President Obama’s executive action on immigration changed lives in Pescadero overnight. On November 20, dozens of South Coast parents who entered the U.S. without papers learned they would be able to raise their children here without threat of deportation – at least for the next three years.

Puente Program Director Rita Mancera believes at least 118 local parents with children in the school district will benefit from the new policy, plus several parents whose children have already graduated or are still too young for school. That’s a substantial segment of the local Latino population.

But many other adults and young people are coping with the realization that they will be excluded from the President’s announcement. Mancera describes the emotional fallout as a mixture of joy, anxiety and sadness.
“It was a lot excitement because many of the families have been around here so many years, living with the constant unknown of whether they will be deported or not,” says Mancera. “But also a lot of families were let down. They will not qualify because they do not have children or because their children are DACA children already.”

The President’s immigration plan will benefit an estimated 4.1 million undocumented adults and 300,000 young people, guaranteeing their safety without offering them a path to legal residency or citizenship. Most are parents whose children are citizens or permanent residents.

The Obama plan also expands DACA, the popular 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. The expanded DACA program removes the upper age limit (which was capped at 30) and now applies to children who arrived by January 1, 2010.

The news affects California more than any other state, where the majority of undocumented immigrants reside.
These aren’t temporary residents; about 85% have been here five years or more. They contribute to their communities, pay taxes and enroll their American-born children in public schools, which is what the Obama policy explicitly acknowledges.

That’s especially true on the South Coast, where many families set down roots so long ago that their eldest children are now in college. Nationally, 7.7% of k-12 students have a parent who is undocumented.

Mancera moved to the area 8 years ago, and she says most of the families she knows predate her. That’s a long time to live in the shadows.

Puente springs into action

Puente is committed to supporting every eligible local resident through the entire application process from start to finish. On the day of the announcement, Puente jumped into action, printing out a fact sheet about the President’s executive order and circulating it at a public gathering that night. Puente has scheduled a community information session on December 10, where a local immigration lawyer will help explain each step in the process and provide information on what documents to collect.

Staff members have already made personal phone calls to dozens of local youth and families, encouraging them to get ready to apply for the program. Certain people don’t have much of a paper trail and consequently may have a hard time proving their presence in the U.S.; Puente has been advising them on the best way to proceed. And Puente has been telling people to beware of fraudsters who claim they can file their papers before the application window, which does not open for another 90 days for DACA and 180 days for parents.

“The next six months, to us, will be very important for providing stability for people in our community,” says Kerry Lobel. That said, the President’s action didn’t go nearly far enough to create a long-term sense of safety, let alone equality.

“This doesn’t begin to address the need for comprehensive immigration reform that will affect the people who grow our food and clean our houses,” adds Lobel.

Puente is preparing to handle the blitz of applications thanks to the recent training (and upcoming testing and accreditation) of two staff members as professionally trained immigration advocates: Rita Mancera and Alejandra Ortega, Puente’s Youth Program Associate. The BIA [Board of Immigration Appeals] accreditation will vastly expand Puente’s immigration services, such as processing green cards, citizenship papers, and deferred deportation applications. Puente will partner with pro bono lawyers to handle the overflow.

Puente has already helped 19 local youth apply for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, as well as renew most of them this fall. The legal imprimatur has changed their lives. They’ve obtained Social Security cards, driver’s licenses and work permits. And they’ve stopped looking over their shoulders. Those college-goers also became eligible for financial aid.
But not everyone has been able to benefit. Mancera recalls the day of the announcement talking to a 16-year-old boy, a student at Pescadero High, who entered the country in 2011. Several friends will be eligible for DACA, but he can’t – the cutoff is 2010. For the second time, a presidential executive order does not provide him with relief.

“He was upset. He said, ‘There’s nothing I can do, is there?’ recalls Mancera. “He got left out.”

For more information about the program, email Rita Mancera.

Juan Gabriel Mejia

Juan Gabriel Mejia has been in the U.S. two years and six months. So far he’s seen the insides of three kitchens, towers of dirty dishes, and a seemingly endless cycle of row crops. He went to San José once, and picked up a Chicago Bulls cap he likes to wear, even though he’s never been to Chicago.

“They used to say in Guatemala that this was a place you didn’t even need to work to earn money. That’s not true,” says Mejia, shaking his head.

The 28-year-old left Olopa, his hometown in the mountainous region of Chiquimula in May 2012 to find work in the U.S. to support his parents, wife and three young children. He found plenty of it, first in Santa Cruz and then in Pescadero.

As he describes his manic schedule, it’s hard not to wonder when he sleeps and eats.

“In Santa Cruz, I worked 4 p.m. to one in the morning washing dishes. And I had another job washing dishes at another restaurant from 4 a.m. to 12:30.

“Here I work in the field six days a week, nine and a half hours a day. I work at Duarte’s washing dishes four days a week; starting at 6:30 p.m. It’s a 6-hour shift.

“On Sundays, I work at Cindy’s in Pescadero (Pescadero Country Store) 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. and then at Duarte’s at night.”

Mejia has three nights off. He spends two of them learning English through Puente’s ESL program. He spends the last one doing laundry 35 miles away in Santa Cruz, since his housing barracks don’t have a washing machine.

Mejia has a brother in town who followed him from Guatemala. They work at the same farm, but Mejia’s schedule is so tight that they barely speak from week to week.

Yet Mejia’s placid face betrays none of the stress and exhaustion his American life has wrought. “It’s a lot of work,” is what he says, spreading his hands in a gesture of acknowledgment.

The only time he smiles is when he describes his children: 9-year-old Wilson, 4-year-old Cindy, and 2-year-old Juan Gabriel, who is named after the father he hasn’t met yet. Mejia had to leave a month before his son was born. And he would like to stay here and continue earning money until 2018, little Juan Gabriel will be a strapping 6-year-old by the time he gets to hug his dad.

At least his kids will all be in school, thanks to tuition he’ll provide. “While I’m here I want to help them study,” he says.

Mejia has set an excellent example with his own commitment to learning English. When he came to the U.S., he didn’t know a single word. When waiters at his restaurant in Santa Cruz would ask him for a ‘fork’ or a ‘plate,’ he would stare at them blankly.

But when he came to Pescadero, some friends brought him to La Sala for a hot meal. That was where he learned of Puente’s services, and decided it was time for him to challenge himself.

Now, thanks to Puente’s comprehension-based English curriculum and a lot of hard work, Mejia has a burgeoning vocabulary.

“I work in the field. I harvest leeks, and I harvest fava beans,” he says slowly and carefully in English.

And then, in Spanish: “Puente’s really helped me with my English. Also, I think the services at La Sala are very good.”

Back home, Mejia is not a farm worker – he’s a farm owner. His father Andrés plants beans and corn on a few small plots of land Mejia purchased since moving to the U.S. The food feeds the whole family.

Constant scrimping and saving enabled him to send money home to buy farmland and build a new house for his parents. Next, he intends to build a house for his wife and children. He’ll join them there, and farm his own land, when he returns to Olopa.

For more information about Puente’s adult education programs, email Omar Ortega.