Marco Antonio Firebaugh In Memoriam

Former assemblyman Marco Firebaugh dies in Los Angeles

Director's Message

It is with great sadness that I announce the passing of Marco Antonio Firebaugh, who died yesterday morning at UCLA Medical Center. He was 39. Marco was a UCLA alumni of the Law School and a great supporter of the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center. He gave the keynote address at our open house in 2002 and again in 2005. But his involvement in the center was much more profound, and also more down-to-earth, including taking part in our annual staff lunch before Christmas break. Below is a link to Marco's keynote in 2002. We will be posting the 2005 keynote shortly. Marco was a major force in the state legislature and was an advocate for increasing access to higher education for all. But he was also a devoted father, as anyone who saw him knew. We fondly recall his 2002 keynote address at CSRC, where he was joined at the podium by his daughter and son; and we will treasure the time we spent with him working toward a better future.
Dr. Chon A. Noriega, Professor and Director, CSRC

CSRC Library Exhibit

Please visit the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Library, where a display on his life and work has been made. It includes a notebook on the legislation that he sponsored, some biographical information, and some photos.

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Remarks by Marco Antonio Firebaugh at the

CSRC Annual Open House on October 20, 2005.

     Good afternoon, I'll be brief. Thank you for the invitation first and foremost. Chon Noriega you have done such a fabulous job with the center here, really leading this academic enterprise of research and scholarship and of course cataloging the experiences of our community. Carlos Haro dragged me over here to UCLA from the East side to join you. Thank you Vice Chancellor Mitchell Kernan, for your continued support of these programs.

     You heard from Cindy Montañez, in her own voice, the passion she carries. I met her when she was a hunger striker way back and I knew then what I know now, that she is and has really been a great leader. She is not one to mince words, not one to hold back. So what you hear in her voice, in her commitment really comes through in her legislative process. That's not an easy thing. This is still much of an old guy institution, an old white guy institution, YES! Old white guy institution, that's right.    And Cindy has come along as a Latina who's in charge. You know she is chair of one of the most powerful committees in the legislature, and I can tell you that drives a lot of the old white guys crazy. And she does a phenomenal job with it and we are so- I am so very proud to call you not just a former colleague but a friend. Thank you.

     I just want to touch base on two small points. I wanted to come here today to join you once again for this open house because I really think that the value of this institution cannot be overstated. You know I think there are two hugely important things that get done through the research center here at UCLA.

      One is the development of scholarship of a people. I don't think any great people can exist absent real scholarship about their experiences, their ethos, about who they are and how they change overtime. The kind of scholarship that emanates from this institution and from this center is equaled by none, it is unparalleled. The type of cataloging of experiences as you have seen; the sleepy lagoon program that you have done, the Mendez case, Westminster case, again is a cataloging of the experience but it speaks to something much greater. It speaks to who we are as the people and how we have evolved and it helps us understand ourselves within the broader context. And it helps others understand us within that broader context and I think it ultimately creates an equity; a system of mutual understanding, a mutual acknowledgment that we each have a fundamentally equal role to play in this society.

     And there's no place more important. The most diverse place on the planet, Los Angeles is the city of the future, what you witness here in this great city you will see across the world in a few short years to come. This is the place where people with different backgrounds, with different languages, with different ideas, different colors, different sizes, come together to build a vibrant economy, a vibrant society, and we can't have the absence of scholarship, for a major component of that vibrancy and still continue to call it a great city. The city of Los Angeles and the state of California would in fact be diminished if the kind of research that takes place here didn't take place. And that has to be acknowledged and, as Cindy said, protected. And we can't take that for granted. This is unique and we have to fight for it. Everything worth having is worth fighting for, and this is one of those instances.

     I have over the years been involved in state politics for over a third of my life, a long time, and I have seen the cycles the ebbs and flows for support for this institution and for this center. Keeping it afloat has been a challenge but it has withstood that challenge on the strength of community it truly has. This is a strength of community of students, community of scholars, community of leaders, community of activist, community of legislators, but it is on the strength of that coalition of that unity that this place survives. Let's never forget that. Let's never, never allow it to cease to exist.

     I think the other important thing that a center like this does is that it provides a training ground, a breeding ground for new scholars, and we see that in the folks who are writing the books that are available today. We see that in so many of the teachers, the friends that so many of us have. I actually have among my family and several friends, a number who are graduates of this place and who have taken their scholarship and transformed it into something nurturing, growing helpful and activists in our community. People who take their PhD's from this institution and teach all across California and all across the nation. People take their experiences here and put them through the real test of life to see if they can make a difference in people's lives. The training ground and opportunity this institution provides has produced many faculty.

     It hasn't been noted in varying ways but Chicano studies has not received in my judgment the kind of embrace it deserves by this institution, by UCLA, and by the University of California. And that kind of change will only come about by activism. Now I was a Mechista at Berkeley and that is one thing I did learn at Berkeley . I was a Mechista and I learned quickly that the best way through the door was not necessarily knocking. And of course I learned in my ways. I just knocked harder. It really emanates from people's struggle, people's willingness to commit themselves to that challenge and to that work.

     And so to all of the students here, these are difficult times, you have seen year after year of growth in fees. There was a piece in the newspapers across the state yesterday of how financial aid has not kept par with the increase in the cost of education. You know it, you see it, you feel it in your everyday lives. I remember that. I still have student loans, but it's getting worse, and how is it that it is getting worse? Here that means we are not doing our part to fight back. That means that we are not doing enough to fight back to be innovative, to be proactive, to be engaging in our own struggle for our own benefit.

     Cindy mentioned AB-540. You know AB- 540 was a product of twelve years of work; it took 12 years to get this state of California to say if you are a young person that goes to our public schools, who lives here, who is going to make this their home, who has contributed, who has succeeded, who has excelled we are going to let you study and pay what everybody else that is a California resident pays. It is not a cut rate, you get to pay what everyone else pays. And it took us 12 years to get there. It is a struggle, it is still a place that demands our activism and our tenacity and hard work, and I guess I'll leave you with that thought.

     Dr. Noriega pointed out that we went from a 30 million dollars art budget to one million dollars. Community college fees went from eleven dollars to twenty-four. Fees for CSU and UC have gone up 10-12%. The professional schools are through the roof. The financial aid has not grown to keep pace with the cost of education. There is less diversity in our major institutions, places like this, than there was just a few years ago. The law school is trying to fall within the top 10 law schools in the country so they are going to raise the demands on the LSAT at the expense of diversity. When of course we know LSAT's tell one piece of success but not all of it. And so it takes a community of people, of scholars, of political leaders, of community leaders of students, of activists, to make that change to fight for it and to fight for it everyday. Cindy touched on it.

     If you are aware, and I am speaking now to the students, that students are among the most directly impacted by the policy choices made in Sacramento and yet you are the least active in deciding who goes to the legislature. So in another way you are a community of non-voters to whom things are done. At the time when fees go up, they go up on you. Financial aid hasn't grown and it hurts you. Book prices, gasoline, all of these things happen to many of you and yet, you are not voters, not active in the democratic process.

     Now I'll tell you, when I was at Berkeley and I was a Mechista, I wasn't a voter either. I admit it. But I'll tell you if I knew then what I know now, if I knew then what I've learned over the years, it is that we must do our part. In whatever way you choose to do it, in whatever form that takes; an essay, a commentary, joining a club, registering voters, becoming a voter, becoming a candidate, leading the California legislature, whatever form that takes, take it, take that step. Take that step because only together are we going to make a difference here. Only together are we going to make these choices.

     AB-540 is a perfect example of that. It wasn't until community, and teachers, and students, and lawmakers came together that we finally had success. And so we can make a difference. We forced this university to repeal SP-1, you remember that? We did that. Latinos led that. We forced this university to repeal that. We forced it to adopt a new admission policy. We forced them to do that. They didn't want to do that. We did it. We forced them to do it. We have power, lets exercise it.

Read Marco Antonio Firebaugh's Keynote Address

at the CSRC Annual Open House, on October 17, 2002.

Or click here.

Interview with Marco Antonio Firebaugh

by Mary Johnson in Teaching to Change LA vol. 2, no. 3 (2002).

Names and Faces

UCLA Today February 23, 2005