Spreading Seeds of Hope

The first time a teen-age Jose Vargas tried to cross the U.S. border in the early 1950s, he was pulled from a train by immigration agents and landed face down in the mud.

“I tried to run away so they pulled me out of the train,” he recalled. “They handcuffed me, I had no shoes and it was freezing cold. I was mad because I thought, ‘All this work for nothing.’ ”

More than 40 years after that unpromising start, he stood before a classroom of students last week as highly decorated Santa Ana Police Officer Jose Vargas, once named one of the Top 10 law enforcement officers in the nation. He had a message for his young listeners, whose beginnings were much like his own.

“We who come from another country, we can have a slice of the American pie,” he said to the young immigrants at the Centennial Education Center. “You deserve to have your slice. But you need to contribute and help to bake the pie before you can eat from it.”

It is Vargas’ job, as the Police Department’s Hispanic affairs officer, to help the city’s more than 50,000 immigrants understand their rights and responsibilities and the laws of their new country.

In his 14 years in this job, created in 1979 to improve communication between police and Spanish-speaking residents, Vargas, 57, has received hundreds of commendations and dozens of awards, including Santa Ana’s 1993 Distinguished Service Award, one of the city’s highest honors.

“I think Jose has really made a difference in fostering positive relationships between the Police Department and the Hispanic community,” City Manager David N. Ream said.

“He’s been especially effective in working with the Spanish-language press in getting word out on how to be responsible citizens in Santa Ana and what is acceptable behavior in a new surrounding. He is highly respected in the community.”

In his speeches and through a weekly column he writes for the Spanish-language newspaper El Rumores, Vargas often uses his own experiences to try to inspire other immigrants to make the most of their lives.

“I get told by some people that just because I made it, it doesn’t mean that everyone is going to make it,” Vargas said. “They say that immigrants are taking too much. I say, ‘They are here. They are not going back.’ All we can do is teach them to be contributors. What I can do best is show them that there is hope.”

Despite the accolades he has received, Vargas admits he has his critics, particularly those who resent the rapidly increasing immigrant population.

“I have been told by some in the community that I defend the immigrants too much,” he said. “But that’s OK, it comes with the territory. I think immigrants are coming to the United States because the cry for tortillas is just too heavy, and you are going to go where you have the better chance.”

That cry compelled the young Vargas to return repeatedly to the United States. He was arrested and deported more than 15 times.

The oldest of six siblings, he had become the head of the household at age 11 when his father died. He spent his youth in Guadalajara, Mexico, selling newspapers, carrying groceries, shining shoes and working other odd jobs.

“Basically, it was up to me to bring home the frijoles,” Vargas said. “I used to come home at night, tired and hungry, and my mother would talk to me about the United States. She had spent two weeks in Texas and talked about field workers who every day brought home all of the vegetables they could carry. You talk like that to a hungry kid and it sounds like paradise.”

At age 15, Vargas decided to make his move.

On his fifth attempt, he made it to Buena Park by train and found work as a field hand. But after a few months, Immigration and Naturalization Service agents found and deported him again.

Vargas was deported at least 10 more times. The last time, he was jailed at the Federal Detention Center in Terminal Island for two days.

“I got picked up so many times that they wanted to teach me a lesson,” he said. “I knew I was breaking the laws of the United States, but I made myself a promise. I was going to keep coming back, even if I had to spend my life behind bars.”

He obtained legal residency in 1959 when he married his girlfriend, who was a U.S. citizen. He and Phyllis Vargas had seven sons and divorced in 1970.

“I remember the day I drove down to Tijuana to get my green card and the guard at the border said, ‘Welcome to the United States, and let me cross the border in my 1950 Chevrolet low-rider. It felt so good that I made a U-turn and crossed the border again. I thought, ‘Hey! I’m legal here in the United States!’ ”

Working full time as a garbage collector, Vargas was able to move his mother, Cuca, and five of his six siblings to the United States legally.

“I thought that was the end of the dream,” he said. “My family was now here, I had a black-and-white television, a car and an apartment. I was the wealthiest person in my family. I was going to be a garbage collector for the rest of my life. It was a good job and I was so proud of my white garbage truck.”

But his boss at Jaycox Disposal in Anaheim saw potential in Vargas and urged him to enroll in English language classes at night. After Vargas learned English, his boss, Warren Jaycox, then persuaded him to earn his high school diploma.

“He carried that diploma everywhere,” remembers Vargas’ eldest son, Joe. “He was so proud of it. He’d take it to the trash yard and show it to all the other drivers.”

Jaycox was not through. He next encouraged his employee to attend college. Buoyed by his earlier successes, Vargas enrolled at Fullerton College, where he told an incredulous counselor that he wanted to study criminal justice to become a policeman.

“The counselor looked at me like I was crazy,” Vargas remembered. “He said, ‘Your English is terrible, you’re too old, too fat and too ugly and you want to be a policeman?’ ”

After three years of college, at age 33, Vargas became the first former illegal immigrant to enter the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Academy.

At graduation, he immediately was hired by the Stanton Police Department.

“Talk about culture shock,” son Joe Vargas said. “One day he was a trash man and the next day he’s a respected member of the community and a police officer. It was so extreme. We moved from the barrio in Anaheim to a nice house with a yard in Stanton. It seemed like everyone in the city knew my dad, he was so well-liked by everyone.”

Joe Vargas said it seemed natural to follow his father’s lead. Joe is now a sergeant with the Anaheim Police Department; 24-year-old Felipe, a former Marine, is a deputy with the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, and Ken, 32, is a detention officer in Santa Ana. Vargas’ sister, Lucy, is a training officer for the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department.

Vargas said his proudest moments were when Joe was made sergeant and Felipe returned from Desert Storm.

“When my son arrived home from the Gulf War, I was so proud to be an American,” Vargas said. “I came to the United States all those years ago to make my mother’s dreams come true. And now my children are following my dream.

“I am very proud.”

Profile: Jose Diaz Vargas

Position: Santa Ana Police Department Hispanic affairs officer

Age: 57

Birthplace: San Martin Hidalgo, Jalisco, Mexico

Citizenship: Entered United States illegally in 1953; became legal resident in 1959 and a citizen in 1968

Family: Remarried in 1980, to Adeline Nuno; seven sons, ages 23 to 36, from first marriage, which ended in divorce. Two stepchildren, 16 and 20, and 13 grandchildren

Education: Graduated from Anaheim Evening High School, 1966; attended Fullerton College, 1966-70

Employment: Stanton police officer, 1969-75; joined Santa Ana Police Department, 1975; named Hispanic affairs officer, 1979

Career highlights: Named Stanton Police Officer of the Year, 1969; life story is entered into congressional record, 1977; named one of top 10 police officers in the United States by International Assn. of Chiefs of Police, 1977; named Most Commended Hispanic Police Officer in California by the Orange County Board of Supervisors, 1985; named Officer of the Year by Latino Peace Officers Assn., 1991; received city of Santa Ana’s Exceptional Quality Service Award, 1993; received more than 50 awards from public and private sectors and more than 400 commendations from community organizations and other groups

Quote: “My message is, ‘If I can do it, so can you. There’s no reason for you to live in the greatest country in the world and live poor.’ I try to motivate and say that there are opportunities in this country. But, we have to pay the price.”

Source: Santa Ana Police Department