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More articles on page 2... Judge Blocks INS Denaturalization, (posted 7/30/98) From the Weekly News Update on the Americas On July 9 in Seattle, US district judge Barbara Jacobs Rothstein issued an injunction barring the INS "from initiating or continuing" denaturalization cases under an administrative procedure the agency launched in 1996. The INS has already moved to strip the citizenship of almost 1,700 newly naturalized immigrants, and is reviewing the cases of more than 6,000 others to determine if they should lose their citizenship for allegedly having lied about past convictions or arrests. Previously, federal courts heard all such cases; this would take years, compared to months for the INS process. Lawyers for the plaintiffs--10 new US citizens from around the country who are facing a loss of citizenship-said Rothstein's decision means that the INS denaturalization process must halt nationwide pending a trial on its constitutionality. [Los Angeles Times 7/15/98] Immigrant Rights Groups Threatened, (posted 7/30/98) From the Weekly News Update on the Americas Two organizations serving New York's immigrant communities received threatening racist letters on June 25. The letters received by the Latino Workers Center (LWC) and the Center for Immigrant Rights (CIR) were similar in style, and both were postmarked and with return addresses near or in the city of Yonkers, in Westchester County, just north of New York City. "We suspect the Ku Klux Klan," said LWC executive director Monica Santana, "since the supremacist group reportedly has a broad network in that area." The letter to CIR was addressed to "Spics." The letters warned: "We are organizing in groups around the country to begin to exterminate you. This is not a joke, we will send you back to your country." Police are investigating the threats. [El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 7/4/98 from correspondent; conversation with CIR director Andrea de Urquiza 7/2/98] Both LWC and CIR are members of the Coalition for the Human Rights of Immigrants (CHRI), and the names and addresses of both groups were listed on a bilingual English/Spanish CHRI leaflet handed out around New York City during the month of May. The leaflet called for people to take action for immigrant rights "because we don't want to live in a country of hate, racism and discrimination." [CHRI Justice & Dignity Vol. 1 #2, May 1998] New Jersey Congressperson Helps INS With Raid, (posted 7/30/98) From the Weekly News Update on the Americas On May 22, about 40 agents from the Newark office of the INS raided Cut Rite, a garment factory in Passaic, New Jersey, and arrested more than 70 suspected undocumented workers. The agents were accompanied by state and city police agents and by congressional representative Bill Pascrell (D-NJ), along with at least one member of his staff. Pascrell, who the Bergen Record calls "a longtime champion of immigrants," provided the tip that led the INS to raid the factory. The majority of the detained workers were Mexican women. "I have no qualms of conscience here because I've fought for immigrants; for people who want to be here legally," said Pascrell. "But we cannot tolerate illegals who do not go through the process of being legal and who are taking jobs from people who need them." Henry Amoroso, an attorney for Cut Rite, suggested that company owner Anthony Dell'Aquila's annual $30,000 contributions to Republicans may have made him a target. But Pascrell and his staff said they tipped off immigration officials without knowing the identity of the factory's owners. Dell'Aquila said he runs a lawful operation, and noted that the workers are union members. He said his factory has passed all inspections. "This is a union shop, not a sweatshop," said Dell'Aquila, who lists Avon and Liz Claiborne among his clients. "The average person makes $7 an hour. I check documents to make sure people can work. I turn away five to 10 girls a week who come looking for work because they don't have papers to prove they're legal." Rep. Marge Roukema (R-NJ), who advocates tighter restrictions on immigration, criticized Pascrell's role in the raid. "I think it's entirely inappropriate for a member of Congress to introduce himself into a raid. This is serious business. It shouldn't be show business." Pascrell said he and his staff member "just stood to the side and watched. I have a clear conscience." [Bergen Record (NJ) 5/23/98] Raids Resume Under New Guidelines in New York (posted 7/30/98) From the Weekly News Update on the Americas The INS has resumed raiding workplaces in New York's midtown garment district, following what appeared to be a month-long hiatus as the agency revamped its raids rules nationwide in response to concerns about a particularly brutal raid in Miami on Apr. 23 [see Briefs 5/98, 6/98]. The New York-based Coalition for the Human Rights of Immigrants (CHRI) reports that 10 garment workers were detained in a June 25 raid; an unknown number were detained on July 8; and on July 9, in one of the largest operations in New York this year, some 25 INS agents seized about 40 of the 90 workers at New UWZ Fashions on West 38th Street. [CHRI press release 7/15/98] Agents reportedly showed a court order before carrying out the June 25 raid-something they had not generally done in the past. [CHRI Justice & Dignity Vol. 1 #4, July 1998] The new INS guidelines-issued on May 22 by Michael Pearson, Executive Associate Commissioner of the Office of Field Operations-call for "an on-site INS community liaison officer present during all worksite enforcement operations." In addition, the new rules require that "a written operation plan" for each raid be prepared and submitted to the Regional Director for approval prior to the raid. The raid plans must also be submitted to the Executive Associate Commissioner for Field Operations if they "involve persons, subject matters, or places of national prominence, notoriety, or newsworthiness" or if they "for other reasons may, in the judgment of the Regional Director, be of sufficient interest to generate inquiries directed to Headquarters." The guidelines require INS agents to immediately notify the INS command center if anyone is seriously injured during a raid; if "an employer or principal business representative of an employer" is arrested; if "allegations of civil rights violations or other abuses" are made against the INS or "any other law enforcement agency" taking part in the raid; or if there is "a significant media presence" during the raid. The guidelines call on INS districts "to conduct outreach meetings and seminars" on at least a quarterly basis with "interested segments of the community," including "advocacy and civil rights groups, service agencies, civil and church groups... and groups representing immigrants and aliens" in order to "develop an atmosphere of communication and understanding" and "improve the INS' dialogue with the public." Also recommended is "notifying consulates of foreign countries prior to INS worksite enforcement operations so they can prepare to interview nationals of their countries who might be affected by the operation." The consulates may be informed about "the time and location where INS processing will take place; the location of the operation should not be disclosed." [Memorandum for Regional Directors from Michael Pearson 5/22/98 on the subject of "Immediate Action Directive for Worksite Enforcement Operations"] Protocol for raids is laid out in an attachment to Pearson's memo. Where "employers are believed to be unknowingly employing unauthorized aliens," agents shouuld "review employment records first, arrest unauthorized aliens later," and "prepare and deliver Notices of Inspection to [the] employer" before reviewing employment records. The employers are then to be trained in the law, in detection of counterfeit documents and other matters; and informed "that the INS will visit their businesses to arrest unauthorized aliens in the near future (date unspecified)." [INS Office of Field Operations Worksite Enforcement Standard Investigation Procedures 5/22/98] Copies of the May 22 memorandum and attachments (20 pages total) are available for $1 from Weekly News Update on the Americas, 339 Lafayette St, New York, NY 10012. 6 Groups Fighting Influx of Aliens, (posted 7/30/98)
Six anti-immigration organizations have started a campaign in Arkansas to temporarily stop the flow of Mexicans and other aliens moving into Northwest Arkansas. Americans for an Immigration Moratorium of Rogers and other organizations are supporting federal legislation that calls for a five-year moratorium on immigration. The organizations are running anti-immigration radio, television and newspaper ads in Arkansas. The campaign will continue for two weeks. Dan Morris of Rogers, who founded the group, said at a news conference at the state Capitol that the influx of Mexicans and other Latin Americans has had a "negative impact" on Northwest Arkansas. Morris said immigration has resulted in a "wage depression" for American workers, forced Americans to compete with immigrants for jobs, increased the welfare rolls, and increased crime and drug use in Northwest Arkansas. "The law-abiding, taxpaying citizens are being forced to finance what many believe is the destruction of their own community," Morris said. "Many of us have asked why, for what and who benefits? Who benefits are the private corporations that utilize this low-wage, unskilled labor." Morris was joined at the news conference by a representative from the American Immigration Control Foundation in Virginia and four Washington, D.C.,-based groups-Federation for American Immigration Reform, Negative Population Growth's Immigration Reform Project, Population-Environment Balance, and Americans for Better Immigration. "We say, 'Enough,'" said Dan Stein, executive director of Federation for American Immigration Reform. "We say a country should do its own work. Americans built this country. Americans fought for this country. No more foreign workers. Americans can do any job." Rey Hernandez of Rogers, operations manager of the Economic Opportunity Agency of Washington County, said in a telephone interview after the news conference that immigrants are not taking jobs away from Americans. The agency operates several programs for immigrants including the Multicultural Center of Northwest Arkansas. "Employers in Northwest Arkansas are pleased to have a work force that fills the void that is created by the lack of employees in the indigenous community," Hernandez said. He said he has seen "no motivation" from residents in southeast Arkansas to relocate in the northern part of the state for work. Hernandez said many immigrants in Northwest Arkansas are hard workers who "buy homes and take on citizenship and become productive members of the community." He said the goals of some of the anti-immigration groups "smacks of isolationism." "On top of that, they are selective about who they think should be allowed into the country and that doesn't sit well with me personally," Hernandez said. Morris said the 1990 census showed 400 Hispanics living in Rogers. That grew to 4,113 Hispanics in a 1996 special census. More than 60,000 Hispanics have moved into Arkansas in the past decade, according to Centro Hispano, a Hispanic advocacy center in Little Rock. About 27,000 live in Northwest Arkansas. About 13,000 live in southwest Arkansas, and about 14,000 live in or near Little Rock. Morris said more than 5 million illegal aliens live in the United State. He said he worries about how many of the illegal aliens are "drug smugglers, terrorists, carriers of contagious disease, thieves and murderers." Morris said his group, which he founded in May 1997, is "probably all white," but it is not made up of racially biased people. "The race issue is always thrown out there, and I think it's unfortunate because it's really a form of name-calling to reduce someone who disagrees with a policy as a moral inferior," Morris said. Information for this article was contributed by The Associated Press. California Governor's Race Highlights Mexico, (posted 7/30/98)
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- The race is for governor of the nation's most populous state, but a central debate concerns another country entirely - Mexico. The relationship is more important than California's bond with any state. It's financially crucial: California's exports to Mexico surged 33 percent last year to $12.1 billion and supported 167,000 jobs here. It carries huge political weight, from bilingual education to illegal immigration and drug trafficking. And there is the growing influence of Mexican-American voters. Hispanics overall constitute about 11 percent of the electorate in California. Talk to Gov. Pete Wilson or the Republican who would succeed him, state Attorney General Dan Lungren, and you might walk away convinced that California and Mexico have a healthy relationship based on robust trade. A conversation with Lungren's Democratic rival, Lt. Gov. Gray Davis, however, might lead you to conclude that California-Mexico relations have deteriorated into a cold war at the hands of Republicans. "There's no question that people in Mexico harbor ill feelings toward Governor Wilson," Davis said in an interview. "You will not see me running to the border and pointing fingers at Mexico." For divisiveness, he picks out Proposition 187, the measure promoted by Wilson and Lungren that bars illegal immigrants from attending public schools and receiving social services and health care. Other ballot measures ended bilingual education programs, and banned preferences based on race and gender in public hiring, contracting and education. Davis argues that Wilson's policies have divided Californians along ethnic lines and engendered resentment south of the border. That resentment has depressed Mexican trade and investment, he said. Look how well Texas has done, Davis argues-it exported $31 billion to Mexico last year, more than double what California exported. It's not hard to find some support for Davis's argument in Mexico. A "quiet, seething, long-term resentment" has grown in Mexico as a result of Wilson's policies, said Julian Nava, a U.S. ambassador to Mexico under Presidents Carter and Reagan. Small businesses get hurt as a result. Jose Eusebio Salgado y Salgado, head of the independent Mexican Association of International Studies in Mexico City, said Proposition 187 -- called "Wilson's law" in Mexico-is one of the most serious problems in U.S.-Mexico relations. Wilson said economic results disprove those arguments. Exports increased last year at twice the rate of those in Texas, his spokesman said. And Wilson notes that Californians voted for the criticized ballot measures. "If I am an evil man, I've got lots of company, because the people of California have voted overwhelmingly for (the three ballot measures), including very many Latinos," Wilson said. Wilson and Lungren argue that the North American Free Trade Agreement is the centerpiece of the cross-border relationship. Bolstering trade ties with Mexico can help shield California from the economic woes that are wracking Asia, Lungren said. But Davis, the two Republicans argue, has offered only lukewarm support for NAFTA. Davis supports the trade agreement now, though he was neutral when it was debated in 1993, his spokesman said. Lungren won't knock Wilson while he hints that he wants to improve the cross-border relationship. "I would attempt to view Mexico as a mature neighbor," he said. "If you want someone to respect you, you ought to treat them with respect." Asked directly whether Wilson has hurt the relationship, Lungren takes a long pause. "I think he's got reason to say he's assisted in increased trade, for instance, with Mexico," Lungren said. "The question, really, for me is, what am I going to do?" For Which Audience is Zorro?, (posted 7/29/98) I think this movie really wasn't meant to be for Raza, though the most insulting thing (more than the casting choices) is that it is being marketed heavily to latino audiences; in a broader sense, filmmakers are marketing more flicks (like Out of Sight) to Latino audiences, without some kind of reciprocal commitment to more latino actors, directors, and positive representations. Robert Rodriguez was originally supposed to have directed Zorro, and while I think that would have changed the final product dramatically, this director would not have made it more Latino or respectful of the community. The choices for casting, as the choice of scriptwriter and final edit, are there to make more money, not to please Latinos, so that much really isn't a surprise or any more insulting that most of what Hollywood does (Latino-related or otherwise. Here's a review I wrote:
With the North American Free Trade Agreement in high gear, the most recent Zorro adaptation seems oddly relevant. Not that the filmmakers wanted audiences to draw comparisons between an imaginary19th century crusader and a band of contemporary masked guerrillas in Mexico (Los Zapatistas) who share the same initial. In a telling displacement, the film's villain, Don Rafael Montero (Stuart Wilson), proclaims "Welcome to the future of California," when he returns from exile in Spain and takes over a gold mine through kidnapped slave labor, with plans to buy the state from Mexico's Gen. Santa Anna. The movie was filmed entirely in Mexico - this scene, in particular, at a former cement quarry that aptly reminds us of exploited labor - with lots of Mexican extras standing in as the workers who Montero plans on sealing in the mines after securing his profit. In effect, the film revisits the Spanish colonial system of indigenous peonage, the underpinnings of why the Zapatistas find themselves fighting against the gold mines of the 20th century - the foreign-owned factories, or maquiladoras, along the U.S.-Mexico border - and against continued indigenous genocide. But The Mask of Zorro cloaks these resonances in romantic nostalgia and noble Spanish panache, set on the eve of the biggest act of banditry in the region: the violent acquisition by the U.S. of the entire Southwest from Mexico between 1846 and 1848. At least this time the masked avenger is not the Lone Ranger, that perverse embodiment of frontier justice in the wake of Indian and Mexican uprisings. Instead, the audience can feast its eyes on the more hygenically pleasing Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones, instead of the Zapatistas' Subcomandantes Marcos and Ramona. The movie itself is caught between the fictive license of historical romance and the demands of historical realism, and as a period-placed adaptation of an originally serialized novel, it does justice to neither realm. Starting in 1821, the movie flashes forward 20 years to the main action, though it is derived from events that happened afterward, when the Gold Rush began in earnest and the Foreign Miner Tax of 1850 was enacted to discourage poor Mexicans and Chinese from making a living. As a result, bandits began rustling livestock and sometimes robbing or even killing miners. In California, five renowned bandits allegedly shared the name JoaquÌn, though accounts seized on the surname Murieta as a composite character. Whether or not JoaquÌn Murieta really existed, he was rumored to run with such infamous companions as Three-Fingered Jack. On May 11, 1853, the California State Legislature authorized a special ranger force under the leadership of one Capt. Harrison Love to capture the five JoaquÌns, with $1000 offered as reward for Murieta. Love brought back a head and pieces of a hand, claiming them to be the appendages of Murieta and Jack. Though no positive ID was established, Love earned the $1000 reward (with a $5,000 bonus granted by the Legislature), and the preserved body parts became lucrative trophies for a travelling show. The Mask of Zorro gets its updated bite from incorporating Joaquin Murieta (Victor Rivers) and Three-Fingered Jack (L.Q. Jones), with Banderas playing Joaquin's brother Alejandro and Matt Letscher standing in as their nemesis, Love. From a tradition of dime novels popularizing legends based loosely on historical figures, a half-white half-Cherokee San Francisco journalist named John Rollin Ridge (aka Yellow Bird) immortalized Murieta in 1854 with his account titled The Life and Adventures of JoaquÌn Murieta. Mixing obvious racial resentment with coin-turning sensationalism, the book fulfilled the essentially commercial mission of novels as they originated. With Indian resistance long demolished and Texas-Mexican uprisings recently destroyed, it was safe enough in 1919 for a police reporter named Johnston McCulley to create a Spanish hero named Zorro, which was based on Murieta and other Robin Hood-type characters. McCulley probably didn't know he'd inspire at least 50 feature films and various TV shows, stage productions, cartoons, theme park spectacles, and bedroom fetishes. Aside from one female and one gay Zorro, most adaptations have stayed true to the formula - as The Mask of Zorro does, though with recognition of growing U.S. Latino population and moviegoers. Where Douglas Fairbanks Sr. played the first filmed Zorro (1920), this movie was originally slated to have a Mexican American director (Robert Rodriguez) to mold the Latinoid lead. Regardless, Latino-audience marketing - aggressive in some cases (per profit potential), and indifferent in others (per ignorance) - means that film companies will do their best to take our money but won't necessarily give back better representations of Latinos in the medium. Robert Rodriguez, by the way, left after demanding more than the $44 million budgeted for the overall production. When Martin Campbell (GoldenEye) came on, the budget eventually reached $65 million.
Charter Schools Exempt From Prop. 227, State Says, (posted 7/29/98) LOS ANGELES TIMES Education: Bilingual programs may continue. Impact is limited now, but could grow as such campuses increase. By DUKE HELFAND, Times Staff Writer California's 154 experimental charter schools are exempt from the provisions of Proposition 227 and remain free to continue bilingual education programs without sanctions, state education officials said Monday. The state's interpretation of the successful initiative was prompted by a San Fernando Valley charter school where the principal ordered that several hundred Spanish speaking students be taught in Spanish for the new semester that starts this week. California charter schools are exempt from virtually all state education codes as part of a legislative effort to foster innovation. Based on their reading of state education code and the new law, attorneys for the state Department of Education said the campuses also are exempt from Proposition 227, which requires public schools to replace bilingual education programs with English immersion. "A charter school needs only comply with all of the provisions set forth in its charter petition, but is otherwise exempt from the laws governing school districts," said Allan Keown, deputy general counsel for the state Department of Education. Proposition 227 author Ron Unz said he would not challenge the state's decision, largely because it covers so few campuses. But the exemption of charter schools from the initiative could have broad impact in coming years, when hundreds more are expected to open under new legislation designed to expand the charter school movement. Unz said bilingual education advocates could seek charter petitions to skirt the initiative. "There certainly is an indication that a lot of existing bilingual programs want to reconfigure themselves as charter schools," Unz said. "It's not clear how many will go through with it." Since passage of Proposition 227 by voters last month, public schools across California have been nervously crafting plans to satisfy the new anti-bilingual initiative for the coming school year. Educators are uncertain, for example, how much Spanish can be spoken during classroom instruction. The Los Angeles Unified School District is offering different versions of English immersion. Parents can ask, for example, that their children be taught in English with the help of bilingual aides or teachers. Parents also can seek waivers for their children to learn in their primary language. Educators at several of the 15 charter schools in the Los Angeles district said they are still weighing their options. The leaders of a South Los Angeles charter school that includes kindergarten through 7th grade said they want to preserve bilingual education, as long as parents agree. The Accelerated School, located near USC, modeled its bilingual program after that of L.A. Unified: Students are taught initially in their primary language and are expected to move to English-language instruction by the end of third grade-a method the school's founders say they have found effective. "We definitely have our preference," said co-director Johnathan Williams. "We feel, absolutely, that bilingual educational support is best for our students." Montague Charter Academy in Pacoima, on the other hand, will follow the district's plan for its students, 80% of whom speak only limited English. Montague's charter requires the school to mirror bilingual programs in Los Angeles Unified. "We've had a lot of parents asking for English," said Montague Principal Diane Pritchard. "I think either approach-immersion in English or primary language-can be effective. It's the quality of the teacher that makes the difference." But Vaughn Next Century Learning Center, also in Pacoima, moved ahead with its plans for Spanish-language instruction Monday. An inquiry from The Times about the school prompted the state to review whether Proposition 227 applied to charter schools. More than 80% of Vaughn's students have limited proficiency in English. Students with the least command of English-about 500 pupils in kindergarten through second grade -will spend 90 minutes a day learning to read and write in Spanish. Those students will spend the majority of the day, however, learning in so-called sheltered English, where teachers speak English slowly and use hand gestures and role playing. The rest of the student body will be taught in sheltered English the entire day. Vaughn Principal Yvonne Chan said she and her staff decided to pursue bilingual education because they continue to believe that teaching students first in their native language enables them to eventually make a quicker transition to English. "You use the primary language so students will label in English the concepts and ideas they already know in their mother tongue," she said. Chan has actively recruited bilingual teachers, more than doubling the number over the past four years to 36. The school has set a goal of preparing its students to enter mainstream English-language classes by the end of third grade. Vaughn held meetings Saturday and Monday, and will hold a session today to inform parents of the bilingual program-and to promise that their youngsters will eventually master English. "We are going to assure that all your children will become English-proficient as soon as possible," Chan told parents before classes early Monday. "If your child is [a beginning English speaker], they will get teachers who will help them in Spanish." One class of first-graders began their semester Monday by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in English and Spanish. Then they launched into a reading exercise in Spanish. Teacher Tanya Pauley asked the students to repeat sentences about a monkey named Bono. "Si, si, Bono! Tu te portas bien," Pauley and the 19 students said. "Yes, yes, Bono! You are behaving well." Unz said he did not have any objections to the Vaughn plan. It appears close to the guidelines laid down by Proposition 227, he said, which call for students to spend "nearly all" their class time in English-language classes. "We don't think this is something that represents a significant violation of the letter or spirit of Proposition 227," he said. Copyright 1998 Los Angeles Times. All Rights Reserved Levi Settles Retaliation Cases Out of Court, (posted 7/29/98)
EL PASO, Texas (AP) Levi Strauss & C. has settled out of court this week with about 80 of 110 employees who had accused the jeans maker of retaliating against them for filing workers' compensation claims. Terms were not disclosed, but one attorney said the settlement was in the millions of dollars. The agreement brought an end to legal battles that began when the employees sued in March 1994. Other plaintiffs had signed a deal earlier this year. Fewer than eight have not accepted a settlement. "Nobody is completely happy," said plaintiffs' attorney Sam Legate. "We believe the workers deserve more, and Levi's believes they should have paid less." Levi Strauss lawyers contend the plaintiffs settled now because they realized jurors have come to their senses and that huge jury verdicts won't be upheld. One-year anniversary of Arizona alien roundup, Illegal aliens sue Border Patrol, INS in California, (posted 7/28/98) Chandler's tidal wave of illegals By Janie Magruder Waves of illegal immigrants continue to wash over Chandler, despite a roundup of 432 undocumented workers one year ago that sparked allegations of civil-rights violations. "Phoenix, in general, and Chandler, in particular, are notorious" destinations, said Jim Bailey, an intelligence director for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service office in Dallas. "They're caught in droves down there (in Chandler), and they're coming through in droves, too. It's like a tidal wave." In a six-month period ending March 31, INS agents stopped 215 vehicles carrying illegals in what the agency defines as its Central Region, which includes Arizona and portions of New Mexico and Texas. Many more go unapprehended, according to the INS. Nearly half of the vehicles came up through the Valley, Bailey said. Those stopped vehicles carried an average of 15 people. In Chandler, some of the undocumented immigrants find jobs picking oranges in groves, pouring driveways for new homes or cleaning motel rooms, while others hitch rides elsewhere. Ron Sanders, chief of the Tucson Border Patrol Office, says his agents continue to be active in Chandler and are doing the best they can, given their budget. Border Patrol statistics show that 1,574 undocumented workers were apprehended in Chandler from July 1, 1997, through June 30, 1998. The efforts generated plenty of controversy, most of it centering on how authorities went about their search for the illegal immigrants during a July 27-31 sweep. American-born Hispanics and legal residents charge that their civil rights were violated when they were randomly stopped by police without cause. A group of them filed a $35 million federal lawsuit against the city in August, and another group followed with a second lawsuit Thursday. The sweep kindled the formation of two civil-rights groups: the Arizona Civil Rights Movement Inc. and the Chandler Coalition for Civil and Human Rights. Members often refer to the state Attorney General's searing critique of the operation. Ultimately, Chandler hired its own team of investigators. City officials had guessed the investigation would cost no more than $80,000 and hoped it would be finished by June. The bills since have surpassed $87,000; the report is expected in August. The probe focuses on events before, during and after the operation, when five Border Patrol agents on bicycles, with the assistance of 20 police officers, caught 432 undocumented workers. Police say they were responding to complaints of illegals loitering and of property damage. Sanders said illegals often ignore police, knowing that the cops have no authority to arrest them. But others believe the operation was part of a plan to run Hispanics out of downtown, making way for an ambitious, expensive redevelopment plan. In the lawsuit filed Thursday in Maricopa County Superior Court, 38 Hispanics allege that police violated their civil rights over a period of two months last summer. Most say they were stopped by police because of their skin color and because they speak Spanish. Some say they were handcuffed and arrested, humiliated and frightened. A few lost jobs or business income. Plaintiff Ramon Gomez, who formed the Arizona Civil Rights Movement Inc. after the roundup, said people don't understand the impact of what happened. "Everyone has called this an Hispanic issue, but it's a human-rights issue," Gomez said. "We are human beings, not labels to be put on." In the federal lawsuit, 15 others say police unlawfully questioned hundreds of U.S.-born Hispanics and legal immigrants during the roundup based on skin color and not because they were suspected of breaking city or state laws. "It's a big deal to be in fear of being stopped habitually, which is what happened in this week in July of 1997," said Stephen Montoya, a lawyer who filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court on behalf of the plaintiffs. Montoya has proposed using a retired judge to mediate the case and avoid a long, expensive trial. He's looking for a settlement that would include an apology from city officials and money to set up programs to prevent similar events from occurring again. "A lot of the individuals who were victims lack English-speaking proficiency and a fundamental grasp of their rights under the law," Montoya said. "It would help everyone in the city, even if the immigration sweep had not transpired, to try to educate these people." City officials have refused to discuss mediation, pending the outcome of the investigation. But Mayor Jay Tibshraeny insists that the city has begun to heal the wounds by appointing a Human Relations Commission, naming a Hispanic police liaison and ordering more diversity training for all city employees. Since March, police officers and civilian personnel have attended nearly 1,500 hours of classes on cultural awareness and hate/bias crimes. The department also is considering a proposal by Sgt. James Bruggeman to teach a basic Spanish course to fellow officers. Montoya said he is bothered that top Chandler officials will not admit wrongdoing. But he stopped short of calling for the resignation of Police Chief Bobby Joe Harris, which some Chandler Hispanics have demanded. "I think it was Harry Truman who said, "The buck stops here.' But apparently the city has never heard that," said activist and downtown resident M.R. Diaz. "It's been a year, and maybe the city has a sacrificial lamb, but I haven't seen one." In November, Councilman Martin Sepulveda asked City Manager Lloyd Harrell to put Harris and other top police officials on paid leave, but Harrell declined. Sepulveda, one of two Hispanics on the council, has hired his own attorney and sat through hours of depositions with Montoya. No other council member has been deposed, but Montoya said Tibshraeny and former Vice Mayor Judy Harris, the chief's wife, will be. Bobby Joe Harris, who has 27 years in the department, including four as chief, said he's not going to be the scapegoat. "If they have the money to pay the attorneys to do it, so be it," Harris said. "I don't feel I or any of my staff did anything wrong." Nor does Sanders, the Border Patrol chief, who said he has interviewed the five agents involved on several occasions. Suit Filed in Crash That Injured, Killed Immigrants, (posted 7/28/98) Los Angeles Times A $5-million damage suit was filed Wednesday on behalf of several illegal immigrants who were killed or injured when a smuggler's truck in which they were being transported overturned near Temecula, Calif., April 6, 1996. The Los Angeles federal court lawsuit names the Border Patrol and the Immigration and Naturalization Service as defendants. It contends that federal agents chased the smuggler's pickup at a high speed and failed to use their emergency lights or sirens to get the driver to stop. The California Highway Patrol gave a different account after the accident, which occurred about 5 a.m. A CHP spokesman said the Border Patrol car was half a mile behind the truck when the pickup's driver reached a crest in the road and then hit the gas pedal. As the truck streaked down the hill, the CHP said, the driver lost control. Skid marks indicated that the truck was traveling 50 mph to 70 mph before it overturned and landed in a shallow gully. The camper shell broke apart and bodies were strewn about. Eight people in the truck died and 17 were injured. The suit filed Wednesday seeks compensation on behalf of four survivors and relatives of two people who died. Lawsuits on behalf of the other passengers have been filed in Riverside federal court. Former INS Chief Harold Ezell Battling Liver Cancer, (posted 7/28/98) Friends and colleagues gather at open house to show support for the controversial Prop. 187 activist. By NANCY CLEELAND, Times Staff Writer Harold W. Ezell, the flamboyant former immigration official who helped write Proposition 187 and became its public point man, is battling liver cancer and has been severely weakened by two months of chemotherapy. Tumors were discovered in Ezell's liver two months ago during a doctor's visit for what had appeared to be a prolonged bout with the flu, said Ezell, 61. Since then, the famously outspoken advocate for tougher immigration control has limited his public appearances and his work schedule at the Ezell Group in Newport Beach. Ezell, who served as western chief of the Immigration and Naturalization Service under Presidents Reagan and Bush, later helped write Proposition 187, the controversial initiative to limit public services, such as education and health care, to illegal immigrants. The initiative passed in 1994 but was ruled unconstitutional. At the same time, Ezell built a thriving consulting business that helped wealthy foreigners take advantage of an immigration law that eased restrictions on the condition they would create U.S. jobs. That business, and a more recent business interest in private prison construction, are temporarily being handled by associates, he said. Ezell met briefly Thursday afternoon with about 50 friends and immigration service colleagues who gathered at his office to show support. Gaunt and exhausted, Ezell was uncharacteristically quiet as he sat on a couch and greeted a stream of well-wishers, including several high school baseball teammates. "This is something that always happens to somebody else and not to you," Ezell said in a near whisper. "I'll tell you, if you don't have faith, you don't have a chance." A letter from Ezell thanking those at the open house had warned, "This may be the last time I'll be in public for a while." However, Ezell, with wife Lee at his side, said he is optimistic. He said doctors this week told him the tumors' growth had been arrested. "He's paid a high price for this chemotherapy, but we're so encouraged that it's doing its job," said Lee Ezell. "Now we're on to phase two. They're going to go after those tumors and shrink them." Others, including Ezell's brother, Don, were more guarded. "He's a fighter, but the prognosis isn't good," said the younger Ezell. A minister's son who grew up in Wilmington, Ezell helped implement the 1986 amnesty program, that granted legal residency to nearly 3 million illegal immigrants, during his stint with the INS. The lifelong Republican has rarely held back an opinion, whether warning of alleged voter fraud or promoting the televangelist Benny Hinn, on whose board he briefly served. His strident stands have earned him loyal admirers as well as detractors who have accused him of promoting divisiveness and racism. Visa Program, High-Tech Workers Exploited, Critics Say Visa Program Brings Charges of Exploitation. (posted 7/28/98)
SUNNYVALE, Calif.-For a man with a master's degree who works in the high-tech industry, Satish Appalakutty lives frugally. He shares a small, sparsely furnished apartment with three other Indian computer programmers, sleeping two to a bedroom. Like them, he is saving for the day when he will either go back to India or, if good fortune allows, become a permanent U.S. resident and start his own company. "Most of the Indians I know here are living this way," the 25-year-old Bombay native said as his apartment shook from the rumble of an elevated commuter train about 30 yards from his front door. Appalakutty and his roommates are among thousands of foreign workers who enter the United States every year under a controversial visa program that allows them to work here temporarily. In some ways, they are the high-tech incarnations of the braceros of old, those laborers who were brought in to toil on American farms during and after World War II. Instead of Mexico, the new techno-braceros come from countries such as India, China and the Philippines, and they tend to be well educated and highly skilled. The information technology industry here in Silicon Valley considers their skills vital to the competitiveness of U.S. companies in an increasingly cutthroat global market. But like their low-tech predecessors, today's migrant cyberworkers constitute a vulnerable group that can be easily exploited. Moreover, labor advocates and other critics say the program has been widely abused. Far from having exceptional skills, they contend, most computer workers brought in under it are run-of-the-mill programmers whose availability serves to hold down wages in a tight labor market. These workers are at the heart of a heated debate over the work force needs of America's information technology sector. The issue has sharply divided congressional Republicans, who have been wrangling over proposed legislation to raise a 65,000-a-year cap on a temporary visa category, called H-1B, that is used to bring in thousands of foreign computer programmers. In a compromise announced Friday, House and Senate Republicans agreed to raise the cap gradually to 115,000 over four years and require companies that use the program heavily to attest that they have tried to recruit Americans and have not laid off U.S. employees in order to hire H-1B workers. The debate also reflects some of the broader social questions and power struggles-between business and labor, for example-that have arisen as the nation tries to absorb one of the greatest waves of immigration in U.S. history. Although H-1B visas are meant to grant only temporary status, they allow for stays of up to six years and often are used as a stepping stone to legal permanent resident status, a prerequisite for U.S. citizenship. The program is designed to help companies fill specialized jobs for which American workers are not available. Technology firms say it is crucial to their industry, allowing them to recruit "the best and the brightest" from around the world. Chandra Sekhar, a former H-1B worker from India who settled here and co-founded a high-tech company called Exodus Communications, argues that the primary motive for bringing in foreign programmers is "getting the right people" and that hiring them "at a good price" is secondary. "I'd better be allowed to hire who I think is right for my company," he said. "We want the least amount of government interference." According to foreign workers, recruiters and U.S. officials, the high-tech braceros generally earn less than their American counterparts, despite laws requiring employers to pay them "prevailing wages." The workers are beholden to the employers who sponsor their visas in what the system's critics describe as a form of indentured servitude. If they wish to move to another company, they not only must obtain a new work visa, but often must pay a penalty of $10,000 to $20,000 to their original employer. To keep them from seeking higher pay elsewhere, employers frequently dangle the promise of sponsoring them for "green cards," denoting much-coveted status as legal permanent residents. This gives the companies enormous leverage, since the process is a lengthy one and must be started over from scratch if the worker moves to another employer. Some companies also promise recruits specific jobs, then put them "on the bench" with small allowances while they try to farm them out as subcontractors. The program generates few formal complaints from H-1B workers, however, since they generally earn much more here than they could in their homelands, and because many are reluctant to offend employers who hold the keys to their future. Still, these workers are quick to recognize inequities in their treatment. Appalakutty, who holds a master's degree in computer management from the University of Poona near Bombay, is paid $50,000 a year by his contracting agency. That is a fortune in India, where he had been earning less than $3,000 a year, but falls well below the approximately $70,000 that he says Americans or permanent residents with his education level make for the same kind of work. He said he is still considering whether to seek sponsorship for a green card. He knows he needs it if he is ever to realize his dream of starting his own software company. But he is wary of being tied to an employer while waiting for it. "Sometimes a company takes advantage of you because they know you're stuck to that company," he said. Besides receiving lower starting pay, H-1B workers complain of getting fewer and smaller raises, remaining mired in relatively menial jobs and, as salaried employees, having to work long hours without overtime. "H-1Bs are expected to work harder," said a Filipino immigrant who works for a Japanese computer firm. "Usually the people who stay late are the non-Americans." For many American workers, particularly older ones, such expectations are precisely the problem. They complain of age discrimination and of having to compete with foreigners who are willing to accept lower salaries and work longer hours. Bill Halchin, 48, recently moved to Silicon Valley from Texas after being unemployed for four months and now works as a computer consultant here. He feels employers overlook valuable experience when they "try to do it on the cheap" by recruiting young H-1B workers or Americans just out of college. At his previous job, Indian co-workers complained to him that "we're treated like slaves here," Halchin said. The preference of some firms for H-1B workers makes it difficult for U.S. citizens to get jobs there and "just drives down salaries," he said. The older programmers have watched as a growing corps of foreign workers has changed the face of Silicon Valley. Here, programmers from China, Russia, India and elsewhere tap away at desktop computers in close proximity with Americans, but tend to stick together by nationality outside the office. Many of the Chinese, who seem to predominate among the valley's foreign high-tech workers, can program in the languages of computers but speak little English. The new demographics can be seen even more vividly in the sea of Asian and South Asian faces at the commuter train stations near Appalakutty's apartment, a tide of humanity that reflects the more than 35 percent of Silicon Valley programmers and computer engineers who are foreign-born. At his middle-class complex of two-story apartment blocks, Chinese and Indian immigrants account for about 65 percent of the residents, Appalakutty says. In his own second-floor apartment, the influences of Indian culture mix with those of a bachelor, cyberworker lifestyle. As in India, shoes are left at the door. The living room furniture consists of a television and a stereo. The walls are unadorned except for an Indian calendar, a poster of the Golden Gate Bridge and, in a small dining area, a whiteboard above a cluttered dinette table and a few chairs. Lying in a corner are a basketball and a deflated balloon left over from a roommate's recent birthday party. One challenge for Indian newcomers is food. "We're mostly vegetarians," said Raghaban Srinivasan, 24, who moved into the apartment when he arrived from Bombay seven months ago. Indian restaurants and grocery stores have sprouted around the valley to meet the need, but fast-food choices remain scanty. McDonald's, he lamented, "doesn't have a veggie burger." Still, Srinivasan speaks in awestruck tones of what he has found in this high-tech Mecca. "It's been a wonderful experience," he said. "I drive past companies like Intel and IBM every day. It's thrilling. All the technology in the world originates here. It inspires you and you can really think big." But life in the valley is expensive. The two-bedroom apartment the Indians share rents for $1,600 a month, and better ones they have looked at cost $2,500 a month. Sitting on dining chairs in their bare living room, Appalakutty and Srinivasan agree that if growing numbers of Indians are taking up computer programming, it is not necessarily because they have better skills than young Americans. Often, they say, it is because they are compelled to by their families. "Here, you choose to live more after your heart," Srinivasan said. "Back home you end up doing something you are asked to do. . . . You have a family decision in many cases. There's a lot of pressure." The biggest employers of workers like the two roommates are agencies known as "job shops," many of them subsidiaries of Indian companies or owned by Indian immigrants. These firms import programmers to hire out as "temps" at substantial profits. The agencies here typically charge client companies fees at least three times higher than what they pay the workers, according to employees and recruiters. The client firms benefit by getting workers with specific skills for the length of a project, thereby avoiding outlays for training and benefits. "These companies are misusing the H-1B process," said Dominique Black, who runs a high-tech personnel placement firm in Silicon Valley. "Importing advanced skills is absolutely essential to our national economy. Hiding behind that to bring in mid- and lower-level skills is a fraud." "A lot of the H-1B process smells of indentured servitude," he said. "Should companies hold out the prospect of American citizenship and in exchange put people in a weak bargaining position? That's the real issue." Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), whose district covers Silicon Valley, said she was surprised to find firms she had never heard of heading the list of H-1B visa sponsors. Among them are HCL America (the initials stand for Hindustan Computers Ltd.), a subsidiary of an Indian firm that occupies an imposing, fortress-like building in Sunnyvale. Although immigration law requires companies to make public their records on H-1B visa applications, an HCL America official declined to tell a reporter the name of the firm's chief executive, Arjun Malhotra, much less any information about its H-1B workers. The owner of another company on the list, Lewis P. Wheeler of Pittsburgh-based Computer People Inc., insisted that the Indian programmers he recruits do not take jobs from Americans or receive lower wages-at least not after they have been in the country for awhile and learn their market value. He said U.S. companies often prefer to hire Indians because they are "better at getting themselves educated" in hotly demanded skills. Manuel, a 29-year-old Filipino who did not want to be further identified for fear of retaliation by his employer, relates a different experience. He was recruited in Manila two years ago for an H-1B programming job here, but arrived to find there were no openings for him and dozens of other recruits. He said they were given $100 a week while "sitting on the bench" for three months, then paid $20 an hour when their agency succeeded in hiring them out. An independent contractor would make at least $35 an hour for the same work, Manuel said. In addition, he said, the programmers were required to pay the American-owned agency $10,000 to $20,000 in "breach of contract" penalties if they took a job elsewhere. "That's why lots of people were afraid to jump ship," he said. "It sounds like slavery." John Fraser, acting chief of the Labor Department's wage and hour division, said that although the department does not believe it is legal to keep H-1B workers "on the bench" without salaries, it has not been able to enforce payment. He said the legality of the breach-of-contract provisions depends on state contract law. Initially, Manuel said, his agency paid its H-1B workers by the hour but later put them on a salary, while continuing to charge clients an hourly rate. This meant that "no matter how many hours you work, you don't get any overtime." Manuel, who shares a house with another programmer and his family, said that like many firms, his agency used the prospect of a green card as a bargaining chip to keep employees from seeking better pay elsewhere. In his case, he said, there was no evidence that the agency had actually filed the sponsorship papers. "It looked like a scam to me," he said. Some workers have been waiting for their employer-sponsored green cards for three years, Manuel said. "They can't jump ship," he said, "because they think the green card may come any day." MIGRANT CYBERWORKERS H-1B visas are granted to foreign workers in specialty occupations, most of which require college degrees. These include architects, engineers, accountants and doctors, though high-tech workers account for an increasing share. Indians outnumber other applicants for H1-B visas.
The biggest users of the program are agencies known as "job shops," which import high-tech workers and hire them out as temporary employees to computer companies. Six of the top seven are owned by Indian immigrants or are subsidiaries of Indian companies.
Congress Likely to Allow More Foreign Engineers, (posted 7/28/98) By ROBERT PEAR WASHINGTON-House and Senate Republican leaders reached agreement Friday on a bill to increase the number of foreign computer programmers, engineers and other skilled workers who can be admitted to the United States to fill job openings at high-technology companies. Under the agreement, the annual limit on the number of visas for such workers, now 65,000, would rise to 115,000 over three years, an increase of 77 percent. High-tech companies and their chief executives, including Bill Gates of Microsoft Corp., have lobbied heavily for an increase in the quota, saying that their industry suffers from shortages of qualified employees and that they desperately need skilled foreign workers to help develop new products. "This is a big victory for those who care about the critical high-tech sector of our economy," said Sen. Spencer Abraham, the Michigan Republican who is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration. "There is probably no more important legislation that Congress will pass this year to create jobs and continue the enormous growth of the high-tech and computer industries." The Republican-led Senate passed a similar bill in May by a vote of 78-20, with support from many Democrats, including their floor leader, Tom Daschle of South Dakota. But the legislation bogged down in the House, prompting Speaker Newt Gingrich and other Republican leaders, from both chambers, to meet this week and help work out a compromise. Abraham said the situation was urgent. The 1998 cap on the visas for the skilled workers was reached on May 7, he said, and since then "no company, university or nonprofit organization in America has been able to hire these highly skilled professionals" from abroad. Abraham said he expected the Senate and the House to approve the compromise before lawmakers leave town for their summer recess early next month. Rep. Lamar Smith, the Texas Republican who heads the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, had expressed skepticism that there were labor shortages in the computer industry. But on Friday he said, "This agreement is good for business, good for workers, good for America." President Clinton had threatened to veto the bill if it did not do enough to protect U.S. workers. But administration officials said they welcomed changes reflected in the compromise bill, which was written in part to address the president's concerns. "There has clearly been some progress in our direction," said Gene Sperling, assistant to the president for economic policy, "but it's unclear at this point whether things have improved enough for us to support it. We need to see the details." The compromise legislation would require a company to certify, before hiring a foreign worker, that it had tried to recruit a U.S. worker for the opening and that it had not laid off an American to hire the foreigner. Congressional aides said this requirement would not apply to big companies like Microsoft or Sun Microsystems Inc., where foreign workers perform important jobs but account for a small proportion of the work force. Aides to Abraham said the agreement also included his proposal to provide training for unemployed U.S. workers and college scholarships for low-income students, so that they could pursue careers in high-tech industries. The training and scholarships would be financed with fees to be collected from employers who use the foreign-worker program, but the amount has not been determined. Whether there is in fact a shortage of high-tech workers is a hotly debated question. An industry group, the Information Technology Association of America, says there are 346,000 openings, amounting to 10 percent of all U.S. jobs for computer programmers, engineers and systems analysts. But the Labor Department, the AFL-CIO and several groups representing U.S. engineers say the high-tech industry, trying to hold down its labor costs by hiring from abroad, has overstated the problem. India provides by far the largest number of skilled foreign workers under the special-visa program. Its citizens received 44 percent of the visas, known as H-1B visas, issued in the first half of the current fiscal year. The next largest share went to China, with 9 percent, Britain (5 percent) and the Philippines and Canada (3 percent each). Japan, Germany, Pakistan and France each received 2 percent of the visas, with other countries getting 28 percent. One person who may be affected by the legislation is Valenita Videva, 26, from Macedonia. She came to the United States in 1995 on a student visa and studied mechanical engineering at Norwich University in Vermont. She graduated at the top of her class and was hired by Texas Instruments Inc. after gaining a one-year work authorization from the Immigration and Naturalization Service. But the authorization expired on June 1, leaving Ms. Videva unable to work and unsure whether she could stay in the country. "I applied for an H-1B visa two months before my work permit was to expire," Ms. Videva said in a telephone interview from the Texas Instruments office in Attleboro, Mass. "I was told that the quota was reached for this year. Until today it was so deadlocked, I started losing hope. It meant that I would have packed my things and told my landlord I was going home, and that's not something I wanted to do." The agreement would provide 20,000 additional visas this year, for a 1998 total of 85,000. It would raise the annual limit to 95,000 next year, 105,000 in 2000 and 115,000 in 2001. Rep. Ron Klink, a Democrat from a Pennsylvania district that has lost tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs in the last 20 years, criticized the agreement. "This is a shame," Klink said. "This is a loophole for big companies to hire cheap indentured labor. It's a huge loss to American workers, especially young people who have made their educational decisions based on an expectation of jobs when they get out of school. Instead, these companies will be hiring cheaper foreigners." Senate Eases Rules for Agricultural Guest Work Labor, (posted 7/28/98) Senate Eases Rules for Agricultural Guest Work Labor: Historic measure would let farmers recruit abroad more simply. Plan could bring thousands more harvesters to California and is opposed by Feinstein, Boxer. By JODI WILGOREN, MARTHA GROVES, Times Staff Writers WASHINGTON-In a historic move that could bring thousands more foreigners to harvest crops in California and across the nation, the Senate voted unexpectedly Thursday to overhaul the federal guest worker program and make it easier for farmers to recruit abroad. The legislation would establish a national registry of domestic farm workers intended to help match supply and demand across regions, and would simplify the application process for employers seeking foreign workers. It also would allow farmers to provide vouchers rather than actual housing for their temporary workers and would make foreigners eligible for permanent residency if they pick crops in four consecutive seasons. "We owe this country something better than a system that relies upon illegal immigration," Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Ore.) told his colleagues before the 68-31 vote. "We ought to give these foreign workers the dignity of being here under the law with some dignity and some benefits." California's two senators vigorously opposed the measure, which was hastily attached to a $33.2-billion bill funding the Commerce, Justice and State departments that later garnered unanimous support. They and other opponents cited a December government study that showed no shortage of farm labor and criticized the program for pandering to agribusiness. "If the growers can't find the workers, pay better wages, provide better working conditions," urged Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.), citing double-digit unemployment rates in some rural areas. "The uncivilized conditions of the farm workers are a national disgrace. This is a huge step backward." The legislation faces an unclear fate in the House, where Republicans are divided on the question of guest workers. Some conservatives are loyal supporters of agribusiness, while others worry that migrant workers often remain in the U.S. illegally. Sponsors of the legislation-introduced just days ago-surprised their colleagues Thursday by attaching it to a must-pass bill funding key government agencies rather than vetting it through committee hearings. That gives the measure a much better chance of becoming law: President Clinton has opposed similar changes in the guest worker program but is unlikely to veto a spending bill because such a move could shut down the government. "This is wrong," Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) complained of the attachment to the appropriation measure. "One [person] says it's going to vastly increase illegal immigration, the other says it's going to control it. One says it's going to depress agricultural workers' wages, another says no, it's going to get better. And what's the impact on American workers? We don't know. Something like this oughtn't be rushed through." Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) called the program "a Trojan horse" and predicted it would make the much-maligned bracero program, terminated in 1965, "look good in retrospect." "In California, this will mean literally tens of thousands of additional immigrants coming into the state," Feinstein said. During the late-summer harvest of grapes and raisins, California employs about 436,000 farm workers, as many as 300,000 of them here illegally, according to some counts. Overall, the General Accounting Office estimates that 600,000 of the nation's 1.6 million agricultural laborers are undocumented, while the little-used guest worker program includes only about 25,000 visas per year. Proponents of the new program say farm owners don't want to employ illegal immigrants-in part because Immigration and Naturalization Service raids can scare laborers from the fields and leave crops rotting -- but find the visa system too complicated to wade through. "Rounding up workers doesn't seem to be the problem," said Steve Danna Jr. of Danna & Danna Inc., which grows prunes, walnuts, apples, melons and other crops in Yuba City and Marysville, Calif. "Rather, rounding up legitimate, legal workers is the problem." The government asks growers to call a hotline to check new workers' Social Security numbers, but Danna said he rarely uses the line because it is tough to get through. Jack King, a spokesman for the California Farm Bureau Federation in Sacramento, said that the state has been facing spot shortages of workers but that "we're seeing the potential for severe shortages." The legislation, he added, will be beneficial for growers and workers. "I'm tickled pink," said Mark Draper, a grower and labor contractor in Indio. "Anything we can do to obtain a readily available source of workers will help." Draper, who employs 500 people during the year, disputed the notion that plenty of workers are available to pick crops, saying "unemployed people don't knock down my door." To keep trained workers coming back, Draper offers a per-box premium that brings wages to $7 or $8 an hour, and grows peppers in Bakersfield for the 2 1/2 months of the year when the Coachella Valley is not in production. Still, finding workers "has been a struggle," he said. The registry, which is intended to match unemployed workers with growers who have vacancies, was among the most controversial provisions in Thursday's Senate debate. While many backed the concept of a database to help match laborers and jobs, others worried that few farm workers would actually get registered, creating a false perception of a labor shortage. Because of the registry, current requirements that employers advertise jobs and recruit domestically before bringing in foreigners would be lifted. "Most farm workers earn less than $12,000 a year. They don't have computers at home," complained Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). "Most farm workers don't even have telephones." The changes in housing help was also a major concern, as Kennedy, Feinstein and others worried that there is not enough affordable housing in agricultural areas and that foreigners would find it difficult to negotiate the market. "These guest workers will pocket the meager allowance that's provided here and they'll sleep in the ditch banks," predicted Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Mission Hills), who led the fight against similar guest worker programs in 1996 and 1986. Ironically, Berman and other pro-immigration liberals who oppose the legislation for fear it will depress wages and worsen working conditions often use the fear of illegal immigration to win support. Migrant workers rarely leave when they are supposed to, they point out, instead becoming immigration beachheads as their families and friends follow them to America. The new program, which permits foreigners to work in the U.S. for up to 10 months a year, also includes a direct immigration incentive. Once employed, workers can apply for a three-year extension of their temporary visa; after four consecutive harvests, workers would automatically qualify for a green card. "We have poured money into increasing the Border Patrol, we're finally setting up meaningful barriers to illegal entry," Berman said in an interview. "This amendment blows a hole through those barriers so large it makes a mockery of thinking we're going to stop illegal entries." Wilgoren reported from Washington and Groves from Los Angeles. Outlook On Society: A Dubious 'Diversity' Report, (posted 7/27/98) BY JOHN LEO While clicking from channel to channel in search of the basketball game last week, I came across a bit of "diversity" reporting on CNN. "Diversity" reporting is similar to ordinary reporting, except that facts are usually avoided and the central message is that life in America is essentially a racial struggle between whites and nonwhites, which the nonwhites, or people of color, will win by becoming the majority in the year 2050. The point of the CNN report-a dubious one supported by no evidence-was that young blacks and Latinos are starting to form a strong alliance. The correspondent said, "The once deep divisions between these groups are now blurring, as little by little, consciously or not, young African-Americans and Latinos are creating a common culture, one that will be in the majority by the year 2050." This emerging black-Latino culture isn't discussed much, though one youth worker says that blacks and Latinos now dress alike and listen to each other's music and that both came from "the same slave ship." All suspense as to what the two groups are uniting against disappeared when CNN's correspondent said they "are beginning to realize they're not fighting each other for jobs. Instead they share a far greater challenge." This undefined challenge was immediately defined by a teenage student. She said: "I don't think there's competition between the blacks and the Latinos. I think it's us against the whites." No interest. Oddly, the report introduced two rather impressive young men, one black and one Latino, who talked about getting ahead by perseverance and hard work. But they apparently didn't much interest the correspondent, who seemed more interested in racial politics. The basic question raised by "diversity" reporting is this: Is it really news, evidence of something actually happening in the outside world, or is it the expression of a reporter's or editor's wish, in this case that blacks and Latinos ought to unite in hostility toward whites? A real news account of a dawning black-Hispanic culture or alliance should presumably include some facts indicating that it actually exists. And the reporting would have to take into account how the "deep divisions" between the groups are supposedly fading. Relations in prisons between Latinos and blacks are so bad that the American Civil Liberties Union supports segregated cellblocks in some cases. Also, journalism has its familiar 2050 problem. Some projections indicate that by the middle of the next century, the United States will be about 53 percent non-Hispanic white, 47 percent minority, with the white plurality supplied mostly by older citizens. The fastest-growing segment of the population, Hispanics, will be about 25 percent of the national total and, when added to the black and Asian-American totals, will produce enough political power to neutralize or overthrow the existing order. Maybe. But this assumes that people always vote their ethnicity, not their interests or beliefs. A lot of very different peoples come under the heading of "Hispanic," but if you look at surveys of Hispanic attitudes, they seem very close to traditional American values. Family solidarity, the work ethic, religion, and patriotism rank very high. Polls show that 90 percent of Hispanics think anyone living here should learn English as quickly as possible. About 75 percent think that we have way too many immigrants and that continued immigration depresses wages. Professor Rodolfo de la Garza at the University of Texas held a focus group in which all 14 Hispanics in the room supported California's Proposition 187, which limited benefits for illegal immigrants. In de la Garza's Latino National Political Survey, people of Mexican, Cuban, and Puerto Rican origins didn't acknowledge having much in common, and each group said it was fonder of Great Britain than of Latin America. Only a few called themselves Latino or Hispanic. Most wanted to be called "American." About 90 percent said they were "proud" or "extremely proud" of the United States. It's certainly true that Hispanics will have a lot to say about America's future. But what they apparently intend to say does not seem out of line with what earlier Americans of all races have believed. The other problem with the picture of a nonwhite majority coalition is that Hispanics are blending into the general population at least as fast as earlier white ethnic groups did. Forty percent of Americans of Puerto Rican ancestry who were born here are married to Anglos. About a third of all young American-born Hispanics are marrying non-Hispanic whites. Will their children identify themselves as Hispanic, or as generic whites, like the Italian Irish or the Polish Swedes? It's a fluid situation that can't be summed up by the simple math of 2050 demographics. A large number of Hispanics are moving into well-off suburbs, and a large number of newcomers seem trapped in communities with few jobs, no education, and segregated schools. But on the evidence so far, it's hard to believe Hispanics will become part of a victim movement or an antiwhite coalition. Diversity reporters, take note. One Hundred Years Of Resisting Paradise, (posted 7/27/98)
To those who believe that "globalization" is a '90s development, they're partly correct, but they're off by a century. In recent history, we can actually point to 1898 as the modern era of globalism when the United States acquired its own set of colonies and began its ascension as the world's leading imperial power. To this day, the United States continues to struggle with the consequences of those immoral acquisitions. Through war with Spain in 1898, the United States suddenly possessed Cuba, the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam. It took Hawaii separately and seized Samoa the following year. These acquisitions posed a dilemma: Imperialism and the possession of colonies were antithetical to democracy and modernity. Rather than grant independence, it euphemistically defined its new colonies as protectorates, possessions or territories. "This psychological manipulation was necessary so as to allow the United States into the world of colonialism," says Frank Bonilla, emeritus professor from Hunter College in New York City. Felix Masud-Piloto, director of the Center for Latino Research at DePaul University, says that the United States took these military actions "because in order to become a superpower, it had to possess a two-ocean navy." In effect, U.S. concerns were militaristic, not humanitarian. Initially, Cuba fared better than other "possessions" because, after a four-year U.S. military occupation, its independence was granted, though on the condition that it accept the Platt Amendment into its constitution, which gave the United States the right to intervene in its affairs. That may well explain why the United States continues to impose a unilateral and crippling economic blockade against the island, 10 years after the end of the Cold War-because of an ingrained 19th-century belief that it knows best what's good for the Americas. In addition, Cuba did not become a permanent U.S. colony because it had fought Spain 30 years for its independence, and a new war of independence 90 miles from the United States might not have sat well with most Americans-who had been told Cuba was being liberated, notes Masud-Piloto. Today, the Philippines are free. Yet they endured genocidal wars and untold suffering, striving first to be free of Spain, then the United States, Japan, and then, once again, the United States. They finally achieved independence in 1946, only to be subjected to a "neocolonial" economic and military relationship with the United States, which later included the U.S.-backed Marcos regime. In Hawaii, the U.S. military and non-native business interests colluded to possess the island for the United States. In 1993, President Clinton signed a document (resolution PL103-150) admitting that the United States had taken Hawaii illegally. Puerto Rico was simply invaded and its residents were granted U.S. citizenship in 1917 -- just in time to serve in World War I. The island was made into a "U.S. commonwealth" in 1952. The promise of commonwealth, says Bonilla, was that by 1970, the people on the island would gain an economic status at least equal to the poorest state (Mississippi) in the union. That has never even come close to happening and islanders still can not vote for a U.S. president or for members of Congress. The same is generally true of Guam and American Samoa, but historically, they have enjoyed even less freedoms. Current legislation that would allow Puerto Ricans to vote in a plebiscite also gives Congress veto power over any decision by the people there. Though the choices are statehood, independence or continued commonwealth, the legislation is designed to repeat the plebiscite every 10 years until the statehood option triumphs. But that option will always face stiff opposition in that there are legislative forces that would never permit a Spanish-speaking, Afro-Latino state into the union. Its congressional delegation would immediately be larger than that of 23 states, and possibly Democratic, notes Bonilla, who collaborated on the book "Resistance in Paradise," about the 1898 territories (American Friends Service Committee, $12). A valid plebiscite would be binding and would be internationally supervised free from coercion and veto threats. Bonilla proposed years ago the idea of an independent Puerto Rico in which the island would be politically and economically linked with its regional neighbors. That option, however, is not being offered in the proposed plebiscite. Many people on the island fear that independence would actually mean economic collapse and, thus, opt for the other alternatives. Ironically, the 1898-1899 U.S. acquisitions are generally still struggling with independence, sovereignty and human rights issues -- 100 years after they were "liberated" by Uncle Sam. COPYRIGHT 1998 UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE PLEASE NOTE NEW CONTACT INFO: Both writers are authors of Gonzales/Rodriguez: Uncut & Uncensored (ISBN 0-918520-22-3 UC Berkeley, Ethnic Studies Library, Publications Unit. Rodriguez is the author of Justice: A Question of Race (Cloth ISBN 0-927534-69-X paper ISBN 0-927534-68-1 Bilingual Review Press) and the antibook, The X in La Raza II, and Codex Tamuanchan: On Becoming Human. They can be reached at PO BOX 7905, Albq NM 87194-7904, 505-242-7282 or XColumn@aol.com Gonzales's direct line is 505-248-0092 or PatiGonzaJ@aol.com. Building Better Bridges for All Students, (posted 7/27/98) "Building Better Bridges for All Students Education: Vice Chancellor Manuel Gomez was working in pupils' best interest long before they showed up at UCI." LA Times: Building Better Bridges for All Students -- UCI's
Manuel Gomez. He's a poet. A philosopher. A veteran Chicano activist and son of the barrio. Manuel Gomez is also one of the University of California system's top Latino administrators, a highly visible role model for the minority students who have become so sought-after in the post-affirmative action era. As vice chancellor for student services at UC Irvine, Gomez, 51, has created innovative links between the campus and local schools and community colleges, with the aim of putting more students from poor, predominantly minority neighborhoods on the university track. Such outreach programs-which include providing tutors for elementary students, coaching high schoolers in SAT test-taking skills, hosting on-campus science and math academies, and planning class curricula that prepare kids for college-have become popular alternatives to the affirmative action admission policies that were dismantled by UC regents two years ago. But Gomez, who joined UCI's Office of Student Affairs 26 years ago, was developing partnerships long before they came into vogue. "He was one of the pioneers of the partnership movement," said Russell Edgerton, director of education programs for the PEW Charitable Trust and former president of the American Assn. for Higher Education. "We date the active role of partnerships from about 1985 forward, and Manuel was one of the people that you always wanted to talk to very early on. I remember being impressed years ago with how his programs were more comprehensive and systemic and enduring rather than just a glancing blow." The UCI programs, which in three years helped move Santa Ana College from 44th to seventh in the state in transferring Latino students to the UC system, were cited as a model for what the state should be doing in a recent report by the nonprofit think tank Policy Analysis for California Education. The university-which was one of only three in the nine-campus UC system that saw an increase in minority enrollment this year-recognized the programs' importance two years ago by creating the Center for Educational Partnerships, which coordinates all UCI partnerships. At a time of often acrimonious debate over the value and necessity of affirmative action, partnerships focus on positive ways to help even the playing field, Gomez said. "These programs create bridges," he said. "And in addition, they move us away from the divisiveness of the moment to recognize our common concerns, and ultimately, our interdependence." Gomez, who remains a staunch supporter of affirmative action programs, cited those partnerships as the most significant achievement of his career. But in a recent interview, he emphasized that he wants to be known as more than UCI's highest-ranking minority. "I'm not a Chicano vice chancellor," he said. "I'm a vice chancellor who happens to be a Chicano." One of eight children born to migrant farm workers, Gomez spent his early years shuttled from the sugar beet fields of Colorado to his grandfather's ramshackle house in the Santa Ana barrio of Santa Anita. He remembers a childhood marked by cold nights in brick, tin-roofed migrant housing, but also the comfort of being surrounded by supportive friends and relatives. At a young age, he began working at his mother's side, hefting sugar beets onto a truck or dragging onions alongside him in a sack. He recalled being charmed by the women's talk as they analyzed their dreams in lilting Spanish or tried to describe the nature of the wind and the way the sun warmed the fields. "My mother gave me the love of poetry," Gomez said. "And I developed a love of nature in Colorado. There were so many birds and trees. In some ways, despite the hard work, it was beautiful." Through his work in the fields, Gomez also developed a compassion for farm workers that deeply influenced his college years and continues to affect his thinking on matters of race and ethnicity. His parents-a maverick musician father and a dreamily romantic mother born in the United States to immigrants from Mexico-were products of a segregated educational system where expectations for Latino students were low. Neither one made it past grade school. Yet, despite his family's frequent moves and poverty, Gomez was determined to succeed. He studied with passion, was named to the Santiago High School football team in Garden Grove, and became student body president in his senior year. "He was a good scholar, very ambitious and interesting to talk to, which you can't say about all high school students," recalled JoAnn Lawton, the former counselor who encouraged Gomez to continue his education beyond high school. "He was definitely college material," she said. "He could have been admitted anywhere, but he didn't want to go that far from home and his parents were leery about letting him leave. They didn't want to take the chance of losing him." In the end, Gomez passed up a Harvard scholarship and chose Cal State Hayward in the Bay Area, where Lawton's brother-in-law taught. Backed by a small stipend from Santa Ana banker Manuel Esqueda, Gomez became the first in his family to attend college. "I remember him very well because he indicated that he was going to go into education and that was music to my ears, he being from the barrio and all," recalled Esqueda, who has helped more than 1,000 local students attend college. "And he kept his word. One of my greatest rewards has been watching Manuel Gomez climb. He has never forgotten where he comes from." However, Gomez didn't take a straight shot to academia. Caught up in the activism of the 1960s, he left college to work for Chicano and farm worker rights. "For three years, I traveled all over the Southwest to speak at rallies," he said. "But I grew weary of it. I wasn't reaching people the way I wanted to. That was when I started writing poetry, and it seemed to reach people in different ways." Since then, Gomez has had two anthologies of poetry published, and he continues to teach a freshmen seminar in poetry writing at UCI. He still writes poetry, most recently an affectionate ode to outgoing UCI Chancellor Laura Wilkening, a planetary scientist whose specialty is comets. In "Comets" he wrote: "In communion, shining beyond their nature, They run, chasing themselves around the sun. Not for transcendence or salvation; they are not so vain. Not in worship or desire, but simply because they do. Unlike us, they do not contemplate their nature. . . ." Gomez did eventually graduate from Cal State Hayward with a history degree and went on to coordinate community relations for Oakland public schools-a job that would plant the seeds for university-public school partnerships. In 1972, he "came home" to Orange County, taking a job in UCI's student affairs department. Aside from a two-year stint at the U.S. Department of Education, he's been at the university since. In 1995, Wilkening promoted him to vice chancellor. Through those years, Gomez, who lives in Irvine with his wife and two teenage children, gained a national reputation for forming educational alliances. He plans to travel to South Africa next month on a Ford Foundation grant to help establish similar programs there. Unlike affirmative action, partnerships intervene long before the college admissions process. In neighborhoods characterized by poverty, language barriers and parents with little education, the most important step may be simply persuading young students to aspire to a university education, Gomez said. That's one reason promising middle school and high school students are brought on campus for summer and weekend academies. Schools in low-income neighborhoods also benefit from the expertise of university education specialists, who can recommend curricula changes that better prepare students for college. "One thing we're trying to do now is get more middle schools to provide algebra courses," Gomez said. Community college students are offered information on the college admissions process, scholarships and loans. Whether such efforts will eventually restore minority admissions in the UC system to affirmative action days remains to be seen. Statewide, minority enrollment at UC campuses dropped significantly this year, the first since affirmative action was abolished. The number of blacks planning to attend UC schools dropped by 24% and the number of Latinos by 5%. The declines were pronounced at the most competitive campuses-UC Berkeley and UCLA. However, UCI, along with UC Riverside and UC Santa Cruz, actually showed increases in minority enrollment. UC Irvine registered 29% more African Americans and 21% more Latinos planning to enroll this year. But Gomez was careful not to take credit for the jump. "It went up [at UCI] due to a lot of hard work, but it didn't go up across the system," he said. He pointed out that UCI could have benefited from a "cascade effect," in which minority students rejected at those more prestigious campuses took UCI as a second-choice. "There's a broader concern of access to public institutions that needs to be addressed," Gomez said. "One of my great frustrations has been seeing education, and particularly the universities, being drawn into these polarized racial politics when we should be talking about educational opportunity." At the same time, Gomez said, he's found his university career to be immensely rewarding. "If there was one lesson I have to offer from inside my own life, it would be the immense power of our human mind to create the kind of life we dream about," he said. "That's why I'm happy working in education. In some respects that's what the fundamental task of education is all about, allowing that potential to unfold." Gov. Bush Prasies Bilingual Ed., (posted 7/22/98) July 2, 1998 DALLAS (AP) -- Gov. George W. Bush, a potential Republican presidential candidate, won favor with the nation's largest Hispanic political organization as he demonstrated his own bilingual approach. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, however, drew just polite applause from the audience at the annual convention the League of United Latin American Citizens. While Gingrich made no mention of his support of making English the nation's official language, Bush pushed for an "English plus" approach that favors teaching English while not ruling out bilingual education. "If the bilingual program serves to teach our children English, then we ought to say, 'Thank you very much,' and leave them in place, Bush said Wednesday. "And if the bilingual program locks someone into Spanish and does not achieve state objectives, then we must say 'Change the program, eliminate the program."" The delegates, some of whom have opposed English-only proposals in their states, roared their approval. Bush also frequently spoke in Spanish, even answering some questions at a pre-speech news conference in Spanish. Support for English-only proposals by some Republican office holders has been blamed for driving Hispanic voters away from the party in some states, notably California. Bush also warned against "policy and rhetoric that will wall Mexico off from America." He opposed the use of military troops to patrol the border with Mexico. "The U.S. military is trained to fight the enemy, and Mexico is not the enemy," Bush said. Bush, heavily favored to win a second term as governor in November, has not said if he will run for the White House in 2000. Gingrich is also believed to be weighing a presidential campaign-high-ranking House Republicans are already jockeying to succeed him as speaker. Gingrich followed Bush to the podium and did not directly address the language issue. The Georgia Republican drew his loudest applause when he said the United States shares blame for the prevalence of illegal drugs with the countries where drugs are cultivated. "There's no point in talking about bashing Mexico on drugs or bashing Colombia ... (or) Bolivia on drugs," he said. "The primary problem with drugs in the world today is the American market buying them." Gingrich joined Bush in calling for tougher border enforcement, but also left wiggle room. He said the border with Mexico can't be sealed because that would cut off legal trade along with illicit drugs and illegal aliens. Hispanic Youths Outnumber Blacks, (posted 7/22/98) By Barbara Vobejda The number of Hispanic children in this country has surpassed the number of African American children, the federal government reported yesterday, signaling the leading edge of a demographic wave that will transform the national profile in the coming decades. There are now 10.5 million Hispanic children under age 18, outnumbering non-Hispanic black children by 35,000. That numerical benchmark constitutes the earliest indicator of a population change that experts have predicted for some time-the point seven years from now when Hispanics will become the nation's largest minority group. Taken together, the trend lines underscore the racial and ethnic reconfiguration that is quickly becoming apparent in this country, as white Americans steadily decline as a share of the population and communities coast to coast take on a much more diverse character. Since birth rates are generally higher among Hispanic women, the makeover is occuring first among the nation's children, where classrooms and playgrounds and soccer fields in many communities now reflect a broad range of languages and cultures. "Children are experiencing the diversity earlier than we are," said Ken Bryson, senior analyst at the Census Bureau. "People who have children in school may be aware that the school they went to is not the school their children are going to." In just a generation, the report said, white non-Hispanic children have declined from 74 percent to 66 percent of all children. And by 2020, projections show, more than one in five children will be of Hispanic origin. Also, the number of school-age children who speak a language other than English at home and have difficulty speaking English has doubled since 1979, making up 5 percent of all children in those age groups. In many communities, these changes are igniting a debate over the merits of bilingual education, particularly in California, where non-Hispanic whites will no longer be the majority as early as next year. In an initiative that could trigger similar efforts elsewhere, California voters recently rejected the practice of teaching children in English and their native languages in favor of a year of intensive instruction in English. The report, "America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being," was released by a consortium of federal agencies and dealt with a range of measures describing the nation's population under 18. The statistics, from health to economic status and educational achievement, portrayed improvements in some areas and serious problems in others. Smoking, drinking and drug use, for example, have been rising across racial and ethnic groups, not just among older teens but even those as young as 13. Reading scores are declining among ninth graders. And the proportion of poor children without sufficient food increased from 9 percent in 1994 to 15 percent two years later. But at the same time, infant mortality is down, immunization rates have improved, teen births have declined and more parents are reading to their children every day. Among the more dramatic improvements was the decline in the proportion of children with elevated levels of lead in their blood, a condition that can cause behavior problems and lowered intelligence. In the late 1970s, 88 percent of children age 5 and under had elevated levels of lead. But that figure fell to just 6 percent by the late 1980s and early '90s, the result of legislation banning lead in paint and plumbing supplies, and the phaseout of lead in gasoline, the report said. "That's an enormous public health accomplishment, and it came about by specific legislation," said Duane Alexander, director of the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development. Undergirding all of the other statistics are the demographic changes recasting the population of children. The Census Bureau counts anyone as Hispanic who identifies themselves as such, even if they also identify themselves as white or black. If Hispanics who also consider themselves black were counted as African American, that group would continue to outnumber Hispanics for another three years, according to projections. The growth in the number of Hispanic children, said Harry Pachon, president of the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute, a California research group, "is a good indicator that, as the turn of the century approaches, we're going to have to seriously grapple with the issue of moving from a biracial to a multiethnic society. "The sad thing is that we don't turn that indicator into a positive," he said. "If 30 percent [of Hispanic children] are having difficulty speaking English, that means there is proficiency in speaking Spanish. What we have in our own back yard is a population that can serve as an economic resource." First Lady Urges Better Education for Latino Kids, (posted 7/22/98) July 21, 1998 PHILADELPHIA-First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday used her platform at the National Council of La Raza to reiterate concern about the high dropout rate of Hispanic students and to promote the president's education agenda. Although the first lady addressed issues such as health and diversity in the workplace at the civil rights group's 20th national convention, much of the speech was devoted to improving public education for Latino children. In a report to be released later this week, the National Council of La Raza, the nation's premier Latino civil rights group, reveals that while the high school dropout rate of blacks has fallen to 12 percent, that of Hispanics is at 30 percent. The dropout rate is of immense concern to leaders of Hispanic organizations. Latinos, the fastest growing ethnic group in the country, account for about 11 percent of the population and are expected to become the largest minority group in the country in the next decade. Officials of the National Council contend that Hispanic children are failing because the public schools are failing them. "We need to be sure we make the public school system work for every child, no matter where that child comes from," Clinton said. She swatted opponents of bilingual education, a program that allows students to be taught in their native language as well as English until they become fluent in English. "We want every child to speak English," she said. "Now does that mean they should give up their native tongue? Of course not." The theme for this year's convention is "Honoring our Past, Forging our Future." Organizers marked the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Guadalupe-Hildago treaty, which ended the Mexican-American war, an era some say began the Latino civil rights struggle in America. Hispanic leaders believe education is the key to forging a successful future in this country. "I know that Hispanic families have long recognized education as the gateway to the future. But I also know that for too many young people, that dream is not a reality," Clinton said. She urged passage of the president's education agenda, which allocates $600 million to a Hispanic Education Action Plan. Under Clinton's education initiative, 100,000 new teachers will be hired. Clinton's speech was well received by the nearly 3,000 in the audience, many of whom surged to the front afterward to try to shake hands or get a photo of her. Roy Lozano, manager of corporate relations for Michigan Consolidated, said, "I think she's showing incredible sensitivity in her support for children, health and language issues. We've always recognized the need to be able to speak English to succeed, but not at the expense of our native language." Lekan Oguntoyinbo can be reached at 1-313-223-4550 or at oguntoyinbo@det-freepress.com Schools Draw Plans to Implement 227, (posted 7/22/98) (from the Los Angeles Times) LOS ANGELES, July 21 -- rom pledges of open defiance to scattered examples of quiet enthusiasm, school districts statewide have begun laying plans to respond to Proposition 227, the state's anti-bilingual education initiative. Today, Los Angeles Unified School District officials plan to formally unveil a strategy that seeks a middle ground for teaching limited-English students: Put most of them into English-intensive classrooms, but allow help in their native language if they need it. The plan will cost the district almost $1 million next year, officials estimate, mostly to retrain teachers for English-immersion classes. At least two other major districts are taking a far more combative stance on the initiative, which voters approved overwhelmingly last month. The Oakland and San Francisco school districts, for example, have pledged an all-out fight to preserve bilingual education. Prop. 227 Stands: And Now the Real Confusion Begins, (posted 7/22/98) (from the Sacramento Bee) SACRAMENTO, July 21 -- If opponents of California's old system of bilingual education worried that a hodgepodge of programs, many of them failures, was doing a disservice to immigrant children, they shouldn't relax: Proposition 227 is not likely to bring improvement any time soon. Now that a federal judge has declared the initiative constitutional, schools must scramble to invent the "sheltered English immersion" classes they must now substitute for whatever programs, including bilingual instruction, they had in place for students with limited English skills. Early reactions from school officials around the state suggest those programs will vary wildly, if they are implemented at all. Africa's Legacy in Mexico, What Is a Mexican?,(posted 7/20/98) from the Smithsonian Institution web site: http://www.si.edu/ "Virgin of the Canes," Corralero, Oaxaca, Mexico, 1987 WHAT IS A MEXICAN? Miriam Jimenez Roman Black people in Mexico? The looks of amazement and disbelief on the faces of first-time viewers of Tony Gleaton's photographs are eloquent testimony to the significance of these images. Particularly to those who have little or no knowledge about societies beyond the borders of the United States, these photographs are a revelation. They force us to rethink many of our preconceptions not only about our southern neighbor but more generally about issues such as race, ethnicity, culture, and national identity. Not long ago, on a hot and humid July day, I rode with friends to the town of Yanga, in the state of Veracruz on Mexico's gulf coast. In recent years, Yanga has received considerable attention as one of the Americas' earliest "maroon communities": settlements founded by fugitive slaves. Originally known as San Lorenzo de los Negros, in 1932 the town was renamed for its founder, a rebellious Muslim man from what is now Nigeria. In 1609, after resisting recapture for 38 years, Yanga negotiated with the Spaniards to establish a free black community. "Embrace of Memory," Cuajinicuilapa, Mexico, 1990 Today a recently erected statue of Yanga stands on the outskirts of the town, more a testimony to the persistence of a few Mexican anthropologists who "re-discovered" the place than to the historical memory of its founders' descendants. For as I strolled through the area and talked to the residents, and saw the evidence of an African past in their faces, I discovered that they have little more than amused curiosity about the outsiders who express interest in that past. Yanga's people have quite simply been living their lives as they always have, making the adjustments necessary in a changing world and giving little thought to an aspect of their history for wh |
