Heide is especially involved in the advocating for immigrants, refugees and undocumented workers here in the United States. As a member of the board on the Greater Rochester Coalition for Immigrant Justice she is helping to work for rights of immigrants. An immigrant herself, she helped her parents and siblings move from the Philippines to America.

Multiculturalism is a constant in Heide’s work here in Rochester. When she first moved from Seattle to Rochester she started working for a progressive Catholic church doing outreach, evangelisation and multiculturalism. She has tried to engage the refugees in the city to make them feel welcome and to help her city and the United States to become more diverse. She says,

“…[The] mutual enriching process its not to make people into a melting pot. The more people can maintain who they are, the more they can contribute to the United States because the United States will be informed about what is happening globally, politically, socially, economically…”

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