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Executive Director of SWOP George Luján

Photo Courtesy of swop.net

Nonprofit confronts social, economic injustices with grassroots organizing

Novel solutions for New Mexicans are culminating in the small SouthWest Organizing Project (SWOP) building on the corner of Park Avenue and 10th Street — but its history has long been established in the foundations of New Mexican activism.

SWOP is a nonprofit community-based group which focuses on organizing and empowering la gente (the people) to achieve social and economic justice as well as racial and gender equality, according to the Executive Director of SWOP George Luján

Luján said SWOP does this in three primary ways: Education, organizing and events.

One of SWOP’s recent events, the annual Chile Harvest Fiesta, showcased New Mexican culture by hosting local musicians, artists and vendors. The event allowed the community to connect and discuss social issues all while indulging in samples of stews during the green chile stew cook-off.

Luján said food plays a large role in how SWOP organizes because it is a sweeping source of injustice in New Mexico. He added that SWOP doesn’t just try to remedy surface-level social maladies, but rather uses these familiar issues to get to the root problems that New Mexican communities are plagued by. SWOP then works to affix them with larger global initiatives.

"This land was stolen from indigenous people and communities that once thrived," Luján said. "(Our communities) used to be able to feed and take ourselves, and now we struggle to do that. These root issues — of land theft and oppression — lead to symptomatic problems like hunger, and in New Mexico about one in three children are food insecure."

Luján said although New Mexico is known for its rich agrarian history, most of the food produced here is exported elsewhere at the cost of local communities’ food security and health. This led many parts of New Mexico to become urban food deserts, where fresh food is inaccessible to many.

Project Feed the Hood, an initiative within SWOP, is a campaign that aims to provide food literacy and agricultural skills for low-income communities of color to combat New Mexico’s hunger crisis, according to Luján. One way organizers within the project do this is by creating community gardens in traditionally low-income areas of Albuquerque, such as the International District and the West Side. One of the project's founders is George Luján’s father, Joaquín Luján, a Burqueño organizer and Polvadera chile farmer.

Environmental justice is another facet of SWOP’s focus. Since SWOP’s inception in 1980, the organization has challenged corporations that threaten the health and well-being of New Mexican communities through lawsuits and activism. Luján said the inaction of many of these corporations, despite adverse consequences to the people who live here, shows that New Mexicans’ concerns are often ignored.

"We have multiple military bases (in New Mexico), and all of them are involved in environmental injustice against people of color," Luján said. "Kirtland Air Force Base has millions of gallons of large jet fuel plume that’s threatening the drinking water of Albuquerque. It started happening decades ago and still hasn’t been cleaned up, which I think shows that an entity like the military sees us as a sacrifice zone."

Though solutions to these issues have not come easily since the founding of the nonprofit nearly 40 years ago, SWOP has continued to work for justice for New Mexican communities of color through grassroots organizing and education, Luájn said.

Currently, SWOP has six major campaigns — SWOP youth group, NM Con Mujeres, Project Feed the Hood, SWOP Environmental Justice, Universidad Sin Fronteras and Arriba NM — and is always receptive to new organizing suggestions.

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For Luján and other swopista’s, SWOP is vital in embracing their cultural identity and recognizing the political influence they possess.

"SWOP really uplifts your sense of identity — of who you are and who your community is — and that is something that’s really fulfilling (about SWOP). Every single day that people are a part of it, they’re improving their sense of identity, their sense of community and reclaiming their power," Luján said.

For more information about SWOP, you can visit their website at www.swop.net or find them on social media at @swopista.

Alyssa Martinez is a beat reporter at the Daily Lobo. She can be contacted at news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @amart4447

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