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page last updated 12-24-2019
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IF 160 Sunflower Lane Watsonville, CA 95076 Phone: 831-724-4108
About IF
IF is a nonprofit humanitarian, educational and social change organization located in the Santa Cruz, CA, area. We are a community of friends seeking hopeful alternatives to the violence, greed and destructiveness of our world.
Read more about IF's history and mission
Read more about IF's history and mission
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IF Fiscal SponsorshipsIF offers Fiscal Sponsorships to qualified groups to facilitate their fundraising. Read more about Fiscal Sponsorships
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See recent updates on two local organizations that receive support from IF:
Watsonville Wetlands Watch and Pajaro Valley Climate Action (Regeneracion)
Updates on other IF supported projects
IF continues to support the courageous work of Pietro Ameglio in Mexico and beyond. IF's support has been integral to Pietro being able to devote himself to nonviolence education and organizing. Pietro is one of the most important nonviolent activists in Latin America today in the specific sense of promoting both the study and the practice of active nonviolence. He has a sophisticated knowledge of nonviolence theory and history, and he combines that with a deep commitment to social justice and decades of front-line experience in nonviolent action. He is an inspiring and popular peace educator who walks his talk, who educates in formal settings as well as on picket lines and at mass actions. Below is his most recent update.
Mexico Nonviolence: Letter from Pietro Ameglio, December 2019
United in the spirit of peace and nonviolence, a spirit that, like the wind, we hear but do not know from where it blows or to where it goes
Vigil of family members of the disappeared in a church in Guerrero, Mexico, 2019
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Excavation of a clandestine mass grave by family members of the disappeared, Guerrero, Mexico, 2019
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Dear friends of IF,
I am very happy to once again share with you some reflections and a message of hope at this time of year that calls us to slow down, to review our path over the last year, and to ask ourselves where we shall go in the coming year.
I expect you will have a tumultuous year, agitated, polarized, unpredictable, with the presidential election whose results will not only have immediate political, social and economic effects all over the world, but which also may bear on the survival of our species, as we saw in the climate summit in Madrid in December. I often tell my students that the deepest level of the work of peace building and nonviolence is the “humanization” of our species, which persists in committing too much genocide and other forms of brutality for it to call itself fully human.
Read more of Pietro's letter.
I am very happy to once again share with you some reflections and a message of hope at this time of year that calls us to slow down, to review our path over the last year, and to ask ourselves where we shall go in the coming year.
I expect you will have a tumultuous year, agitated, polarized, unpredictable, with the presidential election whose results will not only have immediate political, social and economic effects all over the world, but which also may bear on the survival of our species, as we saw in the climate summit in Madrid in December. I often tell my students that the deepest level of the work of peace building and nonviolence is the “humanization” of our species, which persists in committing too much genocide and other forms of brutality for it to call itself fully human.
Read more of Pietro's letter.
Updates on LOCAL INITIATIVES
IF is proud to announce recent grants to local organizations addressing the needs of vulnerable communities and promoting positive social change:
Pájaro Valley Climate Action, Mesa Verde Gardens, The Center for Farmworker Families and Watsonville Wetlands Watch.
IF is proud to announce recent grants to local organizations addressing the needs of vulnerable communities and promoting positive social change:
Pájaro Valley Climate Action, Mesa Verde Gardens, The Center for Farmworker Families and Watsonville Wetlands Watch.
Center for Farmworker Families
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Watsonville Wetlands Watch
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Mesa Verde Gardens
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Regeneración/Pájaro Valley Climate Action Volunteers
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Mexico: Update on Sergio Castro/Fundacion Yok Chij
For over 45 years Sergio Castro (Fundacion Yok Chij) has been working within the indigenous Mayan communities and marginalized Mexicans of San Cristóbal de las Casas in Chiapas, one of the poorest states of Mexico. Don Sergio spends most of his time providing medical and wound care to burn victims, and, with increasing frequency, patients suffering from the effects of type 2 diabetic complications.
For calendar year 2017, Don Sergio provides 120-160 patients visits per week, which equates to around 7,800 patient visits per year. Don Sergio does not charge any fees. This healthcare is costly due to non-reusable wound care dressing supplies and daily or every 2 - 3 day visits depending on type and severity of wound and co-morbidities.
He is a “one-man-wound-care clinic” and is always moving, hence the name ‘yok chij’, Maya language, Tzotzil for ‘deer foot’, because he’s always moving.
Don Sergio's project activities are regularly updated on his blog by Patricia Ferrer, who has worked with him for nine years, @ http://sergiocastrosc.blogspot.mx DONATE to SERGIO CASTRO & YOK CHIJ.
For over 45 years Sergio Castro (Fundacion Yok Chij) has been working within the indigenous Mayan communities and marginalized Mexicans of San Cristóbal de las Casas in Chiapas, one of the poorest states of Mexico. Don Sergio spends most of his time providing medical and wound care to burn victims, and, with increasing frequency, patients suffering from the effects of type 2 diabetic complications.
For calendar year 2017, Don Sergio provides 120-160 patients visits per week, which equates to around 7,800 patient visits per year. Don Sergio does not charge any fees. This healthcare is costly due to non-reusable wound care dressing supplies and daily or every 2 - 3 day visits depending on type and severity of wound and co-morbidities.
He is a “one-man-wound-care clinic” and is always moving, hence the name ‘yok chij’, Maya language, Tzotzil for ‘deer foot’, because he’s always moving.
Don Sergio's project activities are regularly updated on his blog by Patricia Ferrer, who has worked with him for nine years, @ http://sergiocastrosc.blogspot.mx DONATE to SERGIO CASTRO & YOK CHIJ.
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July 2018 Update
This July Bill Hill and Penny Rich, two former members of the IF Board, made a trip to visit Sergio Castro and Yok Chij in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas. Accompanied by our grandchild, Rafaela, a recent high school graduate, we brought 70 pounds of much needed medical supplies to donate to Sergio’s clinic. We also brought an equal weight of school supplies for Sergio to distribute to schools that he has helped construct and renovate. We coordinated our visit with the annual visit of Patricia Ferrer, who has been IF’s contact for Yok Chij in the U.S. Patricia, who has worked with Sergio for over 10 years, also brought medical supplies to donate to Sergio’s clinic. She was accompanied by her pre-med nephew Ethan, Deborah, who is a wound expert, and Alejandra, who volunteers at Patricia’s clinic in Tucson. All assisted Sergio in providing primary care and wound care to his patients. 
Patricia assists Sergio in their treatment of a 90 year old patient with wounds to his feet
On the first day of the visit, we were invited to attend a graduation ceremony at Escuela Primaria Bilingue, a
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school that Sergio has built. It was a wonderful ceremony to witness and the importance of this day to the graduates and their families was quite evident. Students of many grade levels participated in entertaining with traditional dances and speeches. This school teaches in Tzotzil, an indigenous Maya language, and Spanish. It serves approximately 300 children.
 Sergio Castro congratulates parents and students on their graduation at Escuela Primaria Bilingue.
Last year IF facilitated a donation to purchase and install a solar system for the school. Now the school has electricity and a water pump, meals can be cooked without burning wood or paying for natural gas, and the school does not have to rely on costly grid electricity.
On another day of our visit, we accompanied Sergio and Patricia’s team on home visits to patients in the city and in the outlying communities. Often these patients were too ill or injured to get to the clinic. We also visited Sergio’s clinic in the late afternoon on a number of days. There was a steady stream of patients to be attended to, with ailments that varied from minor to those suffering from extensive diabetic- or vascular-induced wounds. read more about Don Sergio's work in Chiapas, Mexico |
Watch the slideshow below which highlights our visit.