Esperanza Peace & Justice Center

a n d p u b l i c f u n d i n g

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Index of Esperanza v. City of San Antonio

Statement by Rodolfo Rosales
Esperanza board member and professor of political science
August 4, 1998

Today La Esperanza Center, the San Antonio Lesbian and Gay Media Project, and VAN are filing a suit against the City of San Antonio for their disrespectful decision singling out and defunding these three groups last Fall.

We stand at this juncture prepared to file a civil suit against the city, not in elation, but in sadness because our institutions have failed us. In sadness, because the shameless and thoughtless use by the city council of arbitrary power can only undermine the public's faith in the democratic process. In sadness, because these kinds of arbitrary and undemocratic actions on the part of our local government can only bring infamy to our beautiful and diverse city.

When La Esperanza was established in 1987, one of the visions that was shared by all was that the creative spirit of a community is not only found in the formal acceptable art and theater forms and venues of expressions, such as symphonies, museums, and established professional theaters. The creative spirit of a community is more, it is by definition a spontaneous voice coming from the community expressing sorrow, happiness, indignation, dignity, and criticism about and of the world we live in as well as of the world we could live in.

The one goal arising out of this vision has been to promote, to facilitate, and most important, to participate in the expression of this creative spirit. Our efforts have been to create space for that part of the community that has been silenced because of the lack of resources and/or the unpopularity of their expression. Our programming efforts have been aimed at creating a dialogue and a respect between all the diverse parts of our community.

While creating this dialogue has been most difficult in the face of an ever increasing intolerance not only to differences in race, class, gender, and sexuality but also to differences in political, ideological, and cultural views, expressions, and practices, we consider this task to be critically important. But until last fall, we at least had the comfort of knowing that our democratic institutions were accountable to a procedure that was fair.

Our suit is specific and demands specific remedies to the injustice that we suffered when La Esperanza was arbitrarily and capriciously selected for defunding even after we had met and indeed went beyond all of the requirements. But the ultimate cause of the suit goes beyond the redressing of a wrong. The critical message that we want to give to the entire community of San Antonio is that hate and intolerance can only further undermine and indeed destroy any sense of community in our very diverse city. The cause is that dialogue, which many of us, including La Esperanza and all of its friends and supporters, have struggled to create through the arts, is the only path to respect. And respect is the only path beyond simply tolerating each other that gives each one of us space for dignity. Without dialogue there can be no respect, without respect we trample on each other's dignity, and without dignity it is quite obvious to us at La Esperanza that we cannot exist as a community much less grow as a community.

What do you think? E-mail us at esperanza@esperanzacenter.org.