Some families raise money picking up empty beer cans at SPI

SOUTH PADRE ISLAND -- Antonia Gomez moved almost unnoticed among hundreds of college students who guzzled beer under the late afternoon sun on one of the beach's top party spots.

As a student finished off a beer bong a few feet away, Gomez took one last look into the near-empty trash can to make sure she had picked it clean. Her work complete there, Gomez slumped down into the shade offered by the trash can as she waited for her brother-in-law to come and carry away the two trash bags overflowing with aluminum beer cans that sat by her side.

The day at the beach is an annual routine for Gomez, 65, a Brownsville resident who said she's made extra cash by picking up beer cans discarded by spring breakers for the past 20 years. But her situation is anything but routine this year.

Needing surgery to remove a tumor from her lung, Gomez spent the past week at the Island picking up hundreds of sand-filled beer cans to raise money for medication. Her husband, Jose, a regular companion on her can-gathering trips, has been in the hospital for the past year recovering from a stroke that left his right side paralyzed. And her health maladies forced her to forgo her part-time business selling tamales to vacationers and locals on the beach.

Collecting cans during spring break is her only chance to earn extra cash.

"I need to make money because it's a difficult situation," she said. "Life is hard right now."

Gomez is one of several people -- usually whole families -- who scour the beach each spring break to turn cans into cash.

The dirty work -- Gomez picks up some cans from the sand but gets most of her load from the beach's trash cans -- can bring in a small amount of cash for about five hours worth of work.

Gomez arrives at the beach about 2 p.m. when most of the students arrive, she said. With help from her sister and brother-in-law, she can pick up enough cans to fill a dozen or so 40-gallon trash bags by the time the beach clears out around 8 p.m.

Once she takes the beer cans to a local recycler where she sells them for 60 to 65 cents a pound, her family splits about $80 a day for their work.

The money will be enough to buy medication to last Gomez a few weeks. Gomez, who has lived on odd jobs since a Weslaco business she worked for closed down 10 years ago, said the cash from the cans will help her survive financially until her surgery is scheduled.

With her husband in the hospital and her health declining, Gomez relied this week on her sister's family to do all the heavy lifting. Her sister, Antonia Garcia, and brother-in-law, Juan Garcia, traveled from Monterrey to help out.

Juan Garcia arrived to carry away a garbage bag while Gomez continued to rest by the trash can. As hip-hop music blared from speakers, Garcia slung the bag over his shoulder, spilling the remnants of a few cans of beer onto his back and the beach. He stumbled off the sandy beach as the college students continued to party and drop more cans onto the sand.

"I don't like it but it's necessary," said Juan Garcia, who has health problems of his own but wants to do what he could to help his sister-in-law raise money for surgery. "A little bit of money is good enough."

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Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor. He can be reached at (956) 683-4424.