 We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These words from the Declaration of Independence are familiar to many of us. And yet it took 143 years for women to get the right to vote, and 189 years for black people to get the right to vote. And still today, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are still only words for many people. Here in Boston, life expectancy varies by 30 years, depending on where you live. In Roxbury, with many poor and black people, life expectancy is 59 years. In the back bay, wealthy and mostly white life expectancy is 91 years. It's tough to have liberty when you are in prison. The United States incarcerates 716 people for every 100,000 people. Our rate of incarceration is more than five times higher than most countries in the world. Millions of people in our country don't have healthcare, a decent job, good education, a home they can afford, and that makes it pretty hard to pursue happiness. So on this show, you are going to meet people who are making it possible to have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. People today who are making the words of the Declaration of Independence come true. Hello. Our guest today is Edwin Argetta, an organizer with Jobs with Justice. How are you, Edwin? I'd like you to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself. I know you were born in El Salvador, and tell us a little about yourself and how you came here and a little bit more about your story. Sure. Thank you, Michael, for inviting me to your program. Sure. I'm glad to have been invited to this conversation because there's many of us that are doing this work on a daily basis. My colleagues need to be recognized. I'm an immigrant from a tiny country in Central America that endured 12 long years of a civil war. El Salvador. I came to the United States in 1992, essentially to meet my biological family, and I was able to finish high school in Cambridge at Cambridge Range in Latin, and from there I went on to study at UMass Boston. At UMass Boston, I took a class, a seminar, that essentially allowed me to put myself in the community. I was so lucky that two blocks from my house, there was this wonderful organization called Centro Presente, an organization that has been helping Central American refugees since the mid-80s until today, and that's where I got my feet wet when it comes to community organizing. How did you get interested in community organizing and organizing for justice? What led you to do that? Yeah, so it was an interesting story because I thought it was going to be an academic exercise for my class at UMass Boston, and it became an awakening, so to speak, because at the time there was a movement to create a path to immigration, to permanent immigration status for Salvadoran and Guatemalan refugees that have been part of a class action lawsuit against the Department of Justice, better known as the ABC case, the American Baptist Church case, and I went from being a volunteer in the ESL classes to being trained at the legal department to then become a part of the emerging national campaign for permanent residency for 250,000 families under this class action lawsuit, and so through this process, like I said, that itch of trying to get all the people together, trying to have conversations with people, trying to collectively look at the big picture, but still without a feat, in reality, just came about, and I learned from great mentors, I learned from the people that were affected, you know, the political asylum refugees, and so it became a great experience for me. I mean, I would always say that I was organized by my own community. And who would you say some of your mentors were? They, at the time, there was someone whose name is Oscar Chacon. Oh, yeah. He is now the Executive Director of Alianza Americas, a national, international actually, sort of immigrant rights, migrant rights organization. Formerly known as NALAC, based in Chicago, but, you know, they do a lot of policy advocacy on behalf of immigrants, and they do all kinds of trainings, analysis of legislation, of policy, et cetera, et cetera. And so Oscar was one of the brains behind the national campaign for a pathway to permanent residency for 250,000 families. There were also other folks who at the time, you know, were working and sort of taught me a great deal about the, you know, some of the basics, the elementary concept of organizing Juan Gonzalez, who was the Director of Community Organizing Gentlemen from Guatemala. He worked for a long time thereafter in Jamaica Plain, for one of the CDCs. I think he's now retired, but along the way, it made a lot of great people from other parts of this country. From California, I met the folks from the National Day Labor Organizing Network, Pablo Alvarado. He's a legend when it comes to organizing day labor workers, refugees, young people, et cetera. And I mean, it's a long list of people that I've been privileged to interact with and that I've learned a lot from. Janet Hueso, who taught me a lot about popular education methodology. She's now the Executive Director of United for a Fair Economy. And the list goes on and on. That's great. And what would you say are some of the lessons you've learned in your decades of organizing now? One of the things that stand out for you is what you've learned and what's important for other younger organizers to learn? I think that some of the essential things that I think are very useful to me over the course of many years. Patience with myself sometimes. And you know this, Michael, sometimes you want to go 100 miles per hour, but the folks that we're working with sometimes you have to take baby steps to bring them along with you. I think you have to develop your own instincts. Your gut always tells you, oh, this doesn't sound right. This strategy is probably not going to work here. Yes, it's fine. It worked in California, but this is not going to work here. Let's say we have to adjust it to our reality here in Boston. A lot of listening. I mean, the number one thing we all need to do is maybe do a 90% of listening and 10% of speaking. That is a very important lesson that I learned. And I think that for the most part now, I think what I would say to younger organizers is to be politically clear. There are many instances where we're promised many, many things and we take for granted those promises and the reality is that we should not take everything for granted that we should always organize and fight for the things that give dignity to our brothers and sisters, our neighbors, our family, ourselves. And that is very important because more often they're not, unfortunately, in the system that we have many times were used as political football. Entire communities are utilized as political football. And in order to get justice for some people, you have to oppress some other group of people and that is not social justice. So it's important to be politically clear and to always be patient and always understand that organizing is a process. Things don't happen overnight. Right. I know in terms of that process, one of the things that you have a vision for is developing a residential social justice training center where people can stay. And can you tell us a little bit more about that? What you envision and why you think it's so important now in this region? Sure. So long story is I've been affected by a very rare disease and I'm currently in rehab for physical therapy and occupational therapy. So I really have a lot of time on my hands and it has made me reflect a lot not only about me, what I would like to be, my legacy, but also the work of my fellow organizers, especially just for justice and a lot of the work that we've done. And I realize that we have very little, a few spaces where we can come together, strategize, and come up with executable plans based on reality, right? You know, a plan is only good if you're really great at executing a plan otherwise it's just a piece of paper where it works in it, right? And so the other thing is that, you know, we're living under very, very unprecedented times. And the fact is there's still a ton of people who believe in all the lies that they were told under the Trump administration. And so that's what we have to deal with in the foreseeable future. And when it comes to the community groups that we work with, whether you are a immigrant, whether you're someone who's fighting eviction, whether you're fighting for environmental justice, et cetera, et cetera, you go down the list, right? Very often when it comes to, hey, we need to have a retreat to fight this bad immigration bill or to come up with a plan to influence the state house for a more comprehensive eviction moratorium or why not? Very often we run into there's little, you know, there's few spaces available, they're very expensive and they don't give us the ability to live in community even at least for a weekend where we could actually break bread and get to know each other and learn about history and look forward, right? And sit and think of a common agenda or at least, you know, just get to know what are we working on. And I was fortunate and had been fortunate to participate in many trainings with, you know, for a fair economy at the Highlander Center in Tennessee, a historic place for organizers. You know, we've learned, you know, stories of how all the civil rights leaders, you know, learn about organizing, about advocacy, about fighting and it was very inspiring. It's a very, very sacred place in the mountains of Tennessee and I envision, you know, something similar to the Highlander Center somewhere in the Northeast. We really don't have much of that here and the more that we're able to build like that, I believe it's better for, you know, the kind of organizing that we are engaged in. And, you know, we deserve to have a place like that that is owned by our communities, that is led by, you know, indigenous black people of color, LGBTQ folks, et cetera. And so I have been able to attract other fellow organizers into this idea and I think, you know, for many of us, you know, that could be our legacy. I don't want to wait until I'm not longer here. I want to be able to make it happen while I'm alive and I want to be able to bring others along to this idea because I know that it will be beneficial literally to ourselves, right? But it will be beneficial to all the, you know, communities that we work with. I envision to have some sort of cooperative, you know, that harvest food for the participants of trainings and the, in this training center. If they're staying for a weekend, I envision to have a library, a research library for organizers. We need to learn our history. I could not stress that enough. You know, we need to learn about what happened to the Jewish community during the Holocaust. We need to know what happened to, you know, the African-American community during the civil rights, during the slavery, right? We need to know more of the history that were not thought in, you know, in the public schools. We need to know the root causes of migration. Why is there so many of us here from many different countries? And I think once we're, once we learn that, and we sort of have this common bond, I think that's one idea's surface. And we're able to articulate these ideas. I mean, there's been so many great campaigns that I've been a part of, and they have started in informal conversations at places like that, like the Highlanders. And then my hope is that in a decade or so, you know, we're able to say here, this is for all of us that are fighting for social justice. Right. You mentioned, you know, breaking bread at least for a weekend. But if you could paint a picture of what this center would look like, could you tell us a little bit more what it would look like when you got there? What would the buildings look like? You mentioned farms, you mentioned a library. Can you sort of paint us a picture of what you might envision? Yeah, I mean, I think that we need to have a state of the art buildings, you know, that are environmentally friendly. They also have sleeping quarters for the participants and people who come to visit the training center, whether it's for a weekend or they want to stay for a whole summer. Heck, we might even have programming for, you know, for young people who want to venture into organizing or doing something else, you know, that is a positive experience. I think that we'll need. How big you mentioned people staying there. What numbers are we talking about in your I mean, I'm talking about the ability to put up at least a hundred people, you know, for a weekend, for, I don't know, for a week, and maybe even a bigger number. I know that. And where do you envision it being? I don't mean exactly, but yeah, I mean, I think it's somewhere in the Northeast, preferably Massachusetts. I really love the idea of western mass or sort of the central Massachusetts area. I think that we need a big chunk of land to make that happen. Obviously, we need to do our work to fundraise for that. I think that we need to create a structure that sort of leaves, you know, this effort and manages, you know, the projects, you know, creating the buildings, you know, you know, creating the decision making protocols, you know, for who, you know, wants to use the space, who wants to stay in the space. I think that there are many opportunities to create cooperatives for folks who, you know, want to think about different economic models, you know, for their communities. I mean, one of the big, big problems that our people face is being so much in debt. It's like that's one of the huge barriers for owning a home, even going to college or university, or even going to a technical vocational school. It's hard today, especially under this health crisis, the pandemic, to think that, you know, you're going to be able to afford to do some of those things where you can even put food on the table. You cannot even pay, you know, for the bills, you know, for heating, for the heating in your house. And we should be able to think of something else that is sustainable, that actually works. And there's so many, so many great minds that are doing that out there right now, but they're lacking a set place, you know, to make it happen. And I think, I think my vision includes, you know, a lot of that. We definitely need, you know, to say thanks to those, you know, that have done this work before, you know, some healing space where we can regenerate charge batteries to and do all the things that we need to do when things don't go the way we want. And when we suffer from, you know, all the oppressive systemic entities that are, on a daily basis, you know, putting barriers for our community to make progress, to live a dignified life. And you mentioned breaking bread and staying overnight. Can you say something about why you think that being there, not just for an evening meeting or an afternoon meeting, why that's important that it's a longer period of time? You mentioned a weekend or a week or longer. So even before this whole four years of the Trump administration, I think some of us have been very clear that the question of race, number one, you know, has not been resolved in this country. Literally, that has not been resolved. And although many people would argue, oh, you know, Obama was the first black president, yeah, but I think it got worse when he became the president. I think white supremacy was just, just came out of the everywhere and became really active. I think number two, it's not just a question of, you know, black and white. I think it's the question of whiteness against everything else that is not understood, right? And to me, that has been always clear, has been always clear. But coming from, and I always say this, I think that if you ever have the opportunity to go outside your community, go to a different country, even go to a different city, do it. You need to get out of your own bubbles. And because we grow up with so much prejudice, we learn that by interacting with the media, by interacting with false information. And sometimes we learn it because we don't have the adequate education. And not just the formal education, but the informal education. And so it's important to learn and to testify things that we take for granted about other people. And I think that has been one of the greatest experiences for me as a human being to be able to learn how great it is for other people to speak another language. For you to try to learn their language, for them to try your own language, for you to try their food, for them to try your food. I am very proud of our culture, right? And I'm sure other people are very proud of their cultures. And so that mutual learning, it's when we realize that at the end of the day, we all want the same thing. We want to have a great family. We want to have a roof over our heads. We want to have a decent education. We want to have a good job. We want to be healthy. And we want to have a dignified way of living. And sometimes prejudice gets in our way. And it isn't until we live with people, we interact with people that are different than us, when we stop making assumptions and we realize the wild things, to begin to understand that sometimes, the many times being different, it's not necessarily a bad thing. It's a plus. And collectively, we make up the community that we want to have, right? That we want to live in. And so I think that's a really, really unique opportunity for us to learn, to learn a lot. And you're saying staying overnight and breaking bread with people, you're saying is a key part of that learning. That's really what's needed. The process. Yeah, it can't just be an evening meeting between 730 and 9 o'clock somewhere. Right. Right. No, I get that. No, thanks a lot. Do you have any other final thoughts? I don't know if there's a name for this center. I know you said somewhere in the country with a room for at least 100 people. Do you have any other thoughts about how this might work or? Well, one of the things that, yes, one of the, I don't, I haven't gotten that far yet in terms of thinking of a particular name, but I do think that one of the things that would make it attractive for the small community groups to be able to utilize such a space is the ability to bring to transport people from location to their location to the center. And so I envision to build a some sort of transportation cooperative where we, you know, work on vehicles that, I don't know, potentially can use environmentally friendly fuel, veggie oil, biofuels, I don't know, I'm not sure. I'm not an expert in those areas, but that is something that is a technology that's already available out there. There are people that are doing it in other parts of the country and why couldn't we do it here? And it would help bring people from downtown Boston to, you know, Western Mass over Mont or Maine, whatever, you know, the center and ends up you know, being constructed. But that just takes such a burden for organizations and organizers. Takes a lot of stress off of their play. Yeah. Okay, Edwin Argetta of Jobs with Justice. Thank you so much for joining us today and this center that you envision out in the country, wherever it'll be, and it'll be a place where people can get to and break bread and learn from each other. I think I couldn't agree with you more is really important. So we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men and women are created equal, but making it happen, I think is going to take a center that Edwin Argetta and others are envisioning now. So thank you very much for joining us, Edwin. We look forward to hearing more news about the center and we hope you and other people who are supporting it can come back soon and let us know what they can do to make this center a reality.