West Marin Community Service’s executive director, Socorro Romo, has announced her retirement from the nonprofit after 18 years with the group.
During her tenure, Ms. Romo helped the organization tackle difficult conversations around discrimination, inhumane housing conditions, retaliation, evictions and immigration authority threats.
Yet it was the nonprofit’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic that stands out as her most prominent accomplishment, she said.
The group took on a regional leadership role while providing resources to those struggling with uncertainty. As the national workforce grappled with layoffs, the nonprofit retained most of its employees, expanding its staff from what was once a handful of employees to more than 20. The group took on two new programs, a youth center and a community resilience team.
Ms. Romo began her career with the organization as a clerk assistant in the early 2000s and returned again as a project manager after working as a classroom aide and family advocate at West Marin School. She was appointed as the executive director in 2018. After seven years steering the ship, she is stepping down to spend more time with family, namely her grandchildren.
“I feel sad, but it’s more peace, because I believe that I gave this organization 18 years of my life,” she said. “I gave everything I could to this organization and this community, and I feel at peace because I gave it with love.”
Ms. Romo spent her first 21 years in Jalostotitlán before heading north alone in 1980. Born fifth in a family of 12, she learned the values of hard work while carrying out her daily chores. In her hometown, the highest level of education was a private middle school, though Ms. Romo left school after sixth grade due to the cost. In search of the American dream, she wound up in West Marin, where she reunited with two siblings who were working on Point Reyes dairy ranches.
Determined to support her mother and a sister who had fallen ill, she took a job shucking oysters for Johnson’s Oyster Company. Prying open hundreds of rugged-shelled oysters a day was not for the faint of heart, but Ms. Romo persevered. She married her husband, José, in 1983, and they raised three children on a ranch.
Working as a housekeeper, Ms. Romo cleaned homes with her youngest child on her hip until she began to learn English. The encouragement and support she received from mentors, friends and employers led her to pursue a G.E.D. and ultimately a career in public service.
“I feel that the community supported me more than I could have ever supported them,” she told the Light on Monday, her emotions swelling. She said key figures in her life pushed her to strive for more. In turn, she tried to pay it forward.
Carlos Porrata, the board chair of West Marin Community Services, emphasized how monumental it was to have someone like Ms. Romo lead the organization. From working and living on ranches to directing a nonprofit with a budget of over $1 million, her success story is an inspiration.
“She’s a perfect example of an immigrant coming in and being successful to the point of getting to lead an organization,” he said.
Ms. Romo’s accomplishments are recognized beyond her community. This month, she became one of just three West Marin residents to be honored in the Marin Women’s Hall of Fame, and her story is one of just two oral histories of Latino residents among over 200 conducted by the Marin County Free Library.
As West Marin Community Services celebrates its 25th anniversary, the organization is ushering in a new era of growth as it works to expand its programs. Ms. Romo hopes to have inspired the next generation of leaders.
“You are a leader. I am a leader—innately, by nature,” she told the Light. “We are someone’s leaders.”