Fiesta Latina with Noelle Braun from Casa Guadalupe

Fuzz Martin  0:00  
Oh hello strangers. Thanks for tuning into Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz. My name is Fuzz Martin and this is a show about all the positive things happening right here in Washington County, Wisconsin. April was a bit of a bust for me. I mean, it was good. April was a good month but my schedule got a bit out of hand, and a couple of interviewees back down not saying names. So it's been a bit of a time for me. However, things have settled down a bit, I hope, and I should be back on track for a while. Okay, cool. This week, Casa Guadalupe Education Center's Executive Director Noelle Braun joins me on the show. Noelle's first time on the show was back on my 14th episode of Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz where she talked about Casa Guadalupe and now we're here on the 75th episode. Isn't that crazy? It is crazy. Today she joins me to talk about Fiesta Latina. A great event coming up on Saturday May 20 at Regner Park in West Bend. With that here are 15 minutes on Casa Guadalupe's Fiesta Latina with Noelle Braun on Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz.

Fuzz Martin  1:30  
Welcome back to Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz, Noelle. First of all, you were on episode 14 of the show back in the day. And now this is episode 75. So that's kind of exciting. Welcome back.

Noelle Braun  1:40  
Thank you. It's super exciting. Congrats to you. Thanks. Learn about here in the community. Exactly,

Fuzz Martin  1:45  
exactly. So last time we were here we spoke about the organization Casa Guadalupe Education Center and its mission, but can you give our listeners a bit of an introduction in case they haven't listened to all 75 episodes?

Noelle Braun  1:58  
Absolutely. So Casa Guadalupe Education Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization in Washington County. And our mission is to be the bridge of integration to Hispanics and the communities in which they live, their education and community access. So we are working with a lot of different families, kids and adults with a variety of literacy and education programs, anything from adult English classes to after school reading programs for elementary school use. We have a college life and career readiness program for middle and high school students. And a large health program too called Healthy Latinos Healthy Futures. And then we're just a resource in the community. We do work with a lot of individuals where their first language is Spanish. They may have just moved here recently from a Latin American country, and we're here to help them connect in the community to provide resources and a variety of topics. So every day is different a casa Guadalupe are really grateful and blessed to be in this community.

Fuzz Martin  2:57  
Well, it's a great cause and and so it's great to have a resource like that for individuals in our county. That's, that's great. And we appreciate all that you do in your role as well. So each year, Casa Guadalupe has an event called Fiesta Latina, which is coming up on Saturday, May 20. At Regner Park in West Bend. Can you tell us about how and when the idea for Fiesta Latina, came about? Absolutely.

Noelle Braun  3:21  
Fiesta Latina came about when I started at Casa Guadalupe, and it's already it's been a little while now. I started in 2012. Okay, and one of the first things I did as director was I found out that the West Bend area Chamber of Commerce had their leadership West Bend program starting up it was the fall of 2012. And they normally pick some nonprofits to support with specific projects or an ask. And I thought, You know what, knowing Washington County, and the festivals or the different events that we already have in this community, they're great events, I think of German fest, for instance, been going on for, like 35 plus years, things like that. And I realized that we didn't have like a large Latin American celebration, and definitely the fastest growing population in Washington County would be among the Hispanic Latino community. And I thought, how cool would it be to gather everyone to celebrate Latin American culture, while you know, gaining some more recognition, and about casa, Guadalupe and all the great things that we're doing in the community, so that was my ask to them. And so in 2012 into 2013, we had a group of three leaders in that leadership West Bend group, plus my office administrator, and I and we put together the first Fiesta Latina, and it's just gone since then, like every year, we it's always around that third weekend in May. It's the first event that kicks things off at Regner Park, and it's just a really fun time to bring the community together.

Fuzz Martin  4:55  
So this is your 11th Yes,

Noelle Braun  4:59  
yeah, this is Our 11th annual the only year we of course did not have it was 2020. we pivoted that year, but ever since then, it's been at Regner Park.

Fuzz Martin  5:10  
that screwed up everybody's math for their annual events forever and ever. So what is the main purpose of the Fiesta Latina?

Noelle Braun  5:20  
So the main purpose and might be repeating myself a little bit, but the main purpose is certainly just to bring our community together our diverse community and to celebrate Latin American culture, as well as raise funds for CASA Guadalupe to bring about awareness and that recognition for our programs and permission. Great.

Fuzz Martin  5:39  
Can you tell us about some of the cultural aspects of Yes, Latina what can attendees expect in terms of Latin American music, dance food, etc?

Noelle Braun  5:48  
Absolutely. Yeah, so we love to bring all of that together at Regner Park. So it's in the course that large area with the pavilions and the Silver Lining stage. So our events going to be on Saturday, May 20, from noon to 8:30pm. So it's a full day event. And there will be entertainment from that stage from the start to the end. We're going to have three different Latin American food trucks. Two of them are going to have more Mexican style food like taco trucks. One other one called sason dominicano is going to be there with some more of like, food from the Republican Dominican Republic.

Fuzz Martin  6:21  
Sure. Yes, backwards in English. Exactly.

Noelle Braun  6:27  
Yeah, so we like to offer a variety of foods that way. The first time we did food trucks was last year was really popular. So we're like, let's do it. Again. We've a variety of drinks they'll be selling Jeff spirits always helps us out with getting variety of like, Latin American or like Mexican beers. There are a lot of other drink options too. Of course, from the stage we're going to be doing a variety of things we are going to be recognizing one of our staff members Maria Gutierrez Corolla, who this school year has transitioned to a role at the West Bend High School, but she has done so much for us and our youth programs over the past five, six years. So we want to make sure that we're recognizing her. We're also going to be recognizing students that are receiving our dream to succeed scholarship. This is our fourth year so we're very excited to announce those recipients. We're going to have anything from a singer named Lucha para Cisneros who's going to sing some songs in Spanish. We're going to have Salsa Rosa dance company come up. They do a lot of Latin dance. They do demos, they do performances. They're fantastic award winning. Now let folklorico Sony's Mahi Cano is doing a bunch of folklore dances from Mexico, they're from Chicago, they come up, they've come up multiple years in a row, and they're just beautiful, phenomenal dancers. We have a couple of bands too. Okay. And yeah, we got some raffles that are coming up. We've got tons of stuff for kids, lots of activities. We're gonna have a couple of bounce houses. We have at least 10 games, face painting. We have MPTC marine park Technical College in their cosmetology some of their students are going to do either like mini manicures or hairstyling. So there's so much there's gonna be lots of vendors too, that are selling handmade items, particularly either let Latino owned businesses, or they're selling items like from Latin America. Okay, we'd love to highlight that as well.

Fuzz Martin  8:10  
That is a lot going on. And probably a lot to coordinate. There's a lot of people that are that help you on your team to get this all together, right?

Noelle Braun  8:17  
Yes, thankfully, we have a staff, a great staff. That is we step up and do a lot this time of year as well as committee and my board of directors. So we're just so grateful for them and lots of volunteers. We're still looking for volunteers, we'll put a plug in for that. There. We have a sign of genius link out there on our website, and also our Facebook page. We have an event out there too. But yeah, we need at least 100 volunteers to make this event a success in such a variety of ways. Yeah, so everyone helps make it a great time for everyone.

Fuzz Martin  8:50  
So if somebody is looking for your website and wants to volunteer, what's the URL for that?

Noelle Braun  8:55  
Yes. So that is www.casaguadalupeonline.org.

Fuzz Martin  9:01  
Okay, casaguadalupeonline.org. And that's on Saturday, May 28, from noon till 8:30pm. So, and I assume you have shifts or something like that or this? Absolutely,

Noelle Braun  9:11  
yeah, we're not expecting outside of staff. We don't expect people to stay the whole day. But we certainly have shifts that are splitting things up. For instance, I know we could still use some people that are greeters at the entrances or you know, giving people wristbands when they enter it is free admission with a little asterisk. Because, you know, obviously, it's our fundraiser. So we do have some suggested donation. And if kids do want to play all the games and activities, we're asking for $5 per kid, they get a little drawstring backpack for their prizes and candy and all that. But just again, it's like a nice way to to contribute a little bit to the fundraiser as well. Otherwise, people if they just want to like come in and just check it out. They've certainly can just mingle in the crowds and everything. So we're absolutely looking forward to it. One of our other top volunteer opportunities we have is cleanup. I know that's everyone's favorite thing to do. But at 8:30pm The more people Well, that can help us it's gonna go by so much faster.

Fuzz Martin  10:02  
Exactly, exactly. Regarding the funds that are raised, how how does that go to support? Casa Guadalupe's programs and services?

Noelle Braun  10:09  
Yeah, that's a great question. So, for Fiesta Latina, it's really, you know, across the board, what we're raising funds for, it could be to support our health programming, it could be to, you know, support the after school reading program. So some of the funds could go to new books for the kids or with like English classes, it could go towards helping to pay instructors or like for the licenses for the curriculum that we use, you know, so many things. And then we also have a large raffle drawing, and all of our raffle tickets that we sell, there's multiple prizes that can be one you don't have to be present when we're selling tickets in advance in day out. All of those proceeds are going directly to our dream to succeed scholarship fund. So all those students that are getting scholarships, so that's that's a very specific earmark. Are those raffle prizes.

Fuzz Martin  10:54  
Perfect. And then he has also the 5050. Raffles. I see you got a couple of those going on which people love 5050 rage. Yeah, you

Noelle Braun  11:00  
could do a big winner. Yeah, exactly.

Fuzz Martin  11:01  
So again, if you want to volunteer, go to Casa Guadalupe online.org. Okay, very good. I was listening. Are there any I know this is your big event every year? Are there other events that you guys have coming up throughout? 2023?

Noelle Braun  11:16  
We do actually. So yes, Fiesta Latina is our largest event of the year. This year, we are going to host our second annual, a dream to succeed scholarship fundraiser. So last year, in the fall, we actually had a Leadership West Bend group help us plan it. They're fantastic. I always give them a shout out. So we're doing it again, because it was a great success last year. And that fundraiser is very specific to raise funds just for that scholarship fund. Keep it sustainable. We want to continue to grow that and make sure because the amount of students that apply every year are just continuing to grow. The first year of the scholarship program, we had six that applied six got scholarships. Fast forward to this year, we had 27 that applied. So it's great. Yeah, absolutely. So that this year, it's going to be on Friday, October 13 at the Washington County Fairgrounds in the Ziegler building. And so shortly after Fiesta is done, we are going to we're going to switch gears and we're going to tell her on a save that date. That's more of like a dinner dance. You buy your ticket and just have a fun night out. So yeah, so that's a big event coming up.

Fuzz Martin  12:19  
I assume you'll have sponsorship opportunities and things like that as well.

Noelle Braun  12:23  
We will Yes, I do want to give a shout out to our top level sponsors for Fiesta Latina, we have three this year which is fantastic. So this is at the $5,000 level. We have MP, MP systems thrive and Ramiro Paz's office here in West Bend, and West Bend Mutual Insurance Company. So yeah, so we have awesome sponsors, multiple levels for Fiesta. But there will be sponsorship opportunities as well for the dream to succeed scholarship fundraiser.

Fuzz Martin  12:50  
Excellent. One more time you give us the details on time, location and ticket information. Well, I guess there's not really ticket information but donation information for Fiesta Latina.

Noelle Braun  12:58  
Yes. So our 11th annual Fiesta Latina fundraiser and Latin American cultural celebration will be on Saturday, May 20. From noon to 8:30pm at Regner Park. And we really look forward to seeing everyone you can get more details at www dot Casa Guadalupe online.org as well as our Facebook page. So you just have to look up Casa Guadalupe Education Center, we have an event that's been created. We also have an Instagram page too, which is at Casa Guadalupe wi. And you can just check out all the updates there.

Fuzz Martin  13:30  
Perfect. Well, no. Well, I appreciate you coming on 15 minutes with fuzz and I look forward to having you on a third time sometime soon.

Noelle Braun  13:36  
Excellent. Thank you so much. Appreciate the opportunity.

Fuzz Martin  13:40  
Thank you so much to Noelle Braun, Executive Director at Casa Guadalupe for joining me on today's episode of Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz again Fiesta Latina takes place on Saturday May 20 at Regner Park in West Bend from noon until 8:30pm It's free and it will be a great time for your entire family go experienced yester Latina if you ever have an idea for Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz, please reach out to me you can go to fuzz.cc slash guest and fill out the form or email me fifteenwithfuzz @ gmail.com Be sure to spell out the word 15. Again, that's fifteenwithfuzz@gmail.com. That'll do it for today's episode barring any curveballs. I'll be back next Tuesday. I appreciate you listening and we'll talk to you again next time right here on Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz