SANTA CRUZ BARRIOS UNIDOS INC
This organization has already been registered
Someone in your organization has already registered and setup an account. would you like to join their team?Profile owner : c********u@g***l.c*m
Mission Statement
To promote multicultural social justice, nonviolence and economic equity through cultural healing, civic leadership, and youth and community development.
About This Cause
Background In 1977, Santa Cruz Barrios Unidos (BU) set out to heal our communities, build sustainable peace and end interpersonal, community and structural violence. For over forty years, Barrios Unidos has provided culturally driven and spiritually informed services to youth and adults within our most marginalized communities. Our services are both preventative and restorative, which has called us to environments from middle schools to maximum security facilities. Barrios Unidos is considered a vestige of the Civil Rights movement as it manifested in California. As such, our organization has remained at the forefront of cultural uplifting, racial justice, community healing, policy initiatives and restorative justice work in both youth and adult facilities as well as state and local communities. Barrios Unidos organized the first ever transcultural, incarcerated gang prevention summit in 1993, known as the Kansas City Peace Summit. Today, the Peace Plan that resulted from that summit has been adopted by the incarcerated community across the state. Vision In all our endeavors, we seek to provide curative space in the face of oppression. We seek the end of mass incarceration. We seek meaningful pathways for our youth, whether it be political and economic or interpersonal and spiritual. We seek a community where the importance of culture is understood, and individuals can draw strength from their authentic selves. We seek a world that is truly just for all. We move forward knowing peace is possible when we come together with understanding, respect and love. Santa Cruz Barrios Unidos currently operates ten community programs’ Each lies on distinct parts of the life cycle. From elementary youth to elders within the incarcerated community, we are there to provide specialized community support during all developmental stages of life. We also have a Retreat Center. Our work seeks to counter oppression, trauma, cultural misappropriation, and spiritual bankruptcy by maintaining a position and place of love and understanding. Our programs include 1) Kids Club, an afterschool program that provides our youngest community members a safe place to engage in life-affirming after school activities. Emphasis is placed on self-esteem building, social justice awareness building and conflict resolution. Our young people can feel dislocated from their cultural roots. At Barrios Unidos Kids Club, we find the right way to reconnect our youth to their roots. The goal is to provide an early connection to our community hub so that they may have access to the cultural, spiritual and community resources they need to fulfill their future 2) Audio Engineering, youth learn all aspects of the recording process including recording, mixing, editing, and mastering. Building upon these skills, youth have an opportunity to write their own songs and record them straight out of our sound proof recording studio We are currently venturing into video engineering next. Access to technology is an important component of racial justice work and one that must stay in focus when we talk about giving our youth opportunities to succeed. While bridging this gap, we also foster the curative nature of creative work. Through the music-making process, we see them tap into parts of themselves with an ease that many of us do not experience in our daily lives. And what comes of that process makes our building shake with huge beats and forward-thinking lyrics, all youth made. 3) Educational Outreach , providing youth development support in local high schools. Our support comes in the form of cultural enrichment spaces, spiritual coping skill development, promotion of authentic identity building, dropout prevention, civic engagement, social justice education, crisis counseling, tutoring and family support. Our approach employs our credibility with youth and minority cultures in a way that clearly acts out the life-affirming principles we seek to instill in them. In this way, it is our one-on-one relationships and mentorships that produce the most compelling forms of community building and youth development. Youth face an array of shifting states that make growing up difficult to navigate. This concept is particularly pronounced for our youth of color, who face pointed acts of bias on a regular basis. Knowing this first-hand, Barrios Unidos staff serves as a springboard from which our youth can know their sacred worth despite oppressive perspectives that cannot. We always want to come from a strength-based approach when working with youth and, at Barrios Unidos, it is our way on being in community. 4] Barrios Unidos Productions (BUP) is a custom screen-printing shop specializing in socially conscious apparel-making. Our approach is community-first. Our process is collaborative. Our decades of experience, wide selection of clothing brands, responsive design process, and deadline-driven production has proven to be the best way to make seriously good apparel with and for you all. In addition to creating quality apparel, we provide opportunities for youth to participate in the silk screening process from the bottom up – youth learn important job skills and attitudes that provide a solid foundation in moving forward in education and work. We Want youth thinking in terms of sustainable life careers not just a “job”. 5) Juvenile Hall Transition seeks to bring in curative cultural and spiritual development opportunity for our incarcerated youth. Our primary goal is to provide specialized support to our youth while they navigate a system that is not built for them. With the understanding that youth must be treated as youth, Barrios Unidos seeks to counter the criminalization of our young people by bringing in youthful activities, meaningful lessons, and healing words. In doing so, we mean to say that a youth that is given a chance to heal can break cycles of recidivism and stand against oppression. Our approach is culturally competent, spiritually informed and family focused. Our curriculum adapts historic examples, cultural principles, spiritual consciousness, self-esteem, forgiveness, authentic self, family relationships, family reunification, career development and educational attainment. These lessons are then applied to active opportunities to play out youth's developed knowledge. As youth begin to grow in what ways make sense for them, we continue community connection through opportunities to provide wrap-around services. Our connectivity with our youth's families also allows us to remain easily accessible when needed. This process always shows how resilient, bright, and capable our young people are. Through cultural and spiritual connection, we see our incarcerated youth begin seeing themselves as the change-makers they truly are. 6} Juvenile Evening Reporting Center is an example of our wrap-around services related to our work in the juvenile justice system. This program allows us an opportunity to continue connection with in-need youth so that we may link them to the community resources most helpful to their development and liberation. We work in partnership with the Santa Cruz County Probation Department as we advocate for and participate in a system of care in the interest of the youth we serve. 8} Adult Re-entry, Barrios Unidos is a service provider under WHO, a state-wide program providing services and support prior to exiting the prison system and support upon and during return to community and the AB 109 Program- a statewide legislative order to reduce the prison population by releasing non-violent incarcerated individuals. Barrios Unidos' role in this paradigm shift has been to provide comprehensive and culturally-based re-entry services to those individuals. Our staff has over 25 years of experience working with our returning community members, providing them with cultural, spiritual and trauma-informed healing. This program shows us that with genuine support, our people can step into their authentic selves and live healthier lives. 9) Food Distribution, Twice a week we provide food for individuals and families reaching well over 3000 individuals monthlly 10) Rapid Responders, We are Rapid Responders, we remained and remain open during the 2019/2020 COVID-19 pandemic and continue to provide food, donations, support and services utilizing COVID-19 health and safety CDC and local protocols, including 1:1 and when needed utilizing technology for certain group activities. We work with families who have been recently evacuated from their homes due to the Santa Cruz Fire sparked by lightening August 16, 2020 We work with families who lost loved ones to gang violence and also work with families who lost loved ones to prison In addition to being Rapid Reponders we currently have two staff who are State CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) certified and we are planning on having all of our employees become State CERT certified. Our Retreat Center - located on five acres in the Redwoods in Aptos, The Walter Guzman Healing Retreat Center currently serves as a base for healing and a cultural connection. With a central focus around traditional Native American ceremony, visitors are immediately greeted by nature, tipis, tree houses, and a sweat lodge. The Walter Guzman Retreat Center is a peaceful place for promoting self-confidence, awareness, sense of purpose as well as many other positive mental, physical and spiritual qualities.