The post In LA’s Altadena Neighborhood, Community Food Solutions Feed Wildfire Recovery appeared first on Civil Eats.
]]>In Los Angeles, the Palisades and Eaton fires that have burned for the past two weeks are among the deadliest and most destructive in California history, exacerbated by climate change. As of publication, the Palisades Fire is 63 percent contained while Eaton, in the suburb of Altadena, is 89 percent contained. Together they’ve burned nearly 40,000 acres of urban Los Angeles.
Pacific Palisades, which has an average home listing price of $4.7 million, has gotten much of the attention in news media because of the many celebrities who own homes there. Altadena, whose average home listing price is just 28 percent that of the Palisades, is less known, yet has a rich history.
During the Great Migration, when 6 million African Americans moved from the South to the North, Midwest, and West, many Black families settled here as nearby neighborhoods like Pasadena practiced redlining. In 2024, 18 percent of Altadena residents were Black; more than half were people of color. And 80 percent of those Black Americans were homeowners.
Though the Eaton fire still smolders, the Altadena community has banded together for relief and recovery. Many have lost so much: family members, friends, homes, valuables, places where memories were made. Through food, residents who have lost everything are finding sustenance for body and soul, and hospitality workers are collaborating to help the best way they know how. Here are 13 initiatives—some within the neighborhood, some from greater Los Angeles—that you can support to keep the victims of the fire in this vibrant community fed in the short and long term.
Altadena Farmers’ Market
In operation since 2012 and held on Wednesday afternoons in Loma Alta Park in west Altadena, the Altadena farmers’ market has sustained a double whammy, with local farms and vendors losing business and residents suffering the tremendous loss of the market, incinerated in the fire. All donations “will be used to purchase local produce from small farmers who are deeply affected by the fires,” says Rafaela Gass, the market manager and owner. “The produce will be given for free to families who lost everything and are now living on cereal bars and fast food. Our community needs and deserves to be nourished with healthy fruits and vegetables, grown with love and care by our farmers.” Farmers’ market food giveaways will take place on Wednesdays starting January 22 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Unincorporated Coffee Roasters, 2160 Colorado Avenue, in Eagle Rock.
Altadena Community Garden
The Altadena Community Garden, which began in the mid-1970s, has also been decimated by the Eaton Fire. Located on the site of a former military academy adjacent to Loma Alta Park, it had 82 plots rented by residents for generations, and a communal area spread over 2.5 acres. Operating as a self-supported nonprofit, it receives no county funding, making the loss of the garden that much more tragic. It is hard to estimate the impact the destruction of the garden will have on the community’s ability to feed itself, as community gardens are instrumental in battling food insecurity. The garden also reduces environmental impacts, since the food doesn’t need to be trucked in. To help the garden rebuild, you can donate to its efforts to rehabilitate the soil, replenish garden tools and structures, and replant foliage—all consumed by the fire.
Altadena Seed Library
Altadena Seed Library is a seed-exchange network, founded to expand access to green spaces and shade while increasing food sovereignty and restoring local ecosystems. Helmed by Nina Raj, the library is accepting native seed and plant donations as well as tools such as shovels, crowbars, gloves, and saws to help sift through the rubble and clear debris. Native plants are especially useful after fire: Because they’re adapted to the dry local environment, they require far less water and are more apt to thrive. To find out which plants are native to the Altadena area, visit Calscape. Seed donations can be mailed to 37 Auburn Ave., No. 8, Sierra Madre, California, 91024, in care of Altadena Seed Library.
New Revelation Missionary Baptist Church, Special Needs Network, and LA Urban League Wildfires Fund
New Revelation Missionary Church, in partnership with Special Needs Network, LA Urban League, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), has served as the site of distributing three hot, to-go meals per day prepared by Black-owned restaurants in L.A., among them The Serving Spoon, Dulan’s on Crenshaw, Hotville Chicken, and A Family Affair. It’s an important partnership between Black communities, with these restaurants—based in Inglewood, Crenshaw, Windsor Hills, and South L.A.—feeding Altadena, where 80 percent of New Revelation’s congregation lives.
“Our initiative not only supports local businesses, but also ensures that Altadena’s displaced residents have access to nourishing meals during this crisis,” says Connie Chavarria, senior director of programs and community services at Special Needs Network. “Donations serve as a lifeline for those who have been affected by the wildfires, offering them not just sustenance but also a sense of care and support from their community.” Donate to their LA/Altadena Fire Relief Fund to keep the meals going at 855 N. Orange Grove Blvd., Pasadena, with distribution times of 9:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m., and 5:30 p.m.
Inclusive Action Cash Assistance for Outdoor Workers
The fires, and the destruction they’ve left in their path, have created dangerously poor air quality in the Los Angeles area, making conditions extremely hazardous for outdoor workers, including food vendors, many of whom live in Altadena. Inclusive Action for the City—an organization dedicated to supporting the economic needs of underinvested communities—has started a fund to provide cash assistance to those workers.
“Many street vendors, gardeners, and recyclers rely on jobs that are out in the open air, but due to the fires, many have lost their incomes or even their homes,” says Rudy Espinoza, the group’s CEO. The fund is offering $500 to each applicant, to be used however they see fit, and so far has received almost 11,000 applications.
“Thanks to generous donors and over 1,100 individuals on GoFundMe, we’ve raised over $1 million that can help us support 2,000 workers, but we still have a long way to go to care for them. We will continue to raise money to cover as many people as we can,” Espinoza says. To contribute to Inclusive Action’s cash assistance fund for outdoor workers, donate here.
Another Round Another Rally
An organization started by bartenders Amanda Gunderson and Travis Nass, Another Round Another Rally helps support restaurant workers, many of whom live in Altadena, with education through scholarships and emergency aid. “Right now our Disaster Relief Fund is focused on hospitality workers who were affected by the fires in Los Angeles. You can donate or apply for aid at disasterrelief. anotherroundanotherrally.org, and you can also find tools there to host a fundraiser,” says Gunderson.
LA Community Meals
Countless independent restaurants around Los Angeles have stepped up to help feed first responders and evacuees despite having lower cash flow due to the slow winter season and empty dining rooms in the aftermath of the fires. Many of these establishments have been paying out of pocket to feed their communities. Thanks to a coalition of restaurants banding together to form LA Community Meals, supporters can purchase prepared foods for those in need while patronizing impacted restaurants at the same time.
“The Community Meals initiative is important, because it has found a way for people in Los Angeles to contribute, while recognizing that restaurants can’t undertake the effort without financial support,” says Beth Griffiths, owner of Little Nelly, in Burbank. “We’re cooking meals at cost and with the assistance of generously donated product from our vendors, but being able to pay our staff has been game-changing in terms of how much we can put out each day.” Support one or more restaurants as they cook meals for those affected by the fires here.
World Central Kitchen in Partnership with Kogi, Socalo, Evan Funke, and HomeState
World Central Kitchen (WCK), helmed by chef José Andrés, has been feeding afflicted communities all over the world, and Los Angeles is no exception. Here, they’ve partnered with Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken of Socalo; Roy Choi’s Kogi Trucks; Evan Funke of Mother Wolf, Funke, and Felix; and Briana Valdez of HomeState Pasadena. WCK’s fleet of food trucks have been on the road, feeding first responders and families who have been affected by the Palisades and Eaton fires, thanks to the funding of generous patrons.
“We chefs are built to feed people, and when there’s a disaster like this one in L.A., we swing into fifth gear,” says Milliken. “WCK is the glue between those in need and chefs who want to keep busy doing what they love: cooking. We’ve made over 10,000 meals and counting. My team is so thankful to be useful at a time when we all feel pretty useless in the face of natural disasters.”
Homestate Pasadena is also open and distributing meals. “Despite not having functional utilities, our team has been able to share over 7,000 meals, warm hospitality, and a place to call home for breakfast and dinner,” says Valdez.
You can donate to keep WCK’s trucks feeding those in need in L.A., or even join the WCK volunteer corps. Sign up to volunteer at HomeState Pasadena, or consider donating an order of Homestate’s tacos to those in need. To receive a free meal from WCK, check out its full list of meal distribution sites.
Hollywood Food Coalition
Hollywood Food Coalition has been serving dinners daily, 365 days a year, since 1987. Since the L.A. fires began, they’ve been ramping up food distributions to emergency responders and evacuation centers. They recognize the inadequacy of current response systems, especially for those experiencing homelessness.
“When a crisis strikes—like the current L.A. fires—we mobilize quickly with our partners to provide immediate relief until government assistance arrives,” says Arnali Ray, executive director. “We must keep investing in our food system infrastructure to ensure that, when the next crisis occurs, everyone—especially marginalized communities—has access to the food they need.”
The coalition is currently accepting dropoffs of food and other supplies in moderate quantities; see the list of desired items here. You can also make monetary donations on the same page. Dinners are served Mondays through Fridays from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. at The Salvation Army Campus at 5939 Hollywood Blvd., and on Saturdays and Sundays from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. on the street, at the corner of Orange and Romaine.
Friends In Deed
Friends In Deed is a Pasadena-based, interfaith grassroots organization that began in 1894 and was officially established as a nonprofit in 1946. It serves homeless and at-risk communities, and during the fires is providing shelter at Trinity Lutheran Church at 997 E. Walnut Street in Pasadena, two miles south of the Eaton fire line. Though normally only operating at nighttime, their Bad Weather Shelter has kicked into 24/7 mode. The ongoing food pantry has been a staple in the community for over 50 years, and accepted donations can be found here, with the most-needed items being canned tuna and canned chicken, cereal, peanut butter, rice, hearty soups, stew, chili, pasta and pasta sauce, oil, sugar, flour, shelf-stable juices, and plant-based products.
“Our community represents just about every culture and background,” says Merria Velasco, senior director of development. “Single retired adults, families with young children, people who have fallen onto hard times, individuals experiencing homelessness, and most every other household picture you can think of, Friends In Deed serves them all.” The food pantry is open on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and on Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Voto Latino and National Day Laborer Organizing Network
Voto Latino, a grassroots political organization focused on empowering the new generation of Latino voters, is matching all donations to the National Day Laborer Organizing Network up to $15,000. The funds will support NDLON’s Pasadena Community Job Center, which is serving as a relief hub for Pasadena and Altadena, providing food, temporary shelter, water, and emergency kits for the workers who put food on L.A.’s tables, yet are frequently forgotten. They’re also taking donations of canned goods, Gatorade, water, fresh produce, and more for second responders, who often are undocumented day laborers who step up for disaster recovery.
Heart of Dinner
This New York-based charity, founded by Yin Chang and Moonlynn Tsai, has expanded its operations to Los Angeles to help battle food insecurity experienced by Asian elders. Culturally sensitive foods accompanied by N95 masks and caring notes written in native languages are packaged in artful, hand-decorated bags, then delivered to homes with the aim of bringing hope and nourishment amid the crisis. On January 10, the first emergency drop to Korean elders contained packages of Korean bone broth, fresh produce, rice, buns, fishcakes, beef kimbap, and more. Donate to help Heart of Dinner reach its goal of feeding 1,000 Asian elders. Just $30 funds two to three days of meals and protective supplies.
Project Angel Food
Project Angel Food prepares and delivers medically tailored meals to the critically ill, designed to fit the unique needs of each patient, whether heart healthy, low fat, low protein, diabetic, gastrointestinal friendly, and more. At the moment, donations to the fire relief fund are being doubled, as it’s more crucial than ever that meals reach clients during this crisis. You can also volunteer for a shift to work in Angel Food’s temporary kitchen, located at 230 W Ave. 26 in Lincoln Heights, or to deliver meals.
As Altadena absorbs the shock and grief of loss, its deep community strength and the outpouring of support from the surrounding city are already helping its citizens recover. It will be a long, slow build, and your support will make a difference.
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]]>The post Chef Francesca Hong Is Proving that Food Is Political appeared first on Civil Eats.
]]>In Wisconsin and many other states, tipped workers, who are mostly women, start at $2.33 per hour and are more likely to face sexual harassment. But at Morris Ramen in Madison, co-founder Francesca Hong pays her tipped employees $15 per hour and fosters an environment in which workers can report any abuse they’ve experienced—there or at other restaurants.
In addition to being a chef and community organizer, Hong was elected to the Wisconsin legislature last November and became the voice of one of the pandemic’s most impacted industries. Now, she’s fighting to raise the wages of all tipped workers in the state.
“I want to repeal [the tip credit] and replace it with the current abysmal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour,” Hong says. “It’s just scratching the surface. We want people to know that this is the floor and not the ceiling.”
As a progressive, Hong has made it clear that she is seeking equity for all Wisconsin residents, including the many communities of color that have been historically underrepresented. She and her colleagues recently introduced an Economic Justice Bill of Rights, which includes the rights to a living income, collective bargaining, affordable healthcare, accessible public education and childcare, and clean water. After witnessing how little support the hospitality industry received from the government during the pandemic, Hong has begun advocating for rights to basic infrastructure for everyone—not only restaurant workers.
“The defunding of public services has led to so much harm, and Republicans are solely responsible for that,” says Hong. “And I think for a long time, Democrats have struggled with making clear what they’re fighting for. We want to be able to message effectively to people that we are fighting for them. And this is our guide, our network, our pathway, and our commitment to how we’re going to do that.”
However, achieving these goals in the Assembly won’t be easy. Hong won her election handily with 88 percent of votes in the 76th District, but as a woman of color in the minority party, she doesn’t always see eye to eye with the overwhelmingly male state legislature, which is two-thirds Republican and 88 percent white. For context, last February, Wisconsin Republicans rejected a resolution honoring Black History Month because they didn’t approve of all the people named in the resolution—and decided to honor conservative firebrand Rush Limbaugh instead.
Activity in the State Assembly also ground to a halt during the pandemic, leading political pundits to call the Wisconsin Legislature one of the laziest in the country.
People of color in Wisconsin have faced overwhelming challenges to becoming a viable political force, but Hong is trying to increase their strength by working with diverse coalitions. Hong, who is Korean American, is the first and only Asian-American representative in Wisconsin history and was elected alongside Samba Baldeh, the state’s first Muslim representative, in 2020. The state has the nation’s third-largest Hmong population; and while Hmong voters were courted by both candidates in the last presidential election, no one of Hmong descent has ever been elected to office in Wisconsin’s state legislature. (In comparison, the legislature next door in Minnesota has had at least three Hmong representatives.)
To make headway in her agenda, Hong has built coalitions with grassroots organizations, including the Asian American Pacific Islander Coalition of Wisconsin, the Hmong Institute, the University of Wisconsin BIPOC Coalition, and Wisconsin Chamber of Commerce. In early May, the Assembly passed a resolution to mark May as Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) Heritage Month—a decision based on a bill Hong first introduced in April. She also sponsored a bill that designates May 14th as Hmong-Lao Veteran’s Day, and Democratic Governor Tony Evers signed it into law on the same day. Hong and fellow legislators have also introduced a bill to require that Hmong and other APIDA culture and history be taught in the schools so that students can learn about the state’s largest Asian ethnic group and their compatriots.
Hong and her fellow Democrats are fighting an ongoing effort to gerrymander the state’s districts, which many believe are drawn to ensure that the Republican party retains power. “For them, democracy is not the people choosing their electeds but the electeds choosing who votes for them,” says Hong. Again, she’s working with coalitions and expects to see the issue end up on court. “We also have an organization called Law Forward that is fighting to keep gerrymandering out of Wisconsin. We may see new maps for 2022,” she says.
Hong, however, has made it a regular practice to challenge the status quo. In a Bon Appétit op-ed, published before the general election, she drew a comparison between the hospitality industry and politics: “Our industry as a whole is in desperate need of restructuring, but guess what? So is our government.”
Building a Better Restaurant Culture
In Madison, like many places in the country, chefs and restaurant owners have been called out for sexist, racist, and abusive behavior. And just like elsewhere, victims of this harassment have often faced repercussions for speaking up.
Most recently, Madison restaurateur Patrick Sweeney was accused of verbally and physically assaulting employees and arrested on domestic abuse charges. His volatility was said to be the “worst-kept secret” of the local restaurant industry, and he has been removed from the restaurants he co-owns in a rare case of workplace accountability.
Sasha Debevec-McKenney, a former employee of Morris Ramen and veteran of the Madison restaurant industry, said she would like to see other chefs face similar consequences for their actions. She added that a number of the city’s food service workers share information about the working conditions of various restaurants in an effort to safeguard their own well-being. “It sucks, but we all have to look out for each other. It’s very [much like a] whisper network,” she said.
Recently, another veteran Madison restaurant worker, Alejandra Perez, published an op-ed about what she sees as the complicity of those in charge of these hostile environments.
Hong’s established history in prioritizing workers in the restaurant industry may offer a parallel for how she intends to revolutionize the state government. Beyond paying employees a fair wage, she has also promoted transparency in her restaurants. Past and present Morris Ramen employees say Hong has an open communication policy with her workers. “Francesca communicated with our staff and said, ‘Not only can you tell me if you have experienced [abuse] here, you can tell me if anyone you know is experiencing that at any restaurant,’” Debevec-McKenney recalls.
Hong began taking a more proactive approach to improving the restaurant industry in 2016 after the election of Donald Trump. She helped establish the Culinary Ladies Collective, an organization centered around mentorship, education, and advocacy for women in hospitality; she currently serves as president. The group’s first and only festival—Femmestival—took place just before the pandemic lockdowns, and spotlighted dishes prepared by women cooks. To cope with the pandemic fallout, Hong also launched Cook It Forward with other restaurateurs to employ workers by providing meals to food-insecure residents in Madison.
Hong also uses her social media feed as a platform to speak out about injustice, especially when restaurant workers are adversely affected. When the alcoholic beverage retailer trade group Tavern League of Wisconsin filed a lawsuit in October against Democrat Governor Tony Evers’ order to shut down eating and drinking establishments as COVID-19 cases soared, Hong criticized the group on Twitter. (Her word choice made local headlines, rather than the substantive issue of worker health.) Her stance puts her at odds with others in the restaurant community, Debevec-McKenney says.
“She’s up against [other people who] own restaurants near her. They might think, ‘We’re good people. We wrote ‘Black Lives Matter’ on our sign or ‘Stop Asian Hate,’ but we’re also going to pay workers $2[.33] an hour right now,” says Debevec-McKenney.
Many restaurants are facing staffing shortages as the pandemic winds down and businesses reopen. One factor is a lack of childcare, but some Wisconsin Republicans blame “laziness” enabled by increased unemployment benefits. The Republican-controlled legislature, which hasn’t passed a bill during the pandemic, worked to cut the $300 federal boost in unemployment benefits—from $670 to $370 per week. Democratic Governor Tony Evers, however, vetoed the move in late June.
With its higher hourly wage, Morris Ramen is having a relatively smooth transition as they bring their employees back to work. But Hong knows that ensuring that all her constituents can earn a living wage and work in a respectful environment will take more than mere business strategy. “You don’t think it’s problematic that [workers are] making more on unemployment than for their hourly wage?” she says. “Why are we not having that conversation?”
Photos courtesy of Francesca Hong.
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]]>The post Undocumented Restaurant Workers Have Held the Industry Together. Now They Stand to Lose the Most. appeared first on Civil Eats.
]]>Originally from Teopantlán in Puebla, Mexico, Reyes is undocumented, but he pays taxes through one of the many untraceable, individual taxpayer identification numbers (ITIN) that the IRS has issued to people in hopes of creating a paper trail of their contributions to the government. Two years ago, this wasn’t possible, since he was getting paid cash, under the table, before he and his co-workers organized and filed a complaint with the Department of Labor.
He says he worries for himself, but also for all of his undocumented peers, who are more susceptible to exploitation than other restaurant workers. They face an array of challenges as a result of the increasingly dangerous combination of restaurant closures and Trump’s immigration policies. Undocumented people are also some of the most susceptible to infection by COVID-19, since many live in close quarters and multi-family dwellings.
“[Working at the restaurant] is hard because I have had to do some of the most difficult jobs that others don’t want to do. I had to clean up sewage that the restaurant is supposed to hire external services to do. But I fear losing my job, so I accept it,” he said.
The amount of work he’s offered has also been inconsistent. The restaurant owner promises him work, only to wait days before calling him back in. “That’s the strategy he’s been using to terrorize us with losing our jobs,” he says.
Since the pandemic first struck the U.S., over 8 million restaurant workers have lost jobs.
Though New York City has created a $20 million fund to disburse cash payments of $400 ($1,000 for families) for up to 20,000 immigrants with both legal and non-legal status, that’s a drop in the bucket for the half-million undocumented people living in the city.
Reyes is just one of millions across the country who face similarly impossible predicaments. Three months since the pandemic first struck the U.S., over 8 million restaurant workers have lost employment—including 5.5 million workers in April alone. A large number of these newly unemployed workers are undocumented. The undocumented comprise 10 percent of all restaurant employees in the U.S., and as many as 40 percent in urban areas such as Los Angeles and New York.
Undocumented immigrants as a whole pay billions in taxes and a higher effective tax rate average than the top 1 percent of taxpayers (8 percent versus 5.4 percent).
And, as they often work in the back of house—as line cooks, bussers, dishwashers, and janitors—they’re largely invisible to the dining public. In reality, they’re the backbone of the industry. And yet, many are unable to obtain health insurance even though they perform backbreaking work day after day. Most didn’t receive a $1,200 stimulus check from the government, and they often fear getting tested for COVID-19 or obtaining care for fear of deportation.
And although several organizations—new and old—are working to provide financial and logistical support for these workers, they’re facing language barriers, privacy, concerns, and a host of other challenges.
“The restaurant industry often employs very vulnerable sectors of the population: seniors, women, people of color, the undocumented,” says Manuel Villaneuva, lead organizer for the Los Angeles chapter of Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United. “Some employers know first-hand the vulnerability of the employees. And they often exploit them, commit wage theft, and let them know psychologically that they’re replaceable.”
A Sizable Need
In California, Governor Gavin Newsom has initiated a public-private partnership to disseminate $125 million in disaster relief. Of the total amount, $75 million is allocated to the undocumented, out of work because of the pandemic and ineligible for stimulus checks and unemployment. The other $50 million, the California Immigrant Resilience Fund, is in direct aid to especially vulnerable communities, including the disabled. But when phone lines opened up early earlier this month, they became completely backlogged, ultimately crashing for many on hold.
Comunidades Indigenas en Liderazgo (CIELO), an organization dedicated to Indigenous language rights, is one of the nonprofit organizations that has received $200,000 of the CIRF to give $400 checks to 500 Indigenous, undocumented families from Latin America for financial relief. Of those, 50 percent work or used to work in restaurants.
“Undocumented migrants undergo a huge problem because they’re pushed out by their home country, escape here, and then [they] are criminalized,” says Odilia Romero, co-founder and executive director of CIELO. “Then, the pandemic happened. They’re at the bottom and the least likely to obtain any support.”
One worker who has applied for funds through CIELO is Federico, a former dishwasher at a Downtown Los Angeles restaurant. Originally from Oaxaca, Mexico, he and his wife, from Puebla, have lived in L.A. for over 30 years and have four children who are U.S. citizens, the eldest of whom is 26. Since being laid off, Federico has found a job sewing masks.
“Undocumented migrants are pushed out by their home country, escape here, and then [they] are criminalized.”
“The money is nothing compared to what I made at the restaurant because we get paid by the piece,” he told Civil Eats. “We are paid either 5 cents or 10 cents apiece. In order to make $40/day I have to make 800 masks,” he explains. His family is fortunately able to get the food they need through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
There are many nonprofits dedicated to restaurant worker relief aid, but the majority fail to specify whether they are inclusive of undocumented workers for fear of political polarization jeopardizing contributions. And for workers, supplying personal information in order to qualify for aid brings anxiety about being tracked by ICE.
“We are pretty scared,” admits Federico. “It’s a constant feeling, but we have kids so we always try to take care of ourselves so we can provide a better life for them. We are aware of our status so we try to just … live with being undocumented.”
Language Barriers
Another obstacle to accessing financial support is linguistic. While many support organizations do have Spanish-speaking employees, many who have emigrated from Mexico or Central America aren’t fluent in Spanish.
Stephen Murray, a Los Angeles chef who organized a Gofundme campaign for 38 undocumented workers with LA Kitchen Migrants, explains, “There are multiple Zapotec [Indigenous people from Oaxaca] kitchen workers who don’t even speak Spanish, let alone English. The same goes for workers from Guatemala, whom we have a lot of in L.A. It’s a huge barrier for them to find help.”
Photo courtesy of @LAKitchenMigrants
Damian Diaz, of Va’La Hospitality, a bar consultancy group, co-founded No Us Without You, a new nonprofit group in Los Angeles that runs a food pantry program supplying packages of food that feeds a family of four for one week. Diaz personally reaches out to each applicant in Spanish and asks them to fill out an easy questionnaire online.
“Every single individual has my direct phone number and I tell them, ‘If you have someone in need who fits the bill, give them my number.’ Once I get the completed questionnaire, they’re on queue,” Diaz said. So far, the group assists 350 families a week and it has no intention of capping the number.
Another Round Another Rally (ARAR) is another nonprofit that was launched by bar professionals dedicated to assisting out-of-work hospitality workers, with the goal of disbursing at least 50 percent of the funds they raise (in $500 payments) to Spanish speakers. It’s funded by spirits companies and foundations, with Campari Group alone donating $1 million to their cause (other donors include Patron, Aperol, Tito’s Vodka, and Ketel One).
Catherine Rosseel, a Boston-based volunteer coordinator, says that at the beginning of the campaign, there were 1,500 English-speaking applicants, but only 100 were Spanish-speaking—a difference she attributes to a reluctance to share personal information on the part of undocumented folks.
“I had four of my [bilingual] friends volunteering to talk to these people. We took down the barrier of [requiring] the application online so people felt safe, but realized it wasn’t efficient because people were too scared to give out their information and the conversations went too long. The calls just kept coming, so we had to regroup,” Rosseel says.
Fortunately, a group of bilingual Stanford MBA students reached out, spurred by a class assignment to help a specific community during the pandemic. Together with ARAR, they came up with a more streamlined application process that involves SMS prompts and rapport with native Spanish speakers, among other tools.
“Just hearing that voice makes them a little bit more comfortable, and to feel like this is real, and not some kind of scam,” says Claudio Gonzalez, a first-year, Stanford MBA candidate.
Actually getting the funds to people hasn’t been easy. No Us Without You and ARAR have both had difficulties maintaining contact with applicants. There are no-shows and calls gone unanswered. “A lot of these families had cars initially,” Diaz said. “But they’ve had to sell their cars to make some type of money. Also, they might have stopped having phone service because they can’t pay their bill, so there’s a lot of [talking over] Whatsapp in order to make reservations and appointments.”
The pandemic has left the country’s most vulnerable with nowhere to turn, and also exposed the reality of razor-thin margins in the restaurant industry.
The pandemic has left the country’s most vulnerable with nowhere to turn, but it has also exposed the reality of razor-thin margins in the restaurant industry, and just how often these businesses rely on the labor of undocumented, “essential” workers who are often treated as disposable.
And as restaurants stay closed or reopen at 25 percent or 50 percent capacity, the future could be even more bleak.
Like many advocates, ROC United’s Villaneuva wants to see undocumented workers given wage replacement and rent forgiveness. But in the long term, he says, the only way out of this conundrum is to provide these workers with a path toward citizenship—a change that some say would be net a positive for our GDP and reduce our deficit.
“We need to revise the immigration system where people can qualify by showing they’ve been working, paying taxes, and they’ve not been a burden on the government,” he says, adding that the current rule requiring people to leave the U.S. to apply for citizenship often puts families in especially precarious positions.
“The process needs to be sped up and made it simpler, so they don’t have to gamble with whether they can come back or not,” says Villaneuva.
Some names of individuals in this story have been shortened to protect their identity.
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