{"id":219089,"date":"2026-03-14T03:20:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T03:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/219089\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T03:20:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T03:20:09","slug":"east-l-a-womens-day-fest-commemorates-eastside-advocacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/219089\/","title":{"rendered":"East L.A. Women’s Day Fest commemorates Eastside advocacy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This Saturday, various women\u2019s groups from across East L.A. are joining forces to celebrate International Women\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

The East L.A. Women\u2019s Day Fest<\/a>, which takes place at the East L.A. Civic Center from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., is being put on by East L.A. Women\u2019s Center, an advocacy program that supports women who have been abused and helps provide health and social services; Mujeres de Maiz, a women\u2019s art and wellness collective that aims to help women address their physical and mental health needs; and the Goddess Mercado, a monthly roving marketplace that provides Latina business owners a space to showcase their wares.<\/p>\n

The event will also serve as a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the East L.A. Women\u2019s Center and Mujeres de Maiz\u2019s 29th anniversary.<\/p>\n

Felicia Montes, the co-founder and executive director of Mujeres de Maiz, helped launch the organization as a student at UCLA alongside several other classmates and Cal State LA undergrads. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe were just looking for representation of Chicanx, Latinx and women of color in artistic and organizing spaces,\u201d Montes told The Times. \u201cBecause we didn\u2019t see it as much, or we oftentimes didn\u2019t feel safe or heard in those spaces, we made our own space.\u201d<\/p>\n

Montes said that one of the main goals of Mujeres de Maiz is to create an intersectional environment for women to discuss and address the many aspects of their lives.<\/p>\n

\u201c[It\u2019s a space where] we do work around women\u2019s issues, around sexuality, around feminism, around spirituality, around immigration, around all of our different selves and not have to go to five different meetings for that,\u201d Montes said.<\/p>\n

Montes also spoke on the work that the East L.A. Women\u2019s Center has done in its 50-year journey.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very inspiring to see an organization that has been along, you know, around so long,\u201d she said. \u201cTheir focus is so many different areas, [they do work] around families, domestic violence, HIV awareness. They have really connected across all of the different important spaces and needs around women and women of color across not only the Eastside, but Southern California.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saturday\u2019s event will feature over 70 vendors with work from local women entrepreneurs and artisans, plus musical performances and talks from prominent Latinx activists and organizers. <\/p>\n

While the festival will mark the first time Mujeres de Maiz and East L.A. Women\u2019s Center come together for an International Women\u2019s Day celebration, it\u2019s not the first time the two organizations have collaborated.<\/p>\n

In 2015, both collectives communed with several other women\u2019s support groups across L.A. to form the Eastside Mujeres Network<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came together really with an urgency around some of the different issues that happen around violence against women in east side and the East L.A. area,\u201d Montes said.<\/p>\n

Though Saturday\u2019s event will be a celebration of unity, it will also serve as an opportunity for these organizations to extend their services. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere will be over 25 different resources, from information on child care to domestic violence, HIV testing as well as immigration and know your rights information,\u201d Montes said. \u201cIt\u2019s really a time right now to come together to create a safe and brave space for women and their families.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This Saturday, various women\u2019s groups from across East L.A. are joining forces to celebrate International Women\u2019s Day. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219090,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[8403,8010,100355,4749,24746,100356,1043,100353,7244,48,52,51,47,50,49,100354,1768,595,1744,100352,1968],"class_list":["post-219089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-celebration","tag-center","tag-day-fest","tag-domestic-violence","tag-east-l-a","tag-east-l-a-women","tag-event","tag-felicia-montes","tag-group","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-mujeres-de-maiz","tag-organization","tag-saturday","tag-space","tag-various-woman","tag-work"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}