John Olive

I have known Beto for more than 10 years. I have worked with him on many events, vigils, fundraisers and protests on behalf of the under-documented immigrant communities in the greater Athens-Clarke County area.

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Beto has worked tirelessly as the coordinator of the Athens Immigration Rights Coalition (AIRC), as a member of Dignidad Inmigrante en Athens (DIA) and the Director of the Latinx Festival in Athens to bring awareness and much needed assistance to the hispanic immigrant community in the greater Athens area.

With the election of Donald Trump in 2016, there was an increased emphasis on hounding the under-documented immigrant communities and deporting productive heads of immigrant households, leaving many families in crisis. The Faith Community in Athens came together with the help of Beto Cacao to form the Interfaith Sanctuary Coalition of Athens (ISC) which became a member of the AIRC. I have been an active member of ISC and worked with Beto on several critical projects, especially during the COVID Pandemic. We held a city-wide Vigil in December of 2018 to show support for those families who were living in fear of deportation. Beto helped organize this vigil that included ministers, speakers and performers from The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Athens (UUFA), The Catholic Center, Congregation Children of Israel, Mindful Breath Sangha, First Baptist Church, Covenant Presbyterian and the Oconee Street United Methodist church. Beto also performed at the vigil and provided sound equipment and interpretation in Spanish for many of the speakers. The vigil was a huge success thanks, in part for the hard work and organization that Beto provided.

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Beto has the pulse of the immigrant community in Athens. In February of 2019 he sent an urgent email to ISC requesting a ride that afternoon for a person who needed to meet with his Probation Officer in Madison County. The ride he had arranged had to cancel at the last minute. Fortunately, I was available and was able to take the gentleman to his probation appointment and possibly prevent a deportation event if he had missed the appointment. Such rapid response to crisis events would not have been possible without the network in the immigrant community that Beto had established.

In March of 2019 Beto organized an important retreat on ending arrests of immigrants for driving without a license. Representatives from immigrant communities from all over the country travelled to Athens for this retreat and Beto organized accommodations for all these representatives, including inflatable beds for them to sleep on! In April of 2019 Beto was the lead organizer for the annual AIRC Town Hall in which member congregations of the ISC participated. The UUFA had several speakers in various sessions. In July of 2019 Beto organized rapid response teams to patrol and be present as witnesses of ICE raids in the immigrant neighborhoods. Beto set up text and email groups for the patrols to alert neighbors when they spotted ICE agents in the neighborhood. Beto was also part of the National Campaign “Driving without fear” and helped raise funds through DIA to send six local representatives to the National conference in New Jersey. During the COVID Pandemic, the ISC (with the help of the non-profit immigrant organization: SIFIC — Support for Immigrant Families in Crisis and DIA) created a fundraising project called Fondo Solidario through which we were able to raise over $200,000 in donations and another$ 300,000 in local grants to assist those under-documented immigrants in our community that were not eligible for any of the government’s pandemic relief money and assistance.

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Beto and DIA helped us recruit local Spanish speaking community representatives to locate families who needed assistance and met with the families that requested assistance, which made it possible for us to pay rent, utilities, medical expenses and insurance directly to the appropriate companies and organizations, thus enabling these families to remain housed and relatively healthy during the shut-down caused by the pandemic. Beto, DIA, SIFIC and these community workers also arranged for food deliveries (donated by local restaurants) to many families (I personally delivered food to many families during the pandemic). During the first three months of the shutdown they distributed 4,400 food baskets to needy families. The Fondo Solidario project was able to provide half a million dollars in pandemic-related aid to these families during the 18months of the pandemic. This would not have been possible without the coordination that Beto provided to the Fondo committee.

In May of 2020 Beto (through DIA) organized a highly successful Caravan Protest to bring awareness of the plight of undocumented workers and families during the pandemic. Approximately 100 vehicles travelled in a procession from the Georgia Square Mall to City Hall in the center of Athens. They were greeted along the way with cheers and thumbs-up signs and raised much needed funds for these families. In June of 2020 Beto organized Marshal Training for the volunteer marshals at civic protest rallies. This training is very important for the safety of participants in civic protest rallies.

Because of the continued limitations on public gatherings in October of 2020 Beto took the annual LatinxFest online using Facebook Live and created an international festival, involving artists and groups from several Hispanic countries. It was a tremendous success!

In January of 2021 Beto organized a “Demonstration of Solidarity” via Zoom for residents of a local trailer park who were being forced to move out of their homes by the owner of the property.

In February of 2021 Beto was instrumental in getting the word out to the immigrant community of the availability of the new COVID vaccines and where and how to obtain the vaccinations without ID or Social Security number.

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Beto has also collaborated with other non-profits in the greater Athens area, helping house the homeless and finding furniture for the newly housed homeless families and refugees. He has also supported many of the protest rallies in support of Black Lives that have been taken by excessive Police action throughout the United States. These protest have been organized primarily by the Athens Anti-Discrimination Movement (AADM) of which I am the treasurer. AADM has also supported the demonstrations that Beto has organized in support of the immigrant and refugee community, most recently the adverse reaction to the immigrant community that followed the murder of a young white female student in Athens.

Last year Beto joined the state-wide effort to advocate for legislation that will give driver licenses for undocumented immigrant workers in Georgia.

It is obvious from all of the above that Beto Mendoza has been and continues to be one of the most active and effective advocates for immigrant justice in this state and beyond. He has earned my sincerest admiration and support.

 

Sincerely,

John Olive, Ph.D. Retired Professor Emeritus

Department of Mathematics and Science Education

The University of Georgia