PRESS RELEASE

IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 13, 2022 

CONTACT: Hugo Nava Community Coordinator: (831) 687-9455; consejojardinesmilperos@gmail.com 

EPISCOPAL CHURCH EVICTS 46 CAMPESINO FAMILIES OF WATSONVILLE

BISHOP LUCINDA ASHBY UNJUSTLY TERMINATES LEASE WITH TIERRAS MILPERAS COMMUNITY GARDENS DURING PEAK GROWING SEASON

Watsonville, CA - Tierras Milperas is a campesino-led organization stewarding 7 community gardens in Watsonville. Twelve years ago farmworker families built their first garden, now they face an unjust eviction from this land by Bishop Lucinda Ashby and Watsonville’s All Saints/Cristo Rey Episcopal Church. The pending eviction will go into effect on August 1 displacing 46 families from the community garden at the peak of the growing season.

On June 2nd Tierras Milperas indirectly received an email signed by Bishop Ashby terminating the five year lease that the organization signed in 2021. Ashby argues with no substantiation community insecurity, illicit activities, unauthorized people, and inability to communicate with Tierras Milperas representatives as grounds for early termination of the lease. Tierra Milperas immediately responded with an invitation for both Bishop Ashby and her team to a dialogue, yet multiple petitions and opportunities to discuss directly with the campesino families of Tierras Milperas about the reasons and terms of the eviction continue to be ignored.  

“We already gathered some signatures and we will see what can be done. We have to fight so they don't take it away because what they are saying is not true. Those are simply false words, false things were told to the reverend and we want to clear all that up” said Agustin Contreras, member of  Tierras Milperas’ Council of Elders.

“We grow our own food because of the love of family and mother earth. After working in the industrial agricultural fields, where chemicals destroy the soil and contaminate the water, we come to our garden to cultivate and gather with other families, to enjoy rest from the toil of the fields, and do so with great effort in search of our family’s well being” said Eliodoro Martinez,  Farmer and member of Tierras Milpera’s Council of Elders. “For this reason we have come to Watsonville with our seeds from our communities in the global south in search of peace that has been denied to us.” 

One of Tierras Milperas’ core principles is to create sanctuaries for farmworker families who experience a disproportionate lack of safety in their workplaces. 95% of Tierras Milperas’ membership are farmworkers and the group considers its gardens as venues of relief where respect is a fundamental value.

Tierras Milperas was formed by campesino families who depend on the land to nourish their communities, families and livelihoods. They are calling on Bishop Lucinda Ashby to publicly rescind the lease termination notice and dialogue in good faith with Tierras Milperas. Supporters can contact Bishop Lucinda to ask her to RESCIND the Eviction of Tierra Milpera’s Campesino Families and engage in a DIALOGUE WITH Tierras Milperas. 

https://www.realepiscopal.org/contact/

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https://all-saints-cristo-rey-watsonville.org/contact/

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About Tierras Milperas

The migrant and farmworker community at Tierras Milperas comes from many generations of farming traditional milpas (biodiverse cornfields) in the global south as campesinos/as, or small scale farmers. Families built their first garden 12 years ago and in the last two years leveraged the power of their assembly to become self-organized as Tierras Milperas. Together they plant and care for a mosaic of seven community gardens in 4 acres of land throughout Watsonville and Pajaro. www.tierrasmilperas.org; IG @tierras.milperas