For decades, the same groups of volunteers have organized 16 de Septiembre celebrations San Antonians know and love: From El Grito ceremonies and Fiestas Patrias in Market Square to the Avenida Guadalupe Association’s Dieciséis de Septiembre Parade commemorating Mexican Independence Day.
As participation has dwindled, however, this year some of the celebration’s longtime champions are tepidly accepting outsiders’ help to keep their treasured traditions from fading into the history books.
The City of San Antonio’s Diez y Seis Commission was founded 30 years ago to lend support to those fervent neighborhood volunteers who put on the Mexican Independence Day celebrations. But its membership has since peeled off, and those remaining have been unable to grow its budget or purview for a decade.
When commission members asked the city for more money this year to help generate some new enthusiasm, some said they were caught off guard when the city’s Arts and Culture Department responded with a plan to take a much larger role in their celebrations — including overhauling the commission’s membership to include citywide representation.
“The entities doing the heavy lifting have been intentionally our cultural organizations over several decades, if not a century,” Avenida Guadalupe Association President and CEO Gabriel Velasquez wrote in an impassioned email to the department’s leaders, who he accused of leaving the commission’s members “ethnically dispossessed.”
Yet months later, the city’s effort to revamp the commission for the future — and breathe new life into a celebration some believe could be on par with Día de Los Muertos or the Martin Luther King Jr. March — has gained the support of commission members.
While many are still adjusting to the commission’s new structure, they said they’ll do whatever it takes to keep their traditions around for the next generation.
“We want to grow this culture. We’re losing it,” said Lourdes Galvan, a former District 5 councilwoman and longtime commission member.
A rich history
Former councilman Juan Solis originally created the commission in 1994 to lend marketing and funding support to the existing efforts of neighborhood-based volunteer groups and organizations to hold Mexican Independence Day celebrations.
Those celebrations have traditionally included El Grito ceremonies honoring the moment in 1810 when the Dolores village priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rang the local church bell to launch the revolution against the Spanish crown.
Other celebrations include mariachi and folklórico performances, educational activities to teach about the Mexican Revolution and a festive parade down West Guadalupe Street, known as “el mero weso,” or the backbone of the city’s West Side.
In their heyday, San Antonio’s 16 de Septiembre celebrations garnered national recognition as a beacon of what Mexican Independence Day celebrations could be. The Dieciséis Parade drew an appearance from then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush one year, had a national sponsorship from Campbell’s Soup for a stretch and the parade was even televised regionally on Telemundo.
But unlike Fiesta and MLK, the Diez y Seis Commission hasn’t organically found a next generation of leaders to carry it forward with the infusions of volunteerism it has long relied on.
With that in mind, Galvan approached Councilwoman Teri Castillo (D5), who represents the near West Side where the Dieciséis de Septiembre Parade is held, about expanding the commission’s outreach budget.
Restructuring
To get that money, commission members quickly learned, their casual operations had to change.
The city said they needed to align with current commission standards and procedures, which include seeking applications for commissioners from each City Council district, a first for the Diez y Seis Commission.
“Among the Diez y Seis Commission members, there was an appetite to advocate for more financial support,” Castillo said. “In that conversation with city staff, staff recommended that we look at restructuring the committee in a way that provides more support from additional council members, as well as the structure in which they convene.”
At their August meeting, members of the revamped commission stumbled painfully through the first implementation of Roberts Rules of Order.
Commission interim chair Mary Ayala-Sandoval took notes via ballpoint pen, but important matters, such as growing the budget and marketing capacity, could not be discussed because they were not on the official agenda.
Only six appointees from among 17 available slots were present, owing to the short time window from the passage of Castillo’s new ordinance on June 6 and no district appointees besides Galvan yet in place.
Without a full commission in place, Sebastián Guajardo, special projects manager for San Antonio’s Department of Arts and Culture, enumerated the current budget’s details and requested a motion for approval.
“I guess we have to accept it,” Galvan said, given that no changes could be introduced for discussion without having been placed on the official agenda in advance of the meeting.
It’s still unclear whether changes to the commission will yield a bigger budget, or whether there’s enough citywide interest to fill the new seats designated to districts that have had little involvement in Diez y Seis 16 de Septiembre celebrations in the past.
Signs of growth
While the reshaped commission hasn’t yet been filled with representatives from across the city, it’s not hard to see how others might want in on the opportunity.
On its own, the Pearl has expanded San Antonio’s Hispanic Heritage Month celebrations including a Viva Dieciséis event on Sept. 16, with the participation of the Consulate General of Mexico.
Though the Pearl does not receive funding from the Diez y Seis Commission, its events will be listed on the Department of Arts and Culture’s online calendar of events.
“We have noticed a trend of these events, like Viva Dieciséis at Pearl, growing in attendance with every passing year,” said Michael Joergensen, CMO of Pearl developer Silver Ventures. “It’s something the community looks forward to and something Pearl will continue to host well into the future.”
To the city, these signs of growth, after years of stagnation, are a positive sign.
“Historically, we have had around 30 events,” said Diana Hidalgo, assistant director of the city’s Arts and Culture Department. “This year, we have over 42 events, so there’s already additional events being added into our calendar.”
Maintaining the culture
Longstanding commission members have been slower to embrace that type of growth.
Velasquez, for one, said his organization is staying focused on the neighborhood it serves, not efforts to attract citywide attention.
“Avenida [Guadalupe Association] is chartered for this neighborhood. We’re not chartered to bring everybody in the city to the Dieciséis parade. We’re not chartered to create gentrification,” he said.
For now, organizations that created and continue to organize the celebration’s longstanding events still form the core of the revamped commission: The Mexican Consulate in San Antonio, Avenida Guadalupe Association, Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center, San Antonio Charro Association, LULAC Council 4947 and LULAC Council 648.
Their events include El Grito in Market Square on Sept. 13, the 43rd annual Dieciséis de Septiembre Parade and the Diez y Seis Mexican Charreada and Escaramuza performance on Sept. 14, the Fiestas Patrias celebration at Market Square Sept. 14-15 and the Mariachi Festival at Arneson River Theatre to close out Hispanic Heritage Month on Oct. 13.
Taking it to the next level
Given the popularity of San Antonio’s other cultural celebrations, however, there’s plenty of optimism that a rebranded 16 de Septiembre celebration could thrive as a city-wide event.
Former mayor Henry Cisneros was among those who created the MLK Commission in 1986. He credited that commission’s leaders, from Aaronetta Pierce to Barbara Gervin-Hawkins, with gathering citywide support to grow its signature march and surrounding events from a handful of neighborhood participants in 1968, to 10,000 marchers in 1988, to the largest MLK march in the nation with upwards of 150,000 marchers annually.
Cisneros said the Diez y Seis Commission could do the same — if its appeal were broadened from a Mexican Independence Day celebration, to a celebration of the essence of that revolution’s goals.
“While that’s certainly important to people of Mexican heritage, it needs to be broadened so that there’s an aspect of it that appeals to everyone of every ethnic group,” similar to King’s vision of equality for all, he said.
Current Diez y Seis Commission members are also eyeing the MLK March as a template for growth — particularly when it comes to the funding it gets from the city.
In 2022, the San Antonio Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Commission successfully lobbied to triple the city’s allocation for its annual Martin Luther King, Jr. March from $100,000 to $300,000.
Galvan asked Ayala-Sandoval to consider a future discussion point, “for next year, that we start talking about increasing and doubling our budget, just like [the] MLK [Commission].”
Other commissioners agreed with Galvan’s point that city funding, which has remained frozen at $50,000 for the past decade, should be increased, mostly to help with marketing for the various events celebrating 16 de Septiembre.
Looking back on the original commission, Solis said his intention was to lend marketing help to the organizations planning the events, not to oversee their work.
“If it was somebody doing a backyard thing, go for it. Congratulations, celebrate. And if you want us to recognize it, just tell us the time and where, and we’ll put it on our posters and tell everybody about it,” Solis said. “That was the concept. Never to control it.”
