secure Communities program. Currently she has been the key community organizer in the recent hunger strikes at the GEO Corp. operated NW Detention Center in Tacoma, WA.
The Dignity Campaign is a national grassroots effort that has crafted a human rights based comprehensive immigration reform platform from the grassroots up, through the convening of Dignity Dialogues.
Edgar Franks – Formacion Civica, C2C
As part of the C2C Team Edgar is the Coordinator for the Formación Cívica (Civic Engagement) Project. He leads the coordination of the Campaign to End Racial Profiling in Whatcom County. Raised in Skagit County, WA, Edgar comes from a farmworker family and is proud of his farm worker roots. He was a member of MEChA throughout High School and College; a volunteer for the Farm Worker Solidarity Organizing Committee from 1999-2011 and Co-Chair of this committee in 2001-2003. Edgar also is a national leader through the Grassroots Global Justice and the National Planning Committee for the US Social Forum. Edgar represents c2C on various local community groups that look for policy solutions to the increased policing through racial profiling of Latino Youth.
Angelica Villa – Community to Community
Angelica is a farm worker and is originally from Oaxaca Mexico and arrived in the United States in 1989 at the age of 18 to start a family in Los Angeles, CA. She is a single mother with four children, ages 10, 14, 17 and 20. She has worked many jobs to provide for them; in the fields, restaurants, and hotels. Angelica lives in rural Whatcom County, which borders Canada and she sees on a daily basis the harassment of workers by the Border Patrol and the cooperation of local police officers with them in detaining farm worker families, many of them Mothers with small children. She is a community organizer with C2C and sees first- hand how quickly hardworking farm workers are racially profiled and labeled criminals and deported. She accompanies them to immigration court hearings and supports their families when they are detained at the NW Detention Center.
Ramon Torres – Familias Unidas por la Justicia
Ramon was elected President of Familias Unidas por la Justicia by over 300 farm workers that went on strike in July of 2013 at Sakuma Bros. Berry Farm. They have since
Formed their own organization and continue to organize for fair wages in the fields and also oppose the federal guest worker program – h2a – which they believe is being used
To displace local experienced farm workers. Most of the members of Familias Unidas por la Justicia are indigenous people from Oaxaca and undocumented. Ramon works daily with entire families that have to deal with making a living while undocumented and also are trying to create a happy life for their children.
Tara Villalba – Raices Culturales Youth Project C2C
Tara leads the Raices Culturales Youth project at c2C. She develops programming that develop leadership within the Latino youth in Whatcom County.
As the key organizer with Latino youth Tara understand the intersection of race, class and gender when it comes to how local police agencies deal with enforcement of
Community policing responsibilities.
This event is a part of RETHINKING PRISONS MONTH – APRIL 2014. Thanks to our co-sponsors Fist Atevergreen, MEXA de Evergreen, EPIC – Evergreen Political Information Center, and Students for a Democratic Society.
2nd wave of hunger strikes begin at NWDC; report of suicide attempt; AFL-CIO supports vigil
For immediate release //
Contact: Jessica Ramirez (206) 617-5898
March 25, 2014
Second Wave of Hunger Strikes Begin at Northwest Detention Center
Tacoma WA – Immigrants held at the Northwest Detention Center are once again adding their voices to the mounting outcry for President Obama to stop deportations. Seeing little change in their conditions following the hunger strike that began on March 7th, about 70 people rejoined the hunger strike on Monday, March 24th. Hearing of others rejoining the strike, hunger strike leader Ramon Mendoza Pascual began eating after more than two weeks of fasting. Jesus Gaspar Navarro remains in isolation after 20 days on hunger strike.
When visiting with hunger strikers on Monday, attorney Angelica Chazaro learned of a suicide attempt in the facility that occurred around 9 a.m. that morning. A witness to the attempt who spoke to Chazaro described seeing a man hanging over a second floor railing with a sheet tied around his neck. The man was pulled back over the railing, and taken out of the facility on a stretcher. Detainees heard a helicopter leaving the facility shortly thereafter. The witness reported to Chazaro that guards informed him and other detainees that the man was still breathing, and that he was taken to the hospital. “This case underscores our deep concern at the treatment of those held in the detention center, as well as the importance of the hunger strike in bringing this treatment to light. The fact that this person was detained when he attempted suicide means that ICE and GEO Group officials hold some responsibility for his attempt,” Chazaro said.
On Sunday, Jeff Johnson, president of the Washington State Labor Council, and Tefere Gebre, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO, joined the daily presence outside the detention center to express their support for those held inside and add their voices to the growing outcry for the President to stop deportations. They vowed to help spread the word of this protest.
That same day GEO Group vans unloaded dozens of detained women into the detention center, while hunger strike supporters looked on through the chain link fence, chanting, “You are not alone!” Up to 200 people, mostly women, many of whom are seeking asylum, are transferred from the U.S.-Mexico border to the Northwest Detention Center each month.
Maru Mora Villalpando
Latino Advocacy
www.latinoadvocacy.org
206-251-6658
