Gloria Santillan Casas

Gloria Santillan Casas: But meanwhile... The ladies in the housing project, most of them were on public assistance, and so they would take me with them to interpret for them. And so then the caseworker told my mom, "I think I have a job for Gloria that I think she would be very good at." And my mom said, "Pues qué ta’ bueno."

Gloria Santillan Casas: So I went and applied in Brownsville. Well, it was for an outreach worker. I would get a little tablet with food vouchers, and my job was to go visit homes and to ask them the special needs, special diet. And I would give them a voucher for $15. And so I began to do... And I think that's where my career in public service began, because I got to know a lot of families in Harlingen. So as soon as there was an opening for a center manager... I was very young. They hired me as a center manager in La Feria, and that's how I got connected with La Feria, and I had three social workers Mrs. Elodia Diaz, Margarita Taguilas, Bertha Escalante, and those three ladies... To this day, I feel they're the ones that mold me about social justice, about being caring for other people, and blah, blah, blah.

Gloria Santillan Casas: They were, really. I was their supervisor, but I was half their age, probably. And so we worked together, and so they're the ones that kind of got me involved in, "This is not right for this family. You need to, you know, show them." Those three ladies were very into building sustainability in people. They were not ladies that, "Oh, Give me a handout." No, no, no, they were not like that. And so, esas three ladies were my social workers, and I managed the center here in Saint Francis. And that's how I became involved with the church. I met people from the church and I always liked La Feria. And around that time I met my husband. And they all three approved. They all loved him very much. [Laughter] They loved my husband.

Gloria Santillan Casas: Because my job, and I'm proud of it, my entire job has been public service, since I was 13. Because I remember that I would go with the families to the welfare worker. And I remember the first time that my mom and I went, and I'll never forget that. The office was at Fair Park, not at the airport like it is now, the air base. And el señor was very mean to us. And my mom, a very humble woman. The teacher had taken us to apply for public assistance, because prior to that we lived off la labor. Whatever was in la labor, my mother would cook, because my father had his challenges.

Gloria Santillan Casas: And so I remember we sat there and he said, "You know, you're a bunch of Mexicans, and that's why you cross the river to come to get supported over here," and this and that. This was a caseworker for public assistance telling us this. And I understood English. And so and mi mama, "Que dice, que dice?" y digo, "Dice que nos va a ayudar." "Muchas gracias. Muchas gracias." I did not tell my mom, and when I went to interpret for other ladies, I didn't tell them the ugly part. I would just, you know, kind of interpret for them. Y mi mamá, "Muchas gracias." And the man was totally confused because my mother was being very grateful. And I said, "Well, you know, we work." I said, "We don't come for you to feed us. We work." And he says, "Well, I know." But I said, "Well, we work. We came to work. My father came to work over here, but now he's sick. He can't work." I didn't tell him he was an alcoholic. And then we ended up qualifying for $106 a month. That's what we would get for a family of eight. Because back then, there was no food stamps. But my mother made it work.

Gloria Santillan Casas: So I walked every single street, and I tried to, I talked to them about what school board was. And as I said, this is a good community. People were happy with Mr. Green, they were happy with what was going on. Este, but I explained to them, they also said there was some things they wished they could have. And I explained to them that the people in charge of leading the school district, or responsible, was the school board. I said, "Mr. Green works for you all. You don't–" And they were like, "No, pero, no." I said, "You all pay taxes, and the taxes pay for the school." So I think I did a lot of education of how the government worked, and that if I got elected, I would be one of those people that would be making those decisions. And so, you know, I did that. I worked really, really hard. I did. I walked, and I guess I could say work and walk. Talking to people, and why you need to get registered to vote, why your vote is so important. And some people who have never voted decided to get registered, and so and see people knew me from the church and they knew me from my kids. They all knew my kids. Angela…That was the year Angela was going to graduate. And Angela had been a drum major. She had been an outstanding athlete. Jaime, my oldest, had been an altar boy, had been awarded the scholarship award and what have you. Rolando was just in football. Rolando has always been very charismatic.

Jennifer Najera: He's very charismatic.

Gloria Santillan Casas: He is very charismatic. My Roli. Everybody likes Roli. And Eddie has always been very settled. They can trust Eddie. Eddie, if Eddie says he's going to do something... So Eddie had a big group of friends, también. So I had four good kids that kind of spoke for us Casas out in the community. And so Angela and Isaac Ruiz were friends in high school. Isaac went on to become an attorney. Him and Angela worked really hard to get people registered, the ones that were already 18. So I got a lot of votes from the senior class.

Jennifer Najera: Wow.

Gloria Santillan Casas: Yeah, they got involved. Angela voted for the first time, Isaac, también, and this and that. And so Angela was a drum major. And for her, for the band and what have you, Angela held a lot of leadership positions and she, you know... La Feria, I cannot say enough, it's a very good community. So on the Saturday, because the elections were held on Saturdays, I was standing in the corner of where [inaudible] is, and Jaime and I were standing there, and Mr. John Calloway drove by. And see John Calloway's daughters were best friends to Roli. And so John Calloway got his window down and he said, "Gloria, good campaign. Better luck next year." And I said, you know, or next time or something like that. I said, "Well, thank you, John. I appreciate that." And he took off and Jaime said, "Such a dummy. He's teasing you." And he, me remedó, "Thank you. Mister." I said, "Jaime, I'm not going to win, Jaime." I said, "But what I did get, Jaime, was a lot of knowledge of our community. What a wonderful community we have." I said, "And I'm probably will run again sometime in the future, but Jaime, I'm not going to win, Jaime, and I'm okay with that." And so, pues bueno, pues we walked, Jaime was teasing me all the way over there, regañando and what have you, that I always wanted to be friends with everybody, blah, blah, blah. "He's not your friend." I said, "Well, I like Mr. Calloway." And so then they started giving the results. Mr. Guillén won, which was not surprising to me since they were... The, and I hate to say the Anglo group, pero the Anglo group was supporting Mr. Guillen, because of his prestige about who he was. And he is a wonderful man. And so then, then did Mr. Ochoa won, because Mr. Ochoa is a homegrown, he's from La Feria and everybody liked Mr. Ochoa. And I was clapping for them, I was real happy. And then the third one, Gloria Casas. And I'm like, "What?" Because there was three positions. And I thought, "Oh my God." I mean, I was literally speechless. And I remember I turned to Jaime and I said, "Jaime y ahora?!” And Jaime said, “Pues ahora ya te metites." And everybody started, you know, clapping for us and everybody was happy and blah, blah, blah. And I feel bad.