Today, Lao Family Community Development is the biggest refugee organization in the East Bay, with a budget of more than $3 million, a staff of 51 and a clientele far more diverse than the Southeast Asian refugees it originally served.

"When we first started, we didn't know if we could succeed," said cofounder Chaosarn Chao. Even if it succeeded, he never imagined the center would still be useful three decades later.

More than 1,000 people were expected to gather in East Oakland on Tuesday for the organization's 30th anniversary party, an outdoor festival with food, music and dance.

The organization has come a long way since thousands of refugees from Laos, many of them former soldiers who fought on the side of the United States military, migrated to Richmond, San Pablo, El Cerrito and Oakland in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

"There have been a lot of changes during the last 30 years," said John Tran, refugee services coordinator at the Alameda County Social Services Agency, who remembers how Lao Family and other organizations serving Cambodian and Vietnamese immigrants sprung up in the East Bay but struggled to raise money.

The homes of the first families to arrive from Laos became makeshift social service agencies. One of the homes was Chaosarn Chao's apartment at Bayview Avenue and 56th Street in Richmond.

"More and more people kept calling our house and coming over asking for help," said Kathy Chao Rothberg, executive director of Lao Family and the daughter of Chaosarn Chao. "Our apartment became the emergency stop. We had people sleeping over in the living room or the kitchen."

Rothberg was a child when her father and a group of men founded the organization, getting support from Lao Family of Santa Ana, which was formed in 1977. At its peak, there was a network of 36 organizations across the country that went by the name Lao Family. Only nine survive today, and the East Bay group is thought to be the biggest.

"The primary concern was the language," Chaosarn Chao said of the early years. "Very few of those new arrivals were able to speak or understand minimal English. Even me, speaking broken English, I was trying to help people. I got called at 3 in the morning, 2 in the morning, to translate at the hospital."

In the early 1980s, Southeast Asian refugees faced a host of problems in the East Bay. They were robbed and did not know how to communicate with police. They struggled to read grocery labels or bus routes. Some fell ill after eating poisonous wild mushrooms they collected from East Bay parks.

Like many refugee associations, the East Bay's Lao Family group found ways to help. But unlike many other Lao Family groups, which mostly served the Hmong community, the East Bay branch expanded its reach to multiple ethnic groups.

"It was Hmong. It was Mien. It was Lao, Lue and Khmu," Rothberg said. "Being in the Bay Area, we knew that in order for us to sustain ourselves not only financially but service-wise we needed to diversify."

Over the decades, Lao Family diversified even further -- to Latinos, African-Americans and new waves of refugees from places as different as Bosnia, Myanmar, Afghanistan and Bhutan.

Services provided by the group include English language and citizenship classes, help obtaining jobs and advice to navigate the banking system and avoid foreclosures or predatory lending. The programs are funded through government grants and donations.

Staff at the center speak 28 languages and serve about 15,000 clients a year from more than 30 countries, Rothberg said.

Tran, whose county agency distributes federal money to groups that serve refugees, said it is because of its leadership that Lao Family became such a strong force.

"They work hard, they try to diversify the programs, and then look for resources everywhere," Tran said.

Organizers expect up to 1,500 people at the outdoor festival, which happens from 3 to 6 p.m. at the Cesar Chavez Education Center, 2825 International Blvd., in Oakland.

Details
Lao Family Community Development provides employment services, family support and other assistance to immigrants and refugees. The Oakland center, at 2325 E. 12th St., can be contacted at 510-533-8850. Go to www.lfcd.org for details or to support the center's programs.