The challenge

The members of Washington State’s Asian Pacific community have diverse origins, beliefs, cultures, and religions. Together, they comprise immigrants, refugees, and native-born Americans of all ages who have come from 50 ethnic communities and speak 68 languages. These varied cultures also share common problems, including anti-immigrant bias and discrimination as well as poverty and sexism. Racial profiling has threatened their civil liberties, and language barriers often limit access to needed services.

Seeds of commitment

Diane Narasaki’s family history guides her work. Her grandparents immigrated to the United States but were barred from citizenship because of quotas on Japanese immigrants. During World War II, they were sent to internment camps with many others of Japanese heritage. “I am grateful to my grandmothers, who battled sexism as well as racism to give their families and communities, including their daughters, a better future,” Narasaki writes. “I am grateful to my father, who left the camp and fought in World War II, as much to liberate his people from racism that held them in the camps as to liberate Europe from fascism.”

Today, Narasaki says, the people she works with also inspire her, from the refugees who escaped killing fields in Asia, to the low-wage workers struggling to survive. “I do this work because few things are more rewarding than to work with my community for a better world, and to see the results from that work.”

Accomplishments

Narasaki’s life has been governed by her passion for social justice. In the 1980s, she served as associate executive director of the Pacific Northwest region of the American Friends Service Committee and as executive director of the Northwest Labor and Employment Law Office, an organization that works for human rights and workers’ economic justice through community organizing and economic development. Also in the 1980s, Narasaki played a role in overturning laws that allowed Japanese Americans to be interned during World War II. She brought together civil-rights groups, religious organizations, and community groups to help educate the public about the dangers to civil liberties posed by these laws.

In 1995 Narasaki became the executive director of the Asian Counseling and Referral Service (ACRS), which provides a number of services for Asian Pacific Americans. These services -- provided in 30 languages -- include assistance with nutrition, mental health, chemical dependency and domestic violence issues as well as employment training, legal aid, and naturalization and citizenship information. One of the largest organizations of its kind in the country, ACRS employs 160 staff who work with some 350 volunteers to serve as many as 20,000 clients.

Narasaki quickly made an impact in her new position. In response to the 1996 welfare-reform laws that excluded immigrants and refugees from federally funded food, medical, and income assistance, Narasaki co-founded the Asian Pacific Islander Coalition (APIC), which she now chairs and which includes more than 100 Asian Pacific American groups. In the first statewide Asian Pacific American (APA) Legislative Day that year, ACRS, APIC, and others gathered to voice their concerns about the cutbacks, contributing to a reinstatement of state services. “We achieved our goals and literally saved people’s lives by securing their access to key safety-net programs that could help replace what they were losing at the federal level,” Narasaki says. APA Legislative Day is now an annual event in Washington State, where thousands of people gather to advocate for equal access to critical services, education, economic development, civil liberties and human rights.

In 2004 Narasaki co-chaired the Asian Pacific American Community Summit, which brought together 5,000 Asian-Pacific Americans to learn about advocacy, citizenship, and voting. Volunteers translated a forum featuring the gubernatorial candidates into 25 languages.

Leadership style

Narasaki typically begins a project by embracing a vision shaped by constituents. Then she makes sure critical tasks are shared by a team with the relevant strengths. “I foster good communication, flexibility, and calculated risk-taking in a supportive environment, where we can innovate, build on what works, and learn what doesn’t,” Narasaki says. “Believing that mistakes are learning opportunities, I hold debriefing sessions after all our major efforts so we can learn what works and what we need to improve.”

The future

Narasaki looks forward to moving into ACRS’ new building in 2008. The group has launched a multi-million-dollar capital campaign for the project. The environmentally sensitive building will be constructed in part by minority and female contractors and apprentices, and will house an activity center/gym, commercial kitchen, art room, computer lab, multipurpose rooms, meeting rooms, classrooms, training center, counseling rooms, and office space. The new building will be in the Rainier Valley, a racially diverse and economically distressed part of town with a large Asian community. Narasaki hopes the organization’s new neighborhood will benefit culturally and economically from the 160 staff, 350 volunteers, and the 20,000 clients ACRS will serve in 2008. Narasaki says: “I see my role in five years as an extension of my current role -- learning from clients, staff, and leaders, and working to provide communities a better future.”

More about Diane Narasaki and the Asian Counseling and Referral Service

“She is the leading figure here in western Washington in terms of bringing together a broad coalition, especially in King County, which has the largest population of Asians in the Pacific Northwest. For at least the last three years, she has been the focal point in bringing the Asian and Pacific Islanders together in Washington State to present to the state legislature the agenda that we need for our people.”
- Nemesio Domingo, Founder, Northwest Labor and Employment Law Office

“Diane builds leadership in others because she knows that a movement is not made up of one person, but many, using individual gifts to bring about positive change.”

- Sharon Maeda, president of SPECTRA, a Seattle media and management consulting firm