FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AUSTIN, TX, AUGUST 4, 2017 – Latina Mami, a celebrated grassroots organization created for and by Latina mothers, has relaunched with a new fiscal partnership with the Austin Community Foundation. Latina Mami is once again offering the unique combination of culturally relevant services with organizing and advocacy capacity-building tools for Latina mothers of children–including those who have children with disabilities or behavior/social needs that are not being addressed by the school and provider systems.
Latina Mami was originally founded in 2000 by community organizer Gloria Perez-Stewart, at the time an overwhelmed 23-year old first-time mother. Perez-Stewart found traditional social services for working-class Latina women like herself sorely lacking.
From the beginning, Latina Mami embodied the premise that working-class Latina mothers were not only capable of organizing themselves, but also of becoming leaders and advocates for the issues facing their community. Perez-Stewart and the organization gradually developed a focus on training the parents of children with disabilities to secure adequate educational resources and an unbiased learning environment for their children.
Since recently receiving her Juris Doctor from the historic activist and social-justice People’s College of Law in Los Angeles, Gloria is combining legal advocacy, a disability and racial justice framework, and community organizing to benefit Latina mamis in Texas, California, and beyond. According to Perez-Stewart, who today is the mother of an 18-year old with autism and splits her time between Austin and Los Angeles, “Our organizers are excited about working with mamis in Austin and helping them create a peer support network and build community–all while working on child, family, and education advocacy concerns unique to Chicanas and Latinas.”
Latina Mami’s previous iteration offered everything from babysitting collectives to ESL classes to informal birth classes, to their “Mamis of Color” radio show that ran for eight years on KOOP 91.7 FM. The nonprofit has been recognized by progressive foundations, Latina Magazine, and Univision, and has been highlighted as a model for grassroots organizing in published, peer-reviewed academic articles.
Latina Mami’s return to the scene this year is off to an enviable start, with the organization receiving a grant for its Mamis Ayudando a Mamis project. The organization will be announcing a new location in South Austin in August 2017. Latina Mami Austin projects will be run collectively by Perez-Stewart and Latina Mami lead organizers Jessica Ochoa Zamarripa, Diana Anzaldua and Liz Cruz.
To register for Latina Mami’s informational meeting on Saturday, August 12th in South Austin, please email info@latinamami.org. To learn more about how Latina Mami organizes working-class Latina mothers to move past inaction and traditional barriers please visit www.latinamami.org.
Contact : Diana Anzaldua
Latina Mami Austin
2028 E. Ben White Blvd. #240-2124
Austin, TX 78741
(512) 956-8512 or diana@latinamami.org
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Latina Mami 