For the past year, Puerto Rico has been battling the effects of Hurricane Maria, which devastated the island in September 2017.
To provide aid, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo put together a coalition to bring SUNY and CUNY students to Puerto Rico during the summer to help work with nonprofit organizations and help the communities in need.
“We had to fix what FEMA was doing,” said Student Association president and recent Puerto Rico volunteer, Omar van Reenen. “I’m not even in construction [and] even I knew that.”
Monday, Oct. 1, the Latino Student Union (LSU) held a panel discussion with two volunteers to discuss their experiences in Puerto Rico, along with some political and societal questions about the island.
The panel was hosted by LSU’s Director of Public Relations Stephanie Gregorio and Paloma De La Rosa, the vice president and graphic designer for the organization.
The two student panelists were committee leader Diana Aguero and van Reenen.
The panel was part of events scheduled by LSU for National Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs Sept. 15 through Oct. 5.
Both panelists had different reasons as to what their motivational factor was to travel down to the island over the summer, but both revolved around the central idea of wanting to give back.
“I have a mentality to go where the people need me,” van Reenen said.
Additionally, Aguero had a personal connection to the island and noted that some of her family was from Puerto Rico and became displaced after the hurricane. For her, traveling to the island she had previously spent time on, now as a volunteer, was a different experience, but one that she wanted to have.
The panel touched upon many different factors for the two students who served on different trips and spent their time in different parts of the island. Despite working on different job sites, both students spent time helping families repair roofs.
“I would wake up and start chipping away tar, sometimes 3 inches thick,” Aguero said.
She also joked about getting badly sunburnt, despite having a proper warning from her local family.
Sharing a similar experience, van Reenan said that he too would spend the greater part of the day working at chipping sealant from a roof.
Another topic discussed at length between the panelists was in regard to the political structure of Puerto Rico. The island is a territory of the United States, and Puerto Rican citizens, therefore, do not have voting power in Congress, nor can they vote for the president of the United States. Citizens can, however, vote in party primaries.
When presented the question if Puerto Rico deserved independence, both panelists took a minute to collect their thoughts.
van Reenen argued that he believed statehood was long overdue. However, from experience talking to many locals, he noted that a fear for many would be becoming more of a western entity and losing some of their culture in the process. However, he also said that the island deserved representation in Congress, which it clearly was not getting as a direct response to the lack of aid and current state of the island.
With background of family on the island, Aguero answered a bit differently, stating at first that “it is what it is.”
She also noted that much of the older generation believed they should remain independent, while the younger generations wanted to pursue their American culture and assimilate.
Photo by Jamie Aranoff | The Oswegonian
