On Sunday, October 12, 2025 at the Starlight Event Center, over 650 leaders from across institutions in El Paso gathered as delegations to launch their campaign -  "Reimagine El Paso." The action was hosted by EPISO/Border Interfaith, a long-standing grassroots community organization, dedicated to forming people to be active participants in the public arena. 

Co-Chair Cindy Ortega of St. Thomas Aquinas told the delegations, "There is a word I learned recently - 'plasticity.' It means that things are not set in stone, they can change. We do not have to be resigned to the way things are- we are moldable and so is the world - we can change things, we can have an impact."

For years, Dallas Area Interfaith (DAI) tenant leaders have shone a public light on the hazardous, unbearable apartment conditions they face, and urged city officials to develop solutions to hold landlords accountable. Despite paying market-rate rents, mold, rats, and leaky sewage are just some of the issues experienced by these tenants.

Almost a decade ago, DAI was at the center of a successful effort to overhaul the Dallas rental housing code. After years of continued organizing, leaders have now secured a mechanism to ensure the code is enforced.

Despite San Antonio facing a staggering $5 billion infrastructure shortfall, many elected leaders are poised to spend $800 million in public funds to finance another Spurs basketball arena.

COPS/Metro, seeing through the project’s complicated funding structure, continues to be a leading voice for using this public money for the public’s benefit. At an August 5th commissioners court meeting, COPS/Metro Leader Rena Oden testified:

“It is unconscionable that you want to give this money for an arena when we have people dying from infrastructure or lack thereof. … Don’t tell us this money is only for arenas. Where is your imagination for our families? In the early 2000s, we voted on the venue tax where there was community benefit for all of us. This deal has no community benefit.” 

Responding to pressure from The Metropolitan Organization (TMO), the City of Houston has issued demolition orders for two long-vacant buildings, one of which is a strip mall that has been abandoned for over 30 years.

In response to changes in immigration law enforcement and the upsurge in ICE detentions and deportations, Dallas Area Interfaith (DAI) is developing a legal representation strategy for people in detention.

[Excerpts]

The black, white and yellow yard signs blaring “No! Project Marvel” first appeared outside two houses in King William.

Then more cropped up in other neighborhoods farther from downtown…

The signs are part of a grassroots effort to derail the development of the city of San Antonio’s proposed downtown sports and entertainment district at Hemisfair, a multibillion-dollar undertaking that staff initially code-named Project Marvel…..

For more than a year, city staff discussed plans to transform downtown behind closed doors. They talked about building a new Spurs arena with franchise executives and required developers, consultants and Bexar County employees to sign nondisclosure agreements to talk about elements of Project Marvel....

No! Project Marvel is joining a much bigger and older organization in opposing Project Marvel.

COPS/Metro Alliance, a prominent interfaith community group, first came out against the district in December. It’s currently collecting signatures from voters who commit to rejecting any ballot measures that seek to use city or county dollars for the project. The organization’s leaders are knocking on doors and talking to parishioners at their 32 member churches and nonprofits.

[Excerpts]

From KSAT:

“Many of our families are experiencing layoffs from their jobs. And families are being squeezed with cuts to SNAP and Medicaid. And here you are proposing a venue tax for yet another arena?" said Debra Garrett, a COPS/Metro leader with Holy Redeemer Catholic Church, who urged the county to spend money on raising county wages, affordable housing and infrastructure.

After nearly three years of organizing, EPISO-Border Interfaith leaders from Bauman Rd celebrated a major victory Wednesday: the City of Socorro revised its “Arterial 1” proposal, renouncing its initial plan to build a major road through the heart of their neighborhood. The move would have impacted over 100 families and displaced dozens of longtime residents—many elderly and living on fixed incomes—who had spent decades building their homes.

Last Sunday, COPS/Metro packed St. Margaret Mary’s Catholic Church for its Accountability Session with 350 leaders and candidates for mayor and city council. The crowd represented over 28 institutions across San Antonio, including schools, interfaith congregations, non-profits, and community/neighborhood associations. 

COPS/Metro launched its Sign-Up, Take Charge campaign, pledging to sign up 50,000 registered voters in opposition of using tax dollars to finance Project Marvel, a multi-billion-dollar sports and entertainment district which has been planned almost entirely behind closed doors. Leaders committed to signing up 50,000 people in support of investing in people and local neighborhood infrastructure, and to delivering this constituency to the polls. 

“We are at a crossroads in our community,” said Fr. Dennis Schafer of Mission San Jose Parish. “San Antonio is the third poorest large city within the entire country.  Will we be a city, a community that seeks good for the people or wants to build playgrounds for the rich who do not live here?”