Redalyc.Hostos Community College: Battle of the Seventies

Centro Journal ISSN: 1538-6279 [email protected] The City University of New York Estados Unidos Jiménez, Ramón J. Hostos Community College: Battle of the Seventies Centro Journal, vol. XV, núm. 1, spring, 2003, pp. 98-111 The City University of New York New York, Estados Unidos Available in: http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=37715105 How to cite Complete issue Scientific Information System More information about this article Network of Scientific Journals from Latin America, the Caribbean, Spain and Portugal Journal's homepage in redalyc.org Non-profit academic project, developed under the open access initiative HE the TOUG MA DE DECISIONS Their names are spelled accordingly. We respects the way individuals write their names. Journal CENTRO Note: Editor’s Hostos Community College: h ave checked the spelling of names for all those mentioned in essay. * South Bronx, student movement, social movements] U the first Spanish-English bilingual college in the history of the and emergency legislation that saved City, York history of New of an academic institution in the in the longest takeover resulted The campaign by a citywide network. and individuals supported groups, groups, constituency professors, professionals, community The collective nucleus was of students, composed militant tactics. movement a civil disobedience armed with aggressivedeveloped into struggle civic advocacy and then began with traditional peaceful This 9-month, community City financial crisis. South Bronx-led to A ABSTRACT Battle of the Seventies Ramón J. Jiménez* Ramón J. nited States. [Key words: radicalism, Puerto Rican politics, radicalism, Puerto words: [Key States. nited personal historical account by the Coordinator of the Coalition by the Coordinator account personal historical Save Hostos Community College during the 1975–76 New York Community College during the 1975–76Save New Hostos This piece is dedicated to you. to is dedicated This piece mention. many names to too played important roles in saving Hostos, of this storyThere are many names not mentioned in the text that CENTRO Journal CENTRO V olume xv Number 1 spring 2003 7 [ 99 ] during the day. The South Bronx was base. now my working during the day. a first amendment prison project conduct to Whitney Fellowship a John I received c it. participating in their last make opportunity to and ex-cons lines, brothers and sisters get off the welfare to neighborhood folks attempting la última parada was the final hope, the last stop, many of the older students, Hostos school. For of the 20 percent population comprised Afro-American and Caribbean and the single mothers, students fromThere were everyAmerican community, Latin the Champs Élyése Concourse, of the Bronx. Street and the Grand on 149th The college was located Harvard University. warehouse at my alma mater the size of a storage main building was an old tire factory, Its States. in the United af rebuild the area, a vow soon forgotten promise to would the candidate Inevitably, States. block in the United Street, the worst pilgrimage Charlotte to involved a candidate’s the eighties each presidential election usually seventies into the late From States. wasThe South Bronx community known as the poorest neighborhood in United and Culture Myths, Values, The South Bronx: In to the South Bronx Harvard From co I had always identtwenty, of and beans, Ro Tito played the music of father Ramón in many ways my upbringing was Latino. My speak it, evenAlicia, but I was though always hesitant to all my life from my mother of Harvard Law School. Rican graduate a Puerto a son… hero…. I was that rare specimen, quickly me, treating me like adopted the system. children and deceiving who spent all their time buying Cadillacs, playing the numbers, drinking, producing was recipients me that the community flooded with welfare They further told off. give them the courage rip you which would to searching for weaknesses, They were watch out for junkies, who supposedly to surrounded everyI was told corner. Savage and hurt you. rob, steal, Skulls roaming the streets at all were times ready to City. I was Rican group La Organización. a student/organizer for the Puerto City. York Commons, and New Boston D.C., Washington I gave numerous speeches in At a culture,” and to the new politics and began to receptive They were etc.). women, (civil rights, labor, learnthe evolution about the history of students who began to of social movements ourses in the C.U.N.Y. system. Upon graduation from Harvard Law School, Upon system. ourses in the C.U.N.Y. t mmunity. I was black and only black. mmunity. I was two 25 years old—an underpaid, overworked adjunct professor teaching the college. thousand students, mainlyOver two Ricans, attended Puerto My The neighborhood me. it had been described to I found the South Bronx nothing like gangs such as the Wild I had heard many stereotypes describing the South Bronx. At At er the elections. Even John Paul II gave the neighborhood his papal blessings. Paul John er the elections. Even interpret the laws that challenged their pastinterpret experiences. 1974, I taught at Hostos Community College, at that time the only bilingual college I taught at Hostos 1974, dríguez, Orquesta Aragón, Pérez Prado, and Lucho Gatica, and I loved and Lucho Gatica, my rice Aragón, Pérez Prado, dríguez, Orquesta Ha H H r oral Spanish was awful, but my understanding was fluent. I had heard Spanish vard, I had become an experienced organizer/activist in the anti-war movement. organizer/activist in the anti-war an experienced vard, I had become ostos, while teaching courses such as courses “Law and Social Change,” I witnessed while teaching ostos, ostos, I suddenly a crash about my entire “Rainbow ostos, received course pasteles bout my language. Rican rank and file. the Puerto into I was initiated for transfer students who had failed at other institutions, , and other dishes of Puerto Rican cuisine. But until the age, and other dishes of Puerto ified myself with my Afro-American friends and ified myself with my [ 100 ] was their first act of resistance. and students this that for many staff understood organizers we As experienced open. Community College be kept a simple petition demanding that Hostos The group circulated Vásquez and Amos Torres. Victor veterans and ex-Vietnam Saniel (a single mother of three challenging system), the welfare organization), Nilsa Quintana (president of the ex-prisoners students Efraín Edgecombe; Wally and M Save Hostos Community College Committee, was 1975. Community College held in December Committee, Save Hostos co As a bilingual Bronx Community College, a bigger campus with numerous buildings. be merged with would strong rumors 1976, there were Around December that Hostos Coalition to Save Hostos Community College to But many of us felt it was officials of our concerns. absolutely necessaryelected informed South Bronx We Church. Ann’s and St. Bronx Parents such as United organizations included community Committee The Save Hostos campaign. was a fiscal crisis; it was a time for budget balancing… cutbacks. Community College was only four million dollars,the budget at Hostos but there that time, At called the fiscal crisis. City, York that had invaded New monster satisfy the ravenous of this to appetite be sacrificed had to decided that Hostos M struggle, had always been tenuous. its existence Born out of community stories. success had nonetheless produced old, Hostos co ACollege be closed. was on a list of institutions to small group of professors, Community that Hostos rumors circulate Early began to in the 1975–76 school year, Save Hostos Community College Committee bilingual college in the United States. States. bilingual college in the United times the yearlyfor renovations, a figure more than fifteen budget of the only Stadium over sixty million dollars Yankee Beame was offering reductions. Mayor and middle-class no such strata, faced the upper- But the powerful, the city. Everyone save join in the effort to had to bankruptcy. go into or the city would other essential services. public elementarybudget reductions were schools, libraries, hospitals, fire and H one believed that Control Board. No and the Emergency Financial York, of New in a struggle Beame, a mostly hostile City Council, the University against Mayor that was engaged from area in the nation were the poorest per capita income of the political order. in confronting the enforcers c to little or no resistance They expected Rican/Latino community. for the Puerto to onsisting of students, staff, and community, had little experience and were fearful and were had little experience and community, onsisting of students, staff, ostos would survive the blow. Other institutions facing closing or significant survive would ostos the blow. aría Barbosa, and Leopoldo Rivera; counselors Félix Ruiz, Carlos Gonzáles, Carlos Félix Ruiz, aría Barbosa, and Leopoldo Rivera; counselors ayor Abraham D. Beame and other powerful elected and appointed officials and appointed elected Beame and other powerful D. Abraham ayor l unselors, and students began to meet in order to plan a response. Only meet in order to five years unselors, and students began to We H abort it even to before its birth. Enemies of bilingualism had attempted The official rhetoric consisted of the following: Everyone sacrifice, consisted had to The official rhetoric The battle had its David vs. Goliath dimensions: a few people from a community wage a creative, disruptive, civil disobedience campaign to force Mayor Beame wage Mayor a creative, disruptive, force campaign to civil disobedience the closing of the old tire factory. We understood that our potential army, that our potential understood We the closing of old tire factory. had little compassion and respect political forces change his decision. Powerful lege, Hostos would be eliminated.

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