Last Friday, the Pajaro River breached an old levee and flooded the small agricultural town of Pajaro in Monterey County, which is home to a large population of migrant farmworker families. The rising waters displaced about 2,000 people and destroyed the area’s strawberry fields, the key source of income for these families. While news of the levee breach has been making headlines and financial aid and emergency supplies are now flowing into the area, local organizers and farmworker advocates are concerned that this help isn’t being distributed equitably, largely because of many preexisting systemic and socio-cultural barriers.

To understand what these barriers are and how we can get beyond them Terra Verde host and Earth Island Journal editor Maureen Nandini Mitra, Nancy Faulstik, executive director of Regeneración – Pajaro Valley Climate Action, Eloy Ortiz, Regenracion’s Special Projects Manager and Board President of the Center for Farmworker Families, Maria Ramos, Founder of Campesina Womb Justice, a mutual aid project for womb justice and healing for Indigenous Campesinas. Maria grew up in a farmworker family in Pajaro and is currently working to provide community members with direct aid.

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