Francisca Montoya
Photo Credit: Phil Soto
Advisory Board Member
Francisca Montoya is a born and raised community activist whose decades of experience advocating for strong neighborhoods, schools and small businesses was sufficient to land her a seat at the South Central Collaborative (S.CC) table.
But Montoya’s work at Raza Development Fund (RDF) also dovetailed with the Collaborative’s dynamic involvement in the $1.3-billion South Central Light Rail Project. The nation’s largest Latino-focused national Community Development Financial Institution, RDF unlocks lasting prosperity in communities across America and is a South Central Collaborative founding partner and major investor.
“The Collaborative is important because it is the voice of the community in South Phoenix,” said Montoya, RDF’s sr. director of strategic partnerships, “and that had been sorely lacking.”
S.CC is a nonprofit organization formed to build partnerships in the South Central Corridor to positively influence the planning, design, construction and artistic elements of the South Central Light Rail Project connecting downtown Phoenix to the Warehouse District, Central City South and South Phoenix. This area is bounded by “the 7s” (7th Street to 7th Avenue), the Union Pacific Railroad and South Mountain.
“For the first time in the history of the city, we see significant investment in this area, a major infrastructure project,” said Montoya, secretary of S.CC’s executive board. “And we know what follows — gentrification and economic development follow. Over time, it has the potential to really change the character of South Central.”
Migrant roots, migrant experiences
Montoya’s parents, Bruno and Maria, were migrant farm workers from Texas who met in Idaho in 1953. They married in 1955, and started their family, including Montoya, the second of seven children. The family moved to Surprise, Ariz., when she was 5.
From a young age, Montoya learned about injustice, from riots in Birmingham, Ala., following the deaths of four young girls in the bombing of a Baptist church in 1963 to violent confrontations between Detroit police and predominantly Black neighborhoods in 1967. She knew of the deadly protests outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968.
“Our Dad would make us watch the news on TV and read the newspaper every day, so we saw what was happening in Alabama, Detroit and Chicago, and the fight for civil rights,” she said.
When labor leader Cesar Chavez visited Arizona to organize farm workers, Montoya’s mom left the field where she was picking grapes, went on strike and joined the movement.
“I’m an activist because of my mom,” she said. “I grew up going to meetings with my mom and joining a march in 1969 from El Mirage to Glendale, then Glendale to the State Capital on an Easter holiday weekend, attending fundraisers and rallies, and being at the Safeway, picketing and asking people not to buy non-union grapes or non-union lettuces. That’s how I was exposed to activism.”
In school, Montoya learned English quickly, was an honor roll student and active in many clubs, including student council. When she was 16, she became pregnant, got married and dropped out of school, but two years later, she earned her GED and, for the first time, thought about college.
A counselor called her “college material,” a term she’d never heard.
“Sometimes people see in you what you don’t see in yourself, and if you have never been out of a small town, you don’t know what it’s like out there,” Montoya said. “So, I was actually the first one in my family that took the deep dive into college, and I was a mentor to my younger siblings because they all went to college, too.”
Working at a bank during the day and attending night classes at Glendale Community College, she earned an associate’s degree and, later, a bachelor’s degree in health policy from ASU. Montoya currently is working on a master’s degree in community and economic development from Penn State World Campus.
A bold career path
Montoya’s education took her many places, from Phoenix, where she organized undocumented people in the Arizona Farmworkers Movement, to New York City, helping incorporate women’s health care issues into a national health care plan in advance of President Bill Clinton’s election.
She’s worked in Phoenix city government, ran for City Council in 2020, and helped develop a vibrant community center to support a large, new subdivision for low-income families in South Phoenix. There, she introduced Head Start and programs for after-school care, English as a Second Language (ESL) tutoring, financial capacity counseling and college scholarships.
Montoya also focused on community development funding and program development as Arizona’s regional director of the Cesar Chavez Foundation, and was director of strategic development for Friendly House, a social-service pioneer that empowers Arizona communities through education and human services.
She is widely known for channeling her sophisticated community development and organizing skills and political savvy to boost the credibility and success of the Collaborative, which was formed ten years ago.
“She has a strong desire to serve her community in a variety of capacities,” said Krista Shepherd, owner and principal of Herring & Shepherd, LLC architectural design studio.
Shepherd worked closely with Montoya and South Phoenix families, neighborhoods, businesses and community members to create the South Central Transit Oriented Development (TOD) Community Plan. The Community Plan and its implementation are essential to protecting the South Central Corridor’s character and culture as residential and commercial development follows the South Central light rail.
For example, Montoya volunteered to gather community input by walking the neighborhoods and knocking on doors, introducing herself to residents, explaining the project, and listening to their thoughts on its potential impact on their lives. But first, she did her homework, boning up on myriad complex systems in the city of Phoenix, and explaining them to the community, Shepherd said.
“Francisca’s a great processor, mediator and representative, and she is quite eloquent in capturing the essence of what’s happening, and why it's important,” she said. “She communicates equally to community stakeholders and officials at the city, calibrating the language, vocabulary and energy that are appropriate for each audience.”
At the same time, Montoya never compromises her values, said Shepherd, who serves on the S.CC’s Advisory Board. “If something’s not right, she’s going to step up and say so. She’s never going to be a parrot or a puppet. People trust her.”
Advancing the Collaborative’s work
Montoya felt strongly that the community’s voice be heard because, as light rail connects South Phoenix with the Valley, she wants residents to have opportunities for employment, education, housing and businesses to benefit from residents who have placed their trust in her.
“What touches my heart is to be a part of an organization that’s really taking a close look at how transit-oriented development will be implemented and to what extent we’re going to be able to protect what we agreed on,” she said. “We are stewards of the community and public servants, so our duty and responsibility is to assure that the plan is implemented the way the community designed it.”
She’s proud, too, that S.CC also was instrumental in defeating a 2019 election ballot initiative that, if passed by Phoenix voters, would have killed all light-rail expansion in the city including along South Central. The proposition failed by a wide margin – due in large part to the authenticity of Francisca’s and many S.CC partners’ broad based education and advocacy throughout South Central and the entire City of Phoenix.
In addition to her work at RDF, which entails building partnerships with nonprofit organizations that serve the Latino community with small business development programs, Montoya is a big believer in volunteerism. She is a member of the Fowler Elementary School Governing Board, the Arizona Latino School Board Association, which she co-founded, a board member at Marisol Federal Credit Union, and the Arizona CDFI (community development financial institution) Network.
And although she’s never lived in the South Central Corridor, Montoya feels a special fondness for it. As a child, her family drove in from the westside to buy groceries there, celebrated Easter at South Mountain Park, and enjoyed Christmas parades along Central Avenue.
Looking into the future, Montoya sees a dynamic South Central Corridor, adorned with exquisite local art installations, affordable housing, new and upgraded mom and pop businesses, inviting cafes, movie theaters, and venues for major concerts.
“We all understand that change doesn’t come overnight,” she said. “But if we’re steadfast, and we maintain our convictions, and keep bringing in community voices that highlight what is important, we’re going to get to the finish line at some point. And it’s going to represent us.”