Yo Soy Miguel!

Miguel rodriguez was born in Mexico City and migrated to Oxnard with his mother and brother when he reached the age of eight in 1993. Learning English quickly, he translated for his mother and other community members at an early age. Miguel developed a sense of “giving a voice to those who could not communicate because of social circumstances”.

 

Miguel attended the Gamaliel foundation’s National Leadership Training Program in Chicago, this is the same program that prepared President Barack Obama for community organizing. Through his work in West Ventura, Miguel helped bring about substantial changes in the neighborhood. He started the first Latino-leadership group in the area which worked to restore public transportation access, develop affordable housing ordinances and farmworker housing.

 

Miguel also organized the first community driven park initiative which resulted in the investment of over $5 million by various partners who helped purchase the land for Kellogg Park. Miguel was also selected by Congressman Luis Gutierrez to be in the initial “Dreamer” cohort that would travel around the country raising awareness for the DREAM Act and which would eventually be the model for the AB540 law which would bring in-state tuition to many undocumented youth across various states. Through these efforts Miguel was awarded the prestigious "El Concilio Latino Leadership Award" in 2013.

 

Miguel has won the 2012 Earth Charter award for “Youth Outreach and Education”, the 2013 El Concilio Latino Leadership Award and the 2014 County of Ventura Health Champion Award. In 2015, Miguel also served as Camp Director for Future Leaders of America level 1 camp for youth from Ventura and Santa Barbara counties.

 

As a Community Organizer, Miguel Rodriguez developed and implemented a youth-led participatory research program that emphasizes youth activism and policy research and advocacy. Miguel served as the Community Services Coordinator for the County of Ventura Behavioral Health Division, where he was part of a specialized team in charge of developing a Latino Outreach Program called "Logrando Bienestar" to engage medi-cal Latino recipients.

 

Miguel is also the founding president of the UCLA club de Estudiantes Migrantes and was graduation speaker at the UCLA Commencement ceremony. While at UCLA, Miguel presented to White House officials on their class research “Addressing Root Causes of Migration” through the UCLA North American Integrated Development (NAID) Center.

 

In 2019, Miguel began as the Port of Hueneme’s first ever Community Outreach Manager. He is tasked with bridging community, global logistics, and public agency environmental work to create community benefits. During the Covid-19 Pandemic, Miguel was able to organize the port’s customers, street and swapmeet vendors, as well as local health clinics to provide food and resources for farmworkers and “Frontline” communities in Ventura County.  Through this work and his collaboration in "Feeding the Frontline",  Miguel was able to help distribute food to over 50,000 families in Ventura County.  He won the 2020 City of Port Hueneme "Hero" Award, the 2022 "40 Under 40" well as the 2023 "Business Champion Award" Miguel Rodriguez’s proudest moment has been to be able to empower people to the point that they realize the power of their personal story and how everyone can transform their community if they are willing to transform themselves.