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A Joint Podcast with RAMA Blueprints and HealthCare Untold

We present a special joint podcast between HealthCare UnTold and RAMA Blueprints Podcast. HealthCare Untold is a Podcast dedicated to giving voice to everyday heroes and their untold health stories that can improve health to our most vulnerable communities.

You can visit their website here.

You can donate to the RAMA Blueprints Podcast by visiting CARECENSF.org

Transcript
Speaker:

You're listening to a special joint broadcast between RAMA

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Blueprints and HealthCare Untold.

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As community podcasters, we need to build an audience of listeners and

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help each other promote our podcasts that share valuable information

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about healing and wellness.

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We explore the journey of how we both created our podcast and

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discuss the topics that we present.

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Healthcare untold is a podcast dedicated to giving voice to the everyday heroes

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and their untold stories that can improve health to our most vulnerable communities.

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We join host Barbara Garcia and producer and co-host Gerardo Sandoval with

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a special joint podcast of the RAMA Blueprints and HealthCare Untold..

Barbara:

Our guests today at HealthCare Untold is RAMA Blueprints podcast

Barbara:

cohost Socorro Gamboa and Darren J.

Barbara:

de Leon.

Barbara:

Welcome to Healthcare Untold.

Socorro:

Thank you.

Socorro:

Thank you.

Darren:

Thank you for having us.

Barbara:

So we're so excited to have both of you on.

Barbara:

You know, we, as Latino, Latinx, Latina, podcasters, we really wanted to bring

Barbara:

other Latinx podcasters to talk to them, and also to share their incredible

Barbara:

tools of podcasting for our communities.

Barbara:

It's a great way to communicate to our community messages that they

Barbara:

probably don't hear from anywhere else.

Socorro:

Well, thank you for having us and thank you for what you're doing,

Socorro:

in inspiration and motivation and getting that word out there through

Socorro:

your podcast on Healthcare Untold.

Socorro:

I wanna thank you for this opportunity for us to, to talk together about

Socorro:

our work and what we're doing, and our goals and our intentions, as

Socorro:

far as impacting community and getting information out there.

Darren:

Yeah, I wanna, I also wanna thank for, thank you for

Darren:

opening up your podcast to us.

Darren:

I think what's gonna happen.

Darren:

I think we're gonna share this with our audience too.

Darren:

So at some point we're gonna be interviewing you

Darren:

folks during the show here.

Darren:

Once again, I think it's really important that the Latinx podcasters

Darren:

really, at least at the minimum, get to know each other and if they

Darren:

can share space and share time and dialogue, I think that's even greater.

Darren:

So I'm, happy about this event happening today.

Barbara:

Yeah, me too.

Barbara:

And again thanking Gerardo Sandoval for our backstage kind of work that he does.

Barbara:

And also he's also a co-host as well.

Barbara:

And as you know, cross promotion is really important for our listeners.

Barbara:

It's a way for us to grow our podcast.

Barbara:

And it's a tool, I think, to encourage people, to listen to more

Barbara:

podcasts from Latinx podcasters.

Barbara:

So we really appreciate you here today.

Barbara:

So let's find out a little bit about your podcast and how you started and

Barbara:

tell us about the focus of your podcast.

Socorro:

So, we got started out of the pandemic.

Socorro:

Darren and I have known each other for over 20 years, we met at RAP when I

Socorro:

was the high school principal there.

Socorro:

And I was the, the last executive director in a sense of the form of the organization

Socorro:

known as the Real Alternatives Program.

Socorro:

But we had a high school in there.

Socorro:

. And so that's kind of our history, how we work together.

Socorro:

I was his supervisor.

Socorro:

I was the principal and he was one of the teachers.

Socorro:

But not just any teacher, he was an extraordinary teacher.

Socorro:

He taught English and literature.

Socorro:

And he was also on the radio.

Socorro:

So as the pandemic became viral in a sense and started going crazy with

Socorro:

us, and affecting so many people.

Socorro:

Obviously, I was home, and I began to isolate.

Socorro:

Unfortunately, as a result of the pandemic and other illnesses, I

Socorro:

lost several friends, four friends.

Socorro:

I started thinking in my head and started all this stuff started coming.

Socorro:

And I started thinking about the work at RAP.

Socorro:

All the communication.

Socorro:

All the relationships.

Socorro:

All the history.

Socorro:

The people I had met.

Socorro:

And I had talked to Darren on occasion.

Socorro:

We had driven up to San Francisco.

Socorro:

One of our former students passed away.

Socorro:

we started getting connected and started talking about how

Socorro:

we could bring people together.

Darren:

Yeah, I wanna take a step back RAMA blueprints podcast is

Darren:

telling the story of a San Francisco nonprofit called Real Alternatives

Darren:

Program that was founded in 1969.

Darren:

But unfortunately, it closed its doors in the year 2000.

Darren:

So through those, 31 years or so, uh, They created a, youth movement and they

Darren:

did leadership development inside San Francisco's Mission District, that was

Darren:

so incredible and transformational to not only the individuals, but it actually

Darren:

transformed the Mission District, their community, also themselves,

Darren:

and then eventually the whole city.

Darren:

So, what we're doing is that we are now telling this story about how RAP, Real

Darren:

Alternatives Program has developed.

Darren:

And like Socorro was saying, I was a teacher and she was running the school.

Darren:

And so at some point, we wanted to have a family reunion and we

Darren:

wound up having these on zoom.

Darren:

And it was interesting because.

Darren:

these people who were staff members for, for years who hadn't came

Darren:

back together for about 20 years or so, they made their way back

Darren:

together through the zoom meetings.

Socorro:

And so we had like seven.

Socorro:

RAP Familia zoom meetings is what we called them.

Socorro:

And every generation of RAP came together.

Socorro:

It's just really interesting how the word got out and people were like, I

Socorro:

wanna go, how come I don't have the link.

Socorro:

I wanna, I wanna connect.

Socorro:

And Darren's absolutely right.

Socorro:

People that hadn't spoken in almost 20 years were now speaking to each other.

Socorro:

Our tagline is "to listen, is to heal."

Socorro:

And we started witnessing a healing in a lot of ways of what was going on.

Socorro:

There had been people that had kind of just disconnected, and some ill feelings

Socorro:

and some people made their way through zoom and eventually connected once again.

Socorro:

The way we worked?

Socorro:

It was, it was like a Familia.

Socorro:

I mean, it was so we were so tied together.

Socorro:

We worked unselfishly, worked tirelessly, people worked a lot,

Socorro:

and there was a core of people that worked together for a lot of years.

Socorro:

And so we do the zoom meetings and Darren, his genius mind and he starts

Socorro:

going, you know, we could probably do something like, like a podcast.

Socorro:

He already had experience.

Socorro:

He'd been, he'd been on the radio and I had no clue.

Socorro:

I was just like, okay, sure.

Socorro:

Yeah.

Socorro:

I don't, I don't mind.

Socorro:

I like to talk, so let's just do this.

Socorro:

And so we started with interviews.

Socorro:

and we started to interview some of the more older, the elder generation,

Socorro:

the folks that had paved the way.

Socorro:

And we started hearing all these stories, all the stuff that started coming out.

Socorro:

There are five organizations that were like the anchor

Socorro:

organizations in the Mission.

Socorro:

What we dubbed is the five sisters.

Socorro:

Both Darren and our gardeners and we started talking about how could

Socorro:

we bring them together through this concept of gardening that

Socorro:

we both are participating in.

Darren:

Yeah.

Darren:

As we had been gardening and talking about gardening and that metaphor of the garden,

Darren:

we were following one of the indigenous planting practices are the three

Darren:

sisters, which is corn squash and beans.

Darren:

And those not only provide the minerals for you to live, but they

Darren:

have a symbiotic relationship to each other and they help each other grow.

Darren:

And so when we looked at the anchor organizations in San Francisco, we

Darren:

had identified five of them and we know that there's a lot, lot more.

Darren:

But these five pivotal ones worked in conjunction with RAP doing a lot of the

Darren:

youth advocacy and violence prevention work that needed to get done, providing

Darren:

court advocacy and services for those individuals that most people ignore

Darren:

that they don't want them in their services, that they don't want them

Darren:

in their classroom, that they don't want them in their presence because

Darren:

they feel that they are dangerous kids and they don't understand them.

Darren:

Luis Rodriguez refers to them as a throwaway kids.

Darren:

The ways that, that throw away society, that they just wish that they're

Darren:

put into prisons and incarcerated for the rest of their life and not

Darren:

have to worry or deal with them.

Darren:

Fortunately, we see the value in those young minds.

Darren:

And the only thing that they're rebelling is there rebelling to have

Darren:

failed system that is unable to develop them in their interest and to be a

Darren:

productive citizen inside their lives.

Darren:

But at RAP we saw those.

Darren:

If a kid was caught up in some type of a drama, we could not only help

Darren:

them, but once we get to know them, we could find what their strengths were

Darren:

and gear them toward a more positive life, like within the community.

Barbara:

And there's, it's such a beauty of that because RAP

Barbara:

represents such an incredible story.

Barbara:

And what I've found through this podcast and talking to other people around

Barbara:

the country is that's so true for many of our Latino Latinx communities that

Barbara:

these types of organizations, the self indigenous organizations bring about

Barbara:

social change in their communities.

Barbara:

And that's really one of the reasons we really wanna tell, tell those

Barbara:

untold stories but with the beauty that you're doing, you're really

Barbara:

going deep into that to see what happened and how did it happen.

Barbara:

And I think it's gonna be great understanding, and also some examples

Barbara:

of what our future leaders can look to.

Barbara:

This is the new technology of oral histories that you're doing.

Barbara:

And so I really honor that and I think it's a beautiful project for you to do.

Socorro:

One thing I wanted to mention is that the other motivator

Socorro:

is about the lessons learned, right?

Socorro:

As you mentioned, there's a new generation of Latino, Latinx leaders

Socorro:

in San Francisco all over the country.

Socorro:

And you can learn a lot from when they chained the doors at juvenile

Socorro:

hall to what's happening now of the closures of all the juvenile halls,

Socorro:

all the youth centers, detention centers in particular California.

Socorro:

We're bringing those parallels like what happened 30 years

Socorro:

ago what's happening now?

Socorro:

Has, are things changed?

Socorro:

It's really, really important.

Socorro:

There's the new generation of leaders.

Socorro:

I have to say, honestly, as you know, I can call myself an elder, a

Socorro:

person that's been doing community work for quite a number of years.

Socorro:

Some folks, they get it handed to 'em.

Socorro:

They don't know what to do with it.

Socorro:

Right.

Socorro:

They don't understand the history, they don't understand the struggle.

Socorro:

And so, part of what this podcast does is it talks about the struggle

Socorro:

to get to where we're at now.

Socorro:

Not that it's perfect.

Socorro:

Not that we've all got it all there already, but at least it can help

Socorro:

people give an understanding, like what are some of those lessons, what are

Socorro:

some of those errors you don't wanna make that we made, that folks made?

Socorro:

And how do we really, move towards a unified Latinx community, Chicano/

Socorro:

Latino community, BIPOC community.

Socorro:

I just wanna say this really quick, the originators of RAP which was a

Socorro:

group called EMUNYO was a BIPOC group.

Socorro:

It was Black, Latino, Samoan, Filipino, Japones, Koreanos it was

Socorro:

a group of people working together.

Socorro:

That's what it was.

Socorro:

They all live in the Mission and all of them have said this, we all just loved

Socorro:

each other and we respected each other.

Socorro:

It didn't matter where we were from what we looked like.

Socorro:

And so somehow, we wanna bring that energy out through the podcast and

Socorro:

share that with people to people say, Hey, at one point there was

Socorro:

things were being done out of love but also also done out of, you know,

Socorro:

fighting for what is rightfully ours.

Socorro:

How did you guys get started?

Barbara:

Well, I just wanted to comment on that.

Barbara:

Okay.

Barbara:

Because coming from the Long Beach LA area.

Barbara:

When I was young, there was a interchange between San Francisco

Barbara:

young kids and ourselves.

Barbara:

and the San Francisco kids came down.

Barbara:

And one of the striking things for me was the fact that many of them were biracial.

Barbara:

And being raised in a very segregated community between African Americans

Barbara:

and Chicanos, in my neighborhood we integrated, but it was very

Barbara:

segregated at the same time.

Barbara:

That was the beauty that I saw in San Francisco was that BIPOC unity

Barbara:

with young people and kind of the leadership also embracing that.

Barbara:

And that's not true for all of our movements in the terms of

Barbara:

how we were having to develop.

Barbara:

So I think San Francisco was ahead of its time in that way.

Barbara:

right.

Barbara:

So, I started the podcast in the aspect of having over 30 years in healthcare and

Barbara:

just meeting, working with people who were so incredible in healthcare and working

Barbara:

on developing a farm worker clinic in Watsonville, which is called Salud Para La

Barbara:

Gente and it's still a big organization.

Barbara:

We started in an apple shed with a doctor who really wanted to do some free care.

Barbara:

And I was organizing food security programs and we invited them in and we

Barbara:

started a free clinic for farm workers and that became a real movement.

Barbara:

And so many people like Dr.

Barbara:

Michael Alcale who kind of gave his life to those kinds of movements, I

Barbara:

really wanted to capture their stories.

Barbara:

And so approaching Gerardo about how do we do this technically?

Barbara:

I knew I wanted to do a podcast.

Barbara:

I just didn't know how to do it.

Barbara:

And so Gerardo really helped me in that engagement and then finding

Barbara:

more and more and more people with so many common threads, that people

Barbara:

coming together can really make a difference in their communities.

Gerardo:

Yeah, it was not a coincidence.

Gerardo:

I think it was meant to be, you know, having my first experience in, uh,

Gerardo:

the Watson community as a college kid and going and working for Salud Para

Gerardo:

La Gente and Barbara, I think that instilled in me a need to continue

Gerardo:

to pay attention to our community.

Gerardo:

And so when Barbara approached me about this idea with HealthCare

Gerardo:

Untold it was very automatic.

Gerardo:

It was, something that, again, was instilled in me from back then and

Gerardo:

understanding that our community needs us.

Gerardo:

Earlier Socorro mentioned our podcast and our community, and I think that's

Gerardo:

what struck me from the beginning when we were working back then and we're

Gerardo:

doing now is that in order for us to continue to support our community,

Gerardo:

we need to tell these stories and what you guys are doing Socorro and

Gerardo:

Darren, that's exactly what it is.

Gerardo:

We're telling these stories.

Gerardo:

And that's, what's amazing about, you know, the power of the mic, the power

Gerardo:

of distribution, and, the need for us to continue to produce and be out

Gerardo:

there with, and about our community.

Barbara:

What I find Socorro and Darren is that so many of our leaders, they may have

Barbara:

a lot of public, work that they do, but they're so scared to tell their stories.

Barbara:

I'm not sure if you find that as well.

Barbara:

But they're kind of challenged by the technology of what we're doing.

Barbara:

And once they start, of course, telling their story.

Barbara:

It's a beautiful one of course.

Barbara:

Yesterday I was doing a podcast with a woman who'd spent 40 years doing

Barbara:

jail health and doing homeless health and no one had asked her story.

Barbara:

No one had ever asked about her story.

Socorro:

I, I think we have found that in some of the

Socorro:

elders that we have spoken with.

Socorro:

And then we've also from interviewing them, we have found stuff about them

Socorro:

about who they are as the persona, right.

Socorro:

Who they are, what drives them, or finding out that at 16, they were involved in

Socorro:

some negative street stuff and then you see them and you go, oh my God, that's

Socorro:

so and so, and then they reveal that.

Socorro:

Or maybe even taking care of their parents at 14, we have a couple of

Socorro:

brothers that have worked in the Mission District that became instant

Socorro:

parents to their mom with a fire.

Socorro:

Their whole house burned down.

Socorro:

I think it was on Shotwell.

Socorro:

And then what drove them to becoming those human beings and caring and compassion.

Socorro:

It's so interesting for at least for Darren and I to have these conversations

Socorro:

and then you hear the story and then we say, oh my God, we we've gotta

Socorro:

talk about that part, that side of so and so, So, and so has this image

Socorro:

and that's what people think, but we need to kind of open that up.

Socorro:

So people start to see the humanity in these individuals.

Socorro:

It's been an interesting journey because the other part of this story is to talk

Socorro:

about the worker, the frontline workers.

Socorro:

My own background, a lot of it came out of doing street outreach work.

Socorro:

I was working directly on the street with a lot of, as they

Socorro:

say, hitters and quitters.

Socorro:

And you know, you name it.

Socorro:

I was working with the homies for a long time and I'm considered a square.

Socorro:

I don't come from that life, but we wanna tell that story too, of the frontline

Socorro:

worker, the outreach worker, the student that's getting her LCSW, that person,

Socorro:

because they're on the front lines.

Socorro:

And a lot of times often you recognize the executive directors, the community

Socorro:

leaders, but then there's Fulana over there who works 40, 60 hours a week,

Socorro:

trying to get that kid to go to his probation meeting because of this and

Socorro:

this and that and what that energy takes.

Socorro:

And so part of the RAMA Blueprints podcast is to talk about that community worker

Socorro:

to share that story of what are some of the challenges to live in this life and

Socorro:

saying, yeah, I'm I work in the community.

Socorro:

But what about their own challenges to keep them their mental health situation?

Socorro:

How does that keep them going?

Socorro:

The issues of counter transference, the issues of PTSD, I could go down the

Socorro:

list, vicarious trauma, you know, if I was self-analyze myself from all the

Socorro:

work I did, you know, I go, well, yeah, I'm walking vicarious trauma sometimes.

Socorro:

Cuz I, sometimes I get retriggered.

Socorro:

I think that not only is it about telling this beautiful story, and the

Socorro:

history of activism in the mission district and community and its impact

Socorro:

citywide, nationally too, because rap it had it fingers everywhere.

Socorro:

It has tentacles everywhere.

Socorro:

It's also about what it takes to do that.

Socorro:

What kind of commitment does it take?

Socorro:

You know, there was a commercial about Lay's potato chips.

Socorro:

You just can't have one.

Socorro:

Back in the day and Ray Balberan used to always say, you know, doing community

Socorro:

work is like eating Lay's potato chips.

Socorro:

Once you have one, you can't stop.

Socorro:

And we'd be like, oh, it's kind of weird the analogy, but he would say that to us.

Socorro:

Doing work in the community can be super great and rewarding, but it also can be

Socorro:

really, really hard on the individual.

Socorro:

We're exploring that we have some interviews of some frontline workers,

Socorro:

some community workers, folks that have gone through some pretty serious, you

Socorro:

know, challenges as a result of it.

Barbara:

Yeah.

Barbara:

You know, that's so interesting Socorro, because one of the things that I've found

Barbara:

is that many of the executive directors of our programs were the frontline workers.

Barbara:

And so they have that in heart of how they treat their

Barbara:

employees and what they're doing.

Barbara:

And so I think that's a really important part of sending that traditional role of

Barbara:

leadership development in organizations.

Barbara:

And I think that's one of.

Barbara:

Many important facets of, of Latinx, Latino, Chicano organizations is

Barbara:

understanding that their leadership was there in that frontline.

Barbara:

I was also a frontline worker and did some of the same work that you're

Barbara:

talking about Socorro and, with trying to do gang prevention work.

Barbara:

And that was doing murals and doing educational pieces and

Barbara:

trying to understand what that dynamic of the potential violence

Barbara:

was going to be around me.

Barbara:

What I learned because I went through a little bit of different kind of trauma,

Barbara:

which was an earthquake of '89 which was centered in downtown Watsonville.

Barbara:

And then also two floods, that was the Pajaro river.

Barbara:

I learned primarily from that system of the red cross that self care

Barbara:

of that worker is so important.

Barbara:

And that I tried to embed that in the work that I do.

Barbara:

In fact, last night, I had a conversation with the colleague and she says,

Barbara:

"well, one of the things you taught me was to take care of myself."

Barbara:

And I think that's a real important message for us to give to our leaders

Barbara:

that it's okay to take care of yourself.

Barbara:

It's okay to take that short vacation because in the long term you're gonna

Barbara:

be better at the work that you do.

Socorro:

And that's an important point you make, I think of the five

Socorro:

executive directors currently that we're focusing on in the community.

Socorro:

All of them came out of being frontline workers, and that generational

Socorro:

education that, you know, motivating people to do that is so critical.

Socorro:

I was just thinking about people at Instituto and just all the

Socorro:

people that have come out of that.

Socorro:

One of the episodes will be to focus on the new generation of

Socorro:

leaders and sort of their stories.

Socorro:

And how they kind of came up through the ranks per se.

Socorro:

That's a very important point.

Socorro:

Thank you for mentioning that.

Darren:

I wanna add on to that about frontline workers, because

Darren:

that is one of the specific target profiles that we are aiming toward.

Darren:

One of the things that we found out just in our research is that with every

Darren:

new generation of frontline workers and people who are extending themselves out

Darren:

into a career in doing community service work, That we find out that some come

Darren:

from the outside of outside the bay area and starting their careers here.

Darren:

And they don't have an understanding of all that social services and the

Darren:

history of it and how they work together collectively inside the Mission.

Darren:

So as a result, we have folks are working in silos.

Darren:

But what we're talking about in our stories too, is about how those

Darren:

opportunities for training for frontline workers, how did that come about?

Darren:

And it all started with a community organizer, community member by the name

Darren:

of Jim Queen who was a merchant Marine.

Darren:

And he just liked helping to develop a community.

Darren:

And when he was approached with these young people.

Darren:

That first marked the creation of EMUNYO, but it also marked a very important

Darren:

developmental stage inside that community where support programs were gonna happen.

Darren:

And the one line that he would always tell his young leaders that he was helping

Darren:

develop was that those people with degrees or those people who are professionals,

Darren:

or those people who are older than you, they don't have the skills that you have.

Darren:

Some things you are an expert in, some things that they are not.

Darren:

And so he was able to get the best out of those folks in the name of

Darren:

creating a type of lifestyle of the environment, that's gonna be safe and

Darren:

helpful to their family and beneficial to themselves and to the community.

Darren:

And that's the story that we're, telling also too,

Socorro:

I have a question.

Socorro:

What is the primary teaching that you'd like for your target

Socorro:

audience to gain from the podcast.

Socorro:

What are the reactions you're looking for?

Socorro:

What are some of those objectives?

Gerardo:

I strongly believe that the more we produce, the more we're out there.

Gerardo:

And so I think that that's what is important.

Gerardo:

As Latinos, as Latinx, as BIPOC the more we produce, the more we're out there.

Gerardo:

And I think that's the primary message.

Gerardo:

I personally have and mission I suppose, is so that, we together

Gerardo:

can help each other by making sure that our story is out there.

Gerardo:

So production for me is important and key to getting our word out, to getting our

Gerardo:

message out, to getting our story out.

Gerardo:

And within that there's a lot of need for us to understand where

Gerardo:

are we coming from and who we are.

Barbara:

Yeah, I guess I really want to push the issue

Barbara:

of innovation and invention.

Barbara:

And my father was an inventor and I would see him take a blank piece of paper and he

Barbara:

was a shipyard worker and he designed some hooks for the painters of the big ships.

Barbara:

So they wouldn't fall off the scaffold.

Barbara:

And he was so proud of his work, and so was the Navy.

Barbara:

They gave him a little certificate and a $500 little bonus, but he saved

Barbara:

probably hundreds of thousands of people.

Barbara:

And so that blank piece of paper of being able to invent, innovate ideas,

Barbara:

and also bring people along with you in solving some of our world's

Barbara:

problems that we can do that together.

Barbara:

our stories prove that over and over again that people coming together can

Barbara:

really support and help people in the most suffering thing they may have.

Darren:

I'd like to ask a question that's regarding the topics that you

Darren:

choose to present and discuss on there.

Darren:

Your podcast is called HealthCare Untold and so we we're assuming that

Darren:

everything is gonna be about healthcare.

Darren:

And I don't know if it's the physical, or what aspects when

Darren:

you're looking at healthcare are you folks trying to address?

Barbara:

Well, that's a great question because healthcare, as I've learned

Barbara:

in the public health field is the social determinants of health.

Barbara:

It can go everywhere from where you live.

Barbara:

How you live.

Barbara:

they say that your zip code will tell what your health status is, and it has

Barbara:

more to do with poverty, social justice.

Barbara:

When we look at healthcare, we're looking at the entire

Barbara:

social determinants of health.

Barbara:

I'm working on a project right now of how do you bring health,

Barbara:

financial security and housing.

Barbara:

As, kind of the ingredients for this COVID recovery.

Barbara:

So, you know, recovering from COVID is not just recovering from that disease.

Barbara:

We have to change the fabric of our communities to improve health

Barbara:

status to ensure that people have the ability to isolate when they get sick.

Barbara:

That they have a healthy home.

Barbara:

That they have food.

Barbara:

And so it is that broad spectrum.

Barbara:

And that's why it's called HealthCare Untold the untold stories

Barbara:

of what really healthcare is.

Gerardo:

You mentioned zip codes, right.

Gerardo:

You know, right away it triggered that thought and it's like, oh

Gerardo:

I guess I do live in the ghetto.

Gerardo:

you know?

Gerardo:

Yeah.

Gerardo:

And it's so telling about just because of your zip code you're

Gerardo:

already like pigeonholed.

Gerardo:

And so that tells data analyst, whoevers is determining, who you are because of

Gerardo:

that in regards to your health, but it also has to do with your financial health.

Gerardo:

Right?

Gerardo:

And so we talk a lot about other health factors that impact our physical health.

Gerardo:

It is emotional.

Gerardo:

It is financial.

Gerardo:

It is your status quo.

Gerardo:

All that impacts your health.

Gerardo:

By the way, these are my first prescription eye glasses.

Gerardo:

And so when I first went to get examined, I didn't realize

Gerardo:

how important eye health is.

Gerardo:

And again, you know, it's so fascinating to realize how many people don't have

Gerardo:

access to a pair of glasses or to an exam and how important it is, how vital it is

Gerardo:

for their health and for their survival.

Gerardo:

Being in the zip code that I am, it is impacting people.

Gerardo:

So that's where HealthCare Untold is, you know, it's a little bit

Gerardo:

of all these factors that impact our overall health as humans.

Barbara:

There's a startling data point that came out of the JAMA which

Barbara:

is the journal of medical association.

Barbara:

And it says that during 2019 to 2021, that the Latino life expectancy

Barbara:

shrunk by six years from 82 to 76.

Barbara:

And we're not talking about it.

Barbara:

What does that mean?

Barbara:

What does it mean for you to not live to 82, but to die at 76.

Barbara:

For your families?

Barbara:

For the wealth of the community?

Barbara:

Cuz you know, our community works till they're very old.

Barbara:

So I do think that these untold stories are so important for our communities to

Barbara:

learn from, but also to take action about.

Socorro:

You know, a really good point and I'm just gonna touch real quickly

Socorro:

on the health perspective because I'm a cancer survivor and I'm 20 years,

Socorro:

21 years into my cancer being gone.

Socorro:

And when I worked in the community, I had no concept of self care.

Socorro:

it was like work, work, work, work, work, work.

Socorro:

Socorro Socorro Socorro.

Socorro:

You know, my name Socorro means to ayudar, to help.

Socorro:

Right.

Socorro:

I didn't learn that until I went to a, um, a restorative justice

Socorro:

workshop about 10 years ago.

Socorro:

And I was doing some sort of training with some folks.

Socorro:

We had talk about our name and I literally lived it.

Socorro:

Lived my work and, ate, breathed community work.

Socorro:

And when I think about your podcast and I think what's important, like

Socorro:

finding out about your eyes, right?

Socorro:

Gerardo like, I have been wearing those cheapy deepy readers mm-hmm because,

Socorro:

I was like, I don't eat glasses.

Socorro:

But I finally went to the doctor and there are my first prescription reading glasses.

Socorro:

I think three years ago.

Socorro:

And I started realizing, oh my God.

Socorro:

And when I'm in those doctor's offices I see people like, oh,

Socorro:

well, you know, haggling like, oh, I can't afford it or this or that.

Socorro:

And it's really, really sad to see that.

Socorro:

But it's also so important for our community to take care of itself right.

Socorro:

To take care of one's self, mind, body and spirit.

Socorro:

And in particular your physical health, I can talk about my Tia Guadalupe who

Socorro:

lived to be 102, and she ate 10 corn tortillas, a glass of milk, pan dulce.

Socorro:

Her ritual was like the most high carb diet I had ever seen in my life.

Socorro:

Somehow there was other factors involved was taking a little walk,

Socorro:

being outside, sitting in the solicito listening to the birds.

Socorro:

There was other type of medicina and one of the things that we explored in episode

Socorro:

one was that medicina of the altar.

Socorro:

Of how we grieve, how we practice, a lot of those sacred traditions.

Socorro:

I see our podcast as also providing those kind of avenues

Socorro:

to seeking your ancestral ways.

Socorro:

Because it does help you heal in a lot of ways.

Socorro:

And so for me personally, where I'm at now in compared to how I was when I was

Socorro:

like working my butt off all the time.

Socorro:

I know now to take those times to self care.

Socorro:

So as we're doing these interviews with these frontline

Socorro:

workers, we're exploring that.

Socorro:

How do you self care?

Socorro:

What are some of the practices you're using right now?

Socorro:

In episode three, when we talked about the Uvalde episode in that round table, each

Socorro:

one of those persons was just so moved.

Socorro:

Just triggered with that experience of uvalde everything that happened there.

Socorro:

But each one of 'em also had a remedio, a remedy on how to take care of themselves.

Socorro:

And I think that's kind of the interesting thing about the podcast we're producing

Socorro:

RAMA Blueprints, is that we can delve into that and get experience from that

Socorro:

and share that message with folks.

Socorro:

I have a question.

Socorro:

How do you envision your shows responsibility to the community?

Barbara:

Yeah.

Barbara:

I think that sharing people's stories, the importance of the Latinx,

Barbara:

Latino, Chicana Chicano communities.

Barbara:

allowing them to share their stories to a bigger audience of

Barbara:

their failures, of their successes.

Barbara:

And then what I found, and I think you're touching on this greatly is

Barbara:

people coming together to create these incredible organizations and that

Barbara:

development of the organization and, intermingled with what a Familia is, but

Barbara:

then trying to keep the business alive.

Barbara:

I think are kind of the responsibilities that we see of telling the true

Barbara:

stories of what's really going on in our community with hope and love.

Darren:

One of the responsibilities for community that we have is that,

Darren:

since I'm trained in radio and also a little bit in production and stuff,

Darren:

I think the responsibility is, is for me to share my skills to help

Darren:

further the development of a community.

Darren:

Now that I partnered with Socorro specifically because she had

Darren:

that professional experience and working within this organization.

Darren:

And so what we've decided.

Darren:

It's fine with me is that we tell these stories of how youth leadership

Darren:

development occurred and then give them these examples of lessons learned or

Darren:

blueprints, which is why it's in the title of how to develop leadership that's

Darren:

gonna have an impact on your community.

Darren:

So our responsibility definitely is to tell the story of San

Darren:

Francisco, Mission District and how it has effectively controlled the

Darren:

destiny of their own neighborhood.

Darren:

And if there are communities out there that have no idea of what that

Darren:

type of self-determination feels like or they get hit with issues

Darren:

that they're unable to handle.

Darren:

I'll just give you a quick example.

Darren:

Back when gentrification occurred here in San Francisco and a lot of

Darren:

folks were forced to leave the city.

Darren:

A lot of them wound up in Santa Rosa and unfortunately, they started experiencing

Darren:

youth community violence in Santa Rosa, and they had no idea how to deal with it

Darren:

because a lot of those kids were coming from Oakland or coming from San Francisco.

Darren:

And these little beefs were being carried out over there.

Darren:

So what we provide is a history and an understanding of how San Francisco

Darren:

developed their responses to that.

Darren:

And hopefully those communities can start addressing it and hopefully

Darren:

they'll get in touch with us so we can actually start helping them address it by

Darren:

creating these networks of dialogues, of experiences with other communities outside

Darren:

of California, outside the bay area.

Darren:

But also the multicultural aspect that, that we have.

Darren:

We're following a multicultural multi-generational movement that

Darren:

still pretty much exists, but the organization itself, which started

Darren:

as a movement no longer exists.

Socorro:

Yeah, I just wanna add that in particular we're partnering

Socorro:

with the Polynesian community.

Socorro:

And when we talk about responsibility to community.

Socorro:

I learned something at rap many years ago, 20 plus years ago, I

Socorro:

said, I'm not responsible for you.

Socorro:

I'm responsible to you.

Socorro:

And so in particular, we are partnering with the Pacific Islander resource hut.

Socorro:

And we've been asked to help train them in producing a podcast,

Socorro:

so they can tell their story.

Socorro:

It can come from their perspective so they can put their twist on it.

Socorro:

I see that as a responsibility for all of us that are here, the

Socorro:

four of us, if were asked how did you guys go about doing this?

Socorro:

How do we reflect that more?

Socorro:

I'm currently mentoring a young woman here, and we talk all the time.

Socorro:

She has her own podcast, and we're just talking about themes

Socorro:

and talking about, well, I wanna talk about young women's stuff.

Socorro:

And she says, I just want other people to know what we go through.

Socorro:

And so I see that a as a responsibility to when we're

Socorro:

asked that we humbly participate.

Socorro:

Sure, we should also be given our respect and resources, and honored for that work.

Socorro:

But I think that, like you said, Gerardo, the more that it gets out to the masses,

Socorro:

then the more individuals are represented, the more people hear about it.

Socorro:

And, and they can also say, well, look, man, these four people are doing this.

Socorro:

This people are doing that, but I wanna get the story out there.

Barbara:

Well, this conversation will continue.

Barbara:

We're so happy to have RAMA Blueprints podcast with us.

Barbara:

Socorro Gamboa, Darren J.

Barbara:

de Leon.

Barbara:

Gracias for your time today.

Socorro:

I wanna thank you, Barbara and Gerardo.

Socorro:

And thank HealthCare Untold podcasts for your work, for your suerso, for your

Socorro:

motivation and inspiration and continue to do the good work you're doing.

Socorro:

Gracias.

Barbara:

Gracias to all of you.

Barbara:

Thank you.

Barbara:

These may be challenging times, but have hope and listen to the untold health

Barbara:

stories about incredible people who have committed their lives to better

Barbara:

their communities, diverse health activists, direct medical providers,

Barbara:

community organizers that are helping our communities to get healthier and stronger.

Barbara:

Stories of local heroes during the pandemic.

Barbara:

And even before that proves over and over again, that people can come together

Barbara:

during times of need and make the world a better place stories you would

Barbara:

never hear of except that healthcare untold hosted by Barbara Ann Garcia

Darren:

Thank you for listening to the RAMA Blueprints podcast, The Five Sisters

Darren:

Audio Garden would like to say thank you to HealthCare Untold, Barbara Ann Garcia

Darren:

and Gerardo Sandoval, and acknowledge the following for their support.

Darren:

CARECEN SF, Instituto Familiar de La Raza, Change Elemental, the Pacific

Darren:

Islander's Resource Hut, the San Francisco Foundation, Our Brother (Rest

Darren:

In Power) Mitchell Salazar, and the many individual supporters who have

Darren:

graciously donated to our production.

Darren:

you can become part of our family by donating and visiting.

Darren:

CARECENSF.org

Darren:

This episode was produced by Gerardo Sandoval and edited by Darren J.

Darren:

de Leon and Socorro Gamboa.

Darren:

If you like our show, subscribe and give it a rating on apple podcasts,

Darren:

share it with two people, spread the word and remember to listen is to heal.

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About the Podcast

Show artwork for RAMA Blueprints
RAMA Blueprints
The History of the Real Alternatives Program (RAP), a Revolutionary Youth Organization practicing Self-Determination.

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About your hosts

Profile picture for Darren J. de Leon

Darren J. de Leon

Darren J. de Leon is an award winning poet from San Bernardino, CA., playwright, podcast/radio producer, street DJ, high school teacher, taquero and community activist. For 12 years, he produced and hosted Radio 2050, a Latino Arts Radio Magazine for KPFA in Berkeley, CA. In the mid 90’s, Darren was a teacher at Real Alternative Programs (RAP High School) where he developed a curriculum that emphasized the practice of non-violence, composition, and self-expression for juvenile delinquents and the chronically truant. Currently, Darren lives in San Bernardino, CA in his family’s house of over 50 years. He continues to write, create art, and tend to his garden of vegetables and fruits. He produced Podcast Descarga: A History of Los Delicados and Project 1521, a poetry podcast. An avid bicycle rider, he can be spotted around the L.A. area on weekends pedaling and enjoying the art and literary scene. He loves mezcal and hates gasoline.
Profile picture for Socorro Gamboa

Socorro Gamboa

Socorro R. Gamboa is a conscious and passionate leader born and raised in Oxnard, California, she is a Community Activist, Artvist, an original Chicano Park muralist, a former high school principal, former Gang Reduction Intervention/Outreach specialist, a podcast producer and a community engagement consultant.
Socorro is truly a renaissance artivist. Socorro moved to San Francisco in 1988 where she began her journey working at the Real Alternatives Program (RAP) where she worked for 15 years as Case Manager, Education DIrector and the interim Executive Director of R.A.P. She also worked as the Director of the Community Response Network (CRN) a city wide community youth violence street intervention program, supervising 25 formerly incarcerated individuals, providing outreach and professionalism development. She is currently the co-founder of the 5 Sisters Audio Garden Production Company and co-producer and host of the RAMA Blueprints Podcast. She is rooted deeply in her spiritual practices, working the land, gardening and preserving the legacy of the elders by leaving a repository of valuable life lessons and insights.