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Rillito, AZ: A Forgotten Town

By: Paulina Verbera

Nestled behind a pawn shop and US Post Office lining the I-10 freeway about 18 miles outside the heart of Tucson, Rillito is a community that stands out to few, but is forgotten by many.

 

As you enter the town on Water Street, you’re met by a series of potholes that lead you to the center of the community, Rillito Vista Park. Many of the manufactured homes are either abandoned or in poor conditions, but the residents there are proud of their houses and the history behind them.

 

Gertha Lee Brown-Hurd, 75, was a young girl when her father was among the few community leaders revolutionizing the future of this town. In 1951 she began attending school while it was still segregated, but the later integration would set the scene for the place that would become her lifetime home.

 

The modern day colonia

 

Within Arizona, the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recognizes 13 rural counties as those that are eligible to receive Community Development Block Grants (CDGB) to address a wide array of community needs. The HUD began taking colonias into account thanks to the Cranston-Gonzalez National Affordable Housing Act of 1990 which mandated that 10% of those funds be allocated to the betterment of those designated communities.

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Rillito can be found alongside one other unincorporated area within Pima County on the Arizona Department of Housing’s list of designated colonias, and according to newspaper clippings dating back to 1978, the community has been receiving portions of these funds for multiple infrastructure projects.       

 

“Typically the colonias that I’ve seen in the past, they’re not organized,” said Guadalupe Gomez, director of U.S. Mexico Border Region lending at Raza Development Fund, the largest Latino community development financial institution.  

 

When what is now Interstate 10 was still Highway 84, however, the founding families of Rillito were fighting for the basic infrastructures of their community, and it was their grassroot initiatives that would bring basic water, electricity, and gas to their homes.  

 

It takes a village

 

Historically, colonia communities along the United States border with Mexico were created due to discriminatory displacement. As the demand for migrant workers, such as those in the bracero program, dropped, families found themselves looking for a place to establish their roots, and this was exactly the case for Rillito’s cotton picking community.

 

“Technology came about at the same time desegregation came about,” said Brown-Hurd.

 

Cotton pickers and their families were driven out of Texas around the time that cotton picking machines became prominent, driving them out of work and bringing them to farms in Marana, the neighboring city to Rillito. Families were finding new jobs and their children began attending the schools, but as integration occurred in 1954 many Marana farmers on the school board were upset and those families were forced to relocate once again.

 

The land south of Marana would become Rillito as it was the only land those families could buy and afford. Brown-Hurd said that her family purchased the land where her family home would be built at $300 per acre, and they made payments until it was theirs.

 

With lack of basic infrastructure such as electricity, sewage, and water, the early years of Rillito resembled conditions such as those in largely Latino populated colonias along the southern border. Strong leaders took initiative among the few families in this community and helped grow and establish Rillito as it stands today.

 

“We’re between Marana and Tucson,” said Armando Yrigolla, a resident of Rillito since 1963. “We had to haul our water from across the railroad tracks. We tried to get Marana to give us some water and they said it was too far to pipe it in here.”

 

Nestled between two larger cities, Rillito has historically had to fight for its water rights. The Southern Pacific Railway owned the nearest water tower and had reached an agreement with the community allowing them to utilize their water, only at the expense of having to carry it across Highway 84 themselves.

 

CDBG funding records show allocations in 1978 for utilities installation, and in 1980 water system improvements were made to the now existing water pump belonging to Rillito residents.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“The Robinsons and my dad had to go around to convince the residents that it was to their benefit to allow [them] to put in the gas lines and the water lines, and also put up the electrical poles for electricity,” said Brown-Hurd.

 

Daniel Tyluki, senior program manager for Pima County Community Development and Neighborhood Conservation has surveyed they needs of the Rillito community when allocating HUD funding to unincorporated communities. One of the needs they identified was an upgrade to that water system.

 

“We were using our CDGB funds to every year upgrade a piece of it,” Tyluki said. “Then we saw the colonia money was available so we decided to pursue getting Rillito qualified with the state. We matched the two funding sources to complete the project, and I want to say it was about a quarter million dollars.”

 

The support of Pima County in projects like this one has shown what can happen when a modern-day colonia organizes to use the funds available to the best of their advantage. Leadership and partnerships have proven invaluable in piecing together what needs to be done, but Rillito’s support system does not stop there.      

 

A neighbor with good intentions

 

Dominating the landscape surrounding Rillito is CalPortland Cement less than a mile from town. Though the large factory stacks seem to ominously loom over Rillito, this company has nurtured a strong relationship with the community since the plant’s establishment in 1948.

 

“The plant has always tried to be a good neighbor,” said Steve Regis, senior VP with CalPortland. Having worked in the Rillito plant from 1989 to 1997, he witnessed the effects of the company’s efforts to invest in and support the community that they passed every day on their way to work.

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“That Portland cement company back there, every Christmas they buy all the gifts for the kids,” said Robert Brown, 44, lifetime resident of Rillito and Brown-Hurd’s nephew.

 

With the funds raised by CalPortland in a golf tournament, they organize an annual holiday celebration that the community members looks forward to year after year. Historically, they have also offered their time, supplies, and equipment to support in neighborhood clean-up projects and revitalization efforts for the homes of residents in need.  

“That community, at different times, has been a disadvantaged community, so we’ve always tried to help,” said Regis. “The people we had there at the plant wanted to get involved. They were by nature altruistic people.”

          

A community still in need

 

When CalPortland’s hands are tied or the county cannot allocate the funds necessary to make Rillito more livable, the community stays true to its history of creating the change they want to see. Streets need paving and lights, abandoned houses need to be cleaned up, and their water needs protection.  

 

Rillito is home and the residents are closely tied to its history and their family’s roots run deep in that land.

 

“My grandparents, they’re no longer here, but they got their house by picking cotton,” said Brown. “They came out here and they picked enough cotton so they could buy their house. My grandparents and parents, they laid the roots down for me and I’m not going to give up on it.”  

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One of the original Rillito water wells on Nov. 15, 2018. (Photo/ Paulina Verbera)

One of the original Rillito water wells on Nov. 15, 2018. (Photo/ Paulina Verbera)

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