Intergenerational, Bilingual Group of Cicero & Berwyn Residents Team Up to Report on Environmental Concerns
(L to R): Myriam Forero, Doris Aguirre, Karime Sanchez
By Efraín Soriano
Photos by Sebastián Hidalgo
As we celebrate the three year anniversary of Cicero Independiente, our mission to equip our neighbors with journalism skills continues to be a priority.
Our fellowship program this year features four reporting fellows of various generations, languages, backgrounds and experience with photography. However, two things that do not vary are their shared passions for environmental justice and community-driven efforts.
We are excited to welcome Mario Tenorio, Doris Aguirre, Karime Sanchez and Myriam Forero as part of our third annual paid reporting fellowship program. For the next few weeks these four individuals will be working alongside the new fellowship coordinator, Sebastian Hidalgo, to learn about the power of photojournalism in the fight for environmental justice.
Read more about them and the program below.
Doris Aguirre
For Doris Aguirre, the power of community organizing has never been a mystery.
Born and raised in Honduras, Aguirre had the chance to witness several labor and environmental justice movements before immigrating to the United States.
“In my country the environment is something we always try to defend, because we live here and a healthy planet benefits us all,” Aguirre said.
Eventually Aguirre settled down in Cicero in the midst of winter and felt uneasy.
“I was initially disappointed when I moved to Cicero because it felt like a ghost town,” said Aguirre. “This was back when Cicero didn’t have that many programs and opportunities to get involved.”
However, her commitment to social justice was quickly reignited through the fight for immigrant rights. Aguirre has traveled across the U.S. with her family to support various movements and marches, finding any possible way to support her community.
It was this commitment that also led Aguirre to apply for the fellowship program this year.
“I didn’t even think I would get a call back when I first applied to the fellowship because I see how many skilled and talented young people there are in this community looking for opportunities like this,” said Aguirre.
Aguirre stated she appreciates being selected and hopes to utilize what she learns during the fellowship to help her community in the best way she can. You can follow Aguirre’s Youtube channel where she features different Cicero places here.
Mario Tenorio
Whether we’re talking about life, photography or the environment, Mario Tenorio has always centered connections with people.
During his childhood in Cicero, Tenorio recalls creating lifelong bonds and “having ultimate happiness from just playing and having fun with the other kids from the block.” According to Tenorio, it was these memories that solidified Cicero would always be home for him.
The timeless quality of memories and photography is something Tenorio finds fascinating.
“I've always been interested in photography, not as the person behind the camera but the impact images have on our psyche both personal and societal,” said Tenorio. “How they can capture historic moments in time.”
The impacts of pollution and climate change have been in the making for a long time according to Tenorio.
“It's been the history of this country to exploit underprivileged, working-class people of color,” said Tenorio. “When factories, plants and other heavy pollutants needed residence they put them in or around these neighborhoods.”
Tenorio believes that the fight for environmental justice is the fight for human rights. He hopes to use the skills and resources gained during this fellowship program to potentially work on a documentary.
Karime Sanchez
Sanchez initially became interested in photojournalism through her studies which focused on democracy, politics, civics and human rights.
“I think that journalism and the press, in general, is a necessary pillar of having free and just communities and I became passionate in the efforts to uphold that,” said Sanchez.
For Sanchez, having free and just communities is all about taking an equitable approach to ensure support for communities who are “subject to a lack of environmental justice.”
“I believe all people deserve the right to clean air, clean water and the protection against environmental racism that harms and pollutes their communities,” she said.
Sanchez hopes to continue to collaborate with other people to raise awareness and reach others through photography and journalism.
“I hope to bring my skills to the other organizations that I work in, both here and elsewhere, that are vested in justice and the press.”
Myriam Forero
Fueled by love and appreciation for nature and youth in the community, Myriam Forero looks to use photojournalism as a tool for holding people in power accountable.
Forero, who was born in Colombia, has been an active Cicero (and now Berwyn) resident since she first called the township home. She still recalls some of her first memories of getting her kids involved in programs here in Cicero.
“I remember there was a program that taught all kinds of home and social skills to kids. They taught us how to cook this dish that had corn, tuna and all types of veggies. It’s still one of our favorite dishes to make to this day,” said Forero.
To Forero, photojournalism and environmental justice go hand in hand. During this fellowship she hopes to learn how to better document the impact that pollution has on communities, and how to center people in that process. Especially youth, whom Myriam believes will most face the impacts of our inaction.
“We live on this planet, and the trees are like the Earth’s lungs. We have to take care of the environment if we want a chance at a healthy life,” she said. “Clean air is our right, and it is our responsibility to leave this planet healthy and sustainable for our kids.”
Forero stated that she is very interested in joining forces with other moms in the community to plant trees and move Cicero and Berwyn closer towards being a healthy, sustainable place for future generations.
Sebastian Hidalgo
For this year’s fellowship coordinator, Sebastián Hidalgo, examining the meaning of home and belonging has led him to cover many different communities.
As an independent visual journalist, Hidalgo originally set out to find out what belonging is by covering the gentrification of Pilsen, the very neighborhood he was once displaced from. This first project of his was published in The New York Times as The Quietest Form of Displacement in a Changing Barrio and now permanently resides in a collection at the National Museum of Mexican Fine Art.
In the past few years Hidalgo has covered many communities in Illinois such as Pilsen, Dolton and Little Village. Focusing on the impacts of urban renewal and industrial development. He has also traveled to Salinas, California to highlight growing housing concerns in farmworker communities.
Hidalgo continues to cover and study a wide range of topics from immigration and housing to environmental injustices, and he hopes to share this knowledge and experience with the fellows over the next few weeks.
Efrain Soriano is a local freelance photographer and a contributing reporter for Cicero Independiente.
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