Next DFA-DFNM Meetup to Feature Community Organizer Santiago Juarez

Our regular monthly Albuquerque DFA-Democracy for New Mexico Meetup is set for Thursday, June 7th, at 7:00 PM at the Social Hall of the First Unitarian Church at Carlisle and Comanche. To join the group, get on our mailing list or RSVP for the Meetup, click here. Our special guest will be long-time community organizer SANTIAGO JUAREZ (photo), who'll address the topic, "Electing to Resist: Vote Suppression and Community Empowerment."

"You take away people's health insurance and you take their right to union pay scales and you take away their pensions--taking away their vote's just one more on the list."--(Santiago Juarez, "Armed Madhouse")

Prominently featured in investigative reporter Greg Palast's recent bestseller, "Armed Madhouse," veteran New Mexico community organizer and attorney Santiago Juarez returns to Democracy for New Mexico, after a nearly two-year interlude. Santiago will recount his exploits in the 2004 Presidential campaign and election, and bring with him the spirit of citizen fightback in a time of both uncertainty and renewed hope.

Based in Espanola, NM, Mr. Juarez's community development work and his influence touch Albuquerque and span New Mexico and beyond. Counting among his early influences the late Chicano labor and civil rights leader Cesar Chavez, Santiago continues and extends the tradition of working-class, community-based political activism.

Santiago Juarez has held organizing positions in Mexicano/Chicano communities in the western United States since the 1970's. A founding organizer of Seattle's ground-breaking community center, El Centro De La Raza, Mr. Juarez also worked in the 1980's with Rev. Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition.

Since 1995, Mr. Juarez has worked with communities in New Mexico as an organizer and facilitator for Re-Visioning New Mexico. He maintains a private law practice, is on the Board of Directors for the International Relations Center, and is currently the Executive Director of New Mexico Progressive Alliance for Community Empowerment (NM PACE).

Mr. Juarez holds a B.S. from Eastern New Mexico University and a J.D. from the University of Washington.