A crowd estimated by organizers at between 2,500 and 3,000 participated in the annual César Chávez March for Justice in Pacoima Sunday, one day before the state holiday honoring the late labor leader.
The two-mile march began on Van Nuys Boulevard near Pacoima Charter Elementary School and ended at Ritchie Valens Park. A cultural arts festival was held at the park from noon to 3:30 p.m. with musical presentations by school groups and professional musicians.
The march was preceded by a rally highlighting the “invaluable contributions of immigrants” at Pacoima Charter Elementary School, organizers said.
Speakers included Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, Rep. Luz Rivas, D-North Hollywood, Sen. Caroline Menjivar, D-Panorama City, Assemblywoman Celeste Rodriguez, D-San Fernando, Los Angeles City Council members Imelda Padilla and Monica Rodriguez and Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education member Kelly Gonez.
“What really stood out is we had a lot of youth that’s becoming aware of the social injustice in our communities,” Ruben Rodriguez, the director of Pueblo y Salud, an organizer of the march and rally, told City News Service.
The annual Mass honoring Chávez’s memory and legacy was celebrated in Spanish by Archbishop José H. Gomez Sunday at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.
Farmworkers, including members of the United Farm Workers union that Chávez co-founded in 1962, participated in the procession down the cathedral’s center aisle before the Mass. Manuel Bernal, president and CEO of the César Chávez Foundation, spoke after communion.
The foundation describes its mission as carrying on Chávez’s “life’s work of uplifting the lives of Latinos and working families by inspiring and transforming communities through social enterprises that address essential human, cultural and community needs.”
The Mass also reflected on the 60th anniversary of the Delano Grape Strike.
A strike by the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, a predominantly Filipino and AFL-CIO-backed labor organization, against table grape growers in the Kern County city about 30 miles north of Bakersfield began on Sept. 8, 1965.
The National Farmworkers Association, the predominately Mexican labor group Chávez founded alongside Dolores Huerta, joined the strike eight days later. The two groups merged in August 1966 to create the United Farm Workers.
The strike and boycott ended in 1970 after 26 table grape growers signed contracts with the UFW.