PASADENA WEEKLY – http://www.pasadenaweekly.com/cms/story/detail/viva_la_raza_y_todos/9430/

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Viva la raza y todos! FROM LEFT:

Randy Jurado Ertll

Ramon Miramontes
Sole Terrame
Dr. Mark Rocha
Ann-Marie Villicana
Chief Philip Sanchez
Dr. Alexander Villicana

Viva la raza y todos!

Latino leaders find their places at the city’s political table

By André Coleman 11/11/2010

When Randy Ertll came to Pasadena in 2001 and began working for the Pasadena Unified School District as an assistant communications director, he was constantly looking around for the community’s Latino leaders. However, Ertll, now the executive director of El Centro de Accion Social, said he didn’t see many, primarily because Latinos during that time had no representative on the school board and almost no presence in the school district’s administrative offices — despite the fact that more than half the children in the district speak Spanish.
Things weren’t much better at City Hall. Prior to 2000, the City Council had no Latino representation and only one Latina — Ann-Marie Villicana — had served on the council, even though the city’s council district lines were redrawn in 1993 to encourage Latinos, which even then made up 27 percent of the city’s population, to get involved in the political process.
But after a troubling experience working for the district — one in which he was often ordered to chauffer district officials to the airport and elsewhere — Ertll decided instead to step up and lead, leaving the district to head El Centro.
“It was a trial by fire,” Ertll, a native of El Salvador, said of his time with PUSD. “I had to run faster and jump higher, and I wasn’t completely accepted because I have an accent. I had to work three times as hard as everyone else. I felt like I do more to give back to the community.”
But today, he said, “The plantation days are over.”
Ertll, an occasional columnist for this newspaper and author of “Hope in Times of Darkness: A Salvadoran American Experience,” an autobiography of his early life in war-torn El Salvador, left the district in 2005 and now directs the 40-year-old nonprofit organization dedicated to providing opportunities for low-income individuals and helping families in the San Gabriel Valley’s Spanish-speaking community.
The group, considered to be one of the strongest political forces in Pasadena, recently raised more than $70,000 in one night at a fundraiser attended by Assemblyman Anthony Portantino and state Sen. Carol Liu, both Democrats, and representatives from the office of Congressman Adam Schiff, also a Democrat.
But Ertll is not alone in understanding the need to fight for inclusion in local decision-making. Pasadena is filled with Latino leaders who have struggled for professional recognition throughout their careers, among them City Councilman Victor Gordo, Pasadena Police Chief Philip Sanchez, PUSD Superintendent Edwin Diaz, Pasadena City College President Mark Rocha, John Muir PTA President Sole Teramae and PUSD Board Member Ramon Miramontes.
For an idea of just how neglected the city’s Latino community has been over the years, the city unveiled its first memorial to a Latino citizen when legendary blind boxing coach Canto Robledo, whose boxing careers spanned decades beginning in the 1930s, was honored earlier this year with a wall relief in the Villa-Parke Community Center.
“The opportunities that have been created by the United States allow us to dream,” Chief Sanchez told the Weekly. When Sanchez replaced Bernard Melekian in August, he became the city’s first Latino chief of police.
“Yes, demographic issues and population shifts play a part in it as well, but the individual has to dream and has to want to do well,” Sanchez said. “The employer can’t want it more than the young Latin man or woman or any of our children. They have to want it more.”
The recent rise of Latino leadership has forced local African Americans to look at a similar situation involving political under-representation occurring in the city’s black community.
“We have not adequately prepared our own for being leaders or in government positions,” said NAACP Pasadena Branch President Joe Brown. “Our ethnic group did not mentor young persons coming through the ranks. When [former District 1 City Councilwoman] Joyce Streator left office, she did not even endorse [her replacement] Jacque Robinson or mentor her. [Former Board of Education member] Esteban Lizardo and Victor Gordo endorsed Miramontes. Latinos have stuck together and it has paid off politically.”
By the numbers
Unlike African-American political leadership, which was largely spurred by the civil rights movement, the rise of Latino leadership seems to be driven as much by demographic factors.
Already the largest minority group in California, Latinos are projected to comprise a majority of the state’s citizens in 2050, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. According to the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia, the purchasing power of California’s Latinos surpassed $250 billion in 2009. California’s 427,678 Latino-owned businesses had sales and receipts of $57 billion and employed 445,820 people in 2002, the last year the data is available, according to the US Census Bureau’s 2002 Survey of Business Owners.
Locally, Pasadena’s population — now a full 33 percent Latino — almost mirrors Southern California, itself 36.6 percent Latino, according to a 2008 American Community Survey.
“Ten years ago I was not active at all, but once my kids started school I decided I needed to take a more active role,” said Muir High PTA President Sole Teramae. “The leadership is still very small in numbers, and we have tried in the past to all meet together to talk about the issues. But so far we have not been able to come together. But the leadership is there — and it is growing.”
Currently, 11,528 — or 55.9 percent — of the district’s 20,826 students are Latino, according to the PUSD Web site. The district is now led by Diaz, whose middle school reforms helped lead the district to achieving higher test scores since his arrival in 2006.
“When I first started as principal and other leadership positions, I was well aware that I was one of the few Latinos in educational leadership and that I represented not only myself but also my culture,” said Diaz, who came to Pasadena from Gilroy, where he headed that community’s school district. “Knowing that, I had more motivation to do a good job, make a positive impact and really make a difference and inspire kids to realize their dreams.”
Over at the Pasadena Police Department, the number of Latino officers closely matches the city’s population, with 39 percent — 79 of the 241 sworn officers— working for the department. In fact, Cmdr. John Perez could be selected as the first Latino deputy chief early next year.
“Latinos are about one-third of the Pasadena population,” school board member Miramontes said. “We have hit a critical mass across the boards. We have decent numbers of an educated class with advanced degrees. It takes a while for people who entered into these entry levels to advance in their careers. How many years did it take Dr. Rocha or Chief Sanchez to advance? It’s taken awhile, but we have stood on the shoulders of the civil rights movement and the first immigrants.”
Looking back
While Miramontes and others were standing on those shoulders, the city was trying to get Latinos involved in the political process. In 1993 — after a special task force recommended the city redraw council district lines to encourage political participation — many were shocked when voters in the newly formed district voted overwhelmingly for Bill Crowfoot, a blonde Spanish-speaking attorney, over Joe Morales, who was also a lawyer. Although Morales is Latino, he did not speak Spanish, at least not nearly as well as Crowfoot, who spent his youth in Puerto Rico.
In 1996, Villicana was elected to serve from District 6, but she only served one term. In 2001, Gordo — who served as Crowfoot’s field representative — won the seat.
In 2005, Gordo was opposed by a Latina candidate, Herminia Ortiz, who had some good ideas but spoke no English and needed to use her daughters as interpreters throughout the campaign. In 2009, Gordo didn’t face any Latino opponents, but was challenged by political newcomer Tarince Tyler, an African American whom Gordo easily defeated. Last year, Gordon became the city’s first Latino vice mayor when he rotated into that largely ceremonial spot.
“I don’t attribute it at all to redistricting,” Gordo said of increased interest in politics. “I attribute it to an interest in public participation. Certainly there has been an increase in the Latino population in Pasadena and the general area. Both in the school district and community affairs, the Latino community is becoming more and more involved, and as a city we should encourage and applaud that. It’s important to have the opinion and the voice of all sectors. In Pasadena, one of the strengths of our community is the diversity, and we can build on that strength by being inclusive when it comes to policy and decision-making.”
In 2001, Esteban Lizardo was elected to the Board of Education and openly opposed the policies of unpopular Superintendent Percy Clark. Lizardo served as board president in 2008 and helped rehabilitate the board’s image, welcoming people put off by the board to meetings. Lizardo was the lone board voice against Measure TT, a $350-million facilities bond which passed and raised property taxes just as the economy was taking a dive. Lizardo did not seek re-election the following year.
Despite the monumental accomplishments of Gordo and Lizardo, the eight-member council and the seven-member school board are still primarily white, with only one Latino serving on each body.
Thus far, no Latinos have expressed intent to run in the March 8 City Council or Board of Education elections.
“Latinos are working hard, running businesses and taking care of their families,” said Villicana. “When I ran, I thought Pasadena was a blue-blood community through and through. I was shocked at how diverse it is across the board.”
Leaps and bounds
But as Latinos made strides in activism and politics, tensions grew between some in that community and African Americans, who struggled as demographic shifts depleted numbers in their neighborhoods and forced competition with Latinos for such things as jobs and services.
“African Americans historically have fought to get into those positions, and to get into those positions Latinos had to push African Americans or Caucasians out of the way, and they are not going to move the Caucasians,” said Fair Oaks Project Area Committee (PAC) Chair Ishmael Trone. “It’s changing the entire face of the city, especially when the Census numbers come out and we see the number of Latino students. They want a bigger place at the table and at the executive level, and I don’t mean that in a negative way. We need to sit at the table and discuss our commonality. This isn’t just a Pasadena issue; it’s a national issue. It’s not a Latino thing or an African-American thing; it’s a people thing. There are commonalities we need to discuss here.”
Ertll agreed, saying the two sides should discuss the issues and not be afraid to hold the feet of local leaders to the fire.
“We have to go beyond the perception of Latinos as servants or maids,” Ertll said. “I’d like to see more Latino candidates, but only if they are qualified. There needs to be responsibility with that leadership. We have to give back. If we were lucky enough to make it, we have to take care of the next generation. It is good we have Latino leaders, but we have to go beyond that and make positive changes for the greater good.”

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