‘Safety over celebration’: Latino Community Association cancels Latino Fest for second straight year
BEND, Ore. (KTVZ) — For the second straight year, the Latino Community Association will cancel its Latino Fest, a long-standing celebration of Latin American cultural diversity in Central Oregon, the organization announced Wednesday.
“Because the festival is a public event in a public space, we cannot guarantee that attendees, performers, or vendors will be safe from racial profiling or threat of federal law enforcement intervention,” said LCA executive director Catalina Sánchez Frank.
Here's the rest of the association's announcement, in full:
For more than eight years, Latino Fest has been LCA’s celebration of different countries, racial backgrounds, ethnic groups and immigrant identities. The event, held at Sahalee Park in Madras, has included music and folkloric dance performers, parades of horses and floats, authentic food vendors, and activities for kids and families. Past events have attracted thousands of participants.
Instead, the organization said it "will focus its resources on its programs that impact the immediate safety of the community: teaching people to observe, document, and report about activities that violate their rights and offering other essential services that keep families together and safe."
LCA's staff members include an attorney, a fellow attorney and several accredited representatives recognized by the US Department of Justice. It also partners directly with non-profit and for-profit licensed immigration attorneys to ensure families have access to high-quality, affordable legal assistance. For more information on these programs, visit www.latinocommunityassociation.org.
“By skipping the festival again this year,” Sanchez Frank added, “we choose instead to protect each other from the anti-immigrant sentiment and aggressive enforcement tactics currently being perpetrated in our region.”
About LCA: Since 2000, the Latino Community Association has been a vital hub for the Latino community in Central Oregon, offering family support, workforce development, and advocacy to ensure immigrants can thrive and contribute to the region’s social and economic fabric.
