MAQUILAPOLIS [city of factories]
COMMUNITY OUTREACH CAMPAIGN
The Community Outreach Campaign for MAQUILAPOLIS is a strategic binational campaign, designed and implemented collaboratively with stakeholder organizations in the U.S. and Mexico. The campaign utilizes a high-profile public television broadcast, top tier film festivals and community screenings of the film to create meaningful social change around the issues of globalization, social and environmental justice and fair trade. Our outreach team includes dedicated activists on both sides of the border, mediamakers commited to social change, and most importantly a group of women factory workers struggling to bring about positive change in their world. Our core Outreach Partners are: Chilpancingo Collective for Environmental Justice; Environmental Health Coalition; Global Exchange; Maquiladora Health and Safety Support Network; San Diego Maquiladora Workers Support Network; SweatFree Communities; Women’s Edge Coalition; Women’s Rights Advocates; and the Worker’s Information Center (CITTAC). Other organizations have also partnered with us to organize and promote community and activist events, including the Sierra Club, Comité Fronterizo de Obreras (CFO/Border Workers’ Committee), Students Against Sweatshops, among many others.
CAMPAIGN PARTNERS
Following is a complete list of the organizational Outreach Partners on the MAQUILAPOLIS Community Outreach Campaign. These are the groups with which the filmmakers have designed and are implementing the campaign. If you’re interested in what these organizations are doing to bring about progressive change, please contact them and get involved.
1. CITTAC, Centro de Información para Trabajadoras y Trabajadores, A.C. (Workers’ Information Center)
Tijuana, BC
Contact person:
Jaime Cota <cittac@prodigy.net.mx>
Carmen Valadez <carmenvaladez69@hotmail.com>
t:
11(52)664-622-4269
http://cittac.org/
US address:
PMB 193, 601E San Ysidro Boulevard, Suite 180, San Ysidro, CA 92173
The Workers Information Center (CITTAC) is a civil association of women and men of Baja California that promotes and supports workers' struggles, especially assembly plant workers, to improve their living and working conditions, to defend their human rights, particularly labor rights, and to create independent and democratic organizations.
2. Colectivo Chilpancingo Pro Justicia Ambiental (Chilpancingo Collective for Environmental Justice)
Tijuana, BC
Contact person:
Lourdes Luján < lurdesj9@hotmail.com>
Yesenia Palomares <chcolectivo@prodigy.net.mx>
Magdalena Cerda <Magdalenac@environmentalhealth.org>
Av. del Fuerte # 15861, Col. Campestre Murúa, C. P. 22500
t:
11(52)664-647-7766
We are a group of compañeras/os who work together for environmental justice and to protect the health of our community. We work to raise consciousness among our neighbors and we demand of the Mexican and U.S. government authorities that they protect the health and the environment in our community and for all communities nearby the maquiladoras.
3. Environmental Health Coalition
National City, CA
Contact person:
Amelia Simpson, Director, Border Environmental Justice Campaign, <AmeliaS@environmentalhealth.org>
401 Mile of Cars Way, Suite 310, National City, CA 91950
t: 619-474-0220
f. 619-474-1210
http://www.environmentalhealth.org
Environmental Health Coalition is a 25-year-old social and environmental justice non-profit organization with offices in San Diego and Tijuana. EHC organizes and advocates to protect public health and the environment threatened by toxic pollution. EHC works with low-income communities and communities of color on both sides of the border.
4. Global Exchange. San Francisco, CA
Contact person:
Kirsten Moller, Executive Director
2017 Mission Street #303, San Francisco, CA 94110
t: 415.255.7296
f: 415.255.7498
http://www.globalexchange.org/
Global Exchange is a membership based international human rights organization dedicated to promoting social, economic and environmental justice around the world. We do this by sending US people on Reality Tours, hosting and supporting speaking events, providing alternatives and organizing local and international campaigns.
5. Maquiladora Health & Safety Support Network
Berkeley, CA
Contact person:
Garrett Brown, Director. <gdbrown@igc.org>
P.O. Box 124, Berkeley, CA 94701-0124
t: 510-558-1014
f: 510-525-8951
http://mhssn.igc.org/
Maquiladora Health & Safety Network is a volunteer network of occupational health and safety professionals who provide information, technical assistance and on-site instruction regarding workplace hazards in the 3,000 "maquiladora" (foreign-owned assembly) plants along the U.S.-Mexico border. Our goal is to build the capacity of workers and their organizations to understand occupational health and safety issues and to be able to speak and act in their own name to protect their health and to exercise their rights.
6. Promotoras por los Derechos de las Mujeres (Women’s Rights Advocates)
Tijuana, BC
Contact person:
Tere Loyola < promodemu@hotmail.com>
t:11(52)664-626-4938
The promotoras are the group of community activists/educators in Tijuana, Mexico who collaborated with the production team to create the film. These women met in training workshops at Casa de la Mujer/Grupo Factor X, a Tijuana women’s organization. Since the closing of Factor X in early 2004, some of the promotoras have formed this new advocacy group while others have gone on to work with other organizations.
7. San Diego Maquiladora Workers Solidarity Network (SDMWSN)
(Red de San Diego en Solidaridad con los y las Trabajadoras de la Maquila)
San Diego, CA
Contact person:
Enrique Dávalos <maquilatijuanasandiego@earthlink.net>
t:(619)216-0095
The San Diego Maquiladora Workers Solidarity Network is a bi-national effort to support the struggle of Mexican workers in Baja California. Our network supports workers‚ struggles to improve life and work conditions and create progressive organizations in the maquiladoras. The network also promotes the bi-national friendship and solidarity between San Diego and Baja California workers. The SDMWSN works together with the Tijuana Maquiladora Workers Network, Workers‚ Information Center (Cittac) and other workers organizations in Baja California.
8. SweatFree Communities
Florence, MA
Contact person:
Liana Foxvog, National Organizer <liana@sweatfree.org>
140 Pine Street, #10, Florence, MA 01062
t: (413)586-0974
f: (413)584-8987
http://www.sweatfree.org/index.shtml
SweatFree Communities supports and coordinates local campaigns for public and religious institutions to adopt "sweatfree" procurement policies that end public support for sweatshops and generate significant market demand for products made in humane conditions by workers who are paid living wages. Sweatfree campaigns succeed because they advance a positive agenda for worker justice and dignity and because they allow activists to organize for worker justice in their own communities where they know the political landscape and have direct access to decision makers.
9. Women Thrive Worldwide (formerly Women's Edge Coalition)
Washington DC
Contact person:
McKenzie Lock, Communications Manager <mlock@womenthrive.org>
1825 Connecticut Avenue NW, suite 800, Washington DC 20009
t:(202)884-8376
f:(202)884-8366
www.womenthrive.org
www.womensedge.org
Women Thrive Worldwide is an advocacy coalition, based in Washington DC, that works to mold U.S. policy in the areas of international assistance and trade, to make them more responsive to the needs of poor women. Their targets for education and advocacy are the Congress and some of the executive branch entities (the U.S. Trade Representative’s office, the Millennium Challenge Corporation, U.S. A.I.D., etc.). They consult closely with women’s organizations around the world to develop and shape proposals to reflect their needs and views. Members of the Women Thrive Worldwide include CARE, Bread for the World, Christian Children’s Fund, the Hunger Project, InterAction Commission on the Advancement of Women, Lutheran World Relief, Soroptimist International of the Americas, United Methodist Women and many other national groups, as well as some local groups.