02
Dec
2012
Why I give to Puente: Ruth Shavel’s donation addiction
‘Ruth Shavel, volunteer’ is a permanent nametag for Shavel. So much so that when she started collecting donated items for Puente schoolchildren, she didn’t even need to be told how to sort everything.
You might even say she’s addicted to giving.
Shavel, a Redwood City resident, has been volunteering since she was a teenager, putting trays on donuts to serve to injured World War II veterans with the Red Cross in Palo Alto.
“You had to be 16 to volunteer but I wasn’t – I was 14. I had to stay in the kitchen because I wasn’t supposed to be there,” says Shavel.
Later on, Shavel’s local school district benefited from her efforts as a volunteer both inside her children’s classrooms and as volunteer coordinator for the entire school district. Then she spent 15 years volunteering with Samaritan House of San Mateo, feeding homeless people.
So when a friend introduced Shavel to Puente last year, it was only natural that Shavel immediately decided to launch an all-out donation campaign to help collect school supplies for local students. She approached her local gym, a Curves franchise, about gathering the supplies. And a few months later, she showed up in Pescadero with an entire trunkful of paper, pencils, water bottles, calculators, crayons, folders, reusable lunch bags and backpacks.
“I took the car and we filled the whole trunk. You couldn’t have gotten a toothpick in there. It was wonderful,” declares Shavel.
She hasn’t stopped there. Shavel now has another drive going for donated adult essentials – towels, soap bars, toothbrushes, jackets and the like, which Puente always keeps in stock to deliver to clients.
Puente needs your help this holiday season! Please see our wish list for children’s Christmas stocking-stuffers as well as gift bags for farm and nursery workers. New this year, Puente is raising $7,000 via a special campaign drive on Rally.org to give South Coast parents a gift card that will allow them to shop for their children.
“I think Puente is so far ahead of the other agencies I started with,” says Shavel. “They have a lot going on with a minimum amount of overhead. They have support up and down the coast. That’s the way to make a better life for these people who are here to help us.”
To learn more about donating to (and volunteering for) Puente, contact Abby Mohaupt at amohaupt@mypuente.org or click here.
29
Nov
2012
16 and legal: work permit changes Fernando’s life
The day that Fernando Macias-Morales received his work permit from the U.S. government’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program was the day his life changed. Just ask his mother, Yanet.
“I couldn’t believe it. He was crying. I was crying,” she recalls.
Last summer, Puente undertook a major outreach effort to young people who could qualify for DACA. Puente partnered with Community Legal Services of East Palo Alto as well as private attorney, David Pasternak, to hold information sessions in Pescadero, and help people gather and complete the complicated paperwork – for free.
Under DACA, successful program applicants (all aged 30 or younger) are guaranteed the right to remain in the U.S for two years and work. The paperwork must be renewed every two years.
Fernando is one of 16 young people who applied for work permits under DACA this fall. So far, 10 of them have already been approved.
Yanet says Fernando knew he was taking a risk by applying to DACA, which would essentially inform immigration authorities that he had been in the U.S. for most of his life.
(Fernando was only two months old when his parents left Mexico. But his siblings are all legal residents, making his case particularly unfair.)
But the 16-year-old knew it was his only chance to live a normal life.
“In the past he used to say, ‘Whether I get an A or an F, it doesn’t matter. I’m not going to be able to go to college or get a driver’s license, or get into the profession I want,’” says Yanet. “Now he knows he’s working to get into college.”
Yessenia Herrera won’t have to bum rides from friends to get to her community college classes from now on. She got her work permit in November and will apply for her California drivers’ license before the year is through.
The question on everyone’s minds is, what happens next? Analysts credit Latinos for propelling President Barack Obama to a second-term victory in many parts of the country. President Obama promised to renew DACA work permits when they expire in 2014, but he has also committed to comprehensive immigration reform.
Yanet Macias hopes her son will never again have to feel like an outsider.
“Since Obama granted Fernando a permit, maybe he’ll give him a green card. A lot can happen in two years,” she says.
To learn more about Puente’s efforts around DACA, contact Program Director Rita Mancera at (650) 879-1691 or rmancera@mypuente.org.
