State offices are closed Monday for Cesar Chavez Day, but Los Angeles city and county offices are open because those jurisdictions observed the holiday honoring the late labor leader last Monday.
Los Angeles Superior Court courtrooms will be closed Monday, as well as state offices such as the Department of Motor Vehicles. Los Angeles Unified School District schools will also be closed.
Banks, Metrolink trains and trash pickup will follow regular schedules.
There will be mail delivery because Cesar Chavez Day is a federal commemorative holiday, first proclaimed by then-President Barack Obama in 2014, and not a federal holiday.
Then-Gov. Gray Davis signed legislation in 2000 making the March 31 anniversary of Chavez’s birth in 1927 a state holiday. When March 31 falls on a Sunday, as it does this year, the holiday is observed on the following Monday.
Chavez is credited with improving work and quality of life conditions for immigrant farm workers in Central California. Alongside Dolores Hureta he co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers Union.
“Cesar Chavez reminds us of what is always possible: power in unity,” Mayor Karen Bass posted on social media last Monday. “His work shaped our nation and inspired me to join the Delano grape boycott with my parents.
“As the city observes Cesar Chavez today, we carry on his values to fight for justice and work for the greater good.”
A strike by the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, a predominantly Filipino and AFL-CIO-sponsored labor organization, against table grape growers in the Kern County city about 30 miles north of Bakersfield began on Sept. 8, 1965.
The predominantly Mexican National Farmworkers Association joined the strike eight days later. The two groups merged in August 1966 to create the United Farm Workers.
“As Cesar Chavez’s 97th birthday approaches, may we reflect on his legacy and the values he modeled,” Los Angeles. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said in a statement. “He is an American hero that stood tall and was the first to fight for labor and civil rights of farm workers.
“He was a humble yet inspiring leader that created a remarkable coalition focused on achieving respect, fair wages, and humane living conditions.”
Barger also said she continues “to be inspired by Cesar Chavez’s extraordinary humanitarian work and approach to public service. He led by example, with courage and moral conviction. Chavez’s achievements and legacy have cemented his place in our country’s history and will never be forgotten.”
President Joe Biden issued a proclamation Friday proclaiming Sunday as Cesar Chavez Day and calling “upon all Americans to observe this day as a day of service and learning with appropriate service, community, and education programs to honor Cesar E. Chavez’s enduring legacy.”
“On this day, we recognize that Cesar Chavez and his fellow farm workers made progress that can never be taken back,” Biden said in the proclamation. “They fought for a sacred cause that continues to beat in the hearts of the American people: Every worker — no matter who they are, where they are from, or what they do — deserves dignity and respect.”
On his first day in office, Biden placed a bronze statue of Chavez, supplied by his children, in the Oval Office.
The 31st annual Cesar E. Chavez Day Celebration and The March For Justice were in the Northeast San Fernando Valley March 17 with Sen. Alex Padilla, D-California, as the keynote speaker.