Promise Arizona

Known locally as Paz, which is the Spanish word for Peace, this faith-based human rights organization was born in 2010, as Arizona’s animosity towards Hispanics exploded with the passage of SB 1070. Paz members were among those who conducted a 103-day anti-SB 1070 prayer vigil at the state capitol in Phoenix. As Arizona laws were tested in the courts, and as Arpaio himself went to trial for unconstitutional policing, Paz members demonstrated on courthouse plazas in Arizona and Washington, D.C.

The group’s executive director, Petra Falcón, was one of several dozen human rights activists arrested in Washington, D.C. in 2013 for briefly blocking a street while protesting inaction on immigration reform. Paz’s accomplishments include promoting civic engagement by training young leaders, conducting successful non-partisan voter registration drives, pressuring the Obama administration for immigration reform, and holding clinics to inform and register people for DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals).

“Promise Arizona’s mission is to train and develop a new generation of leaders to help build an Arizona that is welcoming to all people,” says operations director Otoniel Navarrete. “We hold house meetings and go to neighborhoods, asking folks what they want and agitating folks to dream big.”

promiseaz.org