YAKIMA, Wash. -- In an era of Facebook and mass e-mails, Paula Zambrano's method of activism could be considered old school.

Late one recent weeknight, Zambrano upended a canvas bag onto the living room floor of her southeast Yakima apartment. Fliers, printed postcards to U.S. senators and scraps of paper with names and numbers fluttered down.

"We're not allowed to carry phones with us at work, so whenever someone says they want to join the rally, I write their information down on whatever I can find and put it in my pocket," said Zambrano, a fruit warehouse employee.

Zambrano and others who support immigration reform have found enough Yakima Valley residents to fill five buses to attend a rally in Seattle today. By talking with co-workers -- plus friends, churchgoers and Radio KDNA listeners -- they've developed a network of local people who want to push Congress to approve legislation that will help millions of undocumented immigrants become U.S. citizens.

It's been four years since the massive marches that brought out supporters of immigration reform in record numbers in the Yakima Valley and all over the country. But momentum, organizers say, is building again.

Last month in Washington, D.C., tens of thousands of people -- including Zambrano and her daughter -- rallied in support of an overhaul to the country's immigration system. With the passage of health care reform, they're hopeful that one of the recently introduced immigration bills gains traction in Congress.

The rally in Seattle's Occidental Park is one of many planned for today in cities across the country. On this day four years ago, millions of people in Los Angeles, Chicago and other cities protested legislation before Congress to criminalize illegal immigration.

Turnout at Yakima's 2006 demon-strations took the community by surprise, drawing from 5,000 to 15,000 people.

Interest has waned since then. Last year, fewer than 1,000 took part in Yakima's May 1 rally -- the traditional day that's been commemorated by the national movement for immigration reform.

"A lot of that had to do with what was happening with Radio KDNA," said Francisco Rios, former news director for the iconic station in Granger. "People were confused -- they still are -- about whether they should attend this march or that march."

Spanish-language radio here, as in much of the U.S., was instrumental in promoting the marches. Rios, who provided live march coverage for KDNA listeners in years past, says internal problems at the Granger-based station negatively affected last year's coverage and turnout.

Fractures within the Latino community appear to be healing. Many of the divisions were based on which side people took in the KDNA controversy.

"We're more united now," said Tomás Villa-nueva, a longtime farm worker rights advocate. "After the Seattle demonstration, everybody plans to work together on our own May 1 march in Yakima."

Organizers from Seattle-based One America -- which is providing bus transportation for rally participants from the Yakima Valley -- bypassed some of the rifts among Yakima's Latino leaders for today's march.

"What we did is contact regular people we found through the Catholic churches," said David Ayala-Zamora, the group's organizing director. "We were looking for people who are respected but don't necessarily have a title.

"People of their word, humble and who perhaps their whole lives will be poor."

He said he and other organizers were surprised at differences in immigrants' education level, access to technology and mobility here compared withw Seattle.

"At one of the meetings, there was a significant number of people who were illiterate," Ayala-Zamora said. "One of our organizers, his heart just broke because he'd never seen so many adults who couldn't write."

Organizing in Yakima has meant adapting to a communication level like in his home country of El Salvador during its civil war.

"It's a return to mass pamphlets. Mass e-mails and Facebook don't function here," Ayala-Zamora said.

That is changing, but slowly.

Zambrano, the warehouse worker in Yakima, recently bought a used laptop from a friend and wants to learn about e-mail. She also got her driver's learning permit so she doesn't have to depend on others for rides.

And she bought a second cell phone last month to use strictly for calls related to today's march.

"The truth of the matter is that the only tool we really have used is the cell phone," she said.

* Melissa Sánchez can be reached at 509-577-7675 or msanchez@yakimaherald.com.