Barrio’s New Generation Comes Home

Youngsters growing up in the barrio often think of college as an escape route, an exit leading to more expensive neighborhoods, to big houses and BMWs.

But for Martin GutieRuiz and his Boyle Heights friends, education at Princeton and Berkeley brought them back home.

Back to Mott Street, to the old two-story house where Martin, his five sisters and three brothers were raised, near Santa Isabel Elementary School where they first stepped into a classroom. And back to politics of the barrio.

The 26-year-old GutieRuiz is running against City Councilman Richard Alatorre, the veteran barrio power broker.

On the face of it, the kid hasn’t got a chance in the election next Tuesday. Alatorre has more than $300,000 in the bank. GutieRuiz thought it was a big deal on Monday when finance chairman Eduardo Mundo brought in a Nike shoe box full of small bills from a weekend fund-raiser.

There’s another reason this race is interesting. GutieRuiz was a campaign worker for Los Angeles Supervisor Gloria Molina, Alatorre’s great foe in Eastside politics. She’d like nothing better than to see GutieRuiz knock off Alatorre. It would be a memorable chapter in Eastside political history titled “ Gloria’s Revenge.”

I went to the Mott Street house on Monday. GutieRuiz’ father, Ricardo Gutierrez, was on the front porch to greet me when I walked up the wooden stairs. Gutierrez is a founder of the United Neighborhood Organizations, a big grass-roots group. His mother, Juana Gutierrez, started the Mothers of East Los Angeles, another activist organization.

The son spells his name differently from the parents, you’ll note. That’s because Martin combined his name with that of his wife, Marcelina Ruiz.

GutieRuiz was upstairs with his staff. Political consultant Lauro (Nick) Pacheco, 27, graduated from UC Berkeley in 1988. Finance director Mundo is Cal State Northridge, ’87.

Field director Anthony Torres, 20, left Los Angeles Trade Technical College to work on political campaigns and when this one is over, the others want him to go back to school.

“The idea that was imparted to us in high school,” said GutieRuiz, “was to go away to college and move out of the barrio.”

At Princeton, he said, “I battled the Administration over Chicano issues, faculty hiring and others. I got exposed to activism. And all our parents were activists.”

Their parents were fighting a proposed East L.A. state prison. “When we came home, we used the expertise we developed in college to help them,” said GutieRuiz. “We knew about environmental impact reports. We knew about sound bites.”

Afterward, they worked in Monterey Park Democrat Xavier Becerra’s successful Assembly campaign, as well as campaigning for Molina earlier this year.

Nick Pacheco, the campaign consultant, knows desk-top publishing. He turns out sharp brochures in a Mac in one of the bedrooms, and then takes them down to a print shop. “Just $32 a 1,000 at Kinko’s,” he said. Volunteers see that they’re mailed at the bulk rate.

Lists of registered voters were purchased from a company specializing in such goods. The cost was just $600. The lists break down voters into two categories: Those who go to the polls frequently, and those who don’t. Volunteer precinct walkers hit the frequent voters’ homes.

The 14th District, which reaches from Boyle Heights to Mt. Washington, is a low-turnout district. GutieRuiz expects only 12,000 voters in the primary.

He said he hopes to get 4,000 votes, and expects two other candidates, John Lucero and David Diaz, to receive 1,000 each. That would deny Alatorre a majority and force a runoff with GutieRuiz.

The vigor of this upstart campaign reflects the animosity that many grass-roots organizations have long held toward Alatorre, whom they regard as a captive of business interests. GutieRuiz promises to be more responsive than Alatorre, and to poll constituents before he votes.

Being young, GutieRuiz and associates are full of the pure joy of competing to win.

Being savvy and empowered, Alatorre expects to win.

He says he’s brought business to the Eastside while controlling development, and has improved parks and law enforcement. Alatorre was the hero of the Eastside when he was elected four years ago, the council’s first Latino since Ed Roybal many years before. He’s got the money and skill to remind voters of his strengths. But if GutieRuiz manages to get into a runoff, Molina is expected to endorse him, raise money and make it a competitive race.

She’d no doubt want an Alatorre defeat cast as Gloria’s Revenge. But Princeton, Berkeley and a lot of East L.A. moms and dads deserve credit too.