Article: The Malibu Labor Exchange
Article originally appeared in The graphic weekly newspaper.
The morning air mixes with the musty aroma of the Malibu Labor Exchange’s (MLE) single-wide waiting room as workers gather inside to avoid the bitter February morning.
The walls of the trailer are speckled with signs that relay the rules of the site and offer English to Spanish translations for several on-the-job phrases. On the other side of the wall is Center Director, Oscar Mondragon’s office that dons an oversized American flag opposite a portrait of Cesar Chavez that hangs over his cramped desk. His modest work space boasts the only open windows in the trailer — allowing him to look over the rest of the men and women who zip up their jackets and wait outside, hoping that today will be the day they get a job.
But this hope may soon disappear from the Malibu landscape. After bearing a $20,000 mound of debt, MLE sought help from the city. The city has allocated $10,000 to MLE from a budget set for nonprofits — enabling the center to remain open at least until their March 6 fundraiser.
“There are some jobs that are just about you and there are others where a lot of people depend on you,” Mondragon said. “I work at this place that has to help a 100 people a day. It was absolutely critical for us to get help. We haven’t faced a situation that close since we opened the center 16 years ago.”
After the center firmly planted its mobile-home foundation off Civic Center Way in 1993, a stream of nearly 12,000 migrant workers crossed over the threshold under Mondragon’s experienced watch. Every day, new men and women from Central America, Europe, and even Northern Canada come to sit with Oscar in his confined accommodations and explain their situations and what job they seek. While the typical skill set includes construction, childcare, and almost any form of day labor — the workers at MLE have been known to clean up after Malibu’s natural disasters as well.
As a young man, Mondragon immigrated with his family to America in the 1960s. He soon became a farm-worker in the fields of Salinas Valley — located in an agriculturally dominated region off the central coast of California.
In 1970, at the age of 22, he joined the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) as an organizer. He soon worked his way up to a leadership position in the union and reported directly to the founder of UFW, Cesar Chavez. Soon he was giving presentations and negotiating contracts with employers — but in a language he still wasn’t completely comfortable with.
“Cesar gave me advice before I negotiated my first contract with an employer who had a 1000 workers,” Mondragon said as he pointed up towards the portrait above him. “He told me ‘you have to do it. You have to feel out the relationship between an employer and their workers — it’s a balance of power.’”
After leaving the UFW after 20 years of service, he accepted a job offer from the MLE in 1993 as center director. Since then, he has remained the driving force behind its very existence. Arriving every morning at 6:30 am sharp, he continually hears the cries of anxiety from those whose shoes he has already walked miles in.
“Today, in this country one of the biggest questions is, ‘where are the jobs Mr. Obama promised us?’” Mondragon said. “Heck, he’s created jobs and given more money to the cause but it’s about more than just money — it’s always about more than just money. Here we have people who need jobs and want jobs but we don’t have enough for all of them.”
The desperation at the site is palpable. Whenever a car parks in front of the center, nearly forty men and women gather around it, eagerly awaiting Oscar’s translation of the employer’s needs. One such worker, Carlo Madrid, a middle-aged man from Belize who has been with MLE for over two years, expresses his frustration with the overcrowding and lack of work.
“I left my family in Belize five and a half years ago because I could not find a job there for over six months,” Madrid said. “It’s sort of difficult because it gets very crowded here and it has been very difficult to get jobs. Last year I got a job for three months working in construction and a few other smaller jobs — but now I’ve gone three months without working.”
And many of the same men and women are there every day the center is open, six days a week — hoping for their chance. On Saturdays however, the workers are invited to break the monotony of the waiting game and partake in a free English course taught by Pepperdine University volunteers from the Language Connection. Leading the group is Program Coordinator and senior, Adriana Gomez. The daughter of Mexican immigrants, Gomez has watched her parents struggle to speak both languages in a foreign land.
“I remember growing up I had to be their interpreter and always translate everything for them which was frustrating,” Gomez said. “But they have always supported me through everything and that’s why I think the Labor Exchange is important. It gives them the support they need when they’re looking for a job … Oscar is always looking for jobs and doing his best.”
After clearing the pencils and English lessons off the wooden picnic benches outside the MLE center, Gomez says goodbye to the men and women and gathers the rest of the volunteers to head back home. She walks up to Oscar who, standing in the middle of the group of workers, gives her a grateful hug and closes his eyes – thanking her for coming.
“Students have always been the backbone for change in society, they are the basis for it,” Mondragon said. “Regardless of what you think about our country, here you see every day different signs that people care. You see these things that are inspirational for everyone and they are beautiful.”