I just talked to Luis. He said he’s available to meet tomorrow at 6pm at the migrant center to talk more about Sunday.
He mentioned that he was at court today (not immigration court) and people were not coming to their hearings for things like traffic violations - he was not sure what to do about that, but we can talk about it tomorrow.
@Bozzii @HipGnosis @Tanner @Englishpete08 @Veewok @Adri_Martinez
Also made a couple new images.
Valley watch resources, they said we are free to use them:
legal_observer_training_03.24.2024.pdf (4.4 MB)
Shifting through the Legal Observer Website and looking online I found this presentation for a general training and introduction of this topic.
This can definitely be modified to work for current and more local issues here in Stockton and San Joaquin county.
Thanks @Raiken_202 and @Veewok for working on the KYR things today. We have a decent draft for the flyers (4 half pages - so 1 page both sides) and we have two demonstrations to walk through.
We finished writing (in English and Spanish) KYR materials for if ICE comes to your home, approaches you in public, at your work, and what documents to keep on you. You can see the final draft here.
We held the KYR workshop and overall it went very well! The demonstration of what to do (and not do) when ICE comes to your home seemed like it was beneficial.
We still have to make the following guides:
After the Tenant Union Workshop, @HipGnosis, @Bozzii, and I talked more about how it does not seem like Valley Watch Network is able to staff up here. We talked about potentially starting our own rapid response program, but we would need to figure out how to do recruitment, enrollment, and training on our own.
I did finally hear back that they are scheduling a time to do the training with NCVDSA. So perhaps thinks are changing?
Just as a reminder, this is what we voted to approve:
Finally, we need to set a date to meet with Luis and the other folks we met during the workshop.
Please fill out this rallly poll so we can set dates to meet to work on these various things.
Personally, I think it’d be way easier to work with something preexisting like VWN or NCR’s system than to try to organize it ourselves.
I also think it’ll make things easier when people actually need to contact rapid response people if there’s only one or two numbers they need to reach.
Thanks @ckposadas for recording the recent training by Valley Watch! You can download it here.
It’s only available to members for now - I haven’t had a chance to watch it all so I’m not sure if there’s stuff there they’d want us to keep offline.
@Adri_Martinez @Raiken_202 @Veewok @Sauc3_L1oron_217 I scheduled an online meeting for Tuesday 6PM-8PM so we can work on the following prior to meeting with Luis:
Google Doc to work on the above items is here.
The material we have already “finalized” and translated is here.
The Google Drive folder with all the materials are here - make sure to look in the Valley Watch Network _ 2025 folder as well!
Thank you @ckposadas for re-uploading your recording of the Valley Watch legal observer training. I’m placing another link down here as the original link on @chima’s last post no longer works.
We got a bit off topic from the agenda that we originally planned. On a side note, we were asked to make agendas for future meetings as well, especially as we invite other organizations, to ensure the meeting does not get hijacked by the local nonprofits or other interests.
We began the meeting with an assessment of the current rapid response infrastructure, particularly Valley Watch Network’s limitations. While it does appear that Valley Watch has lawyers with some access to the detention facility, their response system lags behind active events. The incident two weeks ago also highlighted how only arrests that are videotaped and spread through social media or activist circles receive attention and legal support. There were 15-20 other detainees at the Stockton processing facility who appeared to not be receiving any assistance because no one was aware of them.
Valley Watch’s Signal chat for San Joaquin County consisted of only 16 people when we checked during the meeting. Even if we increase that by 3x, it’s insufficient coverage for such a large geographical area. So our focus was on addressing the capacity limitations without just relying on asking more people to join Valley Watch.
To address these gaps, while taking into account our own limited capacities, we proposed two ways to add to what Valley Watch is currently doing:
We proposed creating the following educational materials:
We proposed a dual track approach for rapid response.
This should allow us to fill the gap of being able to respond faster, and in larger numbers, to active arrests. If we do receive false-positive reports, limiting the text blast to people in the same zip code should reduce inconvenience caused to rapid responders.
The technical infrastructure would run through solidarity.tech for the most part. Community members can text us a keyword to receive information and subscribe to alerts. The system would collect minimal information - name (not necessarily legal or real name), phone number (already captured through texting), a zip code for geographic alert targeting. Subscribers could choose what types of information they want: rapid response alerts, resource updates, training announcements, or assistance requests.
For emergency alerts, we would only notify people within the affected zip code to ensure timely response and minimize unnecessary panic. The challenge will be in balancing immediate emergency response with avoiding alert fatigue from too many false alarms.
Another major proposal was establishing a permanent presence at Stockton’s ICE facilities for two reasons: so we can track when people are being brought into the facility and so we can assist both family members and people coming in for appointments.
We proposed creating educational materials for accompaniment that would allow people who have an appointment to recruit family/friends to accompany them. With the number of people that are going in, in additional to the language barrier, this made more sense than trying build up this capacity internally.
This would be our biggest task. We would establish a presence at Stockton’s ICE facilities. We would maintain a presence outside, offering resources to families searching for detained loved one. This addresses situations like people who came from Sacramento searching for their family member, only to discover the system had showed incorrect location information.
We would provide several services: helping people navigate the detainee locator system, identifying case officers and their contact information, and offering basic accompaniment support. They would record names, A-numbers, lawyer contacts, and emergency contacts of people entering for check-ins, promising to alert their contacts (and our rapid response) if they do not emerge. This create a form of “accompaniment-lite” for the people who do not have someone to accompany them.
Which moves us into discussions around security. ICE agents have been confronting people recording or even standing near facilities, so there is awareness that volunteers will likely be identified and potentially surveilled. We agreed on the need for a buddy system, with minimum two-person teams at all times for facility monitoring. While some people suggested extensive disguise, others argued this could create barriers to participation and draw more attention from ICE. The end goal is to help people coming into the facility and no matter what precautions are taken, anyone that signs up should expect to be known to authorities if they participate with any regularity.
Another challenge was around community members’ increasing fear of recording any ICE activities, even when driving by. Many worry that documenting arrests could make them targets for retaliation, even if they are citizens. Hopefully, our above strategies will address this through safety in numbers - if more people know how to properly record and do so, individuals may feel less exposed.
For digital security, solidarity.tech should be considered compromised since it relies on SMS and cell phone for contact. It is also hosted domestically. However, for all our other data storage, information will be hosted on servers outside the country.
We are creating documentation instructions for things like power of attorney forms, emergency contact information, and childcare plans. Ideally, we would combine document preparation with in person Know Your Rights trainings, with a notary present, to fill out all paperwork right then and there. For documents that do not require a notary, there is an option to have people fill them outline and have them stored on our server.
The campaign overall requires extensive ground level organizing through multiple channels.
It was recommended that at the end of the day, printed materials will be the best way to spread information. So we will need to do a door-to-door canvassing operation while keeping track of which doors were visited while also tracking if anyone there asked for additional information / resources / training. We should also provide tenant union outreach materials. Even if people know how to protect themselves from ICE, we are already hearing stories of landlords using people’s legal status against them.
We should also use community notes like vendors, churches, workplaces, parent group meetings at schools, and other neighborhood leaders who can distribute materials and information to their networks. If they trust us enough, we can also hold KYR trainings with smaller groups of people that they can bring together.
We discussed balancing public facing organizing with security concerns. While some strategic discussions should remain private, most activities like canvassing planning, resource development, and recruitment should be open to build trust and encourage participation. The goal is to create multiple entry points for community members with varying comfort levels and capacities, and encouraging a town that does not usually participate in work like this to step up.
Public facing organizing would include being much more transparent and public about upcoming plans/events, having open meetings while we are working on materials/planning, and holding more of those meetings at least hybrid at Odd Fellows.
We also planned to hold meetings every two weeks that would be open to everyone to attend.
Beyond rapid response, we also discussed the possibility of establishing regular community patrols to help people feel safer while conducting daily activities. Right know, people are contacting folks they trust asking if its okay to go to Food4Less, for example, but it is difficult for one person to say one way or the other.
So we discussed the possibility of maintaining a presence at key locations like grocery stores, schools, and other gathering places. Unlike rapid response, which reacts to ICE presence, the goal here would be to provide ongoing reassurance that ICE is not present and an early warning system that people can check in with. The key would be to have a few people provide reassurance to a broader number of people.
We also discussed establishing neighborhood watches, but we did not really go into detail for that.
The next meeting was scheduled for August 8th (so we need to reschedule New Member Orientation).
The immediate priorities include finishing our KYR/training materials, creating the rapid response training videos, and establishing the text alert system since that has already been voted and approved.
Beyond that, at the next General Meeting, we will likely have to vote on shifting this work into our second Focus Campaign, especially if we want to do the field presence, canvassing, ongoing meetings.
super thorough and more than what i was able to recall. can’t think of anything else to add! thank you harpreet for the thorough notes.
I came in at the middle of the meeting and this summary gave me good detailed info on what was discussed before I arrived. Very clear notes and I don’t have anything to add.
Hello, everyone! As some already know, we had our Community Assembly today. We heard from one of the guests, Alex Garcia, that his organization had printed about 1000 trifold pamphlets to pass out for a “Know Your Rights” canvassing effort. I’m posting images of the pamphlet for your reference if needed. Also, it may be a good idea to pass this onto Luis to see if it’s accessible to the farmers he’s organized. If so, it would certainly save on printing costs on our end. If not, it would be good to let Alex know.
@Sandra_Loera recommended we get a translation device for our next KYR meeting, otherwise back and forth translating will really slow things down.
Since this is going to be a pretty big purchase for us, we should do some research before purchasing.
Here are some features I found that we might want to look at when comparing systems:
I would like to add that which ever equipment we aquire that at least 2 transmitters be included.
Someone from ATUN recommended Smart Bugs: Products | Smart Bug Corporation
I called in and they said
$795 per transmitter + $144 for the microphone
$23.95 for each receiver/earpiece/battery
and $195 for a case that holds 30 receivers + the transmitters
Total: $2,791 + tax which is well out of our price range.
We ain’t LATU rich so will have to search elsewhere.
From a brief amount of research…
Retekess T130 series and Exmax ATG-100T look exactly the same? Retekess’s newer models are different (have usb c charging) so Exmax probably is just sourcing the original design and reselling it.
In this case, @Sandra_Loera shared this link, which has 2 transmitters, 30 receivers, from Exmax for $300. That should get here in time if we order today.
Gotta say every other brand I could find: Enersound, ListenTALK, AGJ Wireless are significantly more expensive (AGJ is $888 for 30 receivers, 2 transmitters).
Exmax will have pretty limited range and micro-usb charging is fragile, but I also don’t know if we should be spending nearly $1k on equipment at this time - esp since we will not be using it daily or for every meeting.
If anyone as done any research as well, what do you think?
