Yulisa and her partner, Guillermo, stand among a cluster of volunteers, preparing for a day of touch-up paint. When she looks around, though, Yulisa sees beyond the baseboard in need of an extra coat of white.
“I’m excited about just how hopeful I am that things are going to get better for my family,” she says. It’s Yulisa’s first day at Esperanza Place, the neighborhood that in a few months, she will call home.
“It’s been really hard, especially with the cost of rent going up,” Yulisa says. “I worry constantly that we’re one rent hike away from being displaced."
In her job as a leader in union organizing, Yulisa spends her days in a passionate pursuit of better opportunity for low-wage workers.
“I know that having access to good jobs is so important here in the Bay Area... sometimes, though, that doesn’t mean much, because your quality of life, all your money, goes to your landlord, so you’re not really ever getting ahead.”
For Yulisa and Guillermo, all their motivations are fueled by their 11-year-old son, Cesar. Cesar is nonverbal and autistic, requiring intensive therapy, and Guillermo devotes himself full-time to his care. “Thanks to Guillermo’s dedication,” Yulisa says, they’ve begun to see important milestones in Cesar’s development.
All of her visions for the future revolve around the life she and Guillermo can build for Cesar. With the freedom of homeownership, Yulisa has plans to fully tailor Cesar’s environment, filling his bedroom with things that support his mobility, sensorial needs, and the consistency he thrives on. Instead of pouring more and more of their income every year into rent, she plans to build savings that will support Cesar for the long-term.
For now, Yulisa and Guillermo paint and install fixtures, hang shelves and secure railings – writing the next chapter of their family’s life.