Dear Casa
San Jose Amigos,
Welcome
back to our weekly message! Here’s
what’s new:
Your help is much needed:
To support the May
1 March for Immigrant Rights
(and following fiesta) – where we hope to see you all!
Phone bankers are needed the next two weeks to alert people
about this event – if you can help, and for more information about times and
places:
· For English speakers at Thomas Merton Center – please contact
Gabe at gabriel@thomasmertoncenter.org.
· For Spanish speakers at Casa San Jose – please contact Monica at monica@casasanjose.org.
Political action:
More good news: Monica Ruiz, our community organizer, continues to make
inroads with local legislators about bills in Harrisburg that attacks PA
immigrants and those who help them. Next
in line are Tony DeLuca (D – Penn Hills) and Harry Readshaw (D – South Hills) –
stay tuned for more information about rallies at their offices. The Post-Gazette recently covered efforts by Monica
and Gabe McMoreland from the Thomas Merton Center to advocate for our
community: “Ms. Ruiz is trying to make
sure quieter voices are heard, too. And her approach seems to be working.”
Make some great
posters to carry to the May 1 March! Express your creativity and have some fun with
fellow supporters at the Art Build poster-making sessions, with materials
donated by the Pittsburgh Center for Creative Reuse.
Place: Babyland (460 Melwood across from PGH
Filmmakers).
Wednesday - April 26th at
7PM
Sundays
·
April
16th from 1-5PM
·
April
23rd from 1-5PM
·
April
30th from 12-8PM
Saturday - April
22nd from 10:30-1:30PM, teaming up with OnePA and People's Climate march
Transit system to put immigrants at risk: The new Proof-of-Payment policy on public
transit that will go into effect this summer involves armed transit police
stopping people on the “T” to prove that they have paid their fare. This will
significantly impact undocumented immigrants, who are already terrorized at the
thought of being stopped by police for any reason. It is important to ensure
that Port Authority police are not armed, not cooperating with ICE and are
properly trained to prevent racial profiling. Fare evasion should be de-criminalized,
as was done successfully in San Francisco, where the consequences are more like
a parking ticket and don’t throw people into the criminal justice system. Please send Port Authority a message on their
Facebook page or attend
a public board meeting to express your concern before
this makes the lives of our families that much harder.
National action: Justice for
Immigrants, a growing network of Catholic
institutions, individuals, and other persons of goodwill in support of
immigration reform, has created resources for meetings or calls with US
Senators and Representatives home on their Easter Break. Here
you’ll find talking points on the BRIDGE Act, Executive Orders and a call to
refrain from Family Separation. (Find your elected
officials here.)
Still available - learn
to organize or help someone else learn: Consider attending
the Immigrant
and Refugee Rights Convening
in Harrisburg on May 7- 8, hosted by PICC, which will bring members of
immigrant and refugee communities, grassroots organizations, and advocates from
across the state together for training, networking and movement building. It is
open to anyone who cares about immigrant and refugee communities in PA and
wants to build a vibrant immigrant rights movement. Register and get information here.
Or, help fund someone else who wants to learn to expand immigrant
justice but can’t afford to go. The
funds will allow Casa San Jose and the Thomas Merton Center to cover travel
costs, registration and lodging for new organizers. Please donate here.
“Our Story” episode 5: “Visual Voices”
We were able to see how 10 of our
community’s kids, ages 9 – 16, expressed their hopes, dreams, and anxieties
last week through a poster-making session set up by Professor Jaime Booth from
the Univ. of Pittsburgh School of Social Work.
Latino immigrant youth and children of immigrants were inspired by lots
of art materials and good questions to portray their feelings and experiences
on paper. Concern and care for their families
came through as they showed a longing to earn money to buy their parents a
house, or to become an architect so their parents wouldn’t have to work so
hard. There were also, especially from
the older ones, pictures of drugs and violence in their home countries, where
they still have family and memories. And
there was plenty of evidence of the universal problems facing every regular
kid: annoying little sisters, too much
homework, and having to wake up early for school. A display of the finished posters called
“Visual Voices” was put on display at St Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church,
and will soon be available on our Facebook page.
More on our Rapid Response Team:
Last week we told of how the Team went into action in Cranberry, but you
may be curious as to how it was formed and how it works. There are many being formed all over the
country for this purpose, and Casa San Jose’s was created just this month. It consists of 2 Casa staff members, Monica
Ruiz and Jeimy Sanchez, as well as a community advocate who is a paralegal, and
a pro bono attorney who rotates with a pool of others. The process – which has
happened 3 times already - begins when a family member of someone who has been
taken by ICE calls someone at Casa San Jose (many have the number in their
phones.) The team mobilizes and arrives
at the house, where they attend to immediate needs like taking the children to
school or a place they can be safe, providing emotional support and comfort to
frantic relatives, and explaining what can be done. They then go to ICE’s Pittsburgh location on
the South Side, where only the lawyer is allowed to ask the following
questions: Do you have this person?
Where is he or she? Is there a bond for
this person? It is essential to be calm
and polite to the ICE personnel because they can refuse to cooperate at any
time. They then follow up on whatever
answers they receive – maybe needing to travel to York or Erie, finding funds
for bail, and contacting as many advocates as possible to speak up for the
immigrant’s release before he or she is transported out of the country.
Suggested in case you’d like to read more:
· ICE
detainees enter an unbelievably cruel system designed to make them disappear, from Slate Magazine
· Wilson’s
Way of the Cross – a personal account of a boy’s journey across Mexico and the
border, from the National Catholic Reporter.
· Children
of undocumented parents tell the Trump administration: You won’t break up our
families, from the American Immigration Council
Thank you for your
interest in this cause!
