Oral History Program Jesse Garcia Interviewed by Ruby Licona 1 March 2002 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Jesse Garcia Interviewed by Ruby Licona 1 March 2002 Copyright © 2024 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in Special Collections. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber and Davis County Community Oral History Collection includes interviews conducted by Weber State University faculty, staff and students, and other members of the community. The interviews cover various topics including city government, diversity, personal everyday life experiences and other recollections regarding the history of the Weber and Davis County areas. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management Special Collections All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Jesse Garcia, an oral history by Ruby Licona, 1 March 2002, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, Special Collections and University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Jesse Garcia September 2008 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Jesse Garcia (b. 1953). Mr. Garcia served as an Ogden City Councilman from 1994 to 2010, during which time he also served as the Council’s chairman and worked for Weber Human Services. The interview was by conducted Ruby Licona on March 1, 2002 in order to gather Mr. Garcia’s recollections of his experiences with the city of Ogden, as well as his personal history and accomplishments. RL: This interview is with Ogden City Councilman Jesse Garcia. Today is March 1, 2002. This is being conducted in the Weber State University Stewart Library. Jesse, why don’t we start out, first of all, with some information on your place and date of birth, your parents, and the dates and places of their births, and a little bit about your family background. JG: Okay, my family is originally from Ojinaga, Mexico, which is part of Chihuahua. My family dates back in the Texas-New Mexico area since the early 1830s. RL: And what was the city again? JG: Ojinaga. RL: Ojinaga, okay. JG: My mother was born on October 19, 1914, in Valentine, Texas. My father was born in Las Cruces, New Mexico, July 29, 1913. I am the 10th of 11 children. I was born June 2, 1953 in Lubbock, Texas. We came to Utah as part of a migrant family, a farm-working family, in 1954, and my father decided to stay, and we are still here. RL: And what did he do after? 1 JG: My father was a carpenter and barber by trade, but our first four years here, we all did migrant farm work; I did that after a while, also. I was the first one to graduate from high school. My older brother didn’t have a chance because they were the ones that kept the family going doing the migrant farm work. However, once we got stabilized they went back and got their GED or high school diplomas, and ended up working in various occupations throughout the state. RL: Did they all come to Ogden with your parents? JG: Yes. All of us. RL: Well, that’s great. And the surviving ones are still living here? JG: The surviving ones are all here with the exception of my older sister, who went back to Lubbock, Texas, but she’ll be coming back pretty soon because her son will be graduating from Texas Tech University this summer. RL: Oh, that’s wonderful, that’s great. Well, what can you tell me about growing up in Ogden? JG: Both good and bad. I can start in Riverdale; Riverdale’s where I started going to elementary school, and because English is my second language, Spanish being my first, I was held back my first two years in elementary in special ed, because I didn’t speak English hardly at all. After I learned English well enough, they put me back in the regular classes. I can remember in second grade—third grade, actually—my favorite teacher. Her name was Mrs. Larson. That’s the first time I ever heard, or had the book Where the Red Fern Grows read to me. Since then, I’ve read that to all my grandchildren. In the fifth grade, a teacher by the name of Mr. Simms—who was probably one of the best guys I’ve ever known—taught me 2 the importance of having a mastery in math. The way he put it was, “If you learn to count, no one can ever cheat you out of your money.” And that’s always stuck with me. I went from Riverdale Elementary to seventh grade in Wahlquist Junior High School, which wasn’t a pleasant experience. There were three Latinos in the whole school of 1,800 students; my brother, myself, and a friend of ours. We, quite frankly, had to fight almost on a weekly basis to earn the right to go to school and get an education. That lasted a year, and my father said we need to go back to the city, “So you guys can go to the Ogden City schools, because the county is just not going to work.” RL: Where is Wahlquist Junior? JG: It’s a county school down on the west side of DDL in Farr West. So then we came to Ogden. I lived on the west side of Ogden. I went to Mound Fort Middle School, and for the first two years there it wasn’t that pleasant, either. There was a lot of racial discrimination. On two or three days a week, we had a teacher or administrator saying to us, “What are you doing speaking Spanish? You’re not in Mexico now, you’re in the U.S. You ought to just quit going to school now because you are going back to work in the fields anyway.” It made me even more determined to finish school and graduate and go on to college. I went from there to Ben Lomond High School, which, at first, was kind of rough because of the same things, but then we met a teacher by the name of Mrs. Hyslop who helped us put together the first Hispanic Educational Association in school. We called it the Chicano Clan because that’s the term we used back in the early 70s. We had 3 the last period of the day for the Latinos who wanted to participate in the group, and it was most all of us except for one or two. We tutored each other in different subjects. RL: So whoever had the strengths, it would kind of be a buddy system. JG: Right. And it was wonderful; we built a really good camaraderie. We had a 98% Latino graduation rate the year I graduated, which was wonderful. From there, I went to Utah State University, where we started the first MECHA group at Utah State. I left the university before I received my degree, because my father became very ill and ended up passing away. My other brothers were all married by then, so I came back to help my mom out. She ended up buying a house, and she lived with me for quite some time. I went to work in youth corrections. I worked in youth corrections for about 18 years because where I grew up, the guys I grew up with, a lot of them ended up in trouble. There were eight or nine of us that hung around together, six ended up in the old state school, four or five ended up in prison—a couple of them are still there. I also wanted to try to have a positive impact, especially on the kids in that neighborhood area. I went into youth corrections, worked counseling for quite some time, and then I ended up coaching baseball for 19 years, also. RL: Little League baseball? JG: Little League baseball for about 19 years. Then I was offered a job up at the [Union] Services Drug and Alcohol Counseling. I’ve been doing that now for about seven years. I’ve always been involved in the city, on different city committees; anything from the first Multicultural Advisory Committee to the 4 Mayor, to the Civil Service Commission; I was also involved in the PTA as president of the Mound Fort PTA. And then I became involved in politics. I was elected to office. I’ve been reelected twice now. Unopposed. This last November, I was again reelected, unopposed. RL: That’s a long way from a family that came here to work in the migrant fields. JG: It’s a long way from there, but you know, what we always need to do is remember where we came from, because I believe that at any time you can be right back, so you never forget where you’ve been. And that’s really helped me working with people of all walks of life. And looking at them as people of all walks of life, and not “He’s better, she’s better, I’m better.” You are never better than anyone because, again, at the blink of an eye, you’re at the same place. RL: You’re just different, and at any given point, I think it’s a matter of the luck at the moment. JG: Right, and that’s another word that I chose not to use in counseling. That’s one of the things I do with the different populations because that almost throws up a barricade. The word, and the description of the word, is uniqueness. I think everyone has uniqueness and using that through all the years that I have counseled has made people more interested in another person because of their uniqueness, not their difference. RL: By naming it uniqueness, it implies that everyone has something to contribute. JG: Exactly. RL: Well, now, you’ve told us a little bit about being in school, growing up in school here in Ogden. What were your experiences at Utah State? 5 JG: Utah State was kind of a different school, but actually the experiences were not bad there. For the first couple of months, everyone looked at you like, “Are you in a sport, or what?” You know, “How did you get to school?” But once you became part of the system, people treated you fairly decent. That town was a little bit different. You go downtown to one of the hamburger joints or some of the stores, and you would always have security following you and everything else. But that stuff happens in Ogden today. You just don’t dwell on them, you just keep keeping on. RL: How long were you at Utah State? JG: Three years. RL: Three years? And did you ever go back and finish a degree? JG: I went back and finished a degree, but it wasn’t at Utah State University, and it wasn’t what I was studying. I was studying business administration at Utah State. I came back and received my LSAC, Licensed Substance Abuse Counselor, through the University of Utah by an extension, for counseling. That’s what I ended up doing instead of business. RL: But you’re finished. So another first for your family. JG: Right, another first for my family. RL: So you were the first high school graduate and the first one to get a college degree? JG: Actually, the second to get a college degree. My brother Martin ended up finishing before I did, but he was a veteran of Vietnam. RL: Was he one of the ones that got the GED? 6 JG: He got the GED while he was in Vietnam. RL: So he got that in Vietnam and then came back and used his GI benefits to go to school. JG: Right, he came back and worked at what used to be the Pillsbury mill, the maintenance man or the helper, and he is now the head maintenance man. He went back and got some different degrees and different experiences here at Weber State. RL: That’s great. I imagine your mom was really proud of that. JG: My mom was a person who…she is fluent in English and very well read. There wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t read the newspaper and a part of a book. She read every day in both English and Spanish. And she demanded that we speak both English and Spanish. RL: That’s great. So it’s a matter of living up to expectations, isn’t it? JG: It is. A matter of expectations, and the fact that it’s okay to fall but you get up and keep walking. RL: That’s great. Okay, so what can you tell me about living in Ogden, outside of being in school? JG: Again, it was very different. I had two things going against me growing up in Ogden: first, not only that I was Mexican, but I was Texas Mexican. Tejano-type things were what they would call us. That Tejano term was derogatory of the people that came from Texas to work the fields. So you ended up having to fight your way through a lot of things, until, like I say, we were established. It held on for quite some time. The Anglos wouldn’t accept us because I was Mexican, and 7 the Latino population that was already over here wouldn’t accept me because I was Tejano. RL: Okay, so you had it coming at you from both directions. JG: From both directions; one of the biggest things is just my mom and dad: “Hey, you know what you need to do, you know how to do it, get out there and do it. And don’t let anyone become a barricade. You know there’s always ways to get around and over people without having to hurt them.” I still remember walking out of my mother’s house when I was in high school. It was always, “Acuerdate el nombre que cargas. Remember the name you carry.” So you didn’t do anything to disrespect that name. RL: You inherit a name, and you do everything you can to add to the glory rather than detract from it. JG: One of the…I guess, the most meaningful experiences I had was when we had a gentleman by the name of Officer Rivera, who also lived in West Ogden. He was a police office for Ogden City. He caught me racing my ‘65 Super Sport in West Ogden. The other office that was with him said, “You know, we need to take him to detention and take his car.” Officer Rivera said, “No, I know what I’m going to do with him.” I said, “Oh God, he’s taking me home.” And that’s exactly what he did. RL: Took you home and told your mama, huh? JG: During dinner time. I remember the look on our father’s face as he opened the door and saw Officer Rivera and me. It was like, “Did something to disgrace the name, did you?” And so, of course, they asked Officer Rivera in. He had a sweet 8 roll and coffee with my mom and dad; he let them know what I was doing and what had happened. He thought he would rather bring me home than send me to the detention center. I knew what he was doing. He knew, culturally, that I would get a lot worse from my mom and dad than I would in detention. I was also on the football team at Ben Lomond High School at that time, so as Officer Rivera left, my father put his hand out. I knew what that meant. Give him the keys. I gave him the keys to my car and he said, “Where is the extra set?” I had to go get the extra set and give it to my father. I had bought the car, but I was living under his roof, under his rules, and there was no way I could not do that. I gave him the keys and he says, “When you earn these keys back, you can drive your car to school again. However, you need to know that you’ve lost the privilege not only to drive a car, but to ride in a car.” For three months I was supposed to ride the bus, which was humiliating. But you know, I rode the bus. So a month and a half later he said, “I understand that you have ridden the bus every day.” And I said, “Well, yeah, I wasn’t going to against what you said.” He says, “Well, you’ve done well enough,” and gave me the keys back. But I had to earn them. That was something I’ll never forget growing up. As far as things for us to do...I played baseball until I was 27 years old. And then shortly after I started coaching. RL: Now, you played baseball in school, or Little League? 9 JG: We started what we called the Old Mexican League in Ogden. It ran from about 1969 to about 1977. RL: The Old Mexican League, and who played in it? Was it adolescents? JG: People from all walks of life—adults from 16 to whatever. We had a gentleman who played on our team who was 44 at that time, probably one of the best outfielders you’ll ever see, even at that age. My brother, Joseph, who is 17 years older than me, also played as our first baseman, and all eight of us brothers played baseball. RL: And who did you play against? JG: We played against teams from Brigham City. We had a team from Ogden, from Layton, from the Job Corp centers, from Hill Field, and from Wendover. RL: And these were all part of the Mexican League? JG: They were all part of the Mexican League. RL: Did you have a competition and a championship? JG: Oh yeah, we had the World Cup, the World Series, we had the All-Star game, we had the whole ball of wax. RL: And where did you play in Ogden? JG: At the old John Affleck ball park, that was later knocked down and is now Sam’s Club, I believe. RL: John Affleck? JG: Affleck ball park. Used to be on 33rd and Wall. RL: That’s great. 10 JG: Oh, and one of the nice things, too, is when I was growing up, we also had the Ogden Dodgers baseball. Steve [unintelligible], people like that; then—oh, what was his name, the coach, the Italian coach—coached the Dodgers for so long. But we used to go watch them play all the time. When they’d crack a bat, they’d give it to us because we would gather the balls for them. And we would tack the bats and tape them. RL: So you played with broken-down, fixed-up equipment. Duct tape helps a lot, doesn’t it? JG: Tacks and duct tape, sure does. Or black electrical tape. But yeah, that’s the way we played. It was a lot of fun. There were also a couple of teen spots we went to. The WOW, the Women of the World, they used to have teen dances and what not. RL: And was that for the Mexican kids? JG: That was for everybody. And if you ended up fighting there, you couldn’t go back. The Britanna roller rink, we did a lot of our own roller skating and stuff. And then just down from the house at the old Golden Spike Coliseum was the ice rink, and we used to do some ice skating. We couldn’t afford it, so the guy let us go ahead and shave the ice and what not. RL: So you had to earn a lot of things during your life. JG: My favorite game in the world is billiards. I shot eight-ball, and I have shot eightball for years and years. I love the game. And this guy used to run the White City Bowl; he ran the pool hall there. We used to call him Jimmy the Greek. I went and told him one day, “I would like to learn how to play pool, but I really haven’t 11 got any money. Would you allow me to sweep up and clean the tables and cover the tables at night and shoot some pool?” He said, “If you’ll do that you can shoot every night.” So I would come in and shoot for two and a half hours, and when I wanted to leave I would brush down the tables, clean them, put the plastic over them, sweep up, and go home. RL: Did you ever play competitively? JG: Oh yeah, I shot many tournaments; I even shot one tournament in Vegas. I shot here, in Wendover, all over Salt Lake and Ogden. Love the game, haven’t played in a long time because of city council. I used to shoot Tuesday nights, but I still like the game. So now all I do is golf, when the weather permits. RL: Okay. Now you said you had one brother that was in Vietnam. Were you in the military at all? JG: No. As a matter of fact, I joined in 1972 when I graduated from high school, but I joined on contract, and what I joined for they weren’t offering at the time. So they asked me if I wanted to stay and offer something else or go home. And because I already had an offer at Utah State, I said, “I’ll go home.” So I went home. RL: You’re lucky. That time period wasn’t a good time to be in the military. JG: It was okay. By ’72, they were just doing the mop-up of Vietnam. The war had ended. RL: And you said your brother was at Bien Hoa? JG: Bien Hoa and Phu Loy and I can’t remember the other one. RL: What was the second one? 12 JG: Bien Hoa and Phu Loy. He was a dog gunner on a helicopter for a while, and then his order came. He was supposed to be an air traffic controller, but he chose to be a dog gunner and did that for about five months. And he decided, “Well, that’s too dangerous. I better go back and do the other,” and he did. He spent altogether, I think, 18 months in Vietnam. My father was a Navy man, and he was stationed in the Panama Canal during the Panama conflict. RL: So you’ve got a military history. JG: My family does. RL: It’s amazing how many Chicano or Latino have military backgrounds. I know my aunt told me recently that just in her family she has been to seven military funerals—my grandfather, my father, and five of her brothers. JG: In the 40s and 50s, the Latino population, especially the Mexican population, was recruited into the army. Most of the reason is because once they served this country, they could come back and be a citizen of the United States. RL: It’s very common, even among people who were already citizens. JG: Yeah, yeah, very common. In the case of my family—in my father’s family—four out of six brothers were in the military. In my mother’s family, out of her eight brothers, seven were in the military. RL: It was a way to get ahead, to get some training, and earn a way of living. JG: It was, at least, a way to make the playing field more even. That’s why people took advantage of it. RL: Okay, so you went to work with youth corrections. What kind of things did you do there? By then you already had your degree and your license? 13 JG: I got my degree after that. What I did, I did some of the groups. I put together a drug and alcohol group that we use there, using the 12-step plan. I also did gang intervention groups. And that was kind of fun…kind of fun working with teenagers. RL: Teaching them there are alternatives. JG: Right, there is always an alternative to negative behavior. RL: What can you tell me of incidents that might have taken place while you were working with youth corrections and later with substance abuse? What kinds of things have you seen and worked with? Anything that stands out in your mind? JG: One of the reasons I stayed in youth corrections for so long, and then took a job with IHRD, Institute of Human Resource Development, which was a Latino Organization, and worked with them contracting with youth corrections taking Hispanic young people out of the corrections system and placing them in foster homes. The reason I did that is because after I worked youth corrections for a while, I had seen an enormous amount of Latino population in not only youth corrections, but corrections. And I said, “You know, you need to stay here and see if you can make some kind of difference.” Because Weber County by itself— that population is already overrepresented in the correctional facilities, especially in prison. But if you look at the percentage of the Latino population then, it was way out of balance, there were too many of the Latino population going from youth corrections to adult corrections. I decided to stay in that business for a while and see if I could make some kind of impact. And that’s what made me want to stay there. 14 RL: And any particular incidents or individuals that you remember? JG: I was in an incident where a young man who had the world in his hand, had he wanted it, got in trouble. Probably one of the kids with the fastest hands I’ve ever seen, one of the best boxers. He could have been the champion in his weight division. There was another young man who played baseball, who had the softest hands I’ve ever seen, and had a good bat and everything else. He gave it all up to get in trouble. RL: Did they get involved with drugs or just making fast money…? JG: Fast money. At that time drugs weren’t that prevalent. It was usually the fast money. Back then, what we would find had happened is the older “fences,” as they called them, would get the younger people to go and rip things off, then come back and fence them through them, knowing that the young people wouldn’t really get a “jacket,” if you will, until they were 18. The hope was that once they turned 18, they would stop that lifestyle and move on and do something else. But what happened is it became such a lifestyle they knew nothing else. They went straight from youth corrections into corrections. So that was one of the things that really made me want to get involved in that. As far as getting involved in politics, I’ve lived in Ogden for 47…48 years. 32 of those years were in West Ogden. For 25 years we lived with the landfill; the owner happened to be representative of the west area at that time. We really didn’t fight it or share with the people. It was there for 25 years, then the county wanted to make the old Hopkins Elementary into a landfill area or dump site and they would haul everything else. I fought that tooth and nail. Finally, we were 15 successful in that and it didn’t come about, and the county was really mad, because I cost them money. But that’s okay, I pay taxes, also. And then I chose to get on the city council and run for office, because everything west of Washington no one was really representing in the right way. Mostly self-serving. And then came a time where Weber County wanted to put a shooting range in West Ogden, just off the old landfill after they had had to cover it up after 25 years due to the IFA. RL: What’s the IFA? JG: It’s the airport, because the airport was too close to the landfill—the birds and the seagulls and what not—they didn’t want to have any accidents. They finally took care of that. But they wanted to put a shooting range there; they had it all ready to go. I managed to have the council vote it down 7-0. It didn’t happen there. So now the landfill’s down on Wilson Lane. Not far from my house, but it’s not in West Ogden. A lot of different things have happened now in the area that I represented from Rainbow Pockets areas, which are programs where they help the underprivileged do things…like remodel houses, anything from that to whatever your house needs, to emergency money, to sidewalks, to lights, everything. And so a lot of things are now happening west of Washington. RL: And it’s called Rainbow…? JG: Rainbow Pockets. The RDA is now doing things; the development agency is doing some different things. And, as a matter of fact, the last eight years I’ve been on council, four of the biggest projects in the city have been in my area. RL: Now, why is it called Rainbow Pockets? 16 JG: That’s just a federal term that they used. I guess to make the place brighter, I don’t know; that’s what they used. RL: So it’s not referring to different people of color, or anything like that? JG: No, just Rainbow Pockets makes the place brighter, and that is throughout the states. It’s a federal program. Also on the city council, I can’t remember her name, was a woman fighting to pass the English Only initiative. I fought that tooth and nail. On a 7-0 vote, I had the city council pass an English Plus resolution, which means everyone who wants to, of course, speaks English with proficiency, but doesn’t lose their native tongue. And we used part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the original Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which said that the Mexican population that chose to pretty much stay on this side… RL: Will never be forced to give up their language. JG: Right, that’s the one that was used. However, two weeks after that, they reratified without going back to the Mexican government and took that phrase out. But we used the original and it was 7-0. RL: That’s great. What other things do you feel that you’ve been able to accomplish in politics? JG: I think some of the things I’ve been able to accomplish are…because of racism and the way they look at us, my kids have received calls. I’ve received calls asking what I am doing on the city council. I’m not American, I’m Mexican, we’re not supposed to be there. But since then there have been even more people of the Latino population, in city government. And I have Chris Martinez who is in Clinton, actually he was out in Roy, he’s not there now; Dee Martinez was in Salt 17 Lake; you have Pete Suazo who passed, but now his wife has his place. I’ve been asked to run for legislature because of my work ethic, if you will. I make sure that I know what the issues are before I vote on them. I’m very accessible to the people. If they want to call and talk about whatever issue, I’m accessible. And they’ve learned that we are a hard-working population, and that goes on beyond our work ethic and into our professionalism. And so I think that people seeing that have said, “Okay, yeah.” The demographics are changing, and there are really good people from all walks of life. And we need to learn to work together. RL: What kinds of changes have you seen in Ogden and in Ogden City government during the time that you have been involved with the city council? JG: When I first came to Ogden—actually, it was when I was in high school— probably 3% of the population was Latino. Right now we are in 27% of the population of Ogden proper. RL: Yes, Ogden grew at a rate of 136%, the same rate that the state did, for the Latino population, in the last 10 years’ census period. And I think it’s continuing to grow since 1990. JG: You see a lot more Latino businesses, everything from Rodeo Market, which is just a complete market, and you have different restaurants. RL: Rita’s Bakery. JG: Rita’s Bakery is fantastic. Since my mother is no longer around, God rest her soul, I go down there and get my tortillas. RL: And they are good ones. 18 JG: And the best menudo in town is at La Cabana. You get different places, just so many things and to me, I’m not sure how you would say it in English, it’s enorgullo to see all these. RL: Pride. JG: Enorgullo is more than pride. It’s a sense of alma. RL: Well, it’s a sense of self, and a sense of pride. It’s our soul. JG: Yes. And what they are finding is the people that are coming in are not all these stereotypical, drug lords, gangsters, gang bangers, shoot ‘em up people. They are people who come in for the businesses, their children are going on and getting an education, they are all paying back the community. Javier Chavez, who owns Javier’s Restaurant, actually owns four of them now; he’s also an assistant coach for the cross country team at St. Joseph’s. His wife also gives back to the community. They are finding that all over the place: the people are giving back to the community. As a matter of fact, the Ogden City School District is doing some redistricting, and the Latino population is very much involved with that. We also have Latinos in the school district itself. You have Santiago Sandoval, but you also have his sister, Catherine Ortega, who is the assistant superintendent, who is just a wonderful lady, and really keeps things happening within the city. As you know, six years ago a group brought in OCR and had them do some things with the school district that were so out of compliance. We had a dropout rate of 70% among the Latino population. So there are a lot of positive things that are happening right now. I think it’s up to people such as myself, you, and others to keep the pressure on so it keeps it going in a positive way. 19 RL: I think what works best is the philosophy of the steel hand in the velvet glove. I think you get a lot further going in and being part of things rather than trying to ramrod something through. Now, you mentioned that you were with the first mayor’s Cultural Advisory Committee. I know that they tried to get representation from all of the different minority groups. Is that particular committee still going? JG: It is; it’s still going. The other thing that I managed to get the council to agree with is that all city committees should be, and the goal is, that they all are representative of the community itself. Which means, if they are so, that 25 of any city committee should be Latino. RL: And is that happening? JG: It’s starting to happen. RL: Are you seeing changes because of that? JG: I am. I see changes because people are now, again, going beyond stereotyping saying, “You know, these people are here, they are doing good things. We need to be a part of it.” Demographics say that by the year 2015, 60% of the U.S. workforce is going to be Latino. So there is going to be the voting power. RL: Well, certainly in California you’re seeing where the majority is now—Latinos are close to being the majority. JG: They are the majority in California now. RL: But, not just in number in the population. I mean the majority as far as involvement, and having a voice. JG: I belong to an organization that is called NALEO, the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, and I was in the conference last year in 20 San Jose. There were over 2,800 Latinos there, and the bulk of them were from California. And I can’t remember the name of the city outside of Los Angeles, it’s a small city. But two sisters, Latinos, are on the city council there. RL: Oh, that’s great. And I know I saw a thing yesterday where the…I guess there is a caucus of the Latino legislatures who had actually gotten together and done a study and wrote a letter to the California State University Systems, asking that in the Riverside/San Bernadino area, they have a Latino appointed as chancellor or head of the university to better reflect the population. Because in that area most of the students are Latinos. JG: You get some bigger pockets in the California area and areas, where the Latino population is the largest population. And you are starting to expand. Even in Northern California, now. And that’s why we’ve been a big influence, too. RL: So you are seeing changes in Ogden, in Utah, and on a national basis. JG: And all changes for the positive. RL: Now, your parents came here as migrant workers. You were able to finish high school and go to college. Your brother was able to go on, and at least one got his GED, and then did a college degree. What other changes have you seen in the generations? And with you working with youth corrections, and now being involved with alcohol and drug abuse and so forth, what kinds of changes are you seeing in the different generations? JG: When my children were young, they had a hard time, too, because of being Latino. When I first came into the city council, my house was shot at twice by gang-affiliated informants. So I had to fight the whole police system and get 21 through that. My son was jumped by a gang, by a police informant, who was also a leader of a gang. We finally got him out of that, battled that with the city. And I said “Okay, I’m not going anywhere, neither are my kids, but you will.” So, knowing that I wasn’t going anywhere and they couldn’t get me voted out, they decided “Well, we better do some different things.” And so now, a lot of that is changing. Kids are starting to say, “You know there is something better out there, we can do better things than joining a stupid gang.” We still have a big drug problem; the gangs supply the drugs. We are seeing a lot of young people, especially because their parents are saying, “Hey, you know, education, education, education,” or at least a good work ethic. You know if you don’t want to get your education, at least get a job, and you better yourself in that job. And so you see a lot of that happening now, you see a lot of young people, Latinos, working. You go into places like ICON, Lifetime, all the places around here and there, are sixty percent Latino. And so when you look at that economic factor, it’s $18.2 billion a year in Latino spending, just in the state of Utah. So really, there are a lot of positive things happening. People are now seeing each other as you know, “Hey, he’s a neighbor.” It’s not, “What clique does he belong to?” It’s “Hey, we need to do things with our population.” You are still going to have gangs, but if you have most people say, “You know what, that’s out the door. We need to do something better.” RL: So you are seeing more of a tendency towards people going into professions and being more part of the mainstream and contributing. 22 JG: Much more part of the mainstream. Oh, contributing—you look at right now the percentage of people buying houses, right now. Latinos are on the rise, purchasing homes. RL: And are they still sticking to West Ogden? JG: Oh, no. I have to stick around there because that’s where I’m elected, but east of Harrison. RL: So they are up on the bend. JG: Southeast, where the big, richer homes are. They are all over there. We are all over there. But yeah, there is a law now, and I’m glad it’s there. Before, a realtor could guide you into where you should purchase a home. That is no longer acceptable. And so people of the Latino population are buying homes throughout the city. Some want to go out and be out of the center, some want to be central, some want to be east, and so we are all over the place. And you are seeing that, also. A large amount of the Latino population is Catholic, and so you see Catholic churches that you probably didn’t see for a while. There is one in southeast Ogden; I can’t remember the name of it. It’s just off of Harrison. There is one on 2nd and Harrison. In the valley in Huntsville, there is another one. And so there are a lot of Latinos living in Huntsville. RL: Oh, are there? JG: Yeah, and so we are starting to see that we are all over, that we are not about living the stereotype, but doing some things, and wanting to belong to the community. RL: And you are seeing people across the board in professions too, aren’t you? 23 JG: Oh, all over. A gentleman just talked to me yesterday, he’s a dentist coming out of South America, wants to put his business here in Ogden. And so I’m in the process of helping him do that. The Ogden Business Information Center is helping do a lot of that. We have people who speak Spanish there, also for the RDA and everything. RL: What about health care for Latinos? JG: Right now the Latinos who don’t have health care or health insurance are going to what we call Midtown Community Health Center. At one time, it was the Migrant Community Health Clinic. Now it’s called the Midtown Community Health Center, and a lot of us go there. But you know what? What I really see now is most of the young and or elderly people that are getting jobs now, at different places, also offer insurance. So you have a lot of people who are now insured, who weren’t for a while. RL: So the Midtown Center. Is that run with state funds? JG: State and federal. RL; And grants? JG: And grants, yeah. RL: So, over the years people have gone from being looked down upon, to kind of fitting more in, to now becoming a major part of both the political and the commercial scene. JG: Yeah, and that’s something that I think really needs to happen. Anytime you have 20% of a population—any city, county, or state—whatever the population is, it should be reflected the city, state, or federal government. 24 RL: Now, you mentioned Catholicism, and I know there is at least one Spanish ward—LDS ward—in the city. Are you seeing other Latino churches popping up? JG: Oh, yeah. You see them, everything from Seventh-Day Adventists to whatever. St. Joseph now offers, I believe, two masses in Spanish. One of the other Catholic churches also does a mass in Spanish. So yeah, there are still a lot of people who…not all who go there are monolingual Spanish speaking, but because that’s the way they were raised, that’s where they go. RL: And that is the way they are raising their children. And I know a couple of people who are doing quinceañeras for their 15 year-old daughters. And I’ve seen mariachi groups and things around town. And it’s not necessarily just the Latino community that enjoys that. JG: Oh, case in point. We had a…South Ogden put on kind of an Olympic Celebration at the amphitheater here in Ogden, and the people they had play was the Cap Brothers, who have been around forever. They played bluegrass. And I grew up with them, they were friends of mine; good friends of mine as a matter of fact. I go up there, and one says “Hey, there is Councilman Garcia.” “That’s not Councilman Garcia, that’s my homeboy Jesse.” That’s the way he refers to me and that’s okay. But also, in that same celebration, Las Hermanitas Vega performed. You are seeing that more and more. You have a community or city celebration, it also has Latino music or Latino culture. RL: A few years ago, we had a group of low riders that took part in the Days of ’47 parade. And we got mixed reviews on that. Some people were saying, “What are 25 they doing taking part in our parade?” But now some of those same people are taking part in the Ogden Festival. JG: My response on that, because they were saying, “What are they doing in our parade?” And I just kind of smiled and I said, “What are the Days of ’47? What is the biggest event? The rodeo. Where did the name ‘rodeo’ come from?” RL: El rodeo. JG: Wow, wait a minute. Time out. And so people said, “Hey, you know what, we need to be inclusive, instead of exclusive.” So it’s something that I’ve really fought hard to have in this city. We have a long way to go, but we are taking baby steps right now. RL: And baby steps is how you learn, isn’t it? JG: That’s right. Tienes que gatear antes de andar. RL: Yeah. Now, are you involved with a particular church? JG: I’m Catholic; I’m involved with St. Mary’s. RL: St. Mary’s, that’s out in West Ogden. Do they have a Spanish Mass? JG: They do. RL: Does St. James have one also? JG: I think St. James is the one that does, I’m not sure which one, but yeah. RL: Well, that’s good. Now, what about your thoughts on…well, we mentioned a few minutes ago that in the last census period, the Latino population in Ogden went up 136% JG: Skyrocketed. 26 RL: And it’s still going, and I see immigrants coming in all the time. What are your observations in terms of the immigration, the growth of the Latino population as far as their needs, and their contributions? What kind of changes you are going to see? JG: I think the needs are going to be pretty much the same as they are. We need ESL classes and things of that nature. But one of the biggest impacts that this immigration is giving us is in the revenue. I think it was last year, I’m pretty sure it was last year, that due to unclaimed taxes—these are the people that come in without documents and they are working—the federal government managed to gain $7.2 billion in unclaimed taxes. RL: So this is undocumented workers who maybe had a false social security number…? JG: False social security number, and are paying their taxes so they are poor. And that is exactly what happened with our surplus in Utah. They said 100 some odd million dollars. I truly believe it is because of the unclaimed taxes, some of the unclaimed taxes. But they wouldn’t let us get the numbers; they didn’t want us to see them. I asked the Legislature, I asked many other people, and finally I asked the state; they wouldn’t let us have them. But I’m totally convinced that if it’s 7.2 in the federal government, it’s got to be something here. Because of the impact and the growth. RL: But not all of the immigrants are illegal. JG: No, they are not, but the ones that are illegal are the ones that are so stereotyped against. You know, “Here they come, they are a bunch of drug 27 dealers,” they’re this, that and the other, without looking at the financial impact that they bring to the state. RL: And people say they are coming and they are taking our jobs away. But they don’t acknowledge that these people are doing jobs that nobody else wants to do. JG: That’s exactly what it is. I mean just in the paper: some girl saw two guys jump in the back of the truck, and said, “They’re taking my job.” And the question was, “Would you have done that job?” “Well, no.” Exactly, so they’re not taking any jobs from you. These people sometimes work two jobs full-time because of the low rate of pay, and they are working two jobs because you wouldn’t work one of them. I think that there are a lot of things that we need to learn, but one of the biggest things we need to learn is acceptance. I won’t use the word tolerance because it has a negative connotation. I don’t do anything anyone has to tolerate me for. But I do many things through my uniqueness, and people should be able to accept me. RL: Now, since September 11, there is not so much talk anymore; before that, President Fox and President Bush were talking about some kind of program to help undocumented workers gain a legal status. Is it still going? JG: Actually, it is coming back now. Colin Powell was in South America doing some of that. One of the downsides of September 11 was what they were doing with people here at the airport. I mean they would just say, “Hey, you’re undocumented, you’re out of here because you have some kind of security 28 clearance.” They found out that not one of them had a security clearance. They just kind of wanted to clean it out and let someone else do the work. RL: And a couple of days ago, they did 20 workers at Logan airport. JG: Right, and then Los Angeles had the same thing. But there were things that this country was built on, scapegoat-ism, who has been the scapegoat? Mexico and South America. That is just something that we need to get away from. Instead of looking at what’s wrong, we need to look at what’s right. I think that is one of the things that is going to be the hardest to get past, is people who don’t choose right. It really bothers me, but it’s something that I have to live with. RL: And you think that Ogden is going to grow at the same rate in this census period as it did the last? JG: If not more. As you know, people started coming in and being accepted, and it’s a good place to bring up children. RL: And they brought a cousin, and an uncle… JG: And to me it’s wonderful. RL: Sure. The more people that are here, the more tolerance you have, and more acceptance. You are less afraid of the things that you become familiar with. So I think from that standpoint, things can only improve. JG: If we allow it to. RL: But what we have to do is be on our toes to counter backlash. JG: And be ready to do so. 29 RL: Well, Jesse, thank you. Is there anything else you would like to tell us, any observations you would like to make, or closing statement or story you want to share? JG: No closing statement, other than the fact that we are here and we aren’t going anywhere. RL: So you better learn to accept us. JG: That’s exactly right, work with me, not against me. RL: That’s great. Thank you so much for spending time with us. JG: Thank you, Ruby. 30