Comité is a land development cooperative which works to empower Mexican-Americans and new immigrants to help them overcome the many barriers they face, including very low wages, little access to conventional financing and limited political representation. Founded by farm workers in 1977 and incorporated in 1981, Comité is a membership non-profit that focuses on helping members build assets and strengthen the whole community. Four years after it started by pooling member savings, Comité purchased its first hundred acres for development for $1.4 million.
Comité is located in San Luis, Arizona. San Luis, a town of about 19,000 in Yuma County in the southwestern corner of the state where agriculture is the major industry. The town is just across the river from California and the border from San Luis de Colorado in Mexico, a city of 300,000, many of whom work in multinational maquiladoras. During the height of the Yuma harvesting season, 30,000 to 40,000 Mexican farm workers cross the border each day. 
