CEPA was founded by Dr. Melissa Rosario, a Nuyorican anthropologist when she moved to Puerto Rico in 2016. She had the support of Adela Nieves Martinez, who served as a collaborator in dreaming up a space to strengthen networks and alliances between the island and the diaspora.

With the passage of Hurricane Maria, visual artist Lau Pat RA joined the project, incorporating outreach work and the artistic dimension to the search for healing. Together with Melissa, they began creating spaces to process trauma in community contexts and activist gatherings that brought beauty, joy, and imagination to the healing process.

In 2018, the workshop house was established. The workshop-house space has served as a meeting place between the island and diaspora and has provided safe homes for many people from the queer and trans community. The workshop house anchors art and healing practices that seek to decolonize our everyday lives and create a solidarity economy in the process.

Outside of the workshop house, CEPA has facilitated healing circles, practice spaces, and a curriculum that fosters a Borike beyond the colony through face-to-face and digital forums. They also developed the mobile apothecary to respond in times of crisis with natural remedies where they have been called around the archipelago.