Leelanau locals plant seeds, grow cultural exchanges in Guatemala
The Leland students who traveled to Guatemala this year, (l-r): Kenya Estrada, Delaney Martinez, Cielle Fort, Addison Waskiewicz, Hadley Bison, Eli Petty. Photo by Bruce Randall
By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor
Twenty years ago, then-Suttons Bay resident Paul Sutherland was introduced through a fellow philanthropist to an ambitious, young social worker from Maine who had launched a school for the hard-luck children whose families scavenged in the Guatemala City garbage dump. Sutherland later chaired the board of Hanley Denning’s organization Safe Passage. (Denning and her impact on Guatemala were the subject of my 2022 book, Angel of the Garbage Dump.)
Sutherland, who founded the Utopia Foundation, also helped kickstart what has become a dynamic and ongoing relationship between Leelanau County citizens and Guatemala.
Local schools have sent students, and teams of volunteers have joined cultural exchange trips to the beautiful, yet economically unequal, Central American nation. Since the COVID-19 pandemic abated, another Guatemalan nonprofit called Planting Seeds has hosted “service learning” groups from Northwestern Michigan College (NMC) in 2023, as well as Leelanau Investing for Teens (LIFT) and Leland High School earlier this year.
Planting Seeds works in underserved communities both in Guatemala City and at its model preschool in a nearby village to improve access to quality education to develop healthy children, families, and communities. A new community center, which opened last year a few blocks from the garbage dump, offers an oasis for local kids, and a place to play and learn after school gets out.
Lizzie Brown, a 2021 Glen Lake School graduate, wrote about her experience visiting Planting Seeds on the NMC trip in 2023:
“One of the Planting Seeds programs that Magdelena has taken advantage of is the Read with Your Child program. This program was created to help parents learn to read with their kids by using the pictures in the books. Magdelena’s family had been reading with their kids, but now (her daughter) Juana helps (her youngest daughter) Katy read stories at night. … Magdelena appreciates the smaller class sizes in the preschool. Her two daughters have much smaller class sizes than her son did, which allows for more one-on-one time with the teachers. One of Magdelena’s biggest struggles was getting Katy to attend school. Katy was resistant to coming until she saw that most of the school day included play-based learning.”
Planting Seeds co-director and Illinois-native Mac Philips will visit the County in mid-December to raise awareness about the nonprofit and build support in northern Michigan. Grocer’s Daughter Chocolate in Empire will host Philips on Saturday, Dec. 14, from 3-5 pm, with all profits from sales going to Planting Seeds; he will visit the Suttons Bay Congregational Church on Sunday morning, Dec. 15, and speak with students from LIFT and Leland High School who are interested in traveling to Guatemala. Philips will also meet Traverse City Rotary and the NMC International Service Learning while in the region.

Leland students play games with Guatemalan preschoolers at Planting Seeds.
Jessica Gomez was among eight Suttons Bay high school students who traveled with LIFT on a nine-day trip to Guatemala in April.
“The Planting Seeds community center was really nice,” said Gomez, who is now a first-year student at NMC. “Members of the community told us how the community center has provided a safe space not just for children after school and on weekends, but for adults and the community in general—since there is some gang violence nearby. Everyone we talked to said great things about the organization. It’s important that they provide that space for the community.”
Equipping fire fighters, supporting democracy
Leelanau locals have stepped forward to help underprivileged Guatemalans in other ways, too. Local musician Chris Skellenger’s food security nonprofit, Buckets of Rain (now called Row by Row), worked with local social worker Fredy Maldonado to help impoverished villages around the colonial town of Antigua. Skellenger also worked with families on how to grow vegetables in mini-farms near the Guatemala City garbage dump.
More recently, Skellenger’s buddy Mike Binsfeld has brought donated equipment from the Cedar Fire Department and others in Leelanau County to the “bomberos,” Antigua’s volunteer firefighters and ambulance drivers.
There is no real government support for Guatemala’s first responders. When they’re not on a fire or ambulance call, they are out in the streets getting donations in coffee cans from passing drivers to fund their meager salaries and minimal equipment. Most of them have to fight fires in jeans and t-shirts. Serious injuries are endemic to their work.
Part-time Glen Lake resident Martha Pierce has traveled to Guatemala for decades together with her Chicago-area church. She joined the Sanctuary Movement during the 1980s when a bloody civil war raged there, and later headed the Chicago Metropolitan Sanctuary Alliance, which provided refuge for asylum seekers and urged the U.S. government to change its destructive policies towards Guatemala and El Salvador.
Early in 2024, Pierce joined a delegation of Congressional lawmakers from Illinois who attended and witnessed the inauguration of Guatemala’s new President Bernardo Arévalo. The progressive, reformist’s ascension to power was in doubt until the evening of his inauguration as the country’s oligarchy sought to stimy him.
Read below about Martha Pierce’s work in Guatemala:
Decades of political activism
By Martha Pierce
I first got involved with Guatemala in the mid-1980s and I have traveled there at least once a year since 1990. This connection began when the church I was a member of, First Congregational United Church of Christ, in Wilmette, Illinois, joined the Sanctuary Movement in 1983. At that time, there were armed conflicts going on in both El Salvador and Guatemala, as the people were challenging the military dictatorships in both countries. In both countries, courageous people were attempting to change the unjust conditions in which 90% of the population lived in deep poverty, lacking such basic needs as water, land, decent housing, education, health care, and employment. They had few rights and no justice, while the wealthy and powerful controlled them with brutal force. Some people in both countries began to advocate and work for better conditions, but they were met with brutal repression by their governments. Many people made the difficult decision to flee from this violence and injustice and seek refuge outside their country—some went over the border to Mexico, where they subsisted in refugee encampments, and others made their way to the United States, seeking asylum. However, although they should have qualified for political asylum (under international and U.S. laws), their claims were denied by the U.S. immigration courts, because the U.S. was supporting the governments of El Salvador and Guatemala with arms, money, and investments. Faced with this situation, many congregations and individuals throughout the U.S. decided to provide protection for these refugees—and thus was created the Sanctuary Movement, where congregations invoked the ancient principle that the church or temple is a “sanctuary” even from the power of the State, and government officials will not enter such a space to apprehend fugitives.
Out of my participation in this movement, I learned about the current situations and conditions in Guatemala and El Salvador, and about our own government’s role in it. I became active with the local Chicago Metropolitan Sanctuary Alliance (CMSA), a group of congregations and individuals who were working both to provide refuge for asylum seekers, and also to urge our U.S. government to change its policies towards Guatemala and El Salvador. I became Executive Director of CMSA in 1991 and continued this work until I retired in 2008. Since then, I have remained active as a board member of our successor organization, Chicago Religious Leadership Network on Latin America (CRLN). Our goal has evolved into “working to make Latin America a sanctuary for its own people,” and we have sought to accompany the people in Guatemala, El Salvador, and other countries in the region, in their struggles to build societies of peace, justice, and equity.
On Jan. 12, 1994, I accompanied a group of Guatemalans who returned from the refugee camps in Mexico and established a new village in their homeland. With about 1000 people, I traveled to a tract of land in northwestern Guatemala, where they began to build their new community. I have returned to this village, which is called Chaculá (or Nueva Esperanza) every year since. It has been an immense joy and privilege to see this community take root and flourish in the Guatemalan highlands; where once there were only barren, rolling hills, now there are streets, houses, a school, churches, and shops. They’re not fancy, but they are there! And there is, indeed, “new hope” for the people, even as they continue to struggle to feed their families, educate their children, and build sustainable lives amid the ongoing economic, environmental and political injustice of Guatemala.
Of course, I have made many friendships in the community of Chaculá and look forward to my yearly visits. I was hoping to go this January, especially since I haven’t been able to visit for two years due to the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. However, I got the opportunity to travel to Guatemala in a somewhat different way. The organization I work with, CRLN, was sending a delegation of civic leaders and Congressional representatives from the Chicago area to be present at the inauguration of Guatemala’s new President Bernardo Arévalo, and I joined them.
The election of Bernardo Arévalo [in 2023] was a very big deal in Guatemala—and a surprise to most people. Although Maya and indigenous peoples are the majority of the population, the country has been controlled by the wealthy and powerful (and very corrupt) non-Maya minority for many years. Arévalo was elected in August 2023 by a coalition of the indigenous peoples as well as young urban activists, but the defeated right-wing parties have been doing everything they can since then to overturn the election. The progressive forces have remained vigilant and committed, as they were determined to see him take office.
CRLN was among the many groups supporting Arévalo. Our delegation went to witness the inauguration and also to meet with civil society leaders, whose support helped to make his election a reality. Participants in the delegation included several Democrats: Rep. Delia Ramirez, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the Third District of Illinois, who is Guatemalan, as well as congressional aides from Rep. Jesus Garcia (Ill.), and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (Ill.). Several other members of the delegation were Guatemalan nationals who now live in Chicago, and work with organizations that serve migrant families in the U.S. Our goal for the delegation was to introduce our congressional representatives to grass-roots organizations and activists who are doing effective work protecting the environment and defending human rights in Guatemala, rather than the government-based groups that congresspersons usually meet with. We visited an encampment of people who have been protesting the creation of a gold mine in their area—for 12 years!—and learned about their commitment to protect their land and water rights. We also met with people whose lands and homes were destroyed by the building of a large hydroelectric dam, many of whom had lost family members in the struggle to resist the dam. And we talked with people who are providing support for migrants who are deported back to Guatemala, helping them to adjust and make plans for their future. And we also celebrated the election of President Arévalo with the Guatemalan people.
For several hours on election day, Jan. 14, it was not clear whether the inauguration would take place at all. The outgoing administration and right-wing opposition parties tried very hard to put obstacles in their way, claiming that the incoming party was illegitimate, and invoking obscure stalling tactics. When the people heard about this, some starting marching toward the government buildings, where they were met by a line of police in riot gear. After a lot of pushing and shouting, the marchers were stopped, while inside the Congressional building the commotion continued—we were watching this on TV at this point, and it was very confusing!
The Guatemalan process is for the President to take the oath of office in front of the Congress and other governmental representatives at the National Theater. Afterwards, the new President goes to the National Plaza, to speak to the civilian population. So, people had been gathering at the National Plaza all day, celebrating the election and inauguration of Arévalo and awaiting his arrival. Due to all the shenanigans of the opposition, the ceremony was delayed by about nine hours, but it did eventually take place around 10 p.m. My friends and I went over to the National Plaza at around 10, and found a festive scene, filled with people dancing and singing and celebrating—very alegre! It was moving to see the joy of the people, their pride in having persisted and elected this progressive new leader, and their hopes for a better future.
On his way from the oath-taking ceremony to the celebration in the Plaza, President Arévalo made a stop at the Constitutional Court building. There, he paid his respect and gratitude to the leaders of the indigenous peoples of Guatemala, who had been maintaining a vigil for over 100 days to demand justice for their people. They greeted him as a leader, and pledged their commitment to support him—and hold him accountable—as he undertakes the challenges of governing the country. It will not be an easy task, but he will be accompanied—and overseen—by his strong, creative, and committed Guatemalan people.
We here in the U.S. look forward to working with our new congressional partners, as well as our long-time grass-roots partners here and in Guatemala, to promote justice, peace, and well-being for the people of Guatemala.