Each year in March, Irma Jimenez organizes an event at Multnomah County to celebrate National Farmworker Awareness Week. Last year she couldn’t face it; her mother Ramona had just died.
“She was my Cesar Chavez,” Irma told the Board of County Commissioners Thursday, as it proclaimed March 25th through March 31st, as National Farmworker Awareness Week in Multnomah County.
Ramona Jimenez raised 12 children while her husband Lucio worked on farms in Texas and Oregon. While her oldest children rallied behind national labor organizer Cesar Chavez, who fought for better working conditions for farmworkers, Ramona stayed home with her youngest children and often uttered Chavez’ famous phrase: “Sí, se puede” — yes we can.
“This is something I hold close to my heart,” said Irma Jimenez, a program manager for Multnomah County’s Aging, Disability & Veteran's Services and co-chair of the Managers of Color Employee Resource Group.
Worldwide, 85 percent of fruits and vegetables are handpicked by farmworkers, and largely urban Multnomah County relies primarily on produce from more rural areas. But many of its Latino residents come from families that once worked on farms.
Mexican men and women began traveling to Oregon in the 1940s to work as part of a labor agreement between the United States and Mexico called the Bracero Program. By 1950, more than 15,000 laborers had arrived to work on farms and railroads.
By the 1970s, Mexican and Mexican Americans made up more than 95 percent of farmworkers in the state. But working conditions were unsafe and pay was poor. Farm workers rallied behind Chávez, the national organizer. In 1985 farmworkers in Oregon seeking improved conditions, organized into a union they called Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (PCUN).
“Thank you for shining a light on the work of PCUN and Cesar Chávez, who lifted up Latinos, but also Brown and Black workers around the country, in terms of moving us towards justice,” Commissioner Susheela Jayapal said Thursday.
County leadership and the Managers of Color Employee Resource Group will hold a celebration March 27 to honor the 20th Annual National Farmworker Awareness Week and the birthday of labor organizer Cesar Chávez. The event will be held from noon to 1:30 p.m. in the boardroom of the Multnomah Building, 501 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Portland, with snacks provided by Tamale Boy.