COPS/Metro is a community-leader driven coalition of congregations, schools, non-profits, and unions working together to improve the conditions of families in San Antonio since 1974.

By learning to work together for the public good, COPS/Metro leaders have been able to to work with the business, community, elected leaders to make San Antonio a better place for families. Some of our major accomplishments over the last 48 years include:

  • Leveraged over $2.5 billion for infrastructure in underserved neighborhoods over the last 50 years
  • Founded Project QUEST
  • Spearheaded the Alliance Schools Strategy
  • Developed the idea for SA: Ready to Work and mobilized over 50,000 voters to vote for the initiative
  • Founded Palo Alto Community College

Updates

As Ready to Work Graduates Enter Job Market, COPS/Metro Pressures City to Ensure High Quality Jobs Await Them

[Photo Credit: Ronald Cortes, San Antonio Express News]


[Excerpt]

"...not enough San Antonians are landing jobs through the city sales-tax funded program, say leaders with the interfaith grassroots advocacy group. The city has failed to meet its goal that 80% of Ready to Work participants will find employment paying at least $15 an hour within six months of finishing their training.

“That’s unacceptable,” said Sister Jane Ann Slater, a COPS/Metro leader. “If they would use the process we know works, they can say, ‘We have these jobs on the table,’ and they would be hired immediately.”

  • As Ready to Work Graduates Enter Job Market, COPS/Metro Pressures City to Ensure High Quality Jobs Await Them

    [Photo Credit: Ronald Cortes, San Antonio Express News]


    [Excerpt]

    "...not enough San Antonians are landing jobs through the city sales-tax funded program, say leaders with the interfaith grassroots advocacy group. The city has failed to meet its goal that 80% of Ready to Work participants will find employment paying at least $15 an hour within six months of finishing their training.

    “That’s unacceptable,” said Sister Jane Ann Slater, a COPS/Metro leader. “If they would use the process we know works, they can say, ‘We have these jobs on the table,’ and they would be hired immediately.”

  • COPS/Metro Organize Memorial to The Lost which Features "Stunning" Installation to Spur Change

    [Photo Credit: Reform Austin]

    [Excerpt]

    "More than a hundred people marched from St. Michael's Catholic Church to the Alamodome on Saturday to hang around 2000 t-shirts in front of the parking lot. 

    Each shirt represented a life lost to gun violence in Bexar County. Most shirts had a name, age, and date of death but there were also shirts that simply said "another life stolen." Those represented suicide victims.

  • City Gun Buyback Program Follows Day After COPS/Metro Memorial to the Lost

    On November 19th, the city of San Antonio ran a voluntary gun buy back program that allowed residents to safely dispose of firearms in an effort to reduce the number of gun related deaths in the city by reducing the concentration of firearms.

    The effort was spearheaded by District 9 Councilman John Courage who spotlighted the Memorial to the Lost that was organized by COPS/Metro the day prior.

    Trade in Firearms for HEB Gift Cards with New Buyback Program in San Antonio, Spectrum News 1 [pdf]

  • KSAT Marks COPS/Metro History in Westwood Square

    [Excerpt]

    [A] new coalition of neighborhoods, churches and others formed Communities Organized for Public Service, or COPS, in 1974....

    “That was the perfect storm that planted the seed that allowed COPS to flourish,” said Father Mike DeGerolami, also a leader for COPS/Metro Alliance.

    ...Garza said needed projects and improvements only proceeded after the community demanded that a piece of the city budget be spent on the West Side.

    Struggle, Determination Mark History of Westwood SquareKSAT [pdf]

  • COPS/Metro Calls for Participation in 'Memorial to the Lost'

    [Excerpt]

    COPS/Metro Alliance is calling for people to participate in the Memorial to the Lost, which aims to recognize all the lives lost to gun violence in Bexar County over the last five years....

    Organizers hope to line the streets surrounding the Alamodome with the T-shirts ahead of and during the gun buyback, Pastor Robert Mueller of Divine Redeemer Presbyterian Church told the San Antonio Report last week. They also hope it will spread to other major Texas cities, and they plan to take the shirts to the state capitol to advocate for gun control legislation.

    “Almost three-quarters of voters of every persuasion support about three to four common gun safety laws that are not about taking guns away from anybody,” said Mueller, who is a member of COPS/Metro Alliance.

    “It’s about elevating the responsibility of gun ownership.”

    [Photo Credit: Mark Felix, AFP via Getty Images]

    Faith Groups Step Up to Work on San Antonio's Gun Violence ProblemSan Antonio Report [pdf]

    Guns for Groceries: San Antonio Aims to Take Weapons Off the Street in Exchange for Gift CardsSan Antonio Express News

  • Great News: COPS/Metro and the WSW IAF Reunite with Pope Francis

    “Creating a culture of solidarity” is how Pope Francis described our work of organizing when he met with our COPS/Metro delegation together with our sister organizations in the West/Southwest IAF on Thursday, September 14.

    Traducción en español abajo


    COPS/Metro leaders Sonia Rodriguez, Fr. David Garcia, and Lead Organizer Josephine Lopez Paul met with the pontiff for an hour at his Santa Marta residence in the Vatican and discussed the development of immigrant leaders through our Recognizing the Stranger training and our upcoming 50th year anniversary. It was a moving encounter with substantive conversation, filled with insight and humor.

    Our delegation also met with Sr. Nathalie Becquart, the Vatican’s General Secretariat of the Synod and Emilce Cuda, co-secretary of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.

  • USCCB: Pope Meets US Leaders Patiently Building 'Culture of Solidarity'

    [Excerpt]

    When Pope Francis told a group of U.S. community organizers that their work was "atomic," Jorge Montiel said, "I thought, 'Oh, you mean we blow things up?'"

    But instead, the pope spoke about how the groups associated with the West/Southwest Industrial Areas Foundation in the United States take issues patiently, "atom by atom," and end up building something that "penetrates" and changes entire communities, said Montiel, an IAF organizer in Colorado and New Mexico.

    Pope Francis' hourlong meeting Sept. 14 with 15 delegates from the group was a follow-up to a similar meeting a year ago. Neither meeting was listed on the pope's official schedule and, the delegates said, both were conversations, not "audiences."

    "It was relaxed, it was engaging," said Joe Rubio, national co-director of IAF. "Often you don't see that even with parish priests," he told Catholic News Service Sept. 15, garnering the laughter of other delegates.

    Pope Meets US Leaders Patiently Building Culture of SolidarityUS Conference of Catholic Bishops / Catholic News Service [pdf]

  • COPS/Metro Featured on San Antonio Talk Show Food for Thought

    In August, COPS/Metro leaders Lorraine Gonzales, Mark Wittig, and Sr. Pearl Ceasar, as well as lead organizer Josephine Lopez Paul, were invited by Father Jim Schellenberg to a two part discussion on his talk show "Food for Thought". The conversation centered around COPS/Metro's efforts in the diocese, as well as the recent papal visit from last November.

  • As Ready to Work is Set to Graduate Hundreds, COPS/Metro Presses for Hiring

    [Excerpt]

    COPS/Metro Alliance, the longtime coalition that advocates for working families and is in many ways responsible for the program’s existence, continues to raise concerns.

  • In Wake of Legislature's Failure on Gun Safety, COPS/Metro Organizes for Local Reform



    [Excerpt]

    "Our state legislators cannot muster the courage to act on the will of the people. Why? They fear the vocal minorities who have made gun possession an idol worthy of greater reverence than the lives of our fellow citizens. This is an abomination before God.

    Frustrated by the cowardice and inaction of the state legislators, San Antonio congregations are now working to reduce gun violence. Under the banner of COPS/Metro Alliance, 175 church leaders united to ask city of San Antonio and Bexar County leadership to create a public education campaign emphasizing gun owners’ responsibility to store their firearms safely and to provide safe handgun storage boxes for vehicles.

    It’s past time for lawmakers to come to their senses and listen to the residents they represent."

    [Photo Credit: Pictures Left: Rev. Rob Mueller. Sam Owens, San Antonio Express News]

    Texas Lawmakers Fail the Courage Test on GunsSan Antonio Express News