Many students in Los Angeles return to school this week, from the first day of grade school to first classes at a college campus. Perfect timing to have educator and musician, Victor Campos, on our series. Victor runs a nonprofit called Mosh for Youth, where they donate scholarships to students entering their first year in college. How do they raise their funds? Through the intense energy and support from the harcore music scene. 

We spoke with Victor to learn more about Mosh For Youth, supporting students and communities, and the power music has in this moment. 

This week we spoke with a community member within our organization KYCC, Jeffrey Mashburn. Jeffrey is a manager in our Enhanced Care Management OR ECM unit. ECM focuses on providing support and resources to our most high-risk community members with Medi-Cal. In our conversation with Jeffrey, we learn about the impact raids have be having in the ECM unit. 

On the show we have Valeria Gonzalez, a prevention specialist at KYCC that works with the MacArthur Park Community Initiative. The initiative focuses on strengthening youth activism and leadership development among Westlake residents and the surrounding community. KSP intern Cira Mejia, asks Valeria how the MacArthur Park community has responded to the recent raids and the sweep that happened last month. 

This week student intern Cira Mejia and myself Tony Morales spoke with Lyzzeth Mendoza and Quetzal Flores from the eastside organization Community Power Collective (CPC). Their mission is to organize with tenants, street vendors and transit riders in communities of color to create a solidarity economy, win community control of land & housing, and form dignified public systems that facilitate a culture of radical care.  For the second part of our series “Que Podemos Hacer?” focusing on the community's response to I.C.E raids, we spoke with CPC to learn about their fund and to support street vendors at this moment. 

In this episode, student-intern Cira Mejia and audio producer Tony Morales speak with KTown Local organizer Fernando to learn more about their Community Defense Center, the hub's goal, and his views/experience on community's response to I.C.E raids.

Before we shared our conversation with Fernando, Cira and Tony had the opportunity to speak with community members. Out of concern for their own safety, the people they spoke with declined to be recorded, but still shared their experiences