 Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Buenos dias. How are you? I seem like people are still waking up and still getting here this morning. But thank you for those of you who were here before 10 o'clock, for those of you who are with us with a lot of energy. My name is Graciela Sanchez and in a few minutes we'll go around and ask all of you to introduce yourselves. I'm in this very strange position because we are being filmed by a now cast. Is there anyone else from the media? Is that you over there? We are. Rebar reporting. Is that you, Graciela? Yes. Yes, Graciela. Amen. Okay, so anybody else from press? I'm not reporting this. Okay. Okay. So on behalf of the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center, on behalf of the Buena Mente of San Antonio, which is everyone around the circle, I hope, we welcome you to what is just the continuation of many conversations by the community to try to resolve the problems that we face daily, especially, I mean, the title of today is Take Back the City, Take Back our San Antonio. Esperanza is almost 30 years old and during that timeframe, we have found ourselves always resisting a lot of new policies and development in the city that comes from somewhere else, but it doesn't seem to be something that the community has asked for. And try as we may to resist as we educate each other about what the issues are. It's about East to Ridge pipeline coming in costing $3.4 billion. It's about all this decade of downtown where the downtown, you know, some of us remember was the downtown for everyone, that we shop there, that we played there, that it was ours, right? And now it seems like we've read today's paper, it's going to be for the techies only, or for the folks that are wealthy enough to live in townhomes or efficiencies. That started $1,000 for 400 square feet. That's not my family, that's not me personally, and I know it's not anyone here as well. But that development and all those changes are taking place and it was making those decisions. Esperanza, as I mentioned, has been part of the work, you know, we've come from the history of many, many, many, many people before us. We don't come to our consciousness, it's not for the fact that our aluevas, that our visa aluevas, taught us that and also existed. And so we're, you know, continuing to be present, to be, to say, you know, you can't do this to us, you know, this is our home, this has always been our home for hundreds and not thousands of years. Gianna will explain part of our timeline and power map and possible features in that step in a bit after we, again, introduce ourselves. But just remember, I mean, I, the last couple of issues in La Vos and we don't have any, we have some right here and some downstairs, but a couple of months ago it was all about Brackenridge and, you know, it was just a female that Madia Beniosava sent to some folks and suddenly it's, you know, there's several articles in La Vos and people respond because they're not, we're not happy about what's happening in Brackenridge part. The next issue incorporates concerns about the Alabama budget courts. We saw what happened with Victoria courts, what, 15, 20 years ago. La Vos was then known as an Anglo, low income housing that was both in the 40s, then becomes more brown and black as time goes on. The first of the historical public housing entities in the city that goes down and now it's Hema's view and it's, you know, if 10% of the people that live there are low income or affordable housing, that's about all. So what happened to those other 90% of the community? Where did they get this place to? And then we saw just recently Victoria, I mean, quickly courts and so we know that the Atlas and Apache courts are next. And so they, the San Antonio Housing Authority did apply and fortunately did not get the choice grant that they did get for the weekly courts. The part of our resistance is to do community consciousness raising, education, you know, and to love ourselves for being working class, for being whatever we are, you know, the diversity that we are, but people ultimately who work for justice, people who ultimately work for class. So I think I'll just end there and again, it didn't start in May around Bracken Ridge or talking about Atlas and Apache courts. You know, we've talked about the public space. In 2007 we saw our access to the streets denied because in 2006 tens of thousands of immigrants and migrants and supporters of, you know, of our migrant immigrant community said no to the policies in 2006. And so we never seen so many people march. But within months the city said, no, we don't want you all to march on the street. And suddenly we saw downtown Maine Plaza disappear and go to Maine Plaza Conservancy and then suddenly we couldn't access the Plaza like we used to and Travis Park. So it's all just a continuation, neoliberalist policies in this country. So let us know that today is not the beginning and it's not the end. We hope that this continues on because we need to work together for the solutions and together we win. We separate both of them apart because it's too much for any one person or any one organization to do this work. So, Janet, do you want to just have everybody introduce themselves? Should I just? Yeah. So, okay. Barbara, do you want to ask Barbara with how rural and neighborhood and the Janet to be candid commission on elderly affairs? And yeah, and just like Barbara, just kind of keep it short so that way we can go through and really get to the important. So, if you and who you are isn't important yet. That's just what's happening. Eddie Ecker, also the Department of Terrorist and Agenda. And they broke the case. They put a handle on it. And so, yeah, I'm getting out of what I could make an alliance and when I have to deal with it, I'm out. For a better or what, it's a little too much south of City Hall and coming down there. Oh. Thank you. My name is Regan. Are you? I live in Regan Hill. And they're already here. Eddie Ecker, I'm the Department of Terrorist and Agenda. Eddie Ecker, I'm the Department of Terrorist and Agenda. So, I'm from Polsky. I'm here to tell you about my year in Seattle. So, I'm just going to ask you a lot. My name is Steven. I'm a former U.S. president. I have a good social democratic opinion and I think I've seen things slightly different. I've already been running out of faith. I've been working so hard. I'm trying to make my home under each side and we are under the salt. I work for the great Epidocca Alliance but also I'm on board of the Tees to Campaign for the Environment. We recently started a campaign against corporate control of Uber and how they came into the city. My name is Rhett Smith, I'm an Industry 5. I'm Tony Elmora, and I live in the Carol Heights neighborhood. I'm also with the Faculty Association of Pearlsville College. Our students, families, the kind of part that we haven't known in a year. My name is Kady Sarko, and my family for the past seven generations has been targeted by the so-called urban renewal projects that have developed over actually the centuries because, like I say, it's been seven generations of the past. How about the corporate interest that you like? The idea that Amy was built by my grandfather in 1928, and I think this had a story building, but it just wasn't designated that or a city. But because the city council decided that he was going to, well actually we've got a ride, but we couldn't do it. But in any case, it was demolished in 2002. The Esperanza was one of the groups that joined forces, and I have to tell you, it's been very disappointing to me to see how the process has been so degraded. We lost the case obviously, but at least there was a process. And now with the degradation of our rights, you can't even speak up anymore. They cut you up with an open mouth. So the media too has been very relaxed in really telling the whole story. So that's really something very concerning to me because you can't even start a black thing. They cut it off for me. Here we go. Thank you. Denise Stalker from West Ford, a little three and a half street neighborhood about a half mile north of Pearl. Chuck. My name's Amalia Valdes, and I'm a Buenos Aires staff here at Esperanza. Obviously I'm near up in Laredo, but we're seeing near the Casiano Park, which is one of the oldest parks and it has not been touched as far as getting better. We just had a linear trail opening and a ceremonial there, and we weren't really a part of us talking about the ceremony, but yeah. So I'm involved in that, and I'm a person here at Esperanza. My name's Natalie Rodriguez, and I'm an intern here at Esperanza. My name is Lauren Ferris, and I live in Tobin Hill. My name is Jant Olson, and I'm on the board of the Esperanza. My name is Eduardo de Juarez. I'm a civil rights attorney for the federal government. I'm born and raised on the west side in Prospect Hill. I presently am a little niner, but I've always been on the west side of my heart. My name is Mary McGuire. I've been a sociology professor at the University for the last 23 years, and in my retirement I'm working hard on the Agua Viva Coalition and water issues. Jim Spicker, my main interests are homelessness and affordable housing, with a side interest in actually having the city pay attention to data when they make decisions. Hi, my name is Andy Flores. I'm from the Hotel Union College here, and right now we're working on something around Tender Park, and now we're putting the hotel in Tender Park. I'm Francesca, and I'm an intern here tonight. I'm Ramona Rivera. I work at Kono 101 on the radio station and do a community calendar where this was posted on, and that's how I actually found out about it. I live in District 5, and there's something bottom one against the city. They were trying to build three urban loss, 200 feet from my house, and the legal size letter had a very small portion in Spanish. Most of my neighbors don't even know what it says, so I did the old-fashioned thing and went knocking door to door. I have been gone for 10 years from my neighborhood. I was living in California. I've just been there about a year now. Seeing the transformation, I love some of it. It's one that I don't. So when I went to my neighborhood and I was like, hey, Tenochita, come in. So I had the coffee and water in everybody's house caught up and then by the signatures turned out, the applicant pulled the application, so we won that battle. They called me to join the bar for my wedding. I'll take that all day. And I have my son with me and Nathaniel, the Superman fan in the back. It's because of him that I'm doing this, and they haven't helped me research all the time. The taxes that they're growing up, growing up, growing up, they're seven, they're four, and they're $3,000 a year for them. This is what you're going to have to pay in 10 years when you're out of college paying loans. So me and you need to get on this together. So we use here to observe and watch how black-minded people can do things together and hopefully have some real wins on our side. Yeah, you say your name. I'm from Spicewood, which is up the road near Marble Falls. I'm involved with Miagwa Niveda, Interheia Mia, Green Party. I mean, there's just a whole slew of organizations that I've been involved with here for the last decade or less. I'm an anthropologist, and I'm directly involved with the creation of a new medical school that's supposed to be community-based at the University of Incarnate Word. I'm Joe Boccosti. I'm there studying various issues and I came here to learn about the issues and find out what other people had to say about them. My name is Al Campbell. I came here from New Orleans with Katrina. I just bought a house last year because I just decided after about 14 years that I'm going to stay here in San Antonio. But I've been involved with a lot of initiatives that deal with poverty and the impact of poverty upon people in the East Side Promise neighborhood. I don't know if you're familiar with that. A $30 million grant through United Way who manages that grant to help people rise up out of poverty. I live in the Coliseum Willow Park area. I don't know if you know where that is by the AT&T Center. I'm buying a house that I bought last year and my monthly house payment is less than half that people pay to rent in that same neighborhood. When we talk about affordable housing and we talk about economic disparities my neighborhood property is being consumed almost as soon as it comes on the market. And it's one of those strange dichotomies in that if you have money and you can buy property and invest it seems logical to do so. But at the same time for people who are suffering economically where they could pay and rent what I pay for a house note they could really add some stability to their lives. The other part of this aspect is I've been involved with poverty issues is that we continue to teach everybody that to panacea to poverty is getting a good education and getting a good job that pays good money. That is the main reason that poverty exists because we are participating in the economic disparities that exist in our society because of our goal of success and that is having money and having things and being recognized as somebody. My position is when we teach, when we learn how to develop and maintain healthy relationships between and amongst ourselves and we pass this knowledge, skill, ability and willingness to do so to our children issues that we face now they will face fewer of them because we care about each other and that's what's missing. Good morning my name is Mike Sanchez I think of myself as an opposed worker but today I came as an observer. I'm Phyllis Sanchez, I'm here with my husband Sam invited by my brother-in-law Mike Mike's been very involved and he invited us and I came to learn and observe but my particular interest is in the homelessness among people recovering addicts or people with addiction problems or people who have committed crimes and paid their dues to society and cannot get housing because they have records or addiction problems and remain homeless and become in the cycle of crime and addiction and crime and addiction because I have that in my very household and my family members do not seem to find a way out of that cycle and I never thought we would be faced with that I mean my family members grew up in middle class America and have found themselves in circumstances that they can't get out of because of this housing issue. We are some of the homeless, domestic us and we're neighbors there on the east side so yes poverty and workers that are not recognized and maintaining workers in poverty by paying on poverty wages is a tremendous problem and housing of course all these women that are working real hard and continue to stay in poverty and it's just a pit that they cannot get out of and we need to do something about it so yes I'm working towards those goals but domestic us and we do That's an outcast and you can read your name Hi, I'm Jay, I'm just entering an outcast with me Jeremy Cash, I'm also going to turn You didn't give your name Let's read out your name Back there Okay, that's my husband's house Hi everyone, my name is Jenna and I'm done and I am the staff here at Esperanza and I'm from the west side of San Antonio and so what we're going to be doing next is we're going, as you look around you see we sort of have the beginnings of the timeline and so we wanted to focus on the bulk of today of really kind of going back into the history of San Antonio and Texas and looking at like how this development and how this corporate takeover of our space and how public spaces have been privatized throughout our history because oftentimes we hear oh well this is new or like when we're especially around what's happening recently around Bracken Manager if it's around something else it's like this is new this is something new we have to stop it now it's like well it's been happening and then also we also wanted to look at the history of resistance and what people have been doing historically to kind of stop it because we know that that's whenever there's been oppression there's also been resistance so we're going to spend about 15 minutes we're going to get you all some markers the purple markers or dark colored marker is going to be what you can remember of something that happened even in Texas it could even be nationally if it was an event if it was a person who did something if it was that you think it sort of related to displacement if it's related to developers and corporations having all this power or the red is going to be resistance so if you can think of an event or a person or a movement or something that was a way to kind of combat what's been happening so we only have a few markers so you all can share you can talk but try to keep the red markers at least for resistance so that we can kind of share like Charlotte Ann from Nowcast was here yesterday she made sure to say the founding of Nowcast as a way of resistance and we appreciated that Nowcast is filming today and has been present at the Breckenridge meetings and if they hadn't been there there would have been no recording because the city itself did not record those proceedings so I'll make sure I put 1987 as the answer created so things like that when I'm tonight here so if you all jump up and have markers we'll spend 15 minutes doing that and maybe I don't know later on you can say a little bit about the importance of history I'm not sure if you're right I'm not sure I'm not sure just a minute just some of the stuff that John said but also we'll have some time that if people want to really speak to something and really expand on something we're also going to do that what we think of the first like native people indigenous people migrated it's because it means land to sacred waters it might have been named other things also we do not know that and so that's 11,000 years ago and then we have 1492 so I don't know if Antonia what if you want to kind of speak to colonization and from my perspective as an historian is that we are living we still live the structures and the legacies of colonialism or imperialism we stand at that and how in each era that we are concerned with those structures and those inequalities keep being reproduced in a whole variety of ways and structures and where our communities that we are from that we are concerned about where we fit and to say well that was in the past and it doesn't matter it doesn't matter it doesn't mean it was like a violence of displacement of oppression of enslavement and we can go on and on and finally the only other thing that I would say is that San Antonio has a distinction of being one of the one of has the distinction of being a holding on the first place of cities in the United States with the greatest economic disparity and so it begins there and that is one of the main concerns so for me it's important that we maintain a historical perspective huge part of it so colonialism then reflects the conflict that already existed in the European continent between the Mediterranean cultures Spain, Portugal and ultimately Liberia and the northern of the trans-Albacan cultures that conflict that we've known for at least a thousand years prior to that in fact much longer what I don't see being spoken here is that the indigenous people that were here before the Europeans came here were also in conflict with one another over land, water you know food property rights ownership whatever you call it for example in the American south-west we've seen a web of people everybody looks to them as a spiritual center for indigenous people at least the western part of this country but they were in constant conflict in conflict with a different group that were down in central Mexico they have a different spiritual center and they were in conflict with each other just like the modern day conflict between partisans and Arabs let me just interfere very quickly yes but those historical conflicts with those communities and those people got shifted, changed and totally warped by colonialism and we are the product of colonialism and imperialism so not to disregard what you have said but what the reality that we live is not the most previous indigenous gay conflicts and wars but the consequences of western European colonialism and its collaboration we also at some point have to deal with our own contradictions I just wanted to comment on that so I guess we're going to we can move on but just so that we can get to the present time so I know we can spend a lot of time here which is good, this is very good and then also just keep in mind which word yeah just yes cool so then we move on we said San Antonio we have put here a name or you can say renamed San Antonio this was by the Spanish in 1697 and you have it it continues with the history of colonialism some of quite you know imperialism socialism soldiers militarism we're moving on to US immigrants or if I was the US more settlers more fighting battle out yeah sorry sorry sorry I'm sorry thank you thank you okay so I put fighting so US immigrants reached the settlement of San Antonio in 1925 18 1825 this is that name then we put more this is like the official fighting over the that has blend we have about Elmell 1936 1836 I'm sorry I don't know why I keep saying that you're such a kid 1836 then this was before 18 18 18 okay then you have the end of the you have the Republic of Texas somewhere sorry over here you have the end of the Republic of Texas is not probably the Union United States then you have the tree at the water festival more people if anyone wants to speak to that 1848 1848 okay someone out of this 1910 Bishop Shaw early founded early need war little bit of church and school and that was in response to the influx of citizens that came in from Mexico because of all the turmoil that was going on in Mexico so they were coming in they started settling the west side because that's where they settled some people that had money I believe couldn't settle anywhere else because of segregation so that's why they were coming to the west side when you was there in the very 1910 hundreds the church was established in 1910 which church already was a very well-known church and it also it was 1912 the Walupe sorry can't say this the Walupeanan Society there in the church what was interesting to me is to find out that it was originally founded with the intention to develop leaders among the women they're rarely surviving but they're still around yeah okay so 1928 someone added the city of Austin master plan and then the construction of I-35 sure but yeah I'm not sure of the year I think it was the late 20s but city of Austin this is I guess one of the early manifestations of institutionalized segregation in the city of Austin I went to school in Austin so heard a lot about this highway and the history behind it and it's a really big dividing line in the city of Austin see the east side was kind of left for Latino communities and in Austin it was very underdeveloped not a lot of economic opportunity on that side of town and everyone every communities of color were forced out of the city and forced to develop that side on their own and this driving up in that highway is a constant reminder and you still see that very quickly let me start the 1930s somebody put the topic of worker movement and someone also put my family supported in 1936 so if anyone wrote that one in to speak to them in the 30s there was a depression many times as the economic downturn they turned against the immigrant they're taking their jobs and that's why we're in such dire straits so a lot of families were uprooted and deported and my family was uprooted even though my grandmother was a US citizen my mother a US citizen but she was married to a undocumented man my grandmother so when he was deported I mean what's a woman with children going to do she's going to go with her husband or we have the situation that exists now with many families being torn apart so my mother a US citizen raised in Mexico refused us to this day to speak a word of English even though she's a US citizen okay if somebody's talking to her in English she will ask her name for her so that's resistance okay but we do need to see that these things have happened in the past and they're happening now thank you well and then so very quick two things the river walk construction begins I wasn't too sure if it actually began and the administrator was the idea of beginning the construction in the river walk well there's the 1921 flood that's not here and so part of the you know vision was for then just to cover it up and basically the conservation society the sanitary conservation society has its roots there and they saved the river after the 1921 flood and this is you know WPA money I don't know and raised so Roosevelt putting people back to work and those monies come in to develop the river walk and lots of the beautiful bridges that we see up on Tampere or Roosevelt and places like that and the post office downtown so unlike the Obama use of monies at least it seems like Roosevelt put a lot of people back to work and we're still living with that beauty and I had read the other day that Jack Jack White there was someone who was one of the managers of a hotel and they wanted to try to begin the construction of the river walk so even like back in the days it was then the hotels and the big businesses that were like we need this development but Emma and the and the and Weber and Union CIO is basically starting up in the country right so the AFL the CIO part of it is organizing here and the Communist Party is organizing in San Antonio and Emma the Neuga a 17, 18, 19, 20 something year old in all those years organizes with other women especially to have at that point in my opinion the largest marches in the 20th century so again we're talking about 8 to 10,000 women strong with the men around but it was woman led and they were out there and they got arrested and they were again struggling for paying or they were getting paid six or seven cents a pound and then they were used to like four and five cents a pound and they could actually have gone the factory it was already met how? recognize recognize but it was cheaper to get the women's labor rather than using and buying all the machinery so the women demonstrated march and we also have Maury Maverick at the moment also supporting her voice and the voice of all these labor activists and you know he doesn't go down industry as a good guy because he's supporting these reds and the communists we're going to keep on moving just again if you've spoken once we're going to let other people speak first so Pat we're going to we've already heard your voice and I know you have my cell okay I'm sorry I could sit here quiet okay I'm sorry I thought you had I mean so I wanted to add something to it that was actually the seed that's the conch shell it led to hearings on the minimum wage starting here let me part of 1939 yeah 1939 Apache force built then you put someone added sorry what is I don't know I also inaugurated a 7% mission under Mexican market to raise funds for whoever wrote I did it okay that's right I wrote that because my grandmother moved into the San Francisco mission in 46 into the wild what she called the Mexican market out there she and Archbishop Lucy decided to he had come from California and they started charging for entrance into the mission to try to protect them because it had dilapidated church also so they worked together and that's where so then the conservation society needed money they owned a granary at the time and the part between the granary and the cut through to the mill the church included and then they moved it down to in the 48 down to allow me to to make money for all of this preservation San Antonio someone also took the year that their father built their house on 510 Elvin street in 1934 Eda Eda street Eda so they got from the destroying San Jose Mission House right Roosevelt was supposed to be taken all the walls out that everybody's so happy about right now and that was developers including Zachary et cetera and they stopped them from doing that and now Roosevelt is going to go straight to parallel primaries in the ninth late late they were that's the first subject it was to clear that constitutional prior to that all of the farmers why are we why are we why are we prior to around 1941 then we go to the fifties 1952 I was on the put up here so it's earlier yeah it was in the thirties we have all the urban renewal projects and first the first project I found a building school does who wrote this I'm sorry I have a terrible one in that okay so the war ends in 1945 World War II President Eisenhower was the commander of all the farmers and he saw how good the German autobahn was how quickly they were able the Germans were able to get supplies to the pros so because he entered the White House I believe in 1952 he instituted the highway program across the country the very first highway that I believe came to San Antonio had an economic marriage I mean not even half we just cut it basically you can drive by it right now and it's right in front of the front board of the church what that did is not only did it give part of the people to Guadalupe churches they did the same in Guadalupe there was another church parish I can't remember but the end result of that was that it was the beginning of the urban renewal projects across the country now it didn't happen in San Antonio the 40s went urban because it was illegal in the state of Texas to confiscate anybody's property and put in the eminent domain and they instituted an into the state of Texas constitution so that they could come into San Antonio and bulldoze my neighborhood 500 buildings perfectly neighborhood I've gone to the city records and it's written as prostitution and it was a derelict and urban and it was appalling because my mother who's still alive and God 94 years tells me it was a beautiful neighborhood and there were poor people but everybody it was very it seemed very hard working and the way the city wrote it because it was so horrible that they had to bulldoze some of the buildings the only thing they left was the church so that was the beginning and if you read my church that was an Italian neighborhood then they went to the German church you know the church right by the river center that was the German neighborhood bulldoze that and then the last of the big families was the one around heaven's fair and those were Polish so all of those were systematically raised one after the other and a lot of these I mean if you go by the part of the neighborhood there's nothing there it's like still you can hear a poon drop except for the highway and it's because they destroyed the economy there the neighborhood it's driving and there were my mother says well there was a sanitary factory which was by the way the first mechanized country they had cleaners they had a hospital a women's hospital they had in fact there were so many women dying in childhood they instituted an orphanage there I mean there were just things going on in the community that were very vibrant and contributing to the community the city bulldoze and from there on it hasn't stopped so now they call it economic development they call it so I just right now I just want to raise hands to do so comfortable with that but I know there's some folks that here may have either been younger or maybe their families were displaced because of a renewal so if anyone was displaced they're having families the drought impacts it moved people from farms to 35 built splitting the south side from the west side of San Antonio they also put Elmo Cakes here born in 13 junior that movement so Bright's movement 1963 Kennedy was assassinated 1966 yes sure so as a young child I remember Bryce and they grew my family a portrait of course the president of his wife and I don't remember this something to us as a Democrat at least for them I try to write something for something but nothing that stood up on my mind was Kennedy being assassinated and then being able to see it afterwards and how it affected at least the community thank you so if I 1966 farm worker strike marched to Austin start of sorry do you start with a Chicano move Chicano oh sure I'm not saying that nothing happened before 1966 but I think the Chicano was one of them we were kind of asleep and so after the farm worker strike in March that came to San Antonio in 1966 and went on to Austin very kindly he just pissed us all off because he wouldn't meet with a proprospective after they had walked almost 500 miles he met him and he grumbled and he said no father is going to Austin because I'm going to be there and so he just pissed everybody off and when they got to Austin there were 10,000 people there waiting for them and finished in March after 1966 you had Russell and the boy in us showed up with all kinds of groups and organizations that started after 1966 a valuable end filled with a lot of things and I'm not saying we did everything but it kind of sparked people's attention about where the Chicanos were on the issues that were affecting Houston and by the way all of you have a flyer we're going to have a 50th anniversary celebration here on Labor Day for that it's 50 years it's a few surviving farm workers God bless their souls today the walk is strong they had nothing going for them in 1966 there were no food said there was nothing and they took a risk that they lost their jobs with their employers by going on this Friday and then when nobody was listening to them they said let's march and let's take people in this city of Texas to know what's going on down here on the border