President's Message

Dear Friend,

I am pleased to introduce you to our donor newsletter, Perspectiva Latina. Every other month, we will share with you how your dollars are being used to change the lives of individuals and families throughout the country and to impact the policies that affect their daily lives. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoy doing the work!

Throughout 2018, I have been reminded more than once that the work we do is part of a broad national effort to protect our most cherished values. Values like empathy and fairness. I see it in Puerto Rico where we have worked with local community groups to install solar panels at community health clinics so that residents can continue to access health care. I see it when we work with local businesses there to build pop-up clinics, continuing enterprises that would have disappeared without this innovation. I see it in the numerous homes and businesses that went without electricity for far too long after Hurricane Maria.

Here at home, I see it in our education advocates who fight every day to provide education and opportunities that our youth long for. I see it in the mothers who are outraged by the President’s immoral immigration policies, policies that have forced us to drive refugee parents thousands of miles to help them reunite with their children. I see it in the young scholars who volunteer their evenings to register new voters in Latino communities throughout the country. I see it in the leaders of our member nonprofits who are under-resourced and overwhelmed but refuse to say no to anyone who walks through their doors. And I see it it in our own staff, which is growing and tackling new challenges con ganas - with eagerness and a deep sense of urgency.

Despite the vision of America that our current administration wants us to buy into, I see the continued hard work, the effort, the belief that this vision will not last long. I know this because everywhere I go in our communities I see the real America. An America where neighbors come together to help one another; where we welcome everyone because we know that we all come from somewhere else; where the noble ideas of equality, justice, and fairness aren’t mocked and diminished, they’re honored and expanded. That America is out there, and although there are people who want to make us believe that it does not exist, it is alive, and it is thriving. As long as we are willing to work with one another — across lines of race, class, gender, sexual orientation, and legal status — that America will win the day.

I hope that as you read through this new issue of Perspectiva Latina, you’ll be impressed by the work that your generosity makes possible. You are the dreamers. You are the change makers. And because of you, the Hispanic Federation can continue its work to build equitable, thriving communities. We are glad to stand beside you in this work! Thank you for your support.

Con mucho cariño,

José Calderón
President
Hispanic Federation