“I know what it feels like to have your back ache before noon, to have your hands cracked and dry, and to come home exhausted but still worry about whether there will be enough food for your children the next day. That life taught me something: if we don’t look out for each other, no one else will.”
Sol Angel, Coachella Valley, CA
In the heart of the Coachella Valley, in the community of North Shore, lives Sol Ángel, a farmworker who knows firsthand the hardships faced by working families in the fields.
Sol has been working in the fields for many years—more than she can count. She started young, like so many of farm workers, because “that is what we have. That is what our families know.”
As a farm worker, she has picked grapes, lemons, and all kinds of crops under the same sun that now beats down her community during brutal summer months. Sol is a farmworker who, like her neighbors, has faced a lack of resources and opportunities. However, her fighting spirit has led her to become a pillar for her people.
“I want to see changes in my community: in schools, in jobs, in food,” she states firmly. “The reason I got involved in my community is because I see the need. I want change, I want many more people to benefit.”
She speaks from the experience of living in an unincorporated community, where shortages are many.
“We often don’t have medical care, we don’t have enough food, since we don’t have a store nearby, and the closest one has very high prices,” she said. “We also don’t have a clinic, we don’t have a doctor, we don’t have transportation.”
Sol’s journey into being a farm worker and community leader did not happen overnight. She draws her inspiration from the strong women who came before her—her mother, her grandmother, and the older farmworkers who never stopped fighting for dignity, even when the world seemed to overlook them.
It is with this determination and inspiration that led her to creating a community group made up of her own neighbors—people who, like her, were tired of watching their families go without. Together, they began to distribute food among themselves, ensuring that no household in their corner of North Shore would be left behind.
“My mother always told me, ‘Mija, you have to be strong. Not just for yourself, but for those who cannot be strong on their own,’” she said. “And I have carried those words with me every single day. She is the one who planted the seed in my heart. And now I see that same fire in my neighbors, and that is what keeps me going.”
The journey has been anything but easy, facing obstacles, logistical challenges, and moments of exhaustion. Yet Sol takes profound pride in what they have built together, not because it is perfect, but because it is theirs—a living testament to the power of community when people refuse to abandon one another.
The work has been especially grueling during the summer months. In the Coachella Valley, the heat during June and August is relentless, with temperatures soaring to punishing highs, turning the desert into a furnace.
Yet even under that blazing sun, with the heat radiating off the pavement and the air thick and heavy, Sol and her group have carried out their distributions without fail. They have loaded boxes, organized supplies, and made their rounds through the neighborhood, refusing to let the extreme weather stop them from reaching the families who depend on them. She is deeply grateful to the community members who have chosen to help.
“Without them,” Sol says, “none of this would be possible. Each one of them is a blessing.”
Her connection with the UFW Foundation has also been fundamental in this journey. Sol has maintained constant contact with the organization, attending and supporting most of their events, feeling deeply committed to the cause. For her, the UFW Foundation represents an ally in the fight for farmworkers’ rights and the well-being of agricultural communities.
“I know what it feels like to have your back ache before noon, to have your hands cracked and dry, and to come home exhausted but still worry about whether there will be enough food for your children the next day,” Sol said. “That life taught me something: if we don’t look out for each other, no one else will.”
Her story is a testament that even in the most difficult conditions—and even under the most unforgiving heat— farm workers courage and commitment can ignite hope for an entire community.
Sol Ángel, a farmworker from the Coachella Valley, keeps moving forward, convinced that together—with the support of organizations like the UFW Foundation and the strength of her own neighbors—it is possible to build a fairer future for working farmworker families. And in her small but mighty group of food distributors, she has already planted the seeds of that future, one scorching summer day at a time.
If you would like to help support farm workers like Sol, you can make a donation to the UFW Foundation here.
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