Love for Community - the Emelia Pino story

She saw a community hurting, struggling.

She is from Zia Pueblo, sitting northwest of the Albuquerque/Rio Rancho area. Zia was one of the first Indigenous communities to be hard-hit by COVID cases and deaths in a state where an alarming majority of COVID cases are among Native Americans.

She, is Emelia Pino, daughter of Charlotte and Fernando Pino. 

Emelia is one of 6 children, with four older sisters and a younger brother. She is a senior at Bernalillo High School who plans to become a pediatrician, and someone I got to meet over this last year as she was a part of Native Health Initiative’s Healers of Tomorrow (HOT) program.

Make no mistake: Emelia is a healer of today.

She saw a shortage of PPE in her community and set out to fix it.

“Our community is hurting. We have lost a few of our elders. Being that we are such a close-knit community, it really hurt me to see my community struggling. I don’t see youth taking a lead in my community but I felt it was time to stand up and make a difference.”

1,400 masks and a variety of sanitation supplies resulted from her standing up.

But she was not done. She saw youth hurting in a different way, isolated under Zia’s strict orders that those under 18 are not allowed to leave the Pueblo. The mandate is intended to keep these youth and the Zia Pueblo community safe. But, Emelia saw the way it has affected her peers, especially now that the school year is over.

So, Emelia Pino, healer of today, went to work. She wanted all 270 youth to receive an educational kit with age-appropriate books, games, and supplies. She wrote a grant, something that most folks twice her age shudder to think about doing.

As I write this, she is collecting donations of money and supplies and working to bring joy with these care packages over the next weeks. Not stressing about how it is all going to happen, or about the summer break ticking away. In fact, she is already thinking about how to inspire other youth to step up and lead similar efforts in their Tribes and communities.

Love for community – that is something we maybe have overlooked during the pandemic. It is something that Emelia reminds us a true way to actualize a gratitude perspective on coronavirus. Step up, stand up, and make things happen.

Emelia, I am now writing to you personally. Thank you. Thank you for showing us that all of us can be great, as all of us can serve. Thank you for reminding us of the creativity and leadership that youth have for changing our world, not tomorrow, but today, right now. Thank you for loving your community, Zia Pueblo, in a way that inspires me and all of us to greater service and action. (Emelia, if you blush reading this, that’s cool. No one is watching. They promised not to look).  

If you would like to help in our donation drive, we are accepting educational supplies this Thursday 7/2, 3-5 pm at the NHI Office, located at the UNM Law School. You can also make a tax-deductible donation toward Emelia's drive through NHI's website.

Two more goodies:

1) Emelia in her own words - click here.

2) A great article was published by the Albuquerque Journal 6/20/20 profiling Emelia's leadership and service during the pandemic - click here.