We’ll be performing some of my topical songs in-between speakers, beginning at noon.

A right-to-life  group was first to reserve the usual venue for the pro-choice rally — in front of City Hall. We’d like to encourage a strong turnout to show support for the hard-fought victory in favor of women’s reproductive rights in the landmark Roe v. Wade Supreme Court case back in 1973.

Date: Friday, Jan. 22

Time: Noon

Place: Pioneer Women’s Park

I wrote this song last fall about the settlemen of Lomas del Poleo, which once had 300 families but now is down to 13 after the powerful Zaragoza family laid siege to the community, erecting guard towers and barbed wire to force residents to leave or hold them hostage. The colonia is in the path of binational development–a huge industrial development that will encompass both sides of the border–and has been the object of a land dispute between settlers who were told it was federal land, and the Zaragozas, who claim they own it.  Buildings have been razed, residents burned and beaten to death, but Mexican authorities have declined to get involved, except for a seemingly endless case to resolve the ownership in Agrarian Court in Chihuahua City. For background, check the archives at www.grass-roots-press.com or type Lomas del Poleo into a search engine to find numerous articles and video.

Here are the song lyrics, based on the actual history of the dispute:

LOMAS DEL POLEO
By Steve Klinger © 2008

On top of a hill
We built our homes in north Mexico
On federal land
Just southwest of old El Paso

We put up our shacks
On soil where little but pennyroyal grows
But we had each other
And our homes in Lomas del Poleo

We built a school and a kindergarten ourselves
We called our small chapel Jesus of Nazareth

Todavía vivimos
En Lomas del Poleo
No nos ayudará nadie
Con estos hombres muy feo?
Solamente queremos
En nuestras casas a vivir
Y que nuestros niños
No se van a morir

After thirty years
Some rich men suddenly showed up one day
Laid claim to our land
And told us we must move away

They spoke not a word
Of the plans to develop and put a road through
To the U.S. side
And the land’s future value

A local court ruled that they could turn our power off
Then they brought in armed guards who sure treated us rough

Todavía vivimos
En Lomas del Poleo
No nos ayudará nadie
Con estos hombres muy feo?
Solamente queremos
En nuestras casas a vivir
Y que nuestros niños
No se van a morir

These Zaragozas
Paid thugs to demolish our homes one by one
They beat us with bats
And now our Luis he is gone

They cut off our water
And fenced our colonia in with barbed wire
Two thugs set the flame
And two children died in the fire

The governor of Chihuahua has turned a deaf ear
The federal lawsuit drags on year after year

Todavía vivimos
En Lomas del Poleo
No nos ayudará nadie
Con estos hombres muy feo?
Solamente queremos
En nuestras casas a vivir
Y que nuestros niños
No se van a morir

(Instrumental break)

All of us live
in Lomas del Poleo
As we lived in Dachau,
Manzanar and Soweto
None among is free
While our brothers are oppressed
So speak out we must
Till these crimes are redressed
So speak out we must
Till these crimes are redressed

Local organizers of a donation drive to help needy families in Palomas and Lomas del Poleo, Mexico have announced a benefit event to be held at The Bean in Mesilla, Saturday, Dec. 6 from 7-9 p.m. Admission will be a canned food item, or a bag of beans or rice, or $3 at the door. There will be a presentation about these communities, including a question and answer session, beginning about 7:45 p.m. Entertainment will include live music by Steve Klinger, and warm drinks will be served.

Volunteers April Willeford and Rebecca Wiggins report their donation drive, started two weeks ago, has brought “a tremendous response,” including many articles of clothing. Among items still needed: flashlights, batteries, gallon jugs of water, kerosene lamps, coats, gloves, hats, rice, beans, coffee, sugar, cooking oil, canned foods and toys (new or used).

Palomas, across the border from Columbus, N.M., has few jobs to support its 7,000 residents, and tourism has declined sharply due to the economic downturn and many incidents of street violence earlier in the year, mostly involving drug traffickers.

Lomas del Poleo, a colonia on the outskirts of Ciudad Juárez, has been under siege for several years as a result of a land dispute between the wealthy Zaragoza family and settlers who built houses on the land starting in the 1970s. A portion of the community is surrounded by barbed wire, with armed guards controlling access to the homes, and numerous accusations that they have demolished homes and beaten residents, who are forced to live without electricity or water.

“Though we still need warm clothing, such as jackets, gloves and hats, what we haven’t received much of are non-perishable food items and toys,” the two reported in an e-mail update.  “We are hosting an event this Saturday in hopes to collect more of these items, and to inform people in our community about how they too can become involved and help out.”

Willeford and Wiggins said all proceeds from this event will go directly into the donation drive, including money raised with the cover charge for those who do not bring a food item.

Steve Klinger is editor and publisher of Grassroots Press as well as a singer-songwriter with two CDs, Songs of Freedom and Land of Make-Believe. He will perform a song he wrote about one of the communities, Lomas del Poleo.

For more information, contact Rebecca Wiggins or April Willeford: wiggins@nmsu.edu, or awillefo@nmsu.edu.

Local 1529, Dona Ana County Detention Center/Blue Collar

Local 2393 NMSU

Local 3320 State of New Mexico

Local 3422 NM State Corrections

I’ve dug up a few union songs and will give them a go-round on guitar, along with some of my originals on guitar as well as keyboard. I’m scheduled to play from 2:00 – 2:45. Come on down and party with us!

Kathy will be with me but may not be able to sing; she’s had a bad cold all week. But it shouldn’t stop her from rappin’ out a rhyhm on her tambourine or maybe a wild kazoo solo.

Everyone is welcome, and the music should be fun. the Deming Fusiliers play from 2:45-3:45, then Everett Howl from 3:45-5:15, followed by Benjy Rivas and BBR Band from 5:15-6 pm

Click <A HREF=http://Kunaki.com/Sales.asp?PID=PX00SLXB1C>here </A> to buy my CD.