Saludos mi gente, I write this letter to my community first as an announcement of the transition of my employment from one organization that I love deeply (Southwest Organizing Project) to a new organization (La Plazita Institute) that I also love deeply. Second, I write to you all with profound love, gratitude, and a sense of grief for the closing of a chapter in my life that has meant so much to me. Lastly, I write to this beloved community with a clear vision for the future and a deep appreciation for the past.
My journey at Southwest Organizing Project started as a youth group member in late 2005. I was 16 years old, I was on juvenile probation and I was convinced I knew absolutely everything. By the summer of 2007, I was a paid SWOP intern helping organize for the first US Social Forum in Atlanta. I knew then that I was a lifer.
The late great philosopher, gangster rapper, warrior, poet Ermias Asghedom aka Nipsey Hussle said that we'll never be able to repay our loved ones in this life with material possessions, you can only repay them by standing up and being someone they can be proud of.
For my part I will spend the rest of my life working to repay the people I care about. The people who have poured so much into me over the last two decades of my life.
In those formative years when I found the SouthWest Organizing Project, I had a lot of passion and a lot of anger. I was strong-willed and had already been through so much in such a young life that I was convinced I knew everything and that everyone else was just in the way. I was blessed with a strong sense of self and a deep knowledge of activism gifted to me by movement familia in New Mexico and in Denver. I had an even stronger desire to fight back, to get revenge, against those systems that had done so much to hurt and destroy and take from the people I loved and from the communities I cared about.
At the same time, I had so much pain and trauma that I was living a life rooted in cycles of violence and addiction that perpetrated harm against myself and my community. Without a doubt, Southwest Organizing Project and the mentors and family I met there saved my life.
People like Joaquin Lujan saved me from myself. They opened my eyes and my heart and life to a world of possibilities and gave me the love, knowledge, and the tools to fight not only for my community but for myself and my two beautiful baby girls. And for that I'll never truly be able to repay the organization, the people I met there or the community who has entrusted me with that sacred knowledge, spirit of the ancestors and the birthright of our future generations.
Along the way there have been countless organizers, activists, revolutionaries, mentors, parents, teachers, elders, young leaders, babies, and incredible humans who have challenged me to do better, and to be better. I truly would not still be here on this earth if it wasn't for that sacred rite that was given to me by the people of the SouthWest Organizing Project and the communities we work with. Every opportunity I've been given, every place that I've been, every single day of my life since then has been a gift and for that I'm eternally grateful to this place and those people.
As I transition to the next phase of my life and my career, I feel a sense of mourning and uncertainty, but I know that all those people and all that sacred knowledge that was bestowed upon me will carry me through. It will carry us all through.
I know that SWOP will always be my political home and that the people and the work we do here will always be a center of gravity for me and for so many of us. I will continue to support the organization and fight alongside the new generation of SWOP organizers who have taken up the charge that will sustain and carry our communities through whatever may come during this time of deep uncertainty.
For me, the next journey is one of a deepening love and commitment to my life's work, to my community and to the young people who I see so much of myself in; that angry self-destructive young person who was so full of passion and anger and needed guidance and love.
I have accepted position at La Plazita Institute, another organization who I have built a profound relationship with, whose mission I believe in strongly and a place where I truly believe I can continue to make my community and familia proud.
As the Director of the Albuquerque Justice for Youth Community Collaborative I am being entrusted once again with a sacred responsibility to steward and carry on the powerful work to help transform people and communities. We will continue to work to build power with young people going through the juvenile justice system, their families and formerly incarcerated community members. While carrying on the legacy of our ancestors, like the late great philosopher, warrior, biker, poet BTDT Tomas Martinez who said, "I am who I serve".
Hasta la victoria siempre,
Rodrigo Rodriguez | 
