In addition to our advocacy work benefitting all women in the state of BCS, Centro Mujeres serves as an advocate for community groups and individuals.

Women, youth and adolescents often come to Centro Mujeres in crisis, looking for support to solve serious life problems. CM responds by providing orientation, information and referral, three essential components needed for people to make life decisions. In cases where crimes have been committed, formal referrals are made to the justice system. With over twenty years of uninterrupted work for the human rights of women, youth and migrants, CM is well respected and positioned in the community and has a large constellation of resources to call on when interventions are needed.

In addition to information and referral, CM is committed to bridging service delivery gaps as resources allow. This is manifested by the provision of basic food packages for needy migrant families. CM also distributes free condoms in an effort to combat the rising rate of HIV transmission, primarily among young people that don’t have the means to buy them.

These punctual aids are extremely helpful when external circumstances make it impossible for people to mobilize their full potential to overcome difficult life situations. That is especially true for families of migrant seasonal workers during times of transition when growing seasons require that they move from one ranch to another in a different part of the state or in times of environmental tragedies such as the consequences of hurricane Odile when our assistance was much needed.

A family from the Laguna Azul neighborhood brought their daughter to Centro Mujeres looking for support. Susy was fourteen years old, pregnant and had been studying in a public junior high school in La Paz. Once her pregnancy became obvious, the director of the school asked her to drop out to avoid being a “bad example” for others.

Thanks to Centro Mujeres strategic intervention, Susy was reintegrated into her school, and the principal was sanctioned for violating international agreements supporting the right to education for all girls.

This emblematic case was used by Centro Mujeres to reform the state education law. The law now states that all children have the right to finish school independent of any biologic condition and discrimination for any reason is prohibited.