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Phoenix, Arizona – BARRIOZONA: How does Salvador Reza begins to become involved in the labor’s scene of Phoenix,
Arizona?
SALVADOR REZA: Here in Arizona I have been involved specifically in the rights of people. In May 1992, we passed
through Arizona in the Peace and Dignity Journeys run. The run departed from Alaska toward Mexico City —and to
Teotihuacan. I was participating and started running in San Bernardino, California, in a “tributary route” that joined with the
main Peace and Dignity route. When we crossed through Arizona, I perceived that there is much energy in this land; there
is a strength emanating from the land itself, from nature, but also from the Indigenous Peoples. That is what especially
attracted me here, not so much the abuses against our people, those are everywhere. I decided to stay here, joined the
organization Tonatierra, and continued to do the same I used to do in California, but now from a deeper perspective,
rooted in the indigenous principles.
BARRIOZONA: What is your main motivation in the work you do?
SALVADOR REZA: Well, for me the main motivation —and it didn’t begin this way— is that I have been always involved
against injustice since I arrived to the United States, since in my first school recess at a school in Ysleta, Texas, I was
swatted three times with a wooden board for speaking Spanish. Since then I have it in my inner being: that what’s going
on is not fair. But what motivates me deeply is to see that we don’t understand things in a deeper way, our memory has
been stolen from us. For example, there is many people struggling to obtain an immigration reform without seeing that in
reality —just like as we are now flying in the airplane and you look below— there are no markings on the mother Earth;
there are markings like the rivers, the seas, but no markings drawn by men. Therefore, we have to understand that in
reality we are struggling for the freedom to travel throughout our mother The Earth without having barriers, because in the
same way birds like the swallows migrate from North to South and South to North, we’ve done the same for thousands of
years, and due to the fact that some sick minds invented nationalism, we are told that a nation begins here and another
ends. In reality, they have forgotten that we have our natural Peoples that live in harmony with the land, where we have
been for time immemorial. We are descendants of these Peoples, and that is something that is never spoken nor
mentioned in demonstrations and rallies, and if you talk about it or you want to say something about it, the pro-migrant
leaders tell you, “no, don’t talk about that, that is something from the past, it doesn’t have anything to do with this,” when in
reality it is the root of everything. Since the Papal Bull Inter Caetera was proclaimed (in 1493), in which indigenous virgin
lands were granted to European countries, Europeans brought their emergent nationalism, even though most of them
were under feudalism there was an emergent nationalism, and they imposed it here. So all this motivates me, but more
than anything, you cannot be just fighting for political ends, you have to go deeper than that.
BARRIOZONA: Once you were established in the city of Phoenix, what was the first set of issues you faced, and how a
more specific work began?
SALVADOR REZA: More exactly, the problems began when we started receiving complaints from the people, for example,
from the school Marcos de Niza, in Tempe, Arizona, following orders from the Superintendent, the school began
requesting legal documents to the people, when in reality, that is protected under Plyler vs. Doe Supreme Court Decision,
legal documentation cannot be requested from the children by school districts; they cannot interfere with the education of
young people and children. So we went to see the Superintendent of the Tempe School District, and the first time we
spoke with him, he laughed at us —more precisely, he treated us vulgarly and in a bad manner. He told us “get out of my
office, and don’t want to see you here, blah, blah, blah.” The next day we brought the media to him and had a press
conference in front of the school with the parents of the children and the youth. We denounced the violations of the U.S.
law. With this, the Superintendent began to check with his lawyers; they told him that he was messing things up, and
within 24 hours he reversed everything, let the young people come to school, and dismissed the practice of requesting
legal documents to the students. Until this date, I believe that is the only thing they have not violated in Arizona, because
they have violated everything else, including superior education, and also adult education; people cannot enroll in them
without legal documents. What happened in Marcos de Niza was one of the first things we did at the political level. At
another level, the spiritual level, it was beginning to participate in ceremonies with the Dineh, (Navajos), the Lakota, very
hard ceremonies, like the “Sun Dance”; it teaches us who we are in relation to the four elements, where we come from.
Ceremonies give us clarity and strength to continue moving ahead, because if we just go along with politics, we don’t get
anywhere.
BARRIOZONA: What were the issues that came after the situation at the Marcos de Niza School?
SALVADOR REZA: Well, many, small issues, but one that began and made the anti-immigrant wave stronger was when
driver licenses were denied to undocumented, in the eighties and the early nineties anybody could get a driver license, but
the law that allowed driver licenses changed. Tonatierra organized some protests against that, in one of these protests
Don Pedrito attended —Don Pedro F. Ruiz is an elderly man who is in his nineties. His daughter was an Arizona MVD’s
Supervisor. I saw him unsure about what to do, since his daughter was there representing the State. But given that he is a
veteran movement organizer —he walked with Cesar Chavez and also was a union organizer in Mexico— he did the right
thing and protested against that law, despite the fact his daughter was the one who had to represent Motor Vehicles. It
sometimes reaches that level when you are committed to social change; one family member is on one side and another
member in the other. Unfortunately, however, the driver license law passed and is enforced even today. Some Arizona
legislators submit a new bill yearly to permit licenses for undocumented drivers, but they know nothing is going to happen;
they do it just for public consumption, because they have neither the votes nor the support. We were some of the first ones
that began protesting against the driver license law. After that, an attack came against street taco vendors, when they were
going to sweep away every street taco vendor from the city of Phoenix, supposedly because their business were
contaminating the environment, they were dirty, and were attracting drug addiction. Every evil in the city of Phoenix was
attributed to the street taco vendors. An administrator interpreted a law applicable to carnivals and applied it to Taco
Vendors; his interpretation stated that taco vendors couldn’t be more than four days in on a single place; in other words,
every three months they could be only four days in the same place, when some of them have been there for ten years.
Street vendors didn’t even know they were going to “cut their heads,” until, by mere coincidence, I read about it in The
Arizona Republic. When I read the article, I became very angry —rather because I love tacos, to begin with— but also
because of the injustice. That same day I visited three or four taco street vendors. I went to their food trucks and asked
them if they knew about the plans to eliminate them from the streets, but they didn’t. I showed them the newspaper’s
article, told them what was happening, and asked them if they wanted to have an emergency meeting. They agreed, and
about sixty people showed up at the Tonatierra’s headquarters. I informed them what was going on and asked them if they
wanted to fight it; they said yes. The next day I invited Stephen Montoya right away, he’s the Phoenix attorney who won the
case regarding the INS roundups at the city of Chandler (in 1997). He came and informed us that, legally, the City of
Phoenix could do what they were doing, but that politically we could win the case —which I knew—, so then he suggested
us to talk to several people who told him they could help us. I told him, “no, what we need is that you support us legally,
and we take care of the political aspect,” because I didn’t want others to manipulate us as they always do. Then we went
and submitted and appeal on the last hour of the last day before the City ordinance was to be implemented, so we
appealed it to the City of Phoenix Board of Adjustment. When an appeal happens, it generally takes from one month and a
half to two months to have a hearing. At that time, the neighborhood associations —that in reality were Donna Neill and
Paul Barnes, the same racists we have today— were in charge of the neighborhoods, so we took people to their
meetings. They were only ten of them and we would take sixty to seventy street taco vendors. In one meeting Tupac
Enrique Acosta (from Tonatierra) suggested to them to have talks only between street taco vendors and neighborhoods to
see how we could work together, and to leave the City aside. They came to a meeting, about ten or twelve of them; the
racists didn’t return, only a work team of about four stayed, then later it was reduced to only two —Alma Williams and Paul
Barnes. For a year and a half we negotiated the ordinance, and finally we reached some agreements that we submitted
together to the City, and the City approved what is in effect until this date; the Mobile Vending Ordinance. When the people
from the City of Phoenix asked me how many people we were expecting to attend the last meeting where the ordinance
was going to be approved or disapproved, I told them that about one thousand. They wouldn’t believe me, but more than a
thousand showed up; we filled both of the sides of the meeting room. To me, as I saw it, street taco vendors —without
them even knowing— are organized the same way the Calpullis were organized, because they are organized in families,
and a single food truck puts food on the table for about six families, among cousins, uncles, whatever; among them, each
Mexican family has about ten to fifteen members, so just with what I had accounted for, let’s say that each food truck was
going to bring 60 people each, and there were about 70 to 80 trucks, I figured that about a thousand people were coming
easily. The nicest of all things was that the women came with their children. The ladies would tell me: “I can’t come
because I am still breastfeeding my baby.” So I would tell them, don’t worry, bring your baby, breastfeed him right there, in
front of the City Council people; when they look at you, start feeding your child.” So the people at the City Council didn’t
know what to do. At the end, things like that changed the Council’s minds, because they could see the street taco vendors
were indeed families, so that changed the relationship with them. Besides that, the City government looked good on both
sides. That was a very interesting struggle. After that one, the struggle of day labor workers on the streets arose, and they
asked us to help them too. I wanted to see what was happening at the north side of the city, so we became organized
once again to the point in which they permitted the worker center at the Macehualli Day Labor Center. I would tell the City
Council and staff not to become involved, to just give us the permit, but they wanted to have the control, which they later
regretted, because the racist anti-migrant crowd sprang on them. Right now, the Day Labor Center is very useful to the City
and Palomino neighborhood, but politically they don’t want to be linked to it, because they see the work center ties as
harmful to their political aspirations due to the anti-immigrant wave that we are witnessing.
Copyright © 2007 Hispanic Institute of Social Issues
Grassroots Journalism
www.barriozona.com
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PART I - Barriozona Magazine interviews the man who has organized day laborers, taco vendors and
fights to defend the rights of immigrants in Phoenix, Arizona.
By Eduardo Barraza
BARRIOZONA
June 16, 2007
Salvador Reza: Organizer From the Root