Oral History Interview with Arcenio Garcia, 1997 García, Arcenio Interview conducted by José Angel Gutiérrez, Ph.D., J.D. Interview transcribed by Karen McGee José Angel Gutiérrez Transcript converted to XML encoding by Scott Holmes Center for Mexican American Studies, University of Texas at Arlington Texas State Library and Archives Commission 85 pages; 224 KB.

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 2001

Source: MS-Word file transcript of video recording CMAS No. 117.

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 English Spanish García, Arcenio Gutierrez, Jose Angel University of Texas at Arlington. Center for Mexican American Studies Mexican Americans--Texas--Interviews oral history interview Tejanos Chicanos politics

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Oral History Interview with Arcenio García, 1997 Center for Mexican American Studies (CMAS) Interview Number 117Mexican American Public Figures of Texas Interviewee: Arcenio García Interviewer: José Angel Gutiérrez, Ph.D., J.D. Transcribers: Karen McGee and José Angel Gutiérrez Date of Interview: October 23, 1997 Location of Interview: Cotulla, Texas Number of Transcript Pages: 85Cite this interview as Oral History Interview with Arcenio García, 1997 , by José Angel Gutiérrez. CMAS No. 117 Arcenio García Dr. Gutiérrez: We are in Cotulla, Texas. This is Commissioner Arcenio Arturo García. We are going to ask you four general things and, and if we, we could keep it in English, it is easier on the transcriber pero (but) if you gotta say something in Spanish, pues dilo, aqui estamos para ayudar. (well say it, we are here to help.) Commissioner García: We are bi-lingual. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. All right. Basically we are going to cover the biography, you know, I mean, the family, where they came from, their names, when you were born, your children and so on. And then we are going to talk a little bit about of growing up in Cotulla, your childhood. And then your political career. We want to go through all of that stuff and that's probably the bulk of the interview. And if we have time at the end, we will ask you about issues and leaders and organizations. So, who is Arcenio García? Commissioner García: Well, Arcenio García, I was born in, in Ohio, in Defiance, Ohio. My parents, Arturo and Severiana García were migrants and it just happened that I am one of seven children that was born from Arturo and Severiana García. And I was the only one that was not born in Cotulla, Texas. I was born in Defiance, Ohio because the crop that year was, was very exceptional. So they had decided to stay just a little longer and, of course, they could not travel back to Cotulla because my mother was too far along in her pregnancy. So, I am the only one of seven children that was not born in Cotulla as a result of migrant parents. My parents, Arturo García was born in Saltillo, Mexico and my mother was born in Cotulla. Dr. Gutiérrez: What's her maiden name? Commissioner García: Ruiz. Severiana Ruiz. Muriel Ruiz. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Where are they from? You said they were from Cotulla, but how far back? The grandparents, great-grandparents? Commissioner García: They are all from Mexico. They were all born in, on both sides, on my mother and father are Mexican, well, Mexican citizens. Dr. Gutiérrez: Where from? Commissioner García: Mi abuelita (My grandmother), my father's mother, was born way south in Mexico. I don't know remember exactly where and his father was born in San Antonio. And my grandfather was a maquinista (machinist) for the railroad, so my father just happened to be born in Saltillo because of that's where he was working. And my mother's parents were born in, around Parral, Mexico, en Agua Leguas.(Parral, Mexico in Agua Leguas.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Agua Leguas? Commissioner García: Agua Leguas, Coah... Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: It's only... Dr. Gutiérrez: What state is that? Commissioner García: It's Nuevo Leon. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh.... Commissioner García: It's, I would say about a hundred, no, about seventy miles northeast, northeast of Monterey. So, they are from the northern part of Mexico. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, your family was a migrant family. That's why you were born up there. Commissioner García: Yes. I was the only one that was born out of Cotulla, away from Cotulla. Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you remember when you all stopped migrating? Commissioner García: I was twelve years old the last time we went up north. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, and so, when were you born? Did you tell us? Commissioner García: I was born in 1947, August 26, 1947. Dr. Gutiérrez: How many brothers and sisters and who are they? Commissioner García: My oldest brother, Ramon, he was born here in Cotulla and he is approximately fifty-nine or sixty, and then, I have a sister Alma, she is, her, her married name is Grubbs. She lives in Sacramento and she's fifty-three. And then, I am next. I am fifty. And then, I have a sister, Agustina García. Now she is Ramirez. She is forty-seven. And my brother Alberto, he is forty-five. He lives here in Cotulla. And then, my baby brother, Abel, he lives in Chicago and he is forty-four. And then, I have a baby sister, the last one, Amalia, Luz Amalia. Her last name is Martin. And she is, lives in San Antonio and she is approximately forty-two. I hope I don't offend her. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you ever think you were going to be fifty? Commissioner García: Well, based on my parents' longevity, I knew that I would probably hit fifty. I don't know if I can hit sixty though. Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you, do you believe you are fifty? Commissioner García: I don't feel that I am fifty, but I know that I look like I am fifty. Dr. Gutiérrez: You don't even have a gray hair. Commissioner García: They are there if you, if you look hard enough. Dr. Gutiérrez: All right, then. Well, tell us a little bit about your, your, your personal family. You married; you had children, maybe grandchildren? Commissioner García: Yes, I am married. My wife's name is Maria Xochil Zarzosa García and my wife is forty-seven years old. She was born in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. We have been married since 1967. We have five children. Our oldest is Jose Javier. He is twenty-nine. Maria Aide. She is twenty-eight. And we have Ana Azusana. She is twenty. Arcenio, Jr., he is nineteen. And my, our baby daughter is fourteen years old and her name is Isabel Severiana. I have, my oldest son, Javier has one child, and he is married to a young woman from Laredo, Texas. And my grandson's name is, is Isai, Javier Isai. And then, I have on my, with my daughter, Maria Aide, she has one child and her name is Erica. And we, we have practically raised Erica since she was born until maybe recently, the last few months. She is five years old. And then, Ana Azusana, my middle daughter, she has two children. And one of the children's, the oldest child is Elias Isaias. And the youngest is, well, the youngest child that she has, her real name should be Jada Irasai, but she misspelled it in the birth certificate, and then, the, those are the grandchildren that I have, we have four. Arcenio, Jr., his girlfriend is expecting a, a child, so we are soon to be having a fifth grandchild. Dr. Gutiérrez: Good, Maybe you had better spell Irasai because I don't want to mess it up. Commissioner García: J-A-D-A I-R-A-S-A-I. Irasai. Dr. Gutiérrez: We need to get that correct. Oh, all right, that takes care of the biography part. Why don't you tell us about growing up, your worst teacher; good experiences, bad experiences; Little League, Boy Scouts; jugando la corrida de la venada, (playing hooky), whatever. Deer hunting, whatever. Commissioner García: Well.... Dr. Gutiérrez: How did you form up? Commissioner García: The, the first thing I remember from my childhood is that I had a lot of tios (uncles) and my grandparents, we all used to get together in different homes and just talk about different things. And the first thing that I remember is my elders talking about los espartos (the ghosts), you know. That's the very first thing I... And the very last thing that I remember about my, my real young years and that affected my life because it developed... Me Baba mucho miedo (I would get real scared) in the, in the dark, because I was a little, little kid and they would talk about lechusas (owls) and about a lot of different things that, that like when we were migrants, that they would... We would live in this remote area and they would go to sleep outside and wake up inside in the morning, you know, things like this. So, it affected my childhood. And the next thing I remember is that when I was, I tried to go into the first grade at, at six years old. I was taken to the Amanda Burkes, here in Cotulla, for possible entry into the first grade. And at that time we were given a, an oral entrance exam in English. And, of course, I was brought up in a Spanish household, speaking a hundred percent Spanish, didn't know a lick of English. And at that point, the oral exam included things like: What is your name? Where do you live? How old are you? And I did not understand it. So based on that and, of course, the racial aspect of, of the school system at that time, they had created a special grade, a special room for all of the non-English speaking students. And it all happened to be Mexican kids. And they called it the zero grade. And... Dr. Gutiérrez: And in Spanish, what did you call it? Commissioner García: El zero. (The Zero.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Nomas el zero? (Just the zero?) Commissioner García: Si. (Yes.) Dr. Gutiérrez: In Crystal, we called it el zero bola. (the zero ball) I don't know why we had the two words, but I guess we were emphasizing it was a big zero, bola. (ball.) Commissioner García: Yeah. Well, ours, we just called it el zero. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: And at, at that time, I remember that we, we were just transferred. My parents did not, didn't accompany me to the interview, to the oral exam. I was accompanied by, by my, one of uncles that did know English. But unfortunately, I was not the one that knew English, so I was sent back. I lost a year of, of education, I would say, because in the zero grade, I remember that we didn't do anything. We just sat there all day and once in awhile we would get crayons, whatever our parents, you know, could afford. And, but we were not taught, as I remember, any, any real, we didn't have any real curriculum. And then, of course, after that year, I attended Welhausen. The zero grade just happened to be in the, in the East part of town. And a lot of Mexicano. And in the Welhausen School and so I, from the zero grade, I went to the first grade, which was at the same campus at the Welhausen School. Dr. Gutiérrez: Would you spell Welhausen? Commissioner García: W-E-L-H-A-U-S-E-N. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: That's where Lyndon Johnson got his start as a teacher. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: And at that school, we had from zero to the fourth grade in that campus. And, of course, we had the Amanda Burkes campus. It started off from first grade on up to high school. And I remember that in the first grade I had a teacher named Miss Pena. She was very, very strict. Everybody was scared of her, including myself. And she was very, very, her ways were very rough and you can, you can tell that she was there. And she didn't really want to be in that, at that campus. Like a throwback, someone that was not wanted at the other campus. Was just, the same thing that happened to us, I guess, happened to her. And she was very; she was very rough on all of the children. And my, that was my first bad experience in, in the school system. My, I, for example, if you had to go to the bathroom, she wouldn't let you go until she was ready for you to go and sometimes you couldn't wait. The worst experience I remember having in the first grade was my getting up and it was my turn to be up on the chalkboard and right before I started writing I asked to go to the bathroom. And she said, ""No, you can't go. You have to finish writing what I tell you to write."" So, unfortunately, I had an accident, you know. I just got; I wet my pants standing up in front of the class. Everybody laughed. So, I ran home. Before I, I, I went, I got to the house, I remember stealing one apple from the Jimenez Grocery. They used to have the boxes of, of fruits outside of the building. It was a common thing that everybody did. So, I stole one apple and run home crying because I had peed in my pants. That was really the only bad experience I had. When I got home I hid in the car because I was both ashamed and, and embarrassed. And I hid in the car for hours. I was sweating. No one knew where I was. The police, everybody were, were looking for me, but I didn't want to come out. And I heard all the commotion around the car, but no one knew I was there. Finally they found me and, of course, I got a licking at home for stealing the apple, for running home from school, but no one understood why. No one paid attention as to why I had actually run out of the classroom and gone home. My parents were, were very strict also, especially my father. So, I got punishment at home, and then, the next day when Miss Pena got to me, she grabbed my, my hand and hit my knuckles on the desk ten times because I had peed in, on, in my pants, and I had run home. So, that was a very bad experience for me. That, that was almost entering the school system and I just, I just thought that, that the rest would be educational setting was going to be the same. Fortunately, it was not. That was the only real bad experience that I had when I was a young, young child. Of course, I went to the second grade at the Welhausen campus and then they found out that I was not all that dumb, so for, for the half of the second grade, I was transferred to the Amanda Burkes campus where I prefer, I performed very well. I remember having very good grades. I remember learning my ABCs and, and everything that I needed to, to learn at that grade level. I was a fairly good student when I was in, in elementary and I really never had any other bad experiences during my elementary years. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, how about some good ones? Commissioner García: Good ones that I can remember. Not in school really. Not in elementary. I don't really have any, did not really have any positive or outstanding things happen to me. It was just normal. No extraordinarily good settings. I do remember when I did go into the second grade that I did have a problem with everyone that did not speak Spanish had trouble pronouncing my name. Instead of Arcenio, I had all sort of pronunciations. I got to the point where, this is another adverse thing that I remember that happened to me, I dropped my first name when I was in the fifth grade. And, instead of Arcenio, I wanted to be called Arturo because it was easier for everyone. Unfortunately, when I got into the sixth grade for graduation from the sixth to the seventh grade, they had, they inspected my documents and found out that my name was not just Arturo García. But you should have heard the pronunciations for Arcenio. Everything but Arcenio. So, when, in, in the last part of the sixth grade, I had to use my complete name, and then, I just, I, I was not ashamed of my name. It was just that I didn't like the way my name was being mispronunciated by everyone who did not speak English. And I specifically didn't like people laughing at my name. But after the sixth grade, I adjusted well and I got to the point where I didn't care how it was pronounced. It was my name and that was it. I was proud of it and to this day. And, but people have learned how to pronounce it because of my educational background, and then, what I have accomplished after that. And, of course, it's been more of a common setting; people have heard the name more often, so they know how to pronounce it more or less. But that was an adverse.... Positive things, I really can't remember any that, that I can divulge right now. It's, I guess, sometimes you just don't remember the good times. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: Especially at that age. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, do you remember a favorite teacher? Commissioner García: My favorite, favorite, favorite, favorite teacher? Mrs. Ewing. She was my favorite teacher. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why? Commissioner García: She just had a very good personality. I remember she was very easygoing. She really taught you. She took time. If she had to punish you, she would explain why, what you did wrong. Things like this. And I'd never had anyone else in the entire elementary grades that took that amount of time and actually showed you good from bad, what you didn't write or what you did wrong. She would also reward you when you, when you did something positive and that was not very often that other people would do that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who was your worst teacher other than Miss Pena? Commissioner García: Well, Mrs. Copp because she was, Dr. Gutiérrez: C-O-P-P? Commissioner García: C-0-P-P. She was a very, I would say, very much stricter than anyone else that I had ever, had ever encountered in the elementary setting. And even harder than Miss Pena. This lady would... In the first place, she had, her, her class was a six three or a six four, like you had six one, six two. She was, she was the one that had the worst. Dr. Gutiérrez: And it was all Mexicans? Commissioner García: Right. And fortunately, I only had her for about three months, and then, I was, I had good grades. I don't know why I was put there. I had good grades. I was put there for other reasons, I guess, that I, to, to this day, I don't understand, but I, I was only in there for three months and then I was transferred to the six one setting, which made me very proud. But she was the worst teacher that... Again like Miss Pena, Miss Pena, she wouldn't, there was no real curriculum. You, you were just there wasting away, not really learning anything. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you play sports or anything in high school or junior high? Commissioner García: In junior high, no, I was in the band. I was a band participant... Dr. Gutiérrez: What'd you play? Commissioner García: ...since I was in the fifth grade. Coronet. Trumpet. Dr. Gutiérrez: How did you buy it? Commissioner García: Well, at first they would lend you instruments, but then I, I had to buy it. My, my parents bought, bought me an instrument when I entered the seventh grade. Once they knew that I was going to like it and that I was going to stay in the band, then it was worth making the, the expense. They bought it on credit. It was a used horn. They bought it from another ex student for ninety-eight dollars. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's a lot of money back then. Commissioner García: Ninety-eight dollars was a lot of money. They paid for it. And I used it all through junior high until I got, when I got into high school, I bought one because I was, I was working. My, my father taught me a lot of different things. One of the things that I do remember that, that was very instrumental in my development was that he taught me how to operate movie equipment at the theaters. So, I was earning some money. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is that what he did for a living? Commissioner García: No, he was, he was a jack of all trades. He did that plus at night, and then, during the day, he was an electrician, carpenter, and he did everything that... He had a newspaper route. He was very, very active. And everything he knew, I learned. I am also an electrician. I am a movie operator. By the time I, I reached thirty, I had about twelve years experience as a movie operator. And up until recently, maybe seven or eight years ago, that, that we closed the theaters, that's when my career as a movie operator ended. But in the Fifties, I think that `43 was the last time I did that. And I got; I started when I was thirteen. The electrician part I still do once in a while and but I have been doing that by myself since I was about twenty-two or twenty three, also. So, he taught me a lot of things that he knew and that, that have been very useful. I did get that horn. I bought it. I was earning five dollars a night at the theaters. I paid for it myself. I helped my parents with not being a burden on them because of my wages that I would earn. When I graduated I, I paid for all of my graduation articles, my cap and gown, my invitations, everything. So, I, I feel that I was not a burden on my parents because they didn't have that, the resources to cover everyone. So, after graduation... Dr. Gutiérrez: Had other older brothers graduated before you or were you the first one or...? Commissioner García: I was the second, the third, the third. My brother Roman graduated. Dr. Gutiérrez: They had graduated. Commissioner García: My sister Alma graduated in '63, and then, I graduated in `66. Fortunately all seven of the, of the children are high school graduates. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you have any thoughts about wanting to go to college? You wanted to an astronaut or a physicist or what were your thoughts in high school or junior high about what you wanted to be when you grew up? Commissioner García: I wanted to be a band director because I loved the music. And there were other things that, that interested me and going to college was one of them, but unfortunately the, the counseling that I personally received, along with a lot of others of my friends, in high school was almost non-existent. And the, the few counseling sessions that we had included things like you are not college material. Included things like you should go into the service. You should not waste your parent's money. They don't have any money to waste. They are a having a hard time. So, why kid yourself, you know? Go into the Army, go into the, into the, a branch of govern, go into a trade school. Something that is not a burden on your parents because you are not college material. And unfortunately... Dr. Gutiérrez: Were these Anglo counselors? Commissioner García: Yes. Yes, that was, they were Anglo counselors. We didn't have any, to this day, we might have a couple of that are not Anglos as counselors, but, of course, the system has changed greatly. And those words stuck in my mind. And whenever I, of course, I made some mistakes myself. But yes, the idea of, of going to college, I, I did have. After graduation I had a, I actually paid ten or twenty dollars to go into a, a business school in San Antonio, but I went to Chicago. I started liking the, the freedom that I hadn't ever had in Cotulla. Small city going into a big city setting. And it was just something that I, although I might have had the, the, the assistance necessary for me to go to college, it was not important anymore. And, of course, those words that I was going to waste my parent's money. And that I was not college material had been burned into my, my memory, so all of a sudden it wasn't important anymore. Dr. Gutiérrez: How long did you stay in Chicago and what, where were you working? Commissioner García: I was in Chicago, I left right after graduation in June of '66, and then, I came back in April of `67 to get married. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, you met her over there or....? Commissioner García: I met my wife up in Chicago. Dr. Gutiérrez: She wasn't from around here? Commissioner García: No. She was from Mexico. Dr. Gutiérrez: Right. San Luis Potosi. Commissioner García: Right. And... Dr. Gutiérrez: So, she didn't know what she was coming to? Commissioner García: No. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohhh. Commissioner García: No, she was just a, she was taking care of the, the kids for my brother's brother-in-law. That's where I met her. And then, I think I met her in August of '66, and then, I came back in April of `67. We got married in May of `67. Dr. Gutiérrez: And you've stayed put ever since? Commissioner García: Que aguante. (What tolerance.) For her. Yes. We have been married for, since 1967. Dr. Gutiérrez: Were your streets paved? Did you have a park? Were you in Little League? Did you join the Boy Scouts? Commissioner García: We didn't have a Little League. Boys Scouts was almost off limits because of the expense, you know, with, it was too expensive. You had to buy a lot of articles and my parents didn't have those resources. And, of course, it was a segregated setting, you know, like, you know, there weren't very many of us that, that really did any Boy Scouts. Little League didn't exist. I keep telling the kids now that, that when I was growing up, both elementary and, and junior high, especially, for P. E., they just let you out. Give you a, a soccer ball, and you could either kick the ball or kick each other and, you know, you didn't have any supervision. Y los pachucos traian las zuelas y... (And the zoot suiters had these soles...) Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. I remember. Commissioner García: The soles. And you'd stay away, you know. You'd stay away from that ball, that's for sure. So, there wasn't any organ, anything organized either in school or, or out of school, like Little League and things like that. And whatever existed was too expensive. Dr. Gutiérrez: How about class officers or class activities? You never got into any of that? Commissioner García: Never got into any of that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Because you didn't want to or, or, or you forfeited or, or you, you were excluded or that was just something that Raza didn't do? Commissioner García: It's like the cheerleaders, you know, on, Raza just stayed away until maybe the last couple of years of high school. But at the beginning, Raza just stood away, kept away from a lot of the, the star settings like being elected to different activities like class president. And usually, it was usually a gringo up until about the last couple of years of high school that we had Mexicanos, you know, getting in. I guess that's when I started forming, forming my, my political views and, and developing some sort of political personality because of what I would see. But then, of course, I had this off time from, from June till April, more or less, of `67 that I, I was in another world. You know, I got the taste of the big city and nothing was really important except having a good time. Then, of course, I, I met my, my wife and we got married. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why didn't you stay in Chicago? Commissioner García: It was too cold. It was too cold. I liked it, but it was too cold. I was, I could not get used to that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why didn't you move to San Antonio for example, or Corpus? Commissioner García: I have never liked to live anywhere else except Cotulla. Dr. Gutiérrez: But I thought you just said you liked the big city and all? Commissioner García: Well, for that time, in that particular.. Dr. Gutiérrez: When you were single? Commissioner García: ... in that big city for those months, but, you know, as a result of being in Chicago, I got to know the difference between being in a small town and in a large city. And I didn't want my kids to be raised in that big city setting. So, I moved back and we've... I have made other trips to Chicago along with my wife and family for months at a time, when I couldn't get a job here because of Raza Unida. Couldn't get a job anywhere, so I left for a few months. Came back and got a job. Finally. But I, I have never liked the big city except those few months that I was by myself. And I guess I wanted to experience, experiment with the different environments. And I did and I liked it, but up to a certain point, and then, I started to realize that that was not my, my setting. And, of course, it was too cold. And the San Antonio's and those big cities, I really never liked. Never lived in them, so I never had the opportunity to, to form a, a different opinion than the one I have now. I just don't like the big city. Dr. Gutiérrez: All right. From `67 to `69, did, did you become aware of walkouts in, in, in San Antonio or this organization called MAYO, the Mexican American Youth Organization? That was about to come into your town in `69 through some VISTA volunteers and.... Commissioner García: Well, in 1967, in, in June of `67, we had our first meeting. And I was going through my pictures and I remember seeing this picture. Here that was our first political meeting that we had. Dr. Gutiérrez: Can you hold it up a little higher? Little higher, so I can zoom in. OK. And if you would remember who was in there, can you tell me what it is? Commissioner García: Yes, this picture is, it was taken in June of 1967. And it was, I believe, our third meeting that we had. We didn't even call it a political, a setting for political reasons. It was, because none of us were even close to being twenty one and well, there were a couple of guys that were twenty one, but of the majority of, of, of the rest of the ac, ac, active people were not twenty one. Dr. Gutiérrez: And who are those people? From left to right. Commissioner García: From left to right? I need to get my glasses. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: From left to right, we have Raul Martinez, Juan Toreria, Poncho, Chevo, Luis Zertuche, Abel Ortiz, Cuco Garza, Juan Cruz, Tato Martinez, and one is hidden. I think it's a guy that we called lagana. (sleep in your eye.) Alex Gomez. Dr. Gutiérrez: And who called this meeting or who was the organizer? Commissioner García: Well, we just got together and there were no, we didn't really have any leadership. All of us were equal. None of us really had any ambition of being leaders at, at that time. We just wanted to get together and, and try to work out some of the problems that, that we had in the community. Dr. Gutiérrez: What did, what did you perceive or call problems at that time? Commissioner García: Educational settings. Like I said, counseling, just, el zero. (the zero grade.) The difference in the campuses that we had. One for Mexicans and one for everybody else. Discrimination of all sorts in employment. We had a, the Southwest National Bank, they had no Mexicanos working there at all except for the maintenance man. In the school system we had, had no Mexicanos as teachers especially in the strategic grade levels. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you had Miss Pena. Commissioner García: Well, you know, there are Mexicans, and then, there are Mexicans. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: You, like I said, you know, she was a, someone that was not qualified or that... I think that's why she was at, at the Welhausen campus because all of the teachers that supposedly weren't qualified. Just like the students weren't qualifying to go to, to the regular campus, were thrown to the East Side of town at Welhausen. So, you know, there are Mexicanos that remember that they are Mexicanos and then they would teach you. Well, unfortunately Miss Pena was one of the individuals that, that, in my opinion, was not good enough. She might have done that afterwards, but at, at, at the time that I was in, in her grade, she was not. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, this group picture is all very young men. No women, no older people, what, what, what became of that group because I recognize that that became a nucleus later on, but, but what did you all do between `67 and `69? Commissioner García: This is only part of the, the people. There were thirteen of us that got together at, at, at a building called the WOW Hall. Dr. Gutiérrez: Workmen of the World? Commissioner García: Workmen of the World. And we got together. We started talking about the different problems and what we could do. Well, we were not of voting age, we couldn't run for office. So what we did was we started teaming up lots, properties for different people, especially the old people, just to, to get known in the community as people that were interested in, in helping. So, we started doing that. We borrowed shredders, borrowed lawn mowers, and we did that for people, all of us. And we had a lot of other little kids that, that would help us. And the first contact that we had for any sort of plan for future activities came from a, a man named Mario Compean, Jose Angel Gutierrez, and we, through them, got information as to what they were doing in their communities. And they, they were the individuals that actually provided some sort of semblance of a plan for what needed to be done. And, of course, through them we got information on organizations like MAYO. We also developed an organization here called YA. Youth Association. And we participated in different workshops. So, that's where the actual material for the politics started coming in. Then Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, there were some organizers that were sent. MAYO, MAYO had a contract with the VISTA Minority Mobilization and there was some white VISTA volunteers that were sent here. Bill Richey, Linda Richey, I forgot. There was another young lady, blonde hair, Carol, Joan. What was her, do you remember the names? Commissioner García: I don't remember the names right now, but VISTA, as I recall, started working with us around `68 or '69. And I do not remember who the first ones were, but we had different people that helped us and the VISTA volunteer program was a very essential part. The only VISTA volunteer that I remember that, that created a lot of confidence in me was Bill Richey. You know, I was a very timid individual when it came to speaking in public. And but he gave me this, you did a good job. And he would give me some information, help me compose my information. But I, I could never be an individual that, that could read off of a speech, for example. I could not read and look at the public at the same time, so I didn't feel comfortable doing that. And he gave me a lot of confidence in believing in myself and, you know, that's what I remember about the VISTA volunteer program and that's the individual that I remember the most. He was very instrumental in, in helping us put together different plans for rallies, a lot of the work, you know. He kind of taught me how to do a lot of it. And but the MAYO conferences that we attended and workshops were very instrumental. Because they taught us and they showed us what other people in different areas were doing, parliamentary procedure, a lot of, a lot of the things that we use now, we learned at that time or I learned at that time. And we were kind of organized, I believe, right around 1969. I participated personally in my first election as a poll watcher. It was a school election, and then, from then on, our participation went from cleaning lots to the actual work that had to be done in organizing ourselves. Politically, to fight against the discriminatory setting, to improve our school system, to improve our city, physically and in total, and, of course, at the county level also. Dr. Gutiérrez: I remember that in the fall of `69 we came to Cotulla, quite a large number of people because there had been a murder or, or, or, or a father of one of the YA people in a leadership role had been found murdered on the railroad tracks. Do you recall any of that? Commissioner García: No, I don't. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. ' Commissioner García: I don't recall that. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: I should if it was, you know, but I, there is a lot of things that, that, that because of my busy schedule and the amount of different things that I do that I, I, I forgot. Dr. Gutiérrez: It was also a long time ago. Commissioner García: It was also a long time ago. 1969 was a long time ago. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, shortly after that is Bill Richey and, and Linda Richey were, were pulled out and they moved over to Crystal City and you all were, were by yourselves, I guess, you, you, you now had to develop and do things yourselves. Why don't you take me through what you all did if you... Either you do it by year or do it by, by what you did with the schools, or do the city, what you did with the county? And, and visit with me, if you can, the, the firings because I remember, as you pointed out earlier, they were, the minute you got involved and active in Cotulla, you lost your job. And if you got elected you lost your job, for sure. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, that's correct. Well, in 1969, like I said, we participated in our first election as poll watchers and helping organize the different campaigns. We really didn't believe in the people that were running at that time because they were not part of our, our group. It was just people that, that had run before and they were there, so we helped them. They were Mexicanos. And again, there were Mexicanos and there are Mexicanos. But we helped them anyway and, and that kind of got us our, we wanted to get our feet wet. With the assistance that we received from other leaders, from other different cities in the state of Texas and with what the VISTA volunteer program did for us, we organized our politics around the city elections at, at first. That was our first real endeavor. That occurred in 1970, in April, and we ran three candidates for the city. And we only elected one, which was the mayor and his name is Alfredo Zamora, Jr. He was our first Mexican American or Chicano mayor for the city of Cotulla. And he overwhelmingly beat the Cotulla mayor, which was also named Cotulla, and... Dr. Gutiérrez: So, he is related to the founders, no? Commissioner García: Right. Dr. Gutiérrez: I mean, that's the same family. They always controlled everything. Commissioner García: Right. And he beat that big machine and became our first mayor, and then... Dr. Gutiérrez: How did you all do that? Commissioner García: Well, before we got into the picture, very few people voted. Very few people voted. I would venture to say that not even two hundred people voted in any of the city elections. And that year, when we elected Alfredo, there were about five hundred people voting, so it was a surprise setting that we had. We announced and we registered people to vote and we got to the point where people believed in us because they knew that we were interested in our community and wanted to make a difference, so, and we were young and we had that energy. People had never been in the barrio catered before by anyone for politics except that you vote for whoever is there and the very few people that did that were very true to, to their word when they gave it to someone. So, when we got into the picture, these people just reacted to our organized effort to make changes, to become progressive, to include Mexican Americans, Chicanos into the system. And that's when Alfredo was elected. Dr. Gutiérrez: But how, did you have rallies to register voters... Commissioner García: We had rallies... Dr. Gutiérrez: ... cookouts, or what? Commissioner García: ...voter registrations. We had... Dr. Gutiérrez: Meetings? Commissioner García: We had a whole bunch of different things that we did. This is one of, I have a lot of pictures, but this is one of the pictures. This is one of our first rallies that we had in, in a ranch. Dr. Gutiérrez: A little higher. Commissioner García: In a ranch just outside of Cotulla and... Dr. Gutiérrez: What's the name of the ranch? Commissioner García: It was, we called it el Cloroninos Ranch. Dr. Gutiérrez: Cloroninos? Commissioner García: Cloroninos Ranch. Because the man's name was Cloronino Garza and he was one of the first.... He was an older gentleman that believed in what we were doing. Dr. Gutiérrez: There's a lot of people there. Commissioner García: Yes. We had about, I would say two to three hundred people and... Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you feed them? Commissioner García: ...this was... Dr. Gutiérrez: Or just talk or? Commissioner García: No, we fed them and, and we, we got donations from business people, from just regular supporters that, that would believe or were part of that progressive setting that, that began. And as a result of that activity, we elected this man here, which is the one I was mentioning, Alfredo Zamora, Jr. Dr. Gutiérrez: A little higher please. OK. Commissioner García: And he, he was our, our first Chicano mayor. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: And then, from, from those rallies and voter registration drives and just going to people's homes door to door and we got him elected. That was the first victory politically and then... Dr. Gutiérrez: What happened to him? Commissioner García: He is still here. He only ran for one term because he was a certified teacher and couldn't get a job locally. Dr. Gutiérrez: They wouldn't hire him? Commissioner García: They wouldn't hire him. And then, the, could you...? [Interruption] Dr. Gutiérrez: Sure. All right. We are recording again. You say he served one term because he was a certified teacher. Commissioner García: He only served one, one term. He was a certified teacher. Dr. Gutiérrez: Recording again. Commissioner García: He was a one, one term mayor because as, as a certified teacher, he couldn't get a job in the school system because of his political views and political activities. So, he got a job in Crystal City, in the Crystal City Independent School District, but his pay wasn't conducive to him traveling back and forth. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's about forty-four miles from here, no? Commissioner García: Right. Dr. Gutiérrez: One way. Commissioner García: One way. So, he decided that, that he could not stay around the, the city because he couldn't get a job. He really didn't want to commute back and forth from Crystal City or any other city around the area. So, he moved to Wisconsin. So, that left the door open for someone else to run. Well, before we get to, two years after Alfredo's election, we had another election that same year, in 1972 in, in May, I believe, of 1972 and that's when Raza Unida party or we started running under a name of Raza Unida party. It was, we were not, we did not have any, any primaries or anything because it was not a party yet. Dr. Gutiérrez: Wasn't that in `70? Commissioner García: In `70. Dr. Gutiérrez: Not `72? In `70? Commissioner García: I am sorry. Yes. Alfredo was, he was elected in, in '72. So it was that same year that we had the, we had conventions to, to begin the process for candidates having a format to appear or to be on some ballot or to be able to be able to be written in, in, in some, some ballots for different positions. And I ran for county commissioner of Precinct Number 2 at that time as a write in candidate along with Precinct 3, Roel Rodriguez. He ran for county commissioner for Precinct 3 and we, we ran as write in candidates and Roel Rodriguez won, so he was our, our, our first Dr. Gutiérrez: How, how did you all manage to get into the win and why didn't you win? Commissioner García: OK. Well I, I was a resident of Precinct 3, but I moved out to Precinct Number 2 because I just, we just wanted to have our own house. We used to live with, with our parents. And the only house that I could afford was in Precinct 2. So I ran as the commissioner for that precinct and I was not known in that precinct, and, of course, of course, if I would have run in Precinct 3, I would have been elected just like Roel Rodriguez was elected. And the reason he won was because he was running in his home precinct and, of course, everyone was behind him. And there are no significant number of gringos in that, in that precinct. So, he ran against a gringo and won just because the numbers were there. Dr. Gutiérrez: But you had to write his name exactly right. Commissioner García: You had to write his name. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you all have classes to teach people how to do that? Commissioner García: We had classes to teach people that. We had a lot of people from outside of the, of our city come to help us with information and with actually developing people to that level. And, of course, we, we were assured of, of a victory really in that precinct because of, of the numbers, you know. That was just enough. The numbers were enough to carry us and we had never had a, a Mexicano run for or a Chicano run for any position in that precinct or in any precinct for that matter. So, everybody was excited. Everybody wanted to be part of it. So, we had the numbers. And we, we won that. That was the only precinct that we won. Precinct Number 3. Dr. Gutiérrez: Which is the courthouse precinct? Commissioner García: Precinct 1. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: And then, so we, the only other election we had was in 1972. We had already acquired the mayor; we had already acquired a, one county commissioner; so in 1972, we had an election for city offices and including the mayor. And I ran for mayor in 1972 along with another couple of, with three more individuals who are city council and all of us won. So, I, I became the second Chicano mayor and also somebody gave me the distinction of being the young, youngest mayor in the state of Texas at, of that year. Dr. Gutiérrez: How old were you? Commissioner García: Well, that was 1972, I was born in `47, so I was what, twenty-four? Approximately. And at that time, like I said, we, we, I was elected along with three other city councilmen. Dr. Gutiérrez: Out of five? Commissioner García: Out of, well, it was four out of, four out of four. One was an, an... Dr. Gutiérrez: No, but the council is five members? Commissioner García: Seven. Dr. Gutiérrez: Seven? OK. Commissioner García: But we had four running because usually you, you would have three that year, but four were running because one was an unexpired term. So, we won all four positions and, and then, in `72, a few months later, we had a, a county election and we acquired one, but at, at, in 1972, we did have the party on the ballot, so we were official members. We are, the names were on the ballot as that third party and we acquired another county commissioner's position. Carlos Gonzales, he won for Precinct Number 4. And I believe he was the only one that won that year, but at that point we had two county commissioners in the commissioner's court. Two out of five, which includes a county judge. Dr. Gutiérrez: Was there a conscious decision not to run for J. Ps. or constables or any other positions in the county level? Commissioner García: We knew, we knew very little about constables and J. Ps. at that time and, but we did, we did acquire a J. P. position also that I remember in `70, `74. `74. And I have trouble with dates because it's been so long, but in, in... We did elect a man named Raul Gonzales as a J. P. and Amado Benavides as a constable for Precinct Number 3, which was our easiest precinct to win. And, of course, Precinct 4 did not have a, a, a J. P. for that specific precinct. The J. P. for Precinct 4 included one, which would be commissioner of Precincts 1, 5, and 6. So, actually the only other J. P. that we had within the city of Cotulla is Precinct 3 and one for 1, 5, and 6. So, there is two J. Ps. and there is two constables. Since then we have acquired a lot of other positions. Dr. Gutiérrez: All of them, no? Commissioner García: We have acquired all, almost all of them and, for example, the difference from then and now is we have elected a county judge, our second county judge, which is Jimmy Patterson. Before that we had elected Leodoro Martinez. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, Jimmy Patterson is a Mexicano? Commissioner García: He is Mexicano, yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Just has an Anglo name? Commissioner García: Right. Dr. Gutiérrez: Now going back, when you got elected mayor, did you get fired or did you lose your job? What happened to you? Commissioner García: Well, when I was elected mayor, I used to be the supervisor of a neighborhood center under the old OEO programs. And I was threatened with being fired because I was involved in politics, but we started learning terms like non-partisan, you know, things like that that helped out a lot. Our, our board with the old OEO programs supported me a hundred percent with the exception of a few members that were not totally in support of either making changes in, in the system. People that wanted things to stay as they were or people that were just against Raza Unida for what it stood for or what they thought it stood for. So, I did have some problems, but I always managed to explain the fact that it was non-partisan and I always managed to explain the good things that we were going to do in the city and how it would coordinate with O, OEO. And so I always had support. I was always supported. Dr. Gutiérrez: But you also got by fact that of being in the city council seats on the CAP board, no? Commissioner García: Not at that time. We had, the city didn't have any representation on, on the CAP board. After that we did have. Of course, I was not the representative, someone else was. But I stayed, I worked with that agency. Well, I, let me backtrack a little bit. Back in 1969, in 1969 I was working with the CAP agency as a clerk typist. I started the last part of the year, but when I decided to run as a write in candidate for county commissioner for Precinct Number 2, then at that point I was told I had to resign because of the Hatch Act. So, I resigned in February of 1970 so I could run for county commissioner as a write in candidate. So after that position, I couldn't, I couldn't get a job anywhere. Although I did have a night job as a movie operator in, in the businesses. And I worked with my father with electrical. I always tried, have strived to have a business, so I used to sell candy at that time. I had a little candy company, but some of the businesses wouldn't buy from me because of my political activities. So, that business went down the drain. And I couldn't get a job so, I, I left in, in, in 1970, in November I left, right after the election. I went to Chicago again. Well, to Wisconsin because I was desperate. I had a family by then and, and I couldn't raise two kids and a wife with, without a job. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you go to Project SER? Commissioner García: No. No. We were, we didn't know about any of the projects up there at all. I just went up there and, and worked in the cabbage business for about a month. I got too sick because it was five, ten below zero, which was the reason I didn't want to be up there to begin with, but I was desperate for a job. We did get some assistance from the city of, of Kenosha for food vouchers and things like this, but then I moved to Maywood, Illinois with my brother, and then, I got me a nice job. Once they found out that I was bi-lingual and they had a lot of Puerto Ricans and different Hispanics working there in this factory, so I was appointed or hired as the shipping clerk which required a tie and a nice shirt all of the time. So it was a clean job because I was bi-lingual. So, those are the jobs that I had. Now I was up in, in Maywood from December of `60, of `70 till April or May of '71, and then, I came back to Cotulla. And that's when I was hired as the supervisor for the neighborhood center, which put me in the limelight because I saw all of these people on a one to one basis for different services. And, of course, I had filed, had been elected mayor in `70, so then, after he didn't run, I was the ideal candidate for the position just because of, of the type of work that I was doing in the community for the neighborhood center. So, then I was elected mayor. After, I, I served two, a two year term. I was reelected to my mayor's position, but then the problems that were created for me by the city council and by the people that I had defeated. Started bringing up residency requirements and, of course, I had moved out of this specific house that I lived in for, to renovate it. So, I was out of the city for about seven or eight months while my house was being worked on. So, they used that against me. We, we even got, we went all the way to the Supreme Court and... Dr. Gutiérrez: Of Texas? Commissioner García: Of Texas. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who were the attorneys? Commissioner García: Well, we, I didn't have one. I didn't have an attorney. I just had volunteers that would help me with information. And when we started with the effort, like I say, we didn't have anyone, but right there at the, at the last part of what we, right before we had, we went to the Supreme Court setting we did have an attorney that, that helped. And I have trouble remembering, remembering who that, that was. But they prepared all the legal stuff. But when we went up the Supreme Court, we, they decided, they made, their decision was that I should come back to the community and the city council based rule was a proper body to decide on the qualifications of it's own members. And what that, did that mean? That the people I had defeated had the right to say whether or not I was qualified to be mayor. When we came back, of course, they voted me out and voted the person that I defeated into office. His name was George Carpenter, Mexicano. He was a gringo last name. So, he served out the rest of my term. Dr. Gutiérrez: So the reaction of the Anglos here in Cotulla to, to your incipient organizing and taking over was to then recruit Mexican American candidates of their choice to be against you, no? Commissioner García: That's correct. Dr. Gutiérrez: This George Carpenter? Commissioner García: That's correct. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: These people just were catering to someone else's ideas and ideals about politics, and so, he was, he served the rest of my term, so I never lost the election. I was just removed from office by the people I had defeated. So, at that point, I, like I said, I had been working with the CAP Agency, the OEO program as the neighborhood center supervisor and then after that election. Well, I, I worked with OEO up until approximately, approximately 1974, the last part of `74, and then, I didn't run for office until 1975. But before that, before the election, I was hired as the director for the WIC program. Raul Martinez was the first WIC director. He started in '74, and then, he was convicted of a felony and.... Dr. Gutiérrez: Was that a gun charge? Commissioner García: No. No, it was a, the Cotulla mini riot of 1974. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, tell me about it. Commissioner García: It was a city election. That was when, when, I am sorry. 1973. I was mayor and we had a, a city election at the courthouse and we had three candidates running, I believe. And politics were really hot at that time, you know. We, we just had all sorts of problems in the community. And I remember that I was inside the polls at the courthouse when the, the polls were about to close, so I decided to, decided to go home and take a shower and come back so I could, you know, wait for the results. There were, I don't know, a couple of hundred people outside waiting for results because elections were very close. They could go either way. Dr. Gutiérrez: Was that the tradition, that, that the results were reported outside of the courthouse? Commissioner García: Right. No, inside the courthouse in the hallway. They have a, a chalkboard. They post all of the election results. And since I was the mayor, of course, I was the chief elected official responsible for that election, so I said, ""I will go home, take a shower, and come back.."" Just in that fifteen, twenty minutes that I left, some of the people, including Raul Martinez, tried to get into the courthouse to, to see if some of the results. And we had all these older men just standing there. They wouldn't move and, you know, he, he asked them to move and they wouldn't move. So, he kind of pushed his, his way, his way into, into the courthouse and a, a problem ensued, you know. People were just shouting at each other. People were throwing bottles and rocks and whatever, whatever at the windows because the cops were pointing rifles at them. And there was this Mexicano that just recently died, that starting, started hollering obscenities to all of the people that were outside. And... Dr. Gutiérrez: What was his name? Commissioner García: Jesus Hernandez. He just died last week. Dr. Gutiérrez: Was he local or did he work for the police or? Commissioner García: Local. He was local. He was part of our group and then all of a sudden, he just, he was given a job as a deputy and he was, really he was mentally disturbed up until the day he died. But, you know, since he had their, their views or catered to their views, they, they hired him. So, he fueled this problem and out of everyone that was there, a couple of hundred people, they picked on one person and that was Raul Martinez as the instigator of the Cotulla mini riot. Dr. Gutiérrez: They labeled that a riot? Commissioner García: They labeled it a riot. And well, when I, when I got there, all of this had happened, you know, and the door was locked. And all these people, a few of the people were still left outside. Everybody else had left and so I, I pushed on the door and it was locked and I could see only gringos inside. I said, ""What, what's going on?"" So, I knocked on the door and the sheriff comes to the door and I said, ""Hey, open the door. I want to get in."" He said, ""No."" And I said, ""Why?"" And he just said, ""No."" And then, this, this other gringo tries to come in and he unlocks the door for him. So when this guy walks in, I run right in with him. The sheriff tried to stop me and I pushed the sheriff to the side and I said, ""Hey, I'm, I have business in here and I have a right to be in here."" And he tried to push me out. Of course, he, he couldn't. Nobody else would help him. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who was the sheriff? Commissioner García: Roger McGee. No one else would touch me. He was the only one. But he tried to push me out. He, he just couldn't. So when he found out that he was not going to push me out, then he just left me alone. The Texas Ranger was Jack, Jack Van Cleave, came up and told him to leave me alone. By this time, all of these people that had been outside were in the downtown area breaking windows and you know, things like that. So that the, the Texas Ranger asked me if I would do him a favor of going back outside and telling the people to calm down before something else might happen? And I said, ""I had a hard time getting in here. I came in here to do my job as mayor, get my results from my election, in my city. Neither you nor anyone else is going to put me out of here anymore. I had a hard time getting in here. You go out there and tell them."" Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you, by that time, know what had gone on? Commissioner García: Well, I started to piece it together. And you could see the people downtown two blocks away. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you know that Raul was arrested and... Commissioner García: No, they didn't arrest him. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, they just told him? Commissioner García: They didn't arrest him at that time. They picked him, you know, later on... Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh. Commissioner García: ....at night and said this was the guy. So then after that he was arrested.... But all of these people were in the downtown area and I said, ""Well,"" you know, ""I had better go out there and, and see what I can do."" So, I left. Everybody, I talked to the people and I said, ""Hey,"" you know, ""something might happen. Let's calm down."" And everyone was furious because of the obscenities that had, had been yelled from the second floor of the courthouse and they were offended by all these rifles. The people outside didn't have a problem. It was just at the door, that one or two individuals had had a problem, but everybody else just tried to go into the courthouse for the same reason that we always go into the courthouse for. That's to look at the election results. And so, people just dispersed, went back home. I went back into the courthouse. I assured the Texas Ranger that everyone was going home, no more problems; and so we had peace for that night. But around two or three in the morning, of course, they had a warrant, so they arrested Raul Martinez, which just happened to be the guy running for county judge with Raza Unida party in the election in 1975, and so, he was singled out. And like I said, at, at that time, he used to be working, he was working for WIC so I got the position around February of `75 as the director of WIC and I was very peacefully working in that position. I loved the position, I loved dealing with people, but then, he was, he was convicted, actually convicted by a court in the last part of August. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who was his lawyer? Commissioner García: His lawyer? I don't remember. I don't remember right now who the lawyer was. I, I have some documents in the box here that you could look at. And so, he was convicted around, I think it was the last part of August, so we didn't have a candidate for county judge. So then I said, nobody else wanted to run, so I said "I, I'll run," you know. And so, I got my name on the ballot, but I didn't have very much time to, to campaign. So, I ran against Henry Potthast for, for county judge. Dr. Gutiérrez: Potthast? Commissioner García: Potthast. Dr. Gutiérrez: P-O-T-T-A-S-T? Commissioner García: P-O-T-T-H-A-S-T. And, of course, I came close. It was a countywide election and I came about three hundred votes from winning. And so, I had to quit that job also with WIC to run, so again I was unemployed. And, and, of course, I lost. That was in 1975 and they got, I got rehired again around December of `75 to work with, with WIC and some other programs. And again I put my name up for county commissioner for Precinct 3 because I was already a resident again of my own, own precinct. And the reason for Roy [noel] not running in, in `76 is because he was also convicted of a felony. Dr. Gutiérrez: What was his story? Commissioner García: Well, again he was singled out along with a couple of other people, with, with the Housing Authority, and that he had bought some tires and sold them. And I think the amount was ninety-seven dollars and some cents. But you know, really what, because of lack of, his, his attorney... I do remember. Rufino Cabello. Because of the lack of expertise from Mr. Cabello, he, he didn't quite represent Roy in a way he could have or should have, so he was convicted. And the very first thing the judge said, even right at the announcement of Roy being guilty, was removal from office, which is what they wanted. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who was the district judge? Do you remember? Commissioner García: I think it was, the last name was May. John May, I believe it was. Mays. Dr. Gutiérrez: Same, same judge in, in Martinez' case? Commissioner García: Same judge. Yes. Same judge. And so, he was convicted. So we needed another, needed a candidate. I was already living in my precinct again, so in May of `76 I ran in the primaries as a Raza Unida candidate for county commissioner Precinct Number 3. Dr. Gutiérrez: You had to leave your job again? Commissioner García: I had to leave my job again. Dr. Gutiérrez: Let me ask you some questions. Did Martinez or Roy do jail time? Commissioner García: No. Neither one of them. Dr. Gutiérrez: They got probation? Commissioner García: They got probation. All they, all these people wanted was their positions. One, to keep them from running. And the other, you know, to, to get them out of office, and so, you know, I ran in `76. I won in the primaries. I won in the general election. So, in 1971, January of `71, I took office and that's the same position I hold to this day. Dr. Gutiérrez: `71? No, wait a minute. Commissioner García: I am sorry. 1977. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: January 1, 1977. Dr. Gutiérrez: You ran in `76 and you took office in `77. You have been there twenty years now? Commissioner García: This is my twenty-first. In December, I will finish my twenty-first. Dr. Gutiérrez: I don't want to get you off track of what all happened to Raza Unida, but can you summarize how that, how you have evolved in those twenty years as a commissioner? What things have changed, what you have seen? Commissioner García: Well, at the beginning, when I was elected, there was one other commissioner there that, that we had elected, which is Carlos Gonzales. And then I came in so there was two votes. Unfortunately Mr. Gonzales was not one of those real active candidates or officials that had the educational background or the knowledge or the experience to be able to come forth with issues and, and, and defend issues. He was just a follower. So, when I came into the picture, you know, I had much more to say than any other, anyone else, so we got together on a lot of the issues that were of importance. Roads were not as important to us at that time, but people were. I remember the first thing I did when I went into office was I opened my own office in the barrio, which was a, a total surprise to everyone. Because no one ever had had an office and no one has had an office since, you know, in, in, especially through county government, outside of the courthouse with the exception of the J. Ps. But even the J. Ps. were at the courthouse. But when I got an office, then some of them started branching out to their own, in their own constituency area. So, I, I acquired this office which was already a first and major difference from the old administration to the new. Just the mere fact.... And, and the office space was donated because it belonged to my parents, but just the fact of my putting in an air conditioner was a big problem. Putting in a piece of carpet was a big problem and hiring someone to man that office was a problem because Road and Bridge moneys, you know. You know, they came up with a lot of different things. I, 1 was the subject of, of grand jury discussions by the county clerk and every other gringo elected official because I was not supposed to do that. But, of course, nothing was improper so nothing ever happened, but I was just every time there were, were discussions in regards to my activities because of the Raza Unida party, you know, that came up. The office space. Dr. Gutiérrez: Were you able to hire your own employees? Commissioner García: I hired my own employees, yes. We work under, to this day, we have the same operation. We have never wanted to deviate from that. We, as individual commissioners, decide what goes on in our different precincts. We honor that regardless of what I think of the commissioner from that precinct. Well, that much we do allow each other to do. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, employment of Mexicanos in the county increased with every election? Commissioner García: That's correct. And the only reason it increased was because we had the individual autonomy to do that. And, of course, they didn't like the, the people we hired. And you could hear all these, the commotion about you know, you hired this individual. He shouldn't be there. I hired Roy to, to man the Precinct 3 office. Of course, you know, since he had been convicted, nobody liked that. In the barrio, everybody liked it, but not, but outside. Outside the barrio the old establishment didn't like it. So, the first thing we did, I developed social programs. We, we had, the county had never participated in anything of that nature. We provided referrals, we provided transportation, we provided just community service. I will read this letter to you. I will interpret this letter for you. I will fill out your application for whatever program is out there. We did, we did all of that on a one to one basis with people and that had never been done by the county. So, we were the villains at that, that time, but in the barrio, we were the good guys because we were providing that one to one service that people needed. So, that was different. Dr. Gutiérrez: And now you were getting paid because you get paid to the city and everything else was out of your pocket? Commissioner García: Yes. I believe my pay, at that time, was about six hundred dollars a month. Six hundred and eighty dollars a month. I don't remember exactly. And it hasn't changed much in twenty-one years. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, relatively speaking, back then that was good money. Commissioner García: Right. Dr. Gutiérrez: It isn't now, but... Commissioner García: It isn't now. Right now our last year, I think, the take home pay for the year was about fifteen four, something like that. Twenty-one years later. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you got the votes commissioner. Commissioner García: Yeah, but unfortunately you know, you, you know you view the whole picture. You don't want to come on and be an individual that just out there for the money. You know, I enjoy what I do and even if they would pay me still the six hundred and eighty bucks, I would, I think I would still be there anyway. A lot of these things that I do now or have done throughout my career have been on, you know, voluntary basis. OK. Major changes from the old establishment to when, when I took office. The county was providing some services for once, for the first time to citizens. We developed an indigent program that they had had, kind of unofficially, but we.... I actually fought for a budget for an indigent program and some guidelines and things like this. We started participating with an organization that I created, South Texas Rural Health. I acquired, I acquired a building for a clinic to house South Texas Rural Health. The county had never gotten involved with anything health related except that they would lease this property, this building to a doctor. Dr. Gutiérrez: Was this the collaboration with the clinic in Zavala County and Crystal? Commissioner García: That's correct. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: We had representation from, from four counties. Zavala, Dimmit, Frio, and La Salle. And so, we, again, you know, what was the county doing different under the new administration? Well, we were getting involved in more provision of services to our constituents. So, I acquired part of the building that used to be the old hospital, which had closed in 1975, and was being used as a storeroom. Had a lot of trouble getting that from the county, but we acquired it. And, and began to house a, a clinic that was providing services, medical services. And to this day, it still exists, but now we have clinics in other cities also, in other counties. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is Zamora the director? Commissioner García: He is the executive director. I think this is his twelfth year of being director. We, we recruited him out of Project SER from Dallas. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well OK. Sometime, tell me how you all started that whole connection with Project SER in Milwaukee [Wisconsin] so that anybody who got fired here would have a job there and, and, and back and forth. Whenever you have a chance or, or if you want to talk about it now. Commissioner García: I think the one that broke the ice there was acquiring a site was Alfredo because like I said he had gone back up to Milwaukee and started working up there. And he got a job with SER. And some of the people, people that were here that could not get jobs like Abel Ortiz, Rodolfo Martinez, Alex Romo, Juan Hinojosa. All of these people could not get jobs here for the same reason that I, I, at one time I couldn't get a job. So Alfredo actually set up something where he could hire these people up there. Dr. Gutiérrez: Now Abel became a director, no, of, of the SER office in Milwaukee? Commissioner García: Right. I think he was... Dr. Gutiérrez: And he was the boss? Commissioner García: To this day, he is still there and, or related to a project like SER and Rodolfo Martinez is still working up there. Mr. Hinojosa is still up there. Those are the only ones that I remember that, to this day, still work in Milwaukee. So, that's how they got their jobs up there because Alfredo had set something up. He had set himself up to be in a position to hire people and he did very good with it. And right now we have a very good professional people working up there that are from Cotulla. Dr. Gutiérrez: How did things change when you got Leodoro Martinez elected county judge? Commissioner García: OK. Leodoro Martinez was elected mayor first and he served as mayor for about eight or nine years. Dr. Gutiérrez: That was after you, no? Commissioner García: After I was. After George Carpenter, the one that took over my, my term, I believe he was elected in `76 as mayor. And he served eight or nine years, I believe as mayor, and then, we elected him county judge probably between `82 and `84, somewhere in there. That was our first countywide victory to elect a county judge and he, he served I think, almost three terms. And after that we elected Jimmy Patterson. But the, going back to the years that when I started. It was very hard because the county judge was, was, he was a very nice individual, but, of course, we had not elected him so he didn't owe us anything. But then, he started looking at our program, what we wanted to do or what I wanted to do, and he started liking it, so he started defending it. Social programs, that one to one setting with our constituents, the, the health clinic. Even getting a letter of, a letter of endorsement from the county for, for any program was a problem because we only had two votes. But then, we had another guy get elected from Encinal, Trine García, and he kind of started helping a little bit. Dr. Gutiérrez: What precinct was that? Commissioner García: Precinct 2, the one that I had originally run for a few years before. And but we hadn't elected him either so he didn't have any loyalty to any, anyone else. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, the split with Encinal was early on. I thought there was some issue that was up at the schools, that they wanted to secede or, or somebody wanted to hold an election and it was invalidated or, or the city... Commissioner García: No, it was... Dr. Gutiérrez: ...was abolished or...? Commissioner García: The, the city, we wanted to, we incorporated the city, Ensenada, as, as a city.... Dr. Gutiérrez: When you say we, you are talking about Raza Unida? Commissioner García: Raza Unida Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: ....along with help from the county judge, also, Henry Potthast. Like I said, he, Henry Potthast went from, from no loyalty at all to any of the things that we wanted to do to almost a hundred percent support because he saw the results and, and his results were the same. The ones that he wanted to see were the same ones that we wanted to see, and that was serving people thorough your job as a public official. You are elected by the people. What are we going to do for them? And so, we were working on a one to one basis and we were working programmatic things around our constituents. He liked it. So, he joined the bandwagon. So, along with his help we incorporated Encinal as a city. And of, well, we only, there was always a lot of opposition. There were people that never wanted to become part of the city. They had no real reasons except that they just; they were just fighting the Raza Unida effort once more. But we managed to do it, to do it. Encinal was incorporated and they had their first city council appointed by the county judge and then as a city, up until now, but we have gone through a few phases of people wanting to unincorporate Encinal. And there is a water district there that is composed of mainly people that do not want progress. They are mostly gringos. So, they have gone from never supporting to now, in 1997, supporting the city all of a sudden. But some of the people that had actually supported incorporation were with the effort of unincorporation just recently. But they were not successful and Encinal is still a, still a city and they have gone through a lot of turmoil because of that setting, pros and cons that it has even affected their, their ability to have lights in the city as it was. Their lights were cut off completely. Their streetlights. And because no one would pay the bill because it, they had all this turmoil in the actual city council. And then, of course, they didn't have any money, so a lot of factors contributed, contributed to that problem that, that in the last few months has been much more together on a lot of the issues, especially issues that affect Encinal as a city. And there was quite a few programs going on that, that we have acquired for them. A water project, a sewer project, just a regular progressive setting that people are kind of starting to take pride in, in Encinal as a city, and they had received the kind of adverse publicity because of their own actions. So, that's one other major change that we accomplished as, as a county with the Raza Unida effort. Dr. Gutiérrez: I, I guess the, the Anglos never gave up. Commissioner García: Well, I would venture to say that yes, they, they have for awhile, they have, they, they gave up. I think that right after we elected Leodoro as county judge, their activity kind of went into a, into a setting where, you know, hey, there's nothing more that we can do. I think we are outnumbered. So, they started again to try to infiltrate our own ranks. They were fairly successful, but we have still maintained the, the votes to elect a county judge and maintain representation, Chicano representation in Precinct 3, Precinct 4, Precinct 2. And the only precinct that we have not been able to, to win is Precinct I because it is predominantly, predominantly Anglo. Dr. Gutiérrez: And that's the courthouse precinct? Commissioner García: That's the courthouse precinct. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, the courthouse J. P. is still Anglo? Commissioner García: The J. P., no. He is Mexicano. But again, there are Mexicanos and Mexicanos. So, it's really, the man is really a non-controversial figure for his, his people. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did Raza Unida party candidates for governor carry La Salle County every time that they ran? Ramsey, two times, and Mario Compean in `78? Commissioner García: Yes. Yes. Dr. Gutiérrez: Was the... Commissioner García: Well, he, we carried the county in, in the barrio. I don't remember exactly if Mario Compean also carried the county, but I, I believe that, I would venture to say that yes, they have. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. The party was, was, was declared off the ballot because of the low level of votes and that they changed the requirements. Did, did you all have any discussions or any meetings to decide to be independent or be, to go back and be a regional party or did you just automatically become Democrats? How, how did all that happen? Commissioner García: Well, we went through the independent candidate setting. Henry Potthast, that was with us, he ran independent along with Jose García for sheriff and it was one county commissioner in Encinal, Maria Rita Villarreal that ran independent. And but by that point, we had started to infiltrate the Democratic Party also. And we started talking about getting a precinct chairs elected, so during that indepen, independent party setting, we, we were also developing the Democratic party representation that we needed. So, we elected some of the party precinct chairs, and then, the, the party chair was a very, very generous, very community oriented, Roy Martin. So, he... Dr. Gutiérrez: Was that an Anglo or...? Commissioner García: Anglo. So, he was very instrumental in, in the development of us within the party and, of course, it was, the reason we couldn't get in at the beginning was because we had no representation on, in the precinct, the different precincts. So once we acquired that, but, 1,1 ran as a Raza Unida candidate twice, and then, there was no party officially. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, did the independents win the election? Commissioner García: Yes. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh. Commissioner García: Everyone except the county judge. He was beaten out by a, a guy named Vernon Brown, racist. And so, he was, he was the only one that didn't win. Dr. Gutiérrez: How did you all get along with Brown as county judge then? Commissioner García: We didn't get along at all. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, four years, two years, how long did that last? Commissioner García: That was four years. And the one that had the, the most of, the most of the problems was, was me because I was the one that was trying to, to be progressive and those people didn't want to be progressive. You know, Vernon Brown went as far as, as voting against local labor programs through CETA and all those programs that we had at that time. You know, fortunately I was also a board member of those organizations and I managed to convince everyone else that, yes, La Salle County did need those jobs. But he was a hard man to get along with. Just, he threw me out of his office a few times. And he would always call me back because of certain things he knew I had some extra expertise, so and some experience. And well, one thing that we've always been able to do is we, we have the problems right there on the table in commissioner's court, but once that issue is over, you know, we, we keep talking. And in, in that process we have managed to get some, managed to get it, get it through his conscience. But things like letters of endorsement, again, you know, for projects like the clinics and things like that. He, he was never for it. He was never in favor of any long-term lease to South Texas Rural Health for the building. But you know, some of the things we did manage to get and it, we forced them in there and we got them. So, it, then when we had the representation, when Leodoro beat out Vernon Brown, it was even easier, easier to support issues because we all, we were all on the same page about what progress, you know, should be for La Salle County. And now that, that we have Jimmy Patterson, we still have the same setting. We have one Anglo that is still in there. Andy Landrum. Dr. Gutiérrez: Precinct 1? Commissioner García: Precinct 1, but he works very well with us. He was one of, of the city councilmen that voted me out of office when I was mayor, but you know, in the transition of time, he has changed his attitude a little bit in general. I was against him being appointed to the position just because of his past and oh, he assured me he was different, so he made me eat my words because we have been working very well as commissioners. He supports anything that he sees as, as positive, whether it be for whomever. Dr. Gutiérrez: What happens to the other positions now? Tax Assessor, County Clerk, County Treasurer, the, well, the sheriffs position, the District Attorney, County Attorney, District Clerk? Commissioner García: Well, the, the sheriff s position, we just elected a sheriff this last year, Raul Benavides. He beat out Darwin Avery which had been there for about three terms. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, so this is the first Mexicano sheriff? Commissioner García: Elected. We had one that was appointed. Jose García. We appointed him back in the early Eighties and he was only there for about two years, and then, he ran for that unexpired term setting, and he lost. The county treasurer's position, Jimmy Patterson was the first Mexicano that was elected by the Raza Unida party. No, I am sorry. By the Democratic setting at, at that time, which was supported and that effort were, all of us Raza Unida members and the tax assessor's position, the first Mexicano that went in there as an elected official was B. B. Sanchez. B. B. Gonzales. And you, we have had others. We have had at least two others. Mrs. Benavides, and now Elida Linar. The county clerk, we have never been able to win. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who is that? Commissioner García: Never been able to win that position. Her name is Laura Mae Tyler. Dr. Gutiérrez: How come? Commissioner García: Well, she's the one that controls the, the, the early voting elections, and in, in the past that was the problem. That was our, our major problem that we had, so you can see that, that the only position that we have not been able to win is that one because of her control. Now she is retiring next year and she has been sick, so if, if she or if something happens to her that she needs to resign, then the commissioner's court is in a position to appoint someone and maybe that way we can get someone in. But in, come March of `98, someone has to run. She is not running, so someone has to run and we need to develop a campaign for that office. The county attorney, well, we have no attorneys. Dr. Gutiérrez: At all? Commissioner García: At all. Dr. Gutiérrez: White or Brown or not, no, no attorneys? Commissioner García: Well, we have, we have one that, that is white, married to a, a Mexicano, one of those Mexicanos that, that is not a Chicano. We definitely don't want her. I don't think, even if she would run for election, she wouldn't win. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, you contract the service out or what? Commissioner García: No, we have a county attorney, but he's, he's a, the same one that has been there for ages, but he is going to retire also. The only other individual in town now that is a resident is Leslie Pencil. She doesn't want the position, so I don't know what's going to happen there. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, I guess you don't have a district attorney then either? He comes from somewhere else, no? Commissioner García: Well, the, the district attorney comes out of Karnes City. Dr. Gutiérrez: Karnes? Commissioner García: Karnes City. Dr. Gutiérrez: And your district judge comes out of... Commissioner García: One is from Karnes City and one is from Jourdanton. We have two. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, I am sure they are Anglos, and then.... Commissioner García: They are both Anglos. The D. A. is Anglo, so we, we have not, you know, gotten involved with that type of a position yet. But locally in, in our, in, in county government, we have the majority, the majority of Chicanos and school board, the majority are Chicanos. Dr. Gutiérrez: All right, well Commissioner García: City council. Dr. Gutiérrez: Let's go back and pick up the school board because at the beginning you all did not run, at least from what you said, you left it out that you were not running for, for anything on the school board. Dr. Gutiérrez: This school year? Commissioner García: No, he, this is his second year, I believe. But you know, it's, it, it required pressure from a lot of different people to, to make a drastic change like that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is he a good one? Is he going to make changes Commissioner García: He's, he's been doing a lot of good for the school district. Of course, you know, you can always criticize someone for doing or not doing certain things, but based on the older and the other superintendents that we have had, I would say he is doing a, very close to excellent job. We differ on a lot of things. We differ on approaches to things, but basically, you know, he's changed a lot of things in the school system. There are more Chicano teachers. We even have people that, some of the offspring's of people that started off as Raza Unida and are still Raza Unida oriented people in the community, but their, their offspring's are hired in the school system. It, that never happened before. As long as you were related to someone from the past, you were labeled and your family was labeled and you couldn't get a job. But that, that has changed. And that's one positive thing. We have some real good born and raised kids now in our school system as teachers. I, I think we have more now than we have ever had because of the superintendent. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, how do you do politics now and before? You showed me pictures of meetings out on the ranch, you showed me pictures of guys under a tree. I remember rallies, you know, in the heyday there at the, the, some square here in town. Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: How do you do this now? I mean, do you get phone banks; do you meet somewhere; or is it all by telephone? How do you keep your group and identify yourselves as a group now? Commissioner García: Well, that's the problem now. Although we don't have any real group officially that meets under the tree or in a building or like we used to before, it's more of an individual thing. It's more of an, in the minds of the people that, that run, it's more of an individual thing. In the community, it's not. I mean, this is one of the things that I keep telling people that want to run for positions. We have the county judge running next year and the county treasurer running next year. We have the district, the county attorney running, the county clerk running, Precinct 2 commissioner and Precinct 4 commissioner running, and I keep telling all of those people, they want to be individuals, everyone wants to have their own campaign. Well, that's in your own mind only. Because in the community, the Jimmy Patterson and the commissioner of Precinct 2, commissioner of Precinct 4, and everybody else that's running in the community, by the community, are bunched together as one ticket whether you like it or not, whether you want it or not, whether you want to accept it or not. Although you might have in your own mind that I am the county judge and I am running my own campaign, I am by myself; that's not the case. It's only in his mind. It's only in the mind of the, whoever else is running. So, we do not have a group that meets anymore like we used to. Like when I run, I have to run my own campaign. I receive no help. I run my own campaign. I find my own resources. I might get a donation here and there, but I do not get that old support where people actually went out and helped you either door to door or presented themselves right next to you in public in a rally. People kinda want to be individuals. I am one of the only ones that really, if someone else runs, I am there, you know. And it's like people don't want to be identified with other candidates anymore. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you are also saying that the spirit of voluntarism is gone or the sprit... Commissioner García: That's gone. Dr. Gutiérrez: ....of a movement as a group is gone. Commissioner García: That's gone. Now, you have to pay all your workers, almost all your workers. Fortunately, I have been able to acquire volunteers, but I am one of the only ones that really has used volunteers. Dr. Gutiérrez: What's the going rate now for getting out the vote? Commissioner García: Well, it just depends. If you hire a very good individual that you know is very good, then you pay them, I would say anything from fifty to a hundred dollars a week. Dr. Gutiérrez: Plus gas? Commissioner García: Plus gas. Dr. Gutiérrez: And other expenses? Commissioner García: And, you know, whatever other... Dr. Gutiérrez: Are there bonuses involved? Commissioner García: ... incidentals. No. Dr. Gutiérrez: No? It's flat out. Commissioner García: No bonuses, no incentives. Dr. Gutiérrez: Can they double dip? Can they get fifty or a hundred dollars from Patterson and fifty and hundred dollars from somebody else? Commissioner García: We have some of the people that do that, but generally whoever works for you is working for you and no one else. Unless, you know, two or three candidates are really together and, and, and in a setting that they are, in their own minds, they are together with someone else. And, but like I said, right now everybody wants to handle their own individual campaign. And I can tell you, that's a problem. It's a problem because people still identify you with someone, someone else anyway, even, even if you are or, or are not standing next door, you know, to someone. So, but I have been managing my own campaigns. I have gotten my own resources, my own volunteers, the few I can get. There are still some people out there that are very politically oriented and don't mind spending some time if they believe in the candidate. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, how do you raise your money? Do you get your fundraiser going? Do you sell barbecue chicken or, or fajitas or you ask some of the people who do business with the county to give some contributions or what? Commissioner García: No, I don't do that. The way I, I do my fundraisers. I have them either here or at the square at la plaza and basically what I do is I send out invitations to all of my friends that are, that don't live in Cotulla. People at the state level, people at, friends, attorneys, whomever I meet or have met or have had any sort of relationship with, I have sent invitations and, of course, those invitations ask for a donation. And I would say that I, you, I need a minimum of about two thousand, twenty five hundred dollars to manage a, a fairly good campaign. That's a minimum depending on who I am running against. But I would say that about eighty percent of the donations that I get come from outside of La Salle County. And the rest come from here. People buying a plate from you, people just giving you a five-dollar bill, people contributing the rice for that plate, you know, musicians wanting to contribute an hour of their time. Fortunately I still have some, some of that grassroots support, but a lot of the money that you use does not come, come from the city or from this county. Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you put radio ads, I mean, do you do bumper stickers, your posters are hand cards? Commissioner García: We don't have, we don't have... Dr. Gutiérrez: Newspaper ads, what do you do? Commissioner García: ...any radio. Dr. Gutiérrez: There's no radio coverage here for, for.... Commissioner García: Well, there is, but it doesn't... Dr. Gutiérrez: It's out of San Antonio... Commissioner García: ...nobody listens to it. Dr. Gutiérrez: ... or Laredo? Commissioner García: Out of PearsalI. Dr. Gutiérrez: Pearsall. Commissioner García: And the rest are Laredo or San Antonio and they are too expensive for us. Now, San Antonio, that FM station is something like five hundred dollars for a package that only has six or seven spots, so we don't do that. We do the newspaper. I started the newspaper called El Informador, which I made a few copies, a few additions and circulated them. Door to door. Stickers. That's about it, you know. I, I do the traditional stuff. I do the traditional stuff to get me elected. But that, again you know, what gets me elected is that one to one association that I continue to have to this day with social programs that have, that help people like. I still fill out an application for food stamps or whatever, whether it's on the foot of my, my truck or in somebody else's office or in someone's home or here. I still do a lot of community service. I have not changed my position on that one to one setting. Although I do not do it at my office because of the fact that now it's harder to man an office and everything is so expensive. I do have a phone. I am the only one that does not have a, their phone at the courthouse, so people can find me. So, I still continue to do the same things. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, tell me a little bit about the politics of Mexican American Democrats. I mean, you, you all joined and, and, and Leodoro was a... I, I don't mean this in a negative sense, he was the bagman, you know. I mean if people wanted to put money into this area, they would contact Leodoro through MAD and all of that. And that was what he was known as for this region. Why did all that evolve and what's happening with that? Commissioner García: Well, one of the main gripes we always had about campaigns, whether they be anything that's out of, outside of the county, any other positions that are on the ballot that are not from La Salle County, from the president on down. Our main gripe way back in time was that people from the Valley or from Dallas or San Antonio or somewhere else would, would get the money. And then, all of a sudden, they would show up in Cotulla a week or two before the election or maybe two or three days before the election and say, "Here, here is a hundred dollars to support this candidate." So, we would never get any of the resources to do any of the campaigns for anyone outside of the county. So, because we were fighting for someone to, to have that role that was closer to home, Leodoro was suggested because he was a county judge here and he was very well known in, in, in the majority of the circles politically. So, he started being the one doing what someone else from a lot farther away used to do and that was get the money and spread it around. And then, now, well, he is not around. So we still haven't tested as to who is going to be doing that. For the Ciro, Ciro Rodriguez campaign, I was the one that was chosen for that specific campaign, but I don't know what's going to happen in the, the future. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, it's going to come again every two years, so if you were before, you are going to be again, at least for him, and that's for congressman. Commissioner García: Yeah, for congressman. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, that helps. Commissioner García: So, you know, we, we managed to, to get, to carry this county for, for him with, with the resources that he provided. And again, you know, one of the things that I have always said is that we have had trouble winning elections or helping other candidates win elections. Because the statewide and national elections don't really, they talk about the importance of, of, of absentee voting as, as it was called before and it is early voting now. But they don't put their money into it with the amount of time necessary for you to actually do the work. They tell you they are, and then, you, you start your machine, and then, all of a sudden, you are caught with having to pay people and no one is coming across with any of the money because they do come across with it, but later on in the game. And a lot of times, you lose some of the votes because you don't have the resources to get out there early enough. So, with the, the MAD, now there is another group besides MAD. Dr. Gutiérrez: Tejano Democrats? Commissioner García: Tejano Democrats. I don't know if Tejano Democrats ever pumping any money into it, in the campaigns here yet, up to now. Maybe they have and I don't know about it, but we have these two groups. And I am, I am sure that... Well, I think Tejano Democrats had a, a convention, endorsement convention a couple of weeks ago in Corpus. I don't know if MAD is going to have any. Right now, La Salle County has no members in either of the organizations. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why is that? Commissioner García: It just, it's not intentional. It's just not, the representation is not there. Nobody has, has mobilized anybody to, to become a member or to be an active participant in anything. I know individuals that might attend, you know, Leodoro probably still attends something. I don't know which one or if he does at all. Dr. Gutiérrez: Where is he living now? Commissioner García: He lives in Cotulla, but he works the nine county region, regional private council of governments out of Carrizo, Carrizo Springs. Dr. Gutiérrez: I thought the headquarters was in Uvalde? Commissioner García: . No, it's in Carrizo Springs. Dr. Gutiérrez: Carrizo. So, he drives there everyday? Commissioner García: He drives everyday or you know, he gets caught up in different cities real late so he stays over or he is out, out of state or out of, out of the county. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why don't you hold up that picture again and, and read off who, who is left to right there because you have got a lot of, got a lot of people there that we have been talking about. Commissioner García: OK. From left to right. This is Dr. Gutiérrez: Can you put it straighter so it cuts the glare? There we go. Right there. Right there, right there. Commissioner García: This is Theo Alvarado, he, at, at present, he is, could you, in this picture, he used to be the county commissioner for Precinct Number 2 and now, he is, he goes, he works for the firm named Code 3 and he is Precinct 2 constable. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: This gentleman is the ex-mayor, Joe Lozano. He was just, he was not reelected and an individual named Pablo Gonzales beat him out for mayor this last year. This is Leodoro Martinez. He... Dr. Gutiérrez: That's who we are talking about? Commissioner García: Yes. In this picture he was a county judge and he is now the nine county region... Dr. Gutiérrez: Executive director? Commissioner García: ....executive director for Middle Rio Grande Development Council. And this is myself, county commissioner. Ex mayor of Cotulla. This is Alfredo Zamora, the first Chicano mayor of the city of Cotulla. He is now, for the last twelve years approximately, he has been the executive director of South Texas Rural Health. Dr. Gutiérrez: You have got to move the picture closer to your face because I, there we go, there we go. Commissioner García: And then, this is Roberto Aldaco. He's a, a, at present, he is still a county commissioner, county commissioner for Precinct 2. This is Paul, Paul Edwards. He used to be interim director for Middle Rio Grande Development Council. He, he knew Martinez, the city planner and at the end, Jimmy Patterson, the county judge for La Salle County. So, in this picture we have one, two, three, four mayors of the city of Cotulla. Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Let me turn this off because I need to change tapes. Interview with Arcenio Arturo García in Cotulla, Texas and we were just going over that picture. Why don't we just do this other picture that you have herewith other individuals and that way we have most of the cast of characters including a, a MAD president or chair? Commissioner García: Well, OK. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's Juan Maldonado, no? Let me see. Let me see if I can get and zeroed in. OK. If you pull it just a little more, we get everybody in there. All right. Go ahead. Commissioner García: OK. This is, this is during the Clinton campaign for president. Dr. Gutiérrez: Which one? Commissioner García: The first one. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: The first election. And there was this caravan that, that came by and scheduled a one-night rally here in, in, at Arcenio's in Cotulla. This is Mayor Joe Lozano, and then, Leodoro Martinez, county judge. I don't know this gentleman. He's from the Valley and there's Juan Maldonado, Eddie Lucio, Senator Eddie Lucio. Myself as county commissioner, Roberto Aldaco, and Jimmy Patterson, county judge. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: At that time Jimmy Patterson was the county treasurer and Leodoro was a county judge. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. All right. I, I think that you were describing the, the way politics is now; how you campaign; and how individualistic it's, it's becoming or trying to be made; how everybody has to get paid now to do things. How about a city in the south, are the streets all paved? Is there sewer; is there sidewalks; do you have natural gas; is the Little Red Store still the dominant store? Is there still massive unemployment? Commissioner García: OK. There is still massive unemployment. And although if you look at the approved figures, we don't show that. One, one of the reasons we don't show that or the main reason is because we don't have a Texas Employment Commission [TEC] office in La Salle County. So, all of the figures, everybody that applies for work applies at other offices. And, of course, there are a lot of people that don't apply for jobs through TEC or it's got another name now. Because the way of acquiring jobs in Cotulla is really that Texas Employment process doesn't, doesn't, doesn't apply to the general. Dr. Gutiérrez: Where is the office? Commissioner García: Well, there's one in Carrizo and one in Pearsall and one in Laredo, but there is no office in, we have never had an office in Cotulla. So, we don't have true unemployment figures. So, yes we do still have a massive unemployment rate. We, we have a, as a major supplier for food now, we have a Super S in town. It used to be that we had a whole bunch of neighborhood stores, Red Store #1, Red Store #2, Dr. Gutiérrez: And who was that.. Commissioner García: Red Store #3. Dr. Gutiérrez: ....who was that individual that owned them? Commissioner García: Well, Red Store #1 was and continues to be owned by Reynaldo García. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: Well, now his family because he is deceased. Red Store # 3 was and number 2 were owned by Arnoldo García, but Red Store #3 has been closed and 2 have been closed since I would say, twenty years ago. And Red Store #, #3 just closed in the last, in the last year because of illness in the family and no one to take over the business. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh. Who is Dan García? Commissioner García: Dan García was one of the, was a brother of Reynaldo and Armando García. And he owns, well now, his son owns the store, Dan's furniture store, because Dan García just died recently in the last six months. Dr. Gutiérrez: And they have the propane business in this region, no? Commissioner García: They have the propane business also. Now there, the propane business is in the Zavala, Dimmit, Webb, and Frio County besides La Salle. So, they have extended their business. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why doesn't the cities build more, more lines so that everybody gets connected here in the city? Commissioner García: Well, the city has natural gas. And I would venture to say that eighty to ninety percent of the households are connected to natural gas. Dr. Gutiérrez: Everybody got sewer now? Commissioner García: Everybody, we all have sewer, well, I would, let me back up. Here in this building that we are in, in now, we don't have sewer or, or gas lights and we are part of the city. This is our eleventh year being incorporated and we still don't have those services, so but I would venture to say that the majority of the city has access to sewer and gas. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, how come this doesn't have them? Commissioner García: Well, for the sewer, they keep saying that it is too expensive because they need a, a lift station and there are not enough connections to justify making it cost effective. For, for gas, they just don't have it and no one has, has said anything. I have butane, propane, so I don't mind the, the propane, but that's to my advantage because the good part about propane is if you don't use it, you don't have a minimum to pay. With natural gas, whether you use it or not, you still pay that minimum. And the only adverse thing about propane is during the, the cold spell, if, if you get, if you run out of propane, you're, you're lost. and the good thing about the city natural gas setting is that it's... Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. We are back on. Commissioner García: The good thing about the natural gas it that if lines aren't frozen or someone doesn't sabotage your, your line, you always have gas if you pay for it. But there is a minimum charge whether you use it or not. And the propane, like I said, you know, if you use it, you spend it, if you don't use it, it's there. And the paved streets, well, when I was growing up there were only three or four paved streets and they were all, all on the east, west side of town. None of the barrio streets were paved. And I would say out of a hundred percent streets in the barrio, I would say sixty percent or close to that are paved now. They are not, they are not paved with curb and gutter and all that, that, the fringe benefits, but at least we have paved, paved roads. Physically, I would say that the, the city will be getting better because the city council has looked into and has actually paved some more streets in the last couple of years and we do have plans of continuing and extending that program. Overall, from the time politics started way back in the Sixties, late Sixties to now, the city is much better. Dr. Gutiérrez: And these opponents don't see that? They still rail against what Raza Unida brought or what Raza Unida did? Commissioner García: I don't think that's really the issue anymore. It's just there's, because a lot of the people on both sides are very conscious of what's going on and what's needed. It's only the old mentality, the old factor that still exists, the old racist individual that just because you are a Mexicano that you shouldn't get in. It is really not if you are any good or not. If you are qualified or not. It is only because you are a Mexicano, Chicano and you should not be elected. That's, but that mentality is, is being lost, fortunately, as time goes by. The new generation of, of kids are looking at issues, they are looking at, you know, who is doing for the city or the county or the schools and who is not. Although that element still exists, you know, and, and it's hard to overcome. But in the barrio, unfortunately, it's not, a lot of people don't consider qualifications. In the barrio, people consider who you are, if you are related to me or if you are my compadre (male godparent sponsor of my child) or, or comadre (female godparent sponsor of my child), we still, in the barrio, have, have not educated ourselves totally to look at qualifications. For example, the candidates that I have had in the past, in the recent past, we had one individual that was totally illiterate that really could not function in the position of county commissioner because of the progressive setting and all the paperwork you have to, to read and interpret. But he came close to a victory, because he was, comes from a large family, because he was a musician, and a lot of other factors. Besides the, the electoral being very weak at that time, because all incumbents were the target of people asking for jobs and no jobs being available, that year. The specific year that I am talking about which was about eight, ten years ago, I would say a good eighty- percent of incumbents lost, so I was lucky to win. But it's, it's a setting where that, in the barrio, still a lot of us do not consider qualifications. We consider who is running and what their relationship is to us or someone that we know. In, in the general picture, that's still the case in some areas. But overall, I would say that for a county judge's position, people look at qualifications. For a sheriff's position, people look at qualifications. It's, it's, but there are some positions that, that don't, that you don't have that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is the city, the school, the county, in terms of economics, better off now than it was before? Commissioner García: Economically, yes. I think that even individuals in, in our city and county are better off now or have the potential to be better off now with what's available than thirty years ago when politics began for us here. Like I said at the beginning of the interview, the bank had no Mexicanos, Chicanos working there. Now, about half of the staff that work at the bank are from the barrio. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is that a result of, of the politics that you created a middle class here? Commissioner García: That's a result of politics. It's a result, I wouldn't say middle, middle class because the pay really is, is just ordinary pay. It's nothing extraordinary in, in, when you talk about Dr. Gutiérrez: But relatively speaking, for Cotulla, that would be middle class, no? Because people don't have those, those, those pays or those jobs or six hundred dollars a month regular. Commissioner García: For example, right now I would venture to say that the majority of the women that are working at the bank are at minimum wage or a little over, so I would not say that that is a middle class position. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK.. . Commissioner García: Now, when you get into the, the loan officer setting, we have one Mexicano that, that works there. And I would assume that his position is a middle class position when it comes to pay, but even, you know, we, we are still not where we need to be, but we have more people working in the places where no Mexicanos used to work before. We have a lot of people working with the county, for example, at the county level. They are not minimum wage that are maybe on the verge of a, a middle class positions that were not working ever. Did not have any opportunity to get a job, to getting jobs at that level. We have a lot of, like I said, a lot of the kids at the school that are offspring's of us, for example, of our generation, they are working there. And I don't know if you can term any teacher's salary as middle class, but I would say they are in the twenty thousand-dollar range. And those opportunities didn't exist before. We have people working with the city like the city planner, the department heads, that all of those people used to be white. They used to be Anglos. So, because of politics, that changed. And almost everywhere you look and anything you touch when it comes to jobs, yes, there have been improvements. Of course, with the cost of living, a lot of times it's, if you, the factor is probably the same as it was before, but the pay and the good positions, some of them, a good majority of them, are held by Chicanos. Dr. Gutiérrez: How about the tax situation? Is, is your tax base declining? Do you have business shutting down and farms shutting down and, and you're on a downward spiral in terms of tax moneys so you have to increase tax collections and so you have to increase taxes to keep up? Commissioner García: Well, you know, all of those, all of the three entities that tax, property tax, they base their taxes on what they need to operate. The tax is reflected by you preparing a budget of what you need to operate that county, that city, or that school. And I can tell you that at the county level, we stay with a lot of things. Without a lot of things that we need when it comes to roads, when it comes to natural indigent services, when it comes to law enforcement, all aspects of the county, we have been pinching pennies since I can remember. So, we have never had an overabundance of money because we try to keep, you know, the amount of money for that budget that we need at, at the lowest level. Since I, in the twenty one years that I have been a commissioner, I would say that we have never gone over the allowable three percent raise with the exception of one year when we had all this, the properties reevaluated under, under an appraisal district. That's when people felt it, but not because taxes went up. It was evaluations that went up or some of them went down. One thing that, that messed up the county, I remember in every other county, was that you could, could not tax minerals anymore a few years ago and farm implements and things like that. Dr. Gutiérrez: They are exempt now? Commissioner García: Yeah. So, Dr. Gutiérrez: Who pulled that off? Commissioner García: That's been, well for example, our evaluations when the oil setting went down. We lost something like a million, million and a half dollars of, of evaluations, valuated taxable property and a lot of, a lot of the equipment had just exempt or it wasn't appraised or you couldn't find it to appraise it, whichever was the case. The city, well, the same thing. Now but the city, they have, this city, the city of Cotulla, have gone up considerably and the school district have gone up considerably and that's people that, you hear people always talking about that, those two entities. Now when they ask us how, why are your taxes higher, if you ask an individual that pays, let's say ninety dollars, ours might go up two or three dollars, seven dollars. But nothing major like the other two entities. But we try very hard to keep ourselves from doing that. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is the downtown dead? Commissioner García: Well, on a business wide level, yes. In downtown area, you probably have about two block area, that one stretch of Front Street, which is considered the, the downtown area, there are only about six businesses when you used to have something like twenty, twenty something businesses out there. Dr. Gutiérrez: And how about businesses in the barrio? The barber shop or the los billares, las cantinas (the pool halls, the beer joints), the cantinas, the little grocery stores, are they gone or are they open? Commissioner García: Well, we only have one barber shop when we used to have three. But because men now use hair stylists instead of barbers. You know, that's the only reason. People like to get, men like to get their hair cut by women, I guess, or something. And not very many people frequent the old barber shop like they used to when I was growing up. The thriving business still is the cantinas, but not as it used to be. At one time Cotulla had over thirty cantinas. Now we probably have about five or six, but it's still a, a traditional business in the community. Neighborhood stores, they still have about two or three. We have restaurants, a couple of restaurants in the barrio, small mom and pop, you know, little restaurants. But that's fading in the, in, in, every year that goes by, you know. People consider in closing because times are hard for them, the competition is too great for you to exist in the barrio anymore. I think that we, at the county level, that we have discussed doing is there is a lot of people or organizations that inquire about doing housing projects, about doing this type of industry. And what we are doing now is that we are, whenever we consider a project, we try to split or see if people can split the project from this side of town, the east side of town, and also include something in the west side of town. Because we are gearing everything this way and that area of town will die eventually if we do not look to the future and see that it's preserved in some way, fashion, or form. Dr. Gutiérrez: Now, is this the magnet the freeway or...? Commissioner García: Yes, this is where the freeway is, the, for example, the county has, next door to my property here, sixty seven acres we are trying to develop into business property and there was a housing project that wanted to purchase part of the land, but the requirement that we, that we had was yes, we will sell you part of that land if you promise to buy the other half on the west side of town, east side of town and have two projects. Well, to some people, I think, that's attractive and to some it's not. But we are still working on getting these developers to consider split programs so that the entire city can have growth. Dr. Gutiérrez: Are the farms still in production for crops or are they turned to deer hunting and? Commissioner García: The main crop here is beer and doves and javalines, (wild boars). Dr. Gutiérrez: What happened to that fellow that was raising buffalo in this county? Commissioner García: He is gone. He is gone. There is still two or three people that have buffalo, but not any large numbers. Two or three here and there. Dr. Gutiérrez: What was his name? Do you remember? Commissioner García: No, I don't remember his name. It's been a while since he left. Dr. Gutiérrez: Has the population increased or decreased? Commissioner García: It's increased. It's increased. Dr. Gutiérrez: In the city or in the county or both? Commissioner García: In the city and the county and the reason it, one of the reasons that it has increased is because in the last few years we have acquired a five hundred bed prison and a fifty, fifty four bed detention center, juvenile detention center. So, all of these places hire and in just those two businesses, I would say very close to hundred jobs in the last five years. So, we have had some influx of people moving in, especially people that work at these facilities. Dr. Gutiérrez: Are you part of a community college district? Commissioner García: No, we are not. Dr. Gutiérrez: Tell me about politics in, in the region, if you know, because you're, you seem to be divided. Your congressman runs north and south, your judicial seems to run east and west or at least east. Your, your, your CAP Agency and your war on poverty and your Rio Grande Development Council is all to the west. You seem to be pulled, depending on activity and so do you meet with other people; do you travel; do you know what's going on in say, Tilden or Pearsall or Zapata or Crystal; and do you mix with, with Raza there? Commissioner García: Well, the, for, for almost everything we are at the edge. Like for Middle Rio Grande, a nine county region, we are at the eastern edge. We are the last county east. For the judicial district, we are the last county west, you know. So, we are either at one or the other extreme. But when, when it comes to politics and knowing what's going on in, in the area around us, we have a good and close relationship with people from, from Zavala County, from Frio County, from Dimmit County, and even Duval County to, to the east of us. Webb County. Because we see ourselves often in different functions outside of our county, whether it be South Texas Commissioners and Judges or Texas Commissioners and Judges conferences or the IH-35 corridor, you know. We have different reasons why certain people from the different counties around us see each other fairly often. And that's again, the progressive setting to be part of a group, a regional or, or a South Texas setting where we exchange ideas and, and cooperate with each other to try to acquire things for, for ourselves. For example, in nine county regional council of governments, we have a, a, a gentleman's agreement that nobody else had ever heard of or no one else has. And this gentleman's agreement keeps the small counties in the picture when you have, when you acquire services because things, if you traditionally would, would divide the money according to population and the traditional aspects, La Salle County for example, or counties like... Dr. Gutiérrez: Real. Commissioner García: Real wouldn't be getting very much. So, this gentleman, gentleman's agreement sets aside a certain amount of, of dollars that is split equally, so therefore giving counties, counties like Real and La Salle and Zavala and some of those that are small counties more resources to work with. So, through the Council of Governments we have a regional association that we, that we work with, therefore knowing more or less what each one does in their community. Through the, on the district judge and that setting, the judicial, I personally, rarely have any real association with them, so I am not aware of what judicially is happening in any other parts of the district. But when it comes to politics we mutually have rallies whether it be in Pearsall or in Cotulla or around the other cities, so when it comes to campaigns, you know, we, there is a lot of people around the area and region that we work together with. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, which towns have now become Raza controlled moving north or moving east? Commissioner García: Well, Pearsall, again, when, when you are only talking about Mexicanos because of their last name, there is a lot of them. But when you talk about the progressive mentality of protecting and, and insuring that, that discrimination doesn't exist and things like that, sometimes even if you are a Mexicano in another setting and, and never been involved with discrimination or you think you haven't, you don't really protect that. But at the same time, you are a city councilman or a school board member, maybe just because you want to and not because you have the desire, desire to change things. But Pearsall has, well, both the school and the city has very good representation when it comes to the barrio. Zavala County also has very good representation and it's a, they are like us, we are a majority. Dimmit County, they are on the verge of being either way, you know, no se sabe. (can't really know.) Dr. Gutiérrez: What about this other way towards Karnes? Floresville. What was the... Commissioner García: I don't know. Karnes City, if you want to... Dr. Gutiérrez: Three Rivers or... Commissioner García: I am not, Three Rivers, I am not involved with anyone there. Dr. Gutiérrez: So you all seldom travel east? You go west and north? Commissioner García: Yeah. Well, our, our.... Dr. Gutiérrez: Who is your state rep? Commissioner García: Out of Alice, Richard Raymond. Richard Raymond y (and) Zaffirini, es la (is the) senator. Dr. Gutiérrez: Of course, Raymond now is running for agriculture... Commissioner García: Right. Dr. Gutiérrez: I mean, land commissioner. Commissioner García: For land commissioner. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, there is going to be a vacancy there. Commissioner García: Yes. Dr. Gutiérrez: Maybe Leodoro should run. Unknown:. You got Junior? Commissioner García: No. Unknown:. No? Commissioner García: Well, there, there have been some positions and some people that have talked about being interested in running for different positions. I really doubt that, at this point, Leodoro would want to take on that role. He might. I haven't talked to him. But yes, Richard Raymond is running for another, another position. I have heard in the past that Jimmy Patterson was interested in running for. state rep. But I have talked to him personally and he does not feel that at this time he is ready or he would. He is not willing to put his family obligations and participation with his family in, in jeopardy because of him being out of town in a position like, like the state rep's position would require. So, I don't know. But there might be someone out there that knows more about Leodoro's intent, but I have not talked to him about it. Dr. Gutiérrez: Of course, that doesn't pay well at all. Commissioner García: That's true. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, it's a big sacrifice. You got to have another job. Commissioner García: One, one of the reasons Jimmy Patterson decided it wasn't his setting is because of, you know, he has a business established here, an insurance business. And that would require him to not have enough time to do that. And he has got a very good agency going on for him here, insurance agency. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is he the only one? Commissioner García: No. There are some other ones, but he's, he's, the only Mexicano. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is he the only Mexicano one? Commissioner García: There is another Mexicano, but he's not successful with the insurance setting. So, but we do travel more from Cotulla west than we do from Cotulla east. But like I said, we do know some of the officials from the different areas and whenever we see each other. But mostly the IH corridor, for example, is people to the west of us that have participated more. I think that the people from Tilden and all those other cities to the east of us want the, what is it, the I..... Dr. Gutiérrez: ...37. Commissioner García: ...37 corridor. There is at least two efforts, you know, toward the, the east of us, and but, I know that there are Mexicanos representing their constituents in all those cities to the west of us also. I just don't have that much association with them. Dr. Gutiérrez: Who do you think is our most effective organization nationally or statewide? Commissioner García: Our most effective organization in general or, or...? Dr. Gutiérrez: For Mexican Americans. Commissioner García: Well, right now for La Salle County, I don't see anyone really, that we are participating with anyone at that level. We were and, and participated with the Mexican, Mexican American Democrats. And I felt that it was very effective. When that split happened, you know, a lot of people lost interest in, in, in all of the process because we were shooting, shooting ourselves in the foot, you know. So, since that split I think La Salle County has been in a standstill as to participation with any organization outside of La Salle County politically. Dr. Gutiérrez: How about in terms of leaders? Most effective Mexican American leaders. Who are they in your opinion? Commissioner García: Locally or...? Dr. Gutiérrez: At any level. Commissioner García: At any level. Well, locally I would say that, that we are in the same situation here in Cotulla and, and La Salle County. We don't have any one leader, I think, that when it comes to positions like I said, you know, although in our own minds we might feel that we are individuals in the community, the community sees all of us as leaders, but there is no one que le puedes decir como antes, "Andy con Arcenio. Anda con Leodoro y to va a organizar todo. " (like you could say like before, "Go with Arcenio. Go with Leodoro and he will organize everything.") I not going to.... Right now, that is not the case. So, locally we don't have any real one leader. I think all of us are leaders or leading the, our effort locally. When you talk about outside of La Salle, La Salle County, I think that Leodoro would be the only appropriate individual that up to now has, especially when he was county judge, would kind of be a regional or a South Texas leader. And he was considered by other communities in, in the same light and nada mas con que ... (nothing more that with...) He was elected, hired by the nine county region as a Council of Governments director to decir que (to say that), probably that was the case at that time. But, I think that even at that level, we are lacking because he is busy doing something else. I don't see anyone out there trying to bring us together, any one individual, you know. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why was he double-crossed for that U. S. Marshall position? And who did it? Commissioner García: Well, only, the, the thing that I know, we were all interviewed, you know, regarding Leodoro what we knew about him y todo. (and everything. I think that it just, it just waited so long for the, the actual... The process just took so long that he had either that position or the one that he has now. And there was not too much difference in pay and he always like the Council of Governments position also, but, of course, he knew the prestige in, in getting a presidential appointment, an, an actual position with the, the district. It was, it was a western district and we are from the southern district, which is out of Houston, so that was a problem, too. And then, of course, some of the politicos with the western district wanted someone that, that they knew and was from their own district. Therefore I think that was part of it, but there was a different, a different aspects of, of different reasons why he did not have that position. Then, he just couldn't wait around and didn't want to wait around anymore. He was offered this other position and it was a now or never setting. It is a very prestigious position. One that he can still help locally, so he used a lot of those factors in deciding, well you know, thanks, but no thanks, you know. I can't wait anymore. I am taking the position over here. I don't know if anybody sabotaged his, the process that was used to get him into the Marshall's position, but I think that the end, the reason at the end was that he couldn't wait around anymore. It had taken months and months of his time and they were scrutinizing him from top to bottom like they do everybody. That still didn't faze him that much, but it was just the amount of time. And it was still requires for him to get to the level of actually getting the job. And all of this time, you know, the Council of Governments was with an interim director waiting for him to, to make a decision whether he was going to be Marshall or hopefully he was going to be interested in the position that he holds now. So, he, I think that with all those factors and you know, that he could make a difference, continue to make a difference around the, the same area, created his desire to accept the position as the Council of Governments director. And he is still there. He is still, I just talked to him a few days ago. He says it is a lot of work, but he has, still has a lot of support for him to continue his employment with the COG [Council of Governments] and that this COG is hard to work for. There is too many different characters in the game that sometimes make it difficult. Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you two get along? I thought there was a little rift between you? Commissioner García: Well, no, we, we, we have always gotten along. One of the things that, that I didn't particularly like about his approach to politics again, and we just talked about it, is the individual campaigns. When he started running his campaign for county judge, in his own mind, he thought that he wanted it and he kept advocating for individual campaigns. So that's when the individual setting came in and I didn't particularly like that setting. We really have not had any major problems, although we do have our disagreements on approaches to things, on how we acquire and do our political campaigns. On issues, I don't think we really have any, any major differences. I think we have the same approach to issues and but we have never had any real, I think somebody over blew or blew up, you know, whatever he or I were saying about politics and the way we wanted to go about it. I know one of the problems that was created. Well, I had an opportunity to be appointed sheriff and he was one of the ones that, that derailed that effort. I didn't like his reasons, but that still didn't pull us apart. You know, I have always been the type of individual that wants to be progressive and, and part of the solution and not create a problem. And, and therefore I feel that I was instrumental in keeping things together anyway, even though I didn't like the approach, even though I didn't like the fact that I was not appointed to that position that he was very instrumental in my not getting it. Again, with the county judge's position, when he resigned, I was interested in that position too, and he was very instrumental in my not acquiring it, but still, you know, again. I, I am the type of individual that I am not out there for personal gains, you know. I, I love what I do for people and if, if I have to, have to continue being a county commissioner, I enjoy it. Although as a county judge I knew I, I could have that more one to one setting with people and right now, I think that that's lacking. Right now, you talk to a secretary the majority of the time. You don't talk to the man. Just like when you call Southwestern Bell, you never talk to a person, you talk to a machine and have to punch in numbers. Well you know, I wanted to continue an administration of that one to one setting that I love to do. And that I think is essential. So, in that respect, that's some of the disagreements that we have on how to do things. But we are very good friends. Es mi hermano. Hasta (He is my brother. Even) with my own brothers, I have problems, but we are still brothers, you know. And we continue to have a relationship and I feel that we have a good relationship. A very good relationship. Dr. Gutiérrez: Effective state leaders. Mexican American. Commissioner García: Well, Zaffirini, she is a, a very effective state leader at the state level although she is elected on a district basis. But I think she is a very super-qualified individual that provides that necessary representation we lack. Of course, we have disagreements with her too, on certain things that, that she does, pero (but) I would venture to say that those are very minute, you know. The, the majority of the things she does, we agree with and or I agree with. Other statewide leaders that I associate myself with? Why? It's more a, a general setting with me. The ones that have more individual contact with a lot of other statewide people are, are Jimmy Patterson and Leodoro and I mostly stay here. Dr. Gutiérrez: National leaders. Most effective national leaders. Commissioner García: I, I think that Clinton is one of the... Dr. Gutiérrez: No, no. Mexican Americans. Commissioner García: ::was, well, Ciro Rodriguez 'that's the only one really that I associate with, that I have known for ages. Effective. Well I have seen some of the preliminary work that he has done or that he is doing. And I know that he is working very closely with veteran's issues. I know he is working very carefully with local issues because he has had some town hall meetings just recently and he has been asking for guidance and I think he is going to be very effective for us at the national level. Of course, Henry B. Gonzalez, but he's, he's, he's old. He is not running anymore in the future, but I think he's been an effective leader. [Albert] Bustamante did a lot of good for us. Of course, he hurt himself and us in the process pero (but) he was an effective leader when it came to delivering. I would say right now, that's all I can, can think of because I am more, I am more conscious of what goes on locally. Dr. Gutiérrez: What are the most pressing issues for our community? Commissioner García: Jobs. Healthcare. Education. Lo mismo que existia (The same that existed) thirty years ago is still, forty years ago still is a problem now. Economic development. Dr. Gutiérrez: Why doesn't it get solved? Commissioner García: Well, the, the economy has a lot to do with it, pero (but) locally it, it's just we don't have the.... If, if anyone, someone from the barrio wants to develop a business, it's, it's almost like hit, hitting a brick wall. We don't have the, the resources out there. You have SBA [Small Business Administration] and, you know, guaranteed loans, but that's on an individual basis. But now, you have all this, this population of people that want to work y no hay o hay muy poco y no pagan suficiente. (and there isn't or there is little and they don't pay sufficiently.) Dr. Gutiérrez: I saw that convention center that says Alexander. Who, who is Alexander? Commissioner García: Alexander is a, he, he died about ten years ago, but he left all this property and a lot of money. He was one of the major landowners in La Salle County. Very successful rancher, big enterprise. And he developed this A. B. Alexander Memorial for when he, for when after he would, he would die so that his name would not die with him. And in that decree that he made was that all of his money would go to purchasing different land for different projects in the community. A. B. Alexander Library, Memorial Library that was built with hundred percent funding from his foundation. Yluego esta el (And then there is the) A. B. Alexander Civic Center, Convention Center. That's been about a, between a half and a quarter of a million dollar program for that foundation. Now they are going into other settings, but... Supposedly the money is running out y nomas cuesta cantidad de dinero, (and it only costs a quantity of money,), is to be used, so I think the, the library is going to be on it's own about, in about two years after this expansion that they are going through. But essentially the man was just a rich individual. When he died or before he died, he wanted to ensure himself that his name would not die with him and it hasn't. And it won't. Dr. Gutiérrez: Relations with Mexico. Do you travel to Mexico? Do you have any contact with elected officials, any involvement on this NAFTA business or this 35 corridor, the bridges in Laredo, or? Commissioner García: No, I personally have, don't have any real contact with that IH corridor nor whenever we meet on this side, that's totally a voluntary deal. We have met in Laredo, San Antonio, Austin, and places like that and I have seen some of the counterparts from Mexico, but I can't say that I have any relationships with any of them, yet. The bridges with just what I read in the paper, when I talk to, about con (with) the county judge from Webb County. Just recently I started making contact with the people from Eagle Pass because they are on the verge of acquiring a new bridge. My questions to them were using Laredo for that setting that exists now with NAFTA, you know, with congestion, you know, how, how are you using that as an example to plan your effort for a bridge? Y dijeron que (And they said that) they weren't looking at all aspects como (like) the commercial aspect and, you know, routing, how to get their streets in the city ready for that, that new bridge. But essentially on bridges, that's about the only contact that I have had. That was just recent. I don't travel to Mexico anymore like I used to. At one time, we had developed a sister city setting with Villa Aldama, and so, I knew some of the, the mayors and other officials in that area. And I knew some of the other officials from Nuevo Laredo and, and Monterey, Cienega de Flores, places like that. But that's been in the past, I haven't had any more relationships with anybody. [Note: Commissioner García begins to explain and describe various items in boxes. The dialog is disjointed and unrelated, topic to topic. Consult the video for clarification or identification of the item discussed.] Dr. Gutiérrez: What pictures you got that we can film or things you wanted to show? We will put them on the, the recording device. Commissioner García: Well, I have a few pictures. This is one that is very dear to me and this is, this picture was taken... Dr. Gutiérrez: Hold it up just a little bit higher. Right there. Commissioner García: ... in, in 1970 in, in Uvalde. Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh huh. Commissioner García: This was Roy Rodriguez that we talked about... Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: ...him earlier about him being a county commissioner. His wife, I think that's Father Smith. I don't remember his name. Dr. Gutiérrez: No, that's not Father Smith. Commissioner García: Well, he... Dr. Gutiérrez: Not Sherrill Smith. Maybe, maybe another Smith, but not Sherrill Smith. Commissioner García: I don't remember his name. He's still around here somewhere active. And this is my wife, myself, and my two oldest sons, son and daughter, Javier and Aide. As, as you can tell, we have our berets on. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Did you all think of yourselves as Brown Berets or is that the MAYO beret or MAYO button or what is it? Commissioner García: That's the MAYO buttons. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: And but we participated in the walkouts. This was, this was a, a walkout in Uvalde, I believe. Dr. Gutiérrez: Right. Commissioner García: And of course, we already saw this one. Talking about migrants, you know, this is... Dr. Gutiérrez: Little higher up. Commissioner García: ...this was one of the... Dr. Gutiérrez: There you go. Commissioner García: ...pictures, the little kid in the... Dr. Gutiérrez: Ladder? Commissioner García: ....in the ladder is, is me, and then my, my mother. And some of my, my primas (cousins) and aunts. That was way back in the Forties. And then, this is a picture. This is a, we also talked about this. This was when I was mayor of the city of Cotulla. And this is, picture was taken when I was going to sign the lawsuit against the city for the residency setting that we had. Again, this is another picture of approximately the same setting... Dr. Gutiérrez: Little higher. Commissioner García: ...where we were migrants. This is my mother, tios, primas, tias, (uncles, cousins, aunts), and, of course, I am always in the picture. I have some other pictures. And some of these people are already deceased, but this is a, a picture of some of us going into the different bars and trying to get people to get out the vote. We would just go from bar to bar and, and before people would, would start drinking, we would pick them up and take them to vote. Dr. Gutiérrez: Here, you don't have to take it out of the folder. I, I can undo this and, and get closer to you unless you want to. Commissioner García: Yeah. Es que esta muy pesado. (It's that it's real heavy.) This is also a picture. We used to, as, as you can tell, there is a sticker on the back of this van. It says Raza Unida de Tejas. This picture was taken in, in Desplains, Wheeling, Illinois. Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Commissioner García: 1972 when I was elected mayor all the way to 1982 every, every year we had a Fourth of July fundraiser in Wheeling at, at the Forest Preserve. And all of the people from Cotulla that were, that were migrants and all of the people from Cotulla or from the area that lived up there would get together on the Fourth of July of every year. And those funds we would come back with and, and continue the effort of, of politics. Again, this is another picture where we were at a... Dr. Gutiérrez: Another bar. Commissioner García: ... another bar trying to get people to vote. And we have a lot of other pictures, but I just don't have them with me. Some of them, a good collection of my pictures and newspapers are at the UTSA archives that I need to get back pretty soon. Dr. Gutiérrez: You are not going to get them back if you gave it to them. Commissioner García: No, the setting, I have not given them anything. I just lent them the information and they are supposed to catalog it and send it back. They haven't done it yet, so I have gotten some information on you. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's there. My stuff is there. Commissioner García: And I have gotten some information on someone else and I am thinking of writing up mine, so the majority of my material is up there. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. You said in the box you might have a copy of that lawsuit on, on the mini riot, the charges against Martinez. What happened to him? Where is he living now? Commissioner García: He lives in Donna, Texas. Dr. Gutiérrez: In Donna, Texas. Is he related to Leodoro? Commissioner García: Yeah. They are brothers. Dr. Gutiérrez: Brothers. Commissioner García: Primos hermanos (First cousins). Dr. Gutiérrez: Primos hermanos is different than brothers.... Commissioner García: El (The) cousin. Dr. Gutiérrez: ... is like first cousins. Commissioner García: Yeah. Pues ellos se dicen primos hermanos. (Well, they call themselves first cousins.) This was of the first organization that we used to have. Barrios Unidos. (United Neighborhoods.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh huh. Commissioner García: This was the first vehicle that we used locally to... Dr. Gutiérrez: That was for the adults? Commissioner García: Uh huh. No, we were all young, pero (but)... Dr. Gutiérrez: No, but YA was clearly for the young people. Commissioner García: The last two chapters of the Rules For Radicals deals with Genesis of Tactics. Toda la information que agarrabamos (All the information we used to gather) at that time. Saul Alinsky, no? Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: Ahorita to vi eso, era una (I just saw that, it was a) subpoena or something. Right before you got here to vi aqui. (I saw it here.) This is one of the invitations that I send out for reelections. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, when you do your fund raising? Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: Can I have this? Commissioner García: Yeah. You can have it. Dr. Gutiérrez: We will put this in your archive that you can start now at UT Arlington. Commissioner García: Pues tengo muchas cosas. Tengo que encontrarlas otra vez. (Well, I have lots of things. I have to find them again.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, I will be glad to take whatever you don't want to hang onto. But you really ought to deposit this stuff somewhere. Commissioner García: Paul Rich for Congress. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. I remember that. Commissioner García: Cuando no habla dinero para hacer (When there was no money to do) sample ballots. Yo hacia mi (I would do my own) sample ballots. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, by hand? Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: Each one? Commissioner García: Yeah. Well, las haciamos (we would do them by) Xerox pero (but).... Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, OK. But still, you had to do it by hand, and then, Xerox it. Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, you already ran on a slate with Henry Potthast? Commissioner García: Yeah. Como to dije ya en ese tiempo... (Like I told you that by that time...) Dr. Gutiérrez: And he, so he turned completely full circle, huh? Commissioner García: Yep. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ah. Well, do you have more than one copy of that? Commissioner García: Si, hay muchas. (Yes, there are a lot.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Can I take one? Commissioner García: Yeah. State Convention 1980. Yo fui a la (I went to the) National Convention in, in 1980. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is the delegate for whom? Commissioner García: For Kennedy. Dr. Gutiérrez: Kennedy. Ohhh, look at all that stuff. Commissioner García: Yep. Dr. Gutiérrez: Old stickers. Let me hold this one up for a minute. Oh, there you go. Yours. Do you have anymore of these? Commissioner García: I think so. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, let's leave it aside and if you do, maybe you will consider giving me one for that archive of yours? State of Texas. Commissioner García: Here is one. Dr. Gutiérrez: Hey, you are getting close. State of Texas. Commissioner García: The Chicano get the vote out. Joe Moron campaign. Dr. Gutiérrez: Joe Moron, was that guy out of Beeville? Commissioner García: De Beeville. (From Beeville.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Yes. Is that a subpoena right there? Commissioner García: OK. This is a, the Juan Cruz. I keep, you know.. No se que es esta cosa. (I don't know what this thing is.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh huh. Commissioner García: That's today for county commissioner. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: Of course, they all lost. But as a result of this election.... Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, this is a copy of that two or three issues. You said no. The Informador. Commissioner García: Si (Yes). This guy ran for sheriff. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohh, OK. We got some more stickers. Commissioner García: This guy ran for constable. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you can handle those. Let me have all of those. Commissioner García: Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Do you have anymore of Ayala or Sanchez here? Commissioner García: Yeah. I think, I think I have them here. Dr. Gutiérrez: You have two of them. Sanchez. Can I take one? Commissioner García: Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: There are three of them. And you have Ayala also here. OK. Commissioner García: Yes. No, hay tengo otra caja creo. Esto es cuando corrio Leodoro. Este guy Zertuche. Gano Leodoro (No, I have another box, I think. This is when Leodoro ran. This guy is Zertuche. Leodoro won) for mayor. He had run against a guy that replaced me. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: Puro Paul Rich... (This is all Paul Rich...) This guy.... Dr. Gutiérrez: What is this newspaper? Commissioner García: Dolph Briscoe. John Hill. This guy ran for, for Precinct 2, county commissioner tambien (also). Dr. Gutiérrez: Agapito. Commissioner García: Uh hmm. He lost. Dr. Gutiérrez: So, how did he lose? Precinct 2. Commissioner García: He ran against someone that was very, very well known in Encinal. Dr. Gutiérrez: You've got two of them. Can I take one? Commissioner García: Yeah. Aqui esta el (Here is the) initial copy, incorporation, for the people who were requesting the county judge run the people in election to move for incorporation. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohh. This is just a receipt. Posters or something. Commissioner García: The old drive in theater in ... Que teniamos. (That we had.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Now, did you own that? Commissioner García: Uh huh. We still do. Dr. Gutiérrez: Is it, does it work? Commissioner García: I have all the equipment ready. I can go show a movie now, nomas prendiendo la luz. (just turn on the light.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Of course, nobody comes no more, no? Everybody stays home or rents videos. Commissioner García: No, we have closed it a few years ago. Mira, Mario Compean (Look, Mario Compean) for Governor. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh wow. Look at that. Got any more of these? Commissioner García: No, I think that's the only one that I have. Dr. Gutiérrez: Pos no salio el ... (Well it didn't surface..) Commissioner García: Lo vi. Pero hubiera apartado.. (I saw it. I should have set it aside.) I remember glancing over it. Mira esta tambien como para (Look it is also like for) constable. He's a... sheriff.... Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh huh. Commissioner García: Oh, oh, estas (these) created a big problem, you know, because the county paid for them. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, the letterhead? Commissioner García: Si (Yes). The county paid for them. No querian pagar el bil... (They didn't want to pay the bill....) Legitimate expense. Why not? As a county commissioner, I am going to be using these envelopes for my correspondence. Why is it not an allowable expense? No, porque deci, (No, because it says,) there's a Raza Unida. But still... Dr. Gutiérrez: So, did you get away with it? Commissioner García: Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Let me have a couple of them. Commissioner García: Yeah, because they paid for it. Well, at one time, esto es to que usabamos (this is what we used), put the stickers on. Dr. Gutiérrez: You would just buy the paper? Commissioner García: Yes. Este no los (This was) donated. Como se llama (What is his name) out of Austin, county commissioner. Dr. Gutiérrez: Let me have one of those. You have got several. Commissioner García: It's that county commissioner or it's that en (in) Austin. Como se llama? (What's his name?). Richard, Richard Moya. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh yeah. Richard Moya. Commissioner García: Cuando corrio la primera vez. (When he ran the first time.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: Tenia (He had) silk screen. Dr. Gutiérrez: Right. Well, he was a printer, no? He had a print shop? Commissioner García: Uh huh. Ciro. Contesting elections. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you have an election contest here? Commissioner García: Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Which ones? Luis Perez. Aqui esta una yo creo. (Here is one, I think.) Yeah, this is notice of a contest. City council of `75. And Paul Cotulla is the one that is challenged. Commissioner García: I think we answered that contest. I think.... Dr. Gutiérrez: What are they doing here? Commissioner García: Si (Yes). Dr. Gutiérrez: No, this is Ciro. Commissioner García: Hay ponlo. (Put it there.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Arcenio.... Commissioner García: I think we, I think este fue cuando un gringo (this was when a gringo) got into a problem with dinero (money).... Dr. Gutiérrez: Big ballot. Commissioner García: Yeah, they cuando corrio... (when they ran...) Jose García. Write in for sheriff. Tachaban los nombres. (They would cross out their names.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. Commissioner García: That's .... In fact, cuando to vi fue cuando fuimos (when I saw him it was when we were) poll watchers at de Moron. (for [Joe] Moron). Dr. Gutiérrez: He ran for state representative, no? Commissioner García: Uh huh. Precinct convention. Housing Authority. Esta water well (This water well) when I was elected mayor, we acquired this funding for this water well for the pero como yo estaba en el otro lado del pueblo (but since I was on the other side of town) I was too young and I shouldn't have ideas. Pero to cambiaron para un (But they changed it to) existing water well. Y nunca sirvio la (And it never was a good) water well. Election of `73. Mis notas que hacia cuando era MAYO. (My notes when I was in MAYO). Mira este fue otro (Look this was another) project that, that this man was willing to sell this property to the city in that I am mayor for twenty thousand dollars, four years, four payments, no interest. Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Commissioner García: Este (This) the building is next door, esta pegado en (it is adjacent to) city hall. Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh huh. Commissioner García: But because the letter was addressed to me, they didn't even consider it. Well, something like six years, seven years later, they tried to buy it y el precio era cien mil dolares (and the price was a hundred thousand dollars). Dr. Gutiérrez: A hundred thousand dollars? Commissioner García: A hundred thousand bucks. Dr. Gutiérrez: Let's see right over there. OK. Commissioner García: Well, this is a... Dr. Gutiérrez: Some of the other...? Commissioner García: Some are our participants. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, this is over taxes? Commissioner García: Yeah. Este es (This is) Joe Moron. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah, that's over taxes. Now, that is Krueger with Richter, with todos (all of them) and all the heavy duties). What year was this? Commissioner García: Oh, fue como `80.... (it was around '80 ...) Well, he... Dr. Gutiérrez: Southwest for John Hill. This would be `72? Commissioner García: No, not that old. I would say it is around `80, `78, `80. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, Briscoe wasn't governor then or John Hill. Commissioner García: In, the last Seventies, that is part of the Seventies. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ahh, that's dandy. Let's take a look at it. Oh, you got two? Commissioner García: No, I have one. Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: I should have more of them. Dr. Gutiérrez: You made these yourselves also? Commissioner García: Yo tenia que hacerlo. Yo le escrihia todo tambien el (I had to do it all. I would write all the) campaign material. Dr. Gutiérrez: And you wrote this for him? Commissioner García: Uh huh. For him. Dr. Gutiérrez: Then you have to be more than just political allies. You got to be buddies. Commissioner García: Well, si (yes) to this day. Ya esta viejito. (He is old.) He still comes to, to see, to see me. If we can find one. Este (This) letterhead I developed for South Texas Rural Health. Fue el primer (It was the first) letterhead que tuvimos. (that we had.) Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: Figate, cuando me elijieron (Look, when I was elected) county commissioner.: Dr. Gutiérrez: Those are all copies of the same letter. What is that all about? Commissioner García: When I was elected county commissioner, existia este proyecto de (there existed this project of) healthcare that helped, the South Texas Rural Health, in La Salle County. Migrant health project. La estrellita le deciamos (The Star we called it.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. Commissioner García: Cuando el (When the) Dr. Barton and in the period of time that, that, you know, Dr. Barton, as executive director had the program . Cada ano nunca pedio mas dinero. (Every year he would never ask for more money.) Well, when I got elected commissioner, the very first thing I did fui con (went to) on health care. Ya tenia una organizacion ya establecida (They had an established organization.) So, when I tried to get a letter of recommendation from the, from the county at one of our, my first meetings, el condado no quiso. No queria muy bien darme (the county didn't want. They did not want to give me) letter of endorsement. So... la palabra... (the word...) Como que you queria quitarle el programa a la clínica a los migranies. (Like I wanted to take away the migrant program from the clinic.) Well, by the next meeting, I had more information, the Rural Health Initiative Act. And that all these programs would be phased out into one. Dr. Gutiérrez: Right. Commissioner García: Todos, (All), all of these programs will be phased out eventually into a rural health initiative. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, they are all after you. Commissioner García: Toda la genie que estaba alli y el Dr. y la directora, (All the people that were there and the Dr. and the director) they didn't know that I had this letter. I think this is the letter. I think, este [English translation: ] I think this is the letter. Que ya no hiban a tener la (That they were not going to have the ) migrant clinic. Este tenia muchos problemas y... (They had a lot of problems and...) Oyes, me dieron iodo el paquete. (Listen, they gave me the whole package) Y toda la gente que hablan elejido, votado, por mi... (And all the people that elected me, voted for me... ) Aay y por que no queries quitar la estrellita? (Aay, and why do you want to take away The Star? [Nickname for the clinic] (Y deje a todos hablar y yo nunca dije nada. Y trata mi material. (And I let everyone speak and I never said anything. I had my material.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Right. Commissioner García: Y trata la carta (And I had the letter) as of April of the next year. Yya hablaron todos, porque si..., (And everybody had spoken, because if...) "Well, Dr. Barton, do you have anything you want to say that, that's ...?" Dr. Gutiérrez: En Espanol or in English? Commissioner García: En Espanol y comense a explicar In Spanish and I started to explain.) "Dr. Barton, have you explained to them you are going to give them service up until next year?" "Well we are." "Well, with what funding?" Dijo, (He said,) " The same funds we are getting now or you have been getting for ten years." OK? Y ustedes? Cuantos servicios agaran dental? (And you folks? How many of you receive dental services?) So, I made people consider the ... Pos que, de que no nomas eso podían agarar, sino habla mas Y les dije lo que tenian. (That they, that they did not have just those services to receive, there were more. And I told them what was available.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohhh, ohhhh. Commissioner García: "Les han ensenado a usted, Sra. Ramírez la carta que han mandado a usted y que esta contestada por usted? " (Have they showed you, Mrs. Ramirez, the letter that was sent to you and answered by you?) Dr. Gutiérrez: Whoa. Commissioner García: El primero de (The first of ) `77. OK. Y no había ver nada, (And there wasn't going to be anything,) to phase out period. "Y esta firmada por usted que ya estan preparandose. Firmada por usted. " (And it is signed by you that you are getting prepared. Signed by you.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: "Porque no les dijo esto?" (Why didn't he tell you this?) Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow: What did Brown... Commissioner García: Barton. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, Barton? Commissioner García: Yeah. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, for a dentist... Commissioner García: "Miren to que traigo aqui. " (Look at what I have here.) "Que tan pronto acabe esto aqui vamos poder aplicar por dos millones y uno. Y van haber mas servicios en un,(As soon as I finish this we are going to apply for two million and one. There will be more services on a,) on a sliding fee scale." Ya estaba perdido (It was lost) including Barton. Have faith in me for a few days, man. Dr. Gutiérrez: Absolutely. Commissioner García: No hombre, ya me traian. (No ma, they really had me.). Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Commissioner García: I have a lot of stuff. I have boxes and boxes of stuff. And look. Remember the Rio Grande Federation of Health Centers tambien (also)....? Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: ... en el que estaba tambien Luz. (in the one that Luz also was in.) Alinsky. Rules for Radicals. I wonder who those were? County of Zavala. It must have been when you were judge. Dr. Gutiérrez: Those all the same things? Yeah. OK. Commissioner García: It is. No se que, como seria esto..... (I don't see how, how this could have been....) I have got two of them. You could tell we didn't have anybody to type. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you were already a commissioner, so it had to be after probably 1980. There is a date there about `80. 1 mean, it's. No, that's five. Commissioner García: Yeah. It's `65. La actilud de la gente, le estaban cobrando una cuenta, de cuenta quitan dolares. (The attitude of the people, they were charging them an account, from the account they were taking their dollars.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. This layout sheet...? Commissioner García: Si, cuando haciamos el periodico... (Yes, when we made the newspaper...) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. Texas Migrant Council. Were you involved with that? Commissioner García: Si. El (Yes, The) Texas Migrant Council. Yeah. That's when we thought, thought about the superintendent at the time. Oasis Drive In. That's all about Crystal City. That's in Zavala County isn't it? Dr. Gutiérrez: It sure is. Commissioner García: Donde esta la, Donde esta la presa de los problemas? (Where is the, Where is the dam with all the problems?) Dr. Gutiérrez: Presa? (Dam?) Commissioner García: La presa de los problemas. Es un rancho que esta en (The dam with all the problems. It is on a ranch that is ) in Zavala County, private land. Threw out la Raza. (the Mexicans.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Esta aca el estero... (Over here is the swamp area...) Commissioner García: El (The) judge le dijo a los dos lados, (told both sides), " Get together and work out an agreement." Dr. Gutiérrez: Right here. This area. Commissioner García: Uh hmm. The, the judge, get together and work out an agreement. Dr. Gutiérrez: Or...? Commissioner García: Or we will go to court y van a perder. (and you will lose.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Why are they going to lose if it is being used by the public? Commissioner García: Pues.. (Well...) Dr. Gutiérrez: But if it is being used by the public. Commissioner García: Too bad. Yeah, I think they had already ruled the que si era (that it was) private land. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh. Commissioner García: Ramon Chacon. I think we printed this in the newspaper. Mexican American Cultural Center. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, you gave it a good shot. I don't think that it's in the files anymore. Commissioner García: No, si to vi aqui, (I did see it here), that I specifically put the box down here. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh, OK. Commissioner García: Los demas los deje aqui. Si nos vamos acorder del (The rest I left here. If we are to remember about the) the mini riot. Yale mas dejar la caja. (It's best to leave the box.) Yde aqui pa donde vas? (And from here where are you going?) Dr. Gutiérrez: Pleasanton. Commissioner García: Pleasanton. Dr. Gutiérrez: If you tell me how to get across. Commissioner García: Oh, si to vas aqui como si vas a Corpos al (if you leave here as if you are going to Corpus [Christi] toward) 97 [highway] Corpus. Dr. Gutiérrez: But where is 97? Commissioner García: You go back, you go into town and the only red light that we have, you turn left. This is 97. Dr. Gutiérrez: Where's the street? Up here? Commissioner García: That little access road. Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. Commissioner García: Then you take a right. Los Angeles, Fowlerton, Charlotte. Dr. Gutiérrez: Donde esta la luz? (Where is the traffic light?) Commissioner García: Los Angeles. Los Angeles. You can go to Pleasanton or, you know.... Dr. Gutiérrez: You don't know. The only place I could get a room nearby from, you know, obviously there is motels here and stuff, but in terms of the, the national chains, was a Super 8 in Pleasanton. Commissioner García: Oh, OK. Dr. Gutiérrez: Because I got to get all the way back to Dallas, you know, too. What is it? About an hour away? Commissioner García: Yeah. About an hour. I am going to go through the boxes y haber que mas encuentro. (and see what else I can find.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Do those go over there? Commissioner García: Este muchacho vino hablar conmigo ahora pronto. Ayala. (This young man came to talk to me recently, Ayala.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Uh hmm. Commissioner García: Este es Roberto, corrio para (This is Roberto, he ran for) constable way back in the Seventies. Ahora, querie correr pa' (Now, he wants to run for) county commissioner. Dr. Gutiérrez: Did you have two copies of El lnformador [newspaper ]? Commissioner García: I thought this was the second copy. Dr. Gutiérrez: All right. Or are they two different copies? Commissioner García: I probably have another copy. Dr. Gutiérrez: Are you willing to part with it now not knowing? Commissioner García: Yeah. No, I am sure I have, I am sure I have other copies. Figate aqui fue cuando empezaron a entrar los (Notice here was when the first started coming in) precinct chairs. Dr. Gutiérrez: Oh yeah. Yeah. Commissioner García: El material de (The material of) Henry Potthast. I have lost it now. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Commissioner García: This is a good report or a letter of probation. Aqui esta una letter que le mando a Raul Martinez cuando estaba en probation. (Here is a letter that was sent to Raul Martinez when he was in probation.) We might be getting close. It's cause number, the state of Texas versus Raul Martinez. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's cause number 28-15? In 1973. Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: Your 81st Judicial District. August 15th. This says that the court has ordered all witnesses that you will not receive any further notice of subpoena, so remember the date well. Commissioner García: Yeah, that's the way it was. Pos como si estuvieramos en la escuela.(Well like if we were in school) Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohhh. So, I guess you were summoned as a witness? Commissioner García: Yep. Yo no se, no estaba alli cuando paso, (I didn't know, I wasn't there when it happened), just going home. I guess that's what I saw entonces (then) and I just thought that was the rest of the lawsuit Dr. Gutiérrez: Yes. Commissioner García: Health care is a right, not a privilege. Una agenda (An agenda) for Barrios Unidos. Dr. Gutiérrez: That's good. Commissioner García: Tengo (I have) minutes y todo (and everything) Well, it's in algo. (something.) Esta es la lista de (This is the list of) in a juror's file, a, a trial, the para Raul (for Raul). Of course, if you will notice, in, in those jury pools, siempre habia mucha raza. (there always were a lot of Mexicans.) Dr. Gutiérrez: They all got disqualified, no or excused? Commissioner García: Todos se conocian o eran compadres. (They all knew each other or were like godparents) And at the trial, the puros gringos, nomas un Mexicano. (all gringos, except for one Mexican.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Commissioner García: Este era mi hermano y luego to descalifican porque es mi hermano. (This is my brother and then they disqualify him because he was my brother.) Dr. Gutiérrez: Wow. Do you want to hang onto this or not? Commissioner García: No, go ahead and have them. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, it will be at the UT library, so in case you... Commissioner García: Births and deaths over on Crystal City, Texas. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah. Commissioner García: Yeah, cuando me preguntaste de cuando empezamos a usamos (when you asked me about when we began, we started using) the, the statistics of Cristal y todos los condados (of Crystal City and all the counties.) We, we used statistics. We had Zavala County. Dr. Gutiérrez: In Pearsall the group was called Mexicanos Unidos (United Mexicans), remember? This was Barrios Unidos (United Neighborhoods.) And they were en Cristal, Ciudadanos Unidos. (in Crystal City, United Citizens.) And Robstown was Familias Unidas (United Families. Commissioner García: TRLA, Crystal City branch of TRLA [Texas Rural Legal Aid]. Dr. Gutiérrez: Si, pues (Yes, well) we started Oficina de la Gente (Office of the People) before there was a TRLA, and then, it switched over. Commissioner García: Estas no tenia (These didn't have a ) date, so I can still use them. Dr. Gutiérrez: Ohhh. Commissioner García: In fact, I could use them now. Dr. Gutiérrez: Yeah, well pull them out. Commissioner García: Elena Guerrero for.... campaign letter. Great one. Articles. Yo creo que es la misma. (I think it is the same one.) Dr. Gutiérrez: In English. . Commissioner García: Uh huh. Dr. Gutiérrez: OK. Chief... Commissioner García: That's this box. Dr. Gutiérrez: Well, let me thank you for your time on the interview and all the wonderful information that you are sharing with us. And we are going to put in, in the archive. This will take about, about a year before it gets completed.