A Quiet Rebel : Dedicated Activist Works in New Way to Change Latino Lives

Nativo Lopez doesn’t work in an office. He does his business on barrio street corners and in living rooms filled with the aromas of simmering pinto beans and chilis.

Lopez, 33, a former court interpreter turned activist, has knocked on doors across Orange County --from El Salvador Park in Santa Ana to Anaheim’s Penguin City.

He is the driving force behind a new kind of community-organizing effort among the county’s Latinos, which for the first time is trying to tap the potential political power of undocumented immigrant residents.

His group, the David Coalition of Santa Ana, organized the two-month-old Santa Ana rent strike in which about 500 Latinos are fighting to end slum living conditions such as poor heating, cockroach infestations and crumbling stairways. The renters’ movement is considered a first in California, if not the nation, because it involves many tenants who are in the United States illegally. It has attracted widespread attention, as well as the envy of other community activists in California.

“He’s ahead of the pack on this one,” Cesar Chavez, president of the United Farm Workers, said of Lopez in a recent interview. “I guess more people sense the need to do something about this group, and help them.”

Other organizers across the Southwest are recognizing the importance of undocumented residents. Representatives of the United Neighborhoods Organization in East Los Angeles and Communities Organized for Public Service, San Antonio, two of the larger community-oriented Latino groups, said undocumented immigrants must be included in organizing efforts if such groups are to survive.

Landlords and their attorneys have been critical of Lopez’s methods, however.

“He instigates them,” said one landlord who asked to remain anonymous, speaking of Lopez’s tenant-organizing efforts. “He gets them all riled up, yet he doesn’t live in any of these apartments.”

Ronald L. Calder of Santa Ana, an attorney for landlord Carmine Esposito, one of the targets of the rent strike, has called Lopez “a troublemaker.”

Lopez said he has recognized that California’s growing Latino community (by 1991, Latinos are expected to number 6.6 million, almost a fourth of the projected state population) is a significant factor in the state’s political and social future.

Pointing to a map of Orange County, he said, “Already, schools in Fullerton, Placentia and Anaheim have substantial Hispanic populations. But not just there--Yorba Linda has a thriving Hispanic community, too.”

Latinos are well represented in Santa Ana, the county’s urban core, where almost half the 200,000-plus population is Latino and seven of every 10 students are from Spanish-speaking homes. Seven elementary schools have enrollments that are more than 90% Latino, school district officials say. In addition, Santa Ana’s undocumented residents are estimated to number between 20,000 and 50,000, according to police, immigration and other sources.

In Anaheim elementary schools, 41% of the pupils are Latinos. Elementary schools in Fullerton and Placentia have Latino enrollments of 25% and almost 18%, respectively.

Yorba Linda Figures

In Yorba Linda, in northern Orange County, where there is still much undeveloped land, 10% of elementary-school children are Spanish-speaking, almost double the proportion in 1974.

Moreover, growth studies forecast that the county’s high-tech industries will support a healthy job market in the region, and the demand for cheap, unskilled labor is expected to remain strong well into the 1990s.

The message for Lopez and other Latino-community organizers is clear: Continue efforts with all Latinos, hoping that as their U.S.-born children reach voting age, they also will be politically aggressive, and eventually will mature into a potent political force.

Mexican-Americans and other U.S.-born Latinos can learn from the illegal immigrants’ ambitions to succeed in this country and, in the case of the renters’ movement, to protect what they have gained so far, Lopez said.

Many Orange County activists say there has been a leadership vacuum in recent years, and that while Mexican-American organizations continue to grow, they cater primarily to a middle class.

The Santa Ana Neighborhood Organizations, Orange County’s only true major grass-roots organization, in the 1970s claimed a predominantly Latino membership of 10,000 families, but it has become dormant. It’s successor, the Orange County Organizing Project, is in its development stages, said spokesman George Peterson.

New Target Group

“The tenants really didn’t have any group to go to in Santa Ana. That’s why they went to Nativo (Lopez) and Hermandad Mexicana Nacional,” said Gilbert R. Melendez, a David Coalition member.

Hermandad is an immigrant rights’ group that has about a dozen chapters throughout the state, one of them in Santa Ana.

Community organizers say there is new emphasis on mobilizing the undocumented Latinos, who are some of the county’s poorest residents. Most of them have been hesitant to complain about deplorable housing conditions for fear of being deported.

“Any group that can’t recognize the contributions they (undocumented residents) could make to the organization is making a serious mistake,” said Michael Clements, United Neighborhoods Organization leader in East Los Angeles.

“To avoid being single-minded and narrow, we teach the value of having a broad-based organization. In fact, if some members can’t deal with that, we challenge them,” he added.

Mutual Interests Cited

The issue is simple, said Sister Mary Beth Larkin, executive director of San Antonio’s Communities Organized for Public Service and formerly with United Neighborhoods.

“UNO fought for health care for the undocumented in Los Angeles,” Larkin said. “The issue, as we saw it, was that if you start restricting availability of health care, everybody suffers. This had an effect on kids, and prenatal care. Anybody who is indigent needs to have adequate health care for the protection of everybody.”

Linda Wong, an immigration specialist with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund in Los Angeles, said she was encouraged, as others have been, that organizers in the county have accepted the challenge of helping undocumented residents.

“I also find it ironic, because Orange County has such a conservative image,” Wong said.

She found it surprising that organizers like Lopez and support groups like the Orange County Human Relations Commission, which often speaks out against exploitation of undocumented residents, have taken active roles.

Living on Limited Income

Nativo Lopez and his Mexican-born wife, Maria Rosa, 33, live simply so that he can devote full time to the cause. With the help of savings and private donations, they have enough for the necessities and an occasional night out. Little else.

Like many community organizers, Lopez doesn’t seek publicity. He prefers staying out of the spotlight, but is often seen with pencil and clipboard at renters’ demonstrations and meetings.

“He’s just a low-profile kind of person,” said Sister Carmen Sarati, a Roman Catholic nun and volunteer organizer who works with Lopez. “He prides himself in empowering others.”

Lopez calls other volunteers of the David Coalition “the true leaders.” He gives credit to Maria Rosa, to Sister Carmen, to Santa Ana attorney Salvador Sarmiento and others.

“Focus on Gilbert (Melendez) or Sister Carmen,” Lopez told a reporter. “They’re the ones who are also in the David Coalition, and becoming leaders.”

Melendez, in accepting an award recently from the Orange County Human Relations Commission for his efforts to help slum tenants, said, “This award really should go to Nativo Lopez.”

Praised as a Teacher

Sister Carmen also described Lopez as a teacher.

“He insists we become spokesmen for the people. He often points out the things we have to say to get what we want to help others. He’s always saying, ‘This is what you have to do.’

“He has done what (other successful organizations) have done. That is, knowing how to focus on leadership in the true sense of the word--not the title, but to identify real leaders in each neighborhood,” she said.

Lopez can be bullheaded at times, and becomes a cheerleader when a motivating force is needed, coalition members said. When the movement hits a snag, Lopez says he relies on one of his favorite beliefs: “When you lose faith in the people, you have nothing.”

Lopez and other coalition members say one goal of the rent ers’ movement is to have tenants submit offers to buy the run-down buildings in which they live and turn them into apartment co-ops.

Another goal is to establish an immigrant-rights center to handle immigration cases, job placement and other needs in Orange County.

While the idea of buying their buildings frightens some tenants, it has lifted their hopes and given them a dream to work for, said Alfredo Torres, 43, one of the tenant leaders.

‘He Cares About Us’

“We like Nativo. He has helped us so much. We know he cares about us; it shows in his sincerity,” Torres said.

For Torres and other tenants, their homes are riding on the outcome of the strike. A temporary restraining order forbidding landlords to shut off water or take any other retaliatory action has been granted, and a Superior Court judge has scheduled for April 11 a hearing of both sides in the landlord-tenant dispute.

Torres admitted that Lopez has been a major influence on his life. Amelia Torres, his wife, said she has noticed a change in her husband’s behavior.

“He asks questions all the time now. And neighbors now come to my husband when they need help,” she said proudly.

“I’m more aware of my rights now,” Torres said. “I have changed. I ask more questions, I attend meetings and I’ll speak up when I have to. And I’m not as accepting, anymore, of why we have to live in these poor conditions.”

As his son Sergio, 14, listened, Torres said, “Someday, I want my children to have a better life and fight for their rights, too.

“That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”