Fourteen hundred people, many of them representing nonprofits in the San Joaquin Valley, came together on April 23 on the mall in front of the State Capitol in Sacramento to listen to speakers, see dance performances and lobby their representatives.
The event, called Equity on the Mall, was organized by the Sierra Health Foundation. The founding CEO of Sierra Health, Chet Hewitt, addressing the crowd, said when the first Equity on the Mall event took place in 2015, there were 50 people attending and they had a hard time being heard by the politicians.
Two years later, 750 people came out in the rain. The organizers had ordered 1,000 umbrellas with “Equity on the Mall, the Valley is Rising!” printed on them. “I can tell you that imagery from that particular moment was profound and powerful,” said Hewitt. Politicians began to engage with the organizers’ lobbying efforts.
Three thousand came out in 2019. During the pandemic, the event was held virtually. Then, in 2023 and 2024, the organizers took the event on the road throughout the Valley. This year, celebrating 10 years of organizing, they were back in Sacramento.
“This is not just a protest,” Hewitt said, “this is a process of democracy, where the power of the Valley, your power, is expressed here at the Capitol.”
Civil rights icon Dolores Huerta addressed the crowd, stressing the importance of healthcare in the Valley.
“We do not have enough dentists, we do not have enough doctors, we do not have enough nurses,” noted Huerta.
“And now with all of the big cuts that we see are coming down from the federal government, we know that the situation is not going to get any better. The situation is going to get a lot worse.”
Huerta acknowledged that we as a nation are entering into a bad time. But she said that the country will turn around, and good things can come out of a bad time. Out of the Depression of the 1930s came the New Deal, the right to organize a union and public education.
“We look to the future,” Huerta exhorted. “What do we want? Universal healthcare!”
“Don’t lose hope,” she said. “Because we have to remember that we are the future, and we have the power!”
“We are not just doers, we are also thinkers,” said Hewitt. “We have ideas about what will improve the lives and the life chances of families and our communities.” The program of Equity on the Mall included a panel discussion by activist intellectuals.
There had been a blessing and land acknowledgement at the top of the day’s program by Regina Cuellar of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok.
A member of the panel, Fresno’s Daniel O’Connell, reflected on the spirituality of land. “Land is sacred. We’re in a moment when our values and our communities are going to be assaulted. We need to hold together during this time.
“There’s a vast overreach in what’s happening in our country right now. The opportunity for us is to go further together, envisioning what’s going to come. And I think land can’t just be a basis for our economics, which it is, but a basis of our morality, a basis of our spirituality.”
After the program, 40 advocates from nine community-based organizations lobbied politicians. They met with five Assembly members and two state senators. The topics that were discussed included education, environmental justice, immigration, healthcare, stop the hate protections and affordable housing in the Valley.
Lizbeth Mastache, who lives in Sacramento, was one of 20 activists from Líderes Campesinas (Women Farmworkers’ Leadership) who attended Equity on the Mall. She was picking up a box of t-shirts commemorating the event from a booth where they were being given out to distribute among farmworkers.
“We’re at this rally because we are getting information about health matters, benefits for farm laborers and how to achieve equality,” said Mastache.
She added: “¡La unión hace la fuerza!” (Unity is strength!)
