In the movies, ethnic and racial intolerance are often portrayed as occurring in remote rural communities. Unfortunately, intolerance and bigotry is rampant in suburban communities only a short train ride away from midtown Manhattan.
On September 2, the Southern Law Poverty Center (SPLC) released a special report on the treatment of Latinos in Suffolk County, New York, a collection of Long Island communities 50 to 60 miles east of New York City. After the murder of Ecuadoran immigrant, Marcelo Lucero, SPLC sent a Spanish-speaking researcher to Suffolk County to interview documented and undocumented residents of Suffolk County. The report noted:
The Lucero murder, while the worst of the violence so far, was hardly an isolated incident. Latino immigrants in Suffolk County are regularly harassed, taunted, and pelted with objects hurled from cars. They are frequently run off the road while riding bicycles, and many report being beaten with baseball bats and other objects. Others have been shot with BB guns or pepper-sprayed. Most will not walk alone after dark; parents often refuse to let their children play outside. A few have been the targets of arson attacks and worse.
So how do you defuse violence against minorities? The SPLC makes several recommendations that would work in any community interested in reducing ethnic tension:
- First, local politicians should halt their angry demagoguery on the issue of immigration. There is abundant evidence that Suffolk County officials have contributed substantially to an atmosphere conducive to racial violence.
- Second, the county and state legislatures should mandate that crime victims and witnesses not be asked their immigration status during criminal investigations. As long as they are, immigrants will be unwilling to come out of the shadows to report crimes against themselves and others.
- Third, law enforcement officials should train officers to ensure that they take seriously cases of hate-motivated crime. Until they do, Latino residents will continue to distrust law enforcement officials and avoid cooperation.
- Fourth, the county should maintain accurate hate crime statistics that are readily available to the public. Doing so will help guide county leaders and residents in confronting the problem of hate-motivated violence.
- Fifth, the county should promote educational programs in the public schools to encourage respect for diversity and opposition to hatred. In the end, educating the next generation is the only permanent antidote to hate.
As always, I hope you find the referenced news articles informative.
Best Wishes.
Prepared by
John Vasquez
Chair-Elect
Hispanic Issues Section, State Bar of Texas
johnvasq@gmail.com
PS: With the assistance of the State Bar, these News Summaries will now be posted on the Hispanic Issues Section ListServ and emailed to Section members. Unfortunately, the formatting of the news summary is lost in the process. This make the News Summary a little more difficult to read. In order to give you an opportunity to see the News Summary as formatted, I am starting a new blog for the news summaries at
http://newssummaryhis.blogspot.com/
If the unformatted version of the news summary posted on the ListServ proves difficult to manage, try the formatted version on the blog.
NOTE: This News Summary is a service of the Hispanic Issues Section of the State Bar of Texas, Brian Hamner, Chair. If you would like to support HIS, visit
http://www.texasbar.com/Template.cfm?Section=Sections and click “MyBarPage” (near the bottom of the page) to join online. For further information, contact the Sections Department at 1-800-204-2222 or (512) 427-1463 ext. 1420.
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Top News
Report Cites Culture of Ethnic Hatred in Suffolk County
HAUPPAUGE, N.Y. — An environment of racial intolerance and ethnic hatred, fostered by anti-immigrant groups and some public officials, has helped fuel dozens of attacks on Latinos in Suffolk County during the past decade, says a report issued Wednesday by the Southern Poverty Law Center, an organization that tracks hate groups around the country.
“Latino immigrants in Suffolk County live in fear,” said the report, which the law center released at a news conference here. “Political leaders in the county have done little to discourage the hatred, and some have actively fanned the flames.”
The center’s report is the product of months of investigation on Long Island, including scores of interviews with Latino immigrants and local civic leaders. While it draws heavily on news accounts and public records, center officials said it was the most comprehensive compilation of statements and events showing a pattern of hate crimes in Suffolk that were at least tacitly condoned — if not actively encouraged — by some local leaders.
The center’s investigators made “frightening” discoveries, the report said: “Although Lucero’s murder represented the apex of anti-immigration violence in Suffolk County to date, it was hardly an isolated incident.”
Many Latino immigrants in Suffolk say they have been beaten with baseball bats and other objects, attacked with BB guns and pepper spray, and been the victims of arson, the report said. Latinos, it added, are frequently run off the road while riding bicycles or pelted with objects hurled from cars.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/nyregion/03suffolk.html?em
To read the report Climate of Fear: Latino Immigrants in Suffolk County, N.Y. by the Southern Poverty Law Center, go to:
http://www.splcenter.org/news/item.jsp?aid=395
ACLU Fights 7 Latinos' Loitering Charges: Racial Pattern Alleged In Law's Enforcement
Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia filed paperwork in the Prince William County court system Tuesday, requesting that loitering charges be dropped against three Latinos who were gathered outside their apartment complex.
"We have two problems here," said Rebecca Glenberg, legal director of the ACLU of Virginia. "One is that there appears to be a pattern of using this ordinance to target the Latino community, and two, the loitering ordinance [overall] is unconstitutional."
"These people are paying to live in these apartment complexes and being ticketed to stand outside," Voss said. "What I find so offensive is that the officers obviously walked up with a preconceived idea that they would do whatever they could" to arrest the men.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/01/AR2009090104238.html
EDITORIAL: Workers in America, Cheated
An important new study has cast an appalling light on a place where workplace laws fail to protect workers, where wages and tips are routinely stolen, where having to work sick, injured or off the clock is the price of having a job.
The place is the United States, all across the lower strata of the urban economy.
The most comprehensive investigation of labor-law violations in years, released Wednesday by the Center for Urban Economic Development, the National Employment Law Project and the U.C.L.A. Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, surveyed 4,387 workers in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. Its researchers sought out people often missed by standard surveys and found abuses everywhere: in factories, grocery stores, retail shops, construction sites, offices, warehouses and private homes. The word sweatshop clearly is not big enough anymore to capture the extent and severity of the rot in the low-wage workplace.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/opinion/03thu2.html
To read the report Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers: Violations of Employment and Labor Law in America’s Cities, go to:
http://nelp.3cdn.net/1797b93dd1ccdf9e7d_sdm6bc50n.pdf
E-mails on illegal immigration are eye-opening
The e-mail that popped into my inbox started with an insult and included an attachment full of "facts."
After calling me a "crybaby" for writing a sympathetic story about Mexican immigrants, the sender insisted I read a series of statistics on the effects of illegal immigration on Los Angeles and California. Hospitals, law enforcement and other public services, he said, are being overwhelmed.
At first, because of the sender's tone, I ignored the attachment. Then it arrived again, this time forwarded by a friendly reader. He didn't believe the e-mail, he said, but wanted me to know that three friends had sent it to him. And 10 of its facts were said to have originated in this newspaper.
I'm all in favor of having my eyes opened -- and then making sure my eyes don't deceive me. So I took the 10 "stats" and focused a little light on them. I waded deep into The Times' archive with the help of our librarian Scott Wilson, and made a few phone calls too.
What did I find? A stew made up for the most part of meaty exaggerations and spicy conjecture, mixed in with some giblets of truth. Two of the "stats" are the musings of a conservative op-ed writer. Another takes its information from a government "report" that is, in fact, a work of fiction.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-tobar7-2009sep07%2C0%2C2585698.column
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Texas
Report highlights challenges facing Latina students
While Latina high school seniors have high aspirations, 41 percent of them do not graduate with their class in four years—if they graduate at all, according to a new report which addresses the challenges facing Latina students.
The report, “Listening to Latinas: Barriers to High School Graduation,” by the National Women’s Law Center and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) finds that as Latinos work to provide for their families, education often takes a back seat.
http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/somosaustin/entries/2009/09/04/while_latina_high_school_senio.html
Survey: Latinas face challenges that hinder their education
(CNN) -- Most Latinas have goals to graduate and get professional jobs, but challenges including discrimination and gender stereotyping undermine their chances of success, a new survey shows.
"About 80 percent of the students surveyed want to graduate from college and perhaps go further," the report said. "And 98 percent reported that they wanted to graduate from high school. Yet the dropout rates of Latinas are extremely high."
http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/09/04/lia.latinas.education/
Latino in America
This October, Soledad O'Brien journeys into the homes and hearts of a group destined to change the U.S. Witness the evolution of a country as Latinos change America and America changes Latinos. CNN's "Latino in America" explores how Latinos are reshaping our communities and culture and forcing a nation of immigrants to rediscover what it means to be an American. To learn more about the series “Latino in America”, go to:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2009/latino.in.america/
Lawyer's slate is clean, but Internet keeps dismissed grievance alive
When the State Bar of Texas dropped disciplinary charges against Dallas attorney George Solares a year and a half ago, Solares assumed the matter was over and his law career would continue unimpeded.
But the former president of the Dallas Hispanic Bar Association didn't bank on the reach of the Internet, where accounts of the charges being filed popped up every time a prospective client checked him out.
"I'm embarrassed I never did anything after the [dismissal]," Solares said. "I assumed it went away."
But after being asked about his "problems with the State Bar" repeatedly by potential clients and organizations wanting him to speak at international seminars, Solares wants the public to know the charges were dropped and his disciplinary record is clean.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/DN-solares_03met.ART.Central.Edition1.4c00106.html
Mentors in LULAC program to give kids reasons to believe
Teresita Hurtado has often remembered the words her seventh-grade teacher told her on a school day one blue Monday afternoon:
"You're a fighter, Teresita, and you're special. So keep fighting."
Over the years, Hurtado has found herself echoing the words to inner-city youth who are struggling to stay in school or college. As a new school year begins, she expects to repeat them again.
She's one of 25 volunteers who have signed up and been trained as part of a mentoring program being organized by the LULAC National Education Service Centers Inc. to work with middle school students in Oak Cliff.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/localnews/columnists/molivera/stories/DN-olivera_29met.ART.State.Edition1.4bee91d.html
Wheels of progress are turning for Hispanic college football players in Texas
For years, Hispanics have lamented the dearth of Hispanic college football players in Texas, especially at the bigger schools.
Throughout my 32-year career as a sportswriter, it’s a question that has perplexed Hispanic sports fans in all corners of the state. Of course, they have reason to wonder why there aren’t more Hispanics in the college ranks.
After all, this is a big state with a large percentage of Hispanics who play high school football.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/sacultura/Wheels_of_progress_are_slowly_but_steadily_turning.html
Commentary: It’s time to replace Texas’ bilingual education policy
English is the language of opportunity in the United States and Texas. To ensure a bright future for all Texans, teaching English effectively and as quickly as possible to those who do not speak it must be of paramount importance to educators and policymakers.
While Texas' non-English speaking population continues to steadily increase, Texas maintains an outdated and ineffective bilingual education policy that only three other states — New York, New Jersey, and Illinois —still have.
Texas lawmakers need to examine whether the state's bilingual education programs can be more effective at teaching students English. The new research report I produced for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, “Does Bilingual Education Work? The Case of Texas,” examines this question and determines that current bilingual education programs are ineffective and should be replaced with sheltered English immersion.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/6601746.html
Irving dispuesto a arreglar demanda electoral
El cabildo de Irving considerará este jueves un acuerdo para finiquitar una demanda de violación a los derechos electorales entablada por un residente hispano.
El cabildo está dispuesto a pagar $200,000 dólares a Manuel Benavídez por concepto de gastos de abogado y establecer un sistema electoral por medio del cual sus ciudadanos elegirán a seis de los ocho concejales según los vecindarios donde vivan. Los otros dos concejales y el alcalde continuarán siendo electos por voto general.
http://www.aldiatx.com/sharedcontent/dws/aldia/locales/stories/DN-WEBirving_00dia.State.Edition1.2d8d90b.html
UTSA business school recognized
The University of Texas at San Antonio's College of Business graduate school has been named No. 1 in the nation for Hispanic students by Hispanic Business Magazine. The publication ranks schools based on the percentage of Hispanic students and faculty, student support services, graduation rates and reputation.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/UTSA_business_school_recognized.html
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USA
Hispanic Influx Causes Tensions with Blacks
Virginia - In a region where race relations traditionally have been defined in terms of Black and White, an influx of immigrants to the Deep South in the last decade has upset the delicate cultural balance and created tensions among longtime residents and new ethnic groups.
The changing demographics have forced the South to again confront its prejudices as it becomes home to unfamiliar cultures. This time, however, the resistance has come not only from whites, but the region's largest minority group, African-Americans.
In Georgia, Black legislators recently defeated a bill supported by the governor to broaden the state's "minority" designation to include Hispanics. The bill would have allowed Hispanics, whose population in Georgia increased by at least 120 percent since 1990, to be included in tax breaks for companies that hire minority contractors.
Though the vote angered many Hispanics, some said the South could still emerge as a leader to improve relations between the groups.
http://www.dailypress.com/bv-hispanics010320,0,4967522.story
Justice for Latino Farmers
Latino farmers expected that the Obama administration would remedy the discrimination they have suffered for decades at the hands of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Instead, the White House remains an obstacle to closing a shameful chapter in racism.
There is no question that the agency long discriminated against African American and Latino farmers in how it issued loans. Rural aid programs regularly offer support to farmers in times of need during the agricultural cycle. This could mean, for example, situations where the lack of liquidity for purchasing seeds can lead to a farmer going bankrupt. Yet, the USDA systematically denied these critical loans to black and Latino farmers.
The USDA eventually acknowledged its discriminatory practices. To this point, the federal government has negotiated out-of-court agreements of more than $2 billion in compensation to African American victims of the USDA’s discrimination.
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=c0560a4f97e12db3df585c3350a6c4ad
Aiming to add more diversity under America's blue skies
(CNN) -- Audrey Peterman grew up surrounded by Jamaica's verdant mountains and lush mango orchards. She'd watch fish and an occasional shrimp dart in the stream that flowed near her house. When she settled in America, she yearned to relish the natural beauty of her new homeland.
But amid the breathtaking views, she noticed a glaring omission. Under the pristine blue skies, there were hardly any people of color.
By midcentury, minorities are expected to become the majority in this country, but 5.5 percent of the current park system staffing is Hispanic, while 9 percent is black and 1.8 percent is Asian, according to the National Park Service. About 80 percent of the park service work force is white.
In a report issued in May, the park service acknowledged it needs to make diversity in both its work force and its visitors a priority.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TRAVEL/09/02/national.parks.minorities/
Remarks as Prepared for Delivery by Attorney General Eric Holder at the Hispanic National Bar Association Annual Conference
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Sept. 3 -- The following are remarks as prepared for delivery by Attorney General Eric Holder at the
Hispanic National Bar Association Annual Conference:
Thank you, Ramona Romero, for your kind introduction. And congratulations to the very deserving recipients of this year's awards: Christina Hernandez-Malaby, Mari Carmen Aponte, and, of course, Justice Sotomayor.
It is my great privilege to join you for the 34th annual conference of the Hispanic National Bar Association, particularly on the occasion of your first judicial conference.
The effects of this recession have been felt broadly - in all regions and in virtually every neighborhood. And although there are new signs that the economy is turning around, many of our most vulnerable communities - particularly communities of color - have shouldered a disproportionate share of the economic burden during the past two years.
As members of the legal profession, it is our responsibility to help ease that burden when possible - so that all Americans have the chance to prosper. The men and women who created the HNBA several decades ago understood this special responsibility to fight for justice.
When Latino children were denied entry into schools and Mexican-Americans faced unlawful discrimination in the West, the founders of the HNBA used the law to change lives for the better. For in the final analysis, the law serves as the great equalizer of our society - and it is still our job to make it so.
http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS234389+03-Sep-2009+PRN20090903
Arrest in L.I. church Hispanic hate crime case: Suspect is Hispanic
Suffolk County police have busted the man who left an anti-Hispanic note at the altar of a church.
And the suspect is Hispanic.
Christian Mungia Garcia, 25, was arrested Friday night after hurling a wooden log and a glass bottle at a congregant of the Iglesia Evangelica Refugio de Salvacion in Patchogue. Cops later accused Garcia of leaving the hate-filled note Wednesday at the church.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/09/06/2009-09-06_arrest_in_li_hate_crime.html
Upcoming editorial: Confirm Tom Perez
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. has his work cut out for him cleaning up the mess the Bush administration left at the Justice Department. Having begun by appointing a special prosecutor to investigate CIA abuses in the torture of terror suspects and hiring veteran career attorneys to oversee the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility and Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, one of his top priorities must be reorganizing the agency’s long-suffering civil rights division so that it can return to its traditional mission of enforcing anti-discrimination laws and protecting the rights of minorities.
None of this is going to be easy, and Republican critics of change in the Senate are already coalescing around opposition to Mr. Holder’s choice to head the civil rights division, Maryland Labor, Licensing and Regulation Secretary Thomas E. Perez. Mr. Perez, a former Montgomery County Councilman and civil rights attorney in the Clinton Justice Department, is an experienced lawyer and administrator who has excellent qualifications for the job.
He also served on the board of CASA de Maryland, an immigrant rights group that criticized a 2007 Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency operation in Baltimore that targeted Latino day laborers. But GOP senators have pounced on that incident as evidence that Mr. Perez is too liberal on immigration; they’ve used it as a pretext to put his nomination as deputy attorney general for civil rights on hold, possibly postponing for months the administration’s efforts to reorganize the division.
http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/2009/09/upcoming_editorial_confirm_tom.html
ACLU: Colo ID theft probe was 'fishing expedition'
DENVER—Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union maintain Weld County authorities went on a "fishing expedition" when they seized thousands of tax documents from suspected illegal immigrants for an identity theft investigation.
The ACLU has asked the Colorado Supreme Court to uphold a District Court ruling that stopped the investigation in April. The judge ruled that Weld County authorities violated people's privacy and had no probable cause to inspect so many confidential taxpayer records.
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_13239899
Massive Iowa immigration raid trial could be moved
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- A federal judge on Monday delayed the trial of four former top managers at an Iowa slaughterhouse where 389 people were arrested last year in what was the largest immigration raid in U.S. history at the time.
U.S. District Court Judge Linda Reade agreed to an Oct. 13 trial date as she considers whether to move the trial out of Cedar Rapids, about 75 miles from where the kosher Agriprocessors Inc. operated in Postville. Defense attorneys want it moved to another state.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/31/AR2009083102764.html
US seeks tighter rules on foreign farm workers
WASHINGTON — The Labor Department is trying again to roll back Bush administration regulations that made it easier for farmers to hire temporary foreign farm workers.
The agency on Thursday said it is proposing new rules that would boost wages and increase safeguards for thousands of seasonal workers brought in each year to help farmers pick their crops. It would also require that growers make greater efforts to fill those jobs with American workers.
If the rules are adopted, they would largely reverse regulations finalized shortly before President George W. Bush left office and return to a framework that had been in effect since 1987.
Labor and immigrant rights groups have criticized the Bush regulations, claiming they would slash farm wages and make it harder for domestic workers to claim those jobs.
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/sep/03/us-guest-workers-090309/?nation&zIndex=159831
With more labor inspectors, enforcement expected
SEATTLE -- Bob Blank's frustration is evident when he talks about an inspection of his Okanogan County farm by U.S. Department of Labor wage inspectors.
"These people absolutely appeared to be bent on not helping, but fining the farms," Blank said. "The problem I have with that, in my case, it's the first time you show up in 35 years, and you tell me 'fines.' I'm gonna get (irritated) about that. You're not working with me. You're working against me."
The new inspectors are welcomed by labor advocates, but they're a cautionary development for employers.
"After the last 8 years, where inspectors all but disappeared at the federal level, we definitely welcome appropriating more money," said Erik Nicholson of the United Farmworkers of America. "We called those the dark ages - pretty much dead for eight years in terms of enforcement."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/06/AR2009090601181.html
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General Interest
Former US attorney addresses Hispanic convention
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.—David Iglesias says U.S. attorneys should be appointed for six-year terms that overlap administrations to minimize the influence of politics on what should be an independent federal office.
The former U.S. attorney for New Mexico—one of nine federal prosecutors fired in a series of politically tinged dismissals in 2006—spoke Friday at the Hispanic National Bar Association's annual conference in Albuquerque.
"When you talk or think about prosecutors, there should be two adjectives that are attached: independent and integrity. If you don't have those two, you don't have a legitimate prosecutor," he said.
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_13276543?nclick_check=1
Los latinos sufren más por el cáncer
Casi uno de cada dos hombres y una de cada tres mujeres hispanas de Estados Unidos serán diagnosticados con cáncer a lo largo de su vida.
"La buena noticia es que el cáncer ya no equivale a una sentencia de muerte, pero entre las malas para esta minoría destaca el menor acceso a prestaciones médicas", dice el doctor Israel de Alba, quien durante el próximo año presidirá la Sociedad Americana del Cáncer en California (ACS).
http://www.impre.com/laopinion/noticias/2009/9/3/los-latinos-sufren-mas-por-el--145748-1.html
Sons of Immigrants Have High Obesity Levels, Report Finds
The sons of immigrants to the United States suffer from alarmingly high levels of childhood obesity, according to a new report funded by the Foundation for Child Development.
Thirty-four percent of kindergarten-age immigrant boys are obese or overweight, compared with 25 percent of the sons of native-born Americans, according to an analysis of data collected by the U.S. Education Department. By eighth grade, that number rises to 49 percent, compared with 33 percent among natives. No similar discrepancy was found among girls.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2009/09/04/ST2009090400697.html
To read the report Moving to the Land of Milk and Cookies: Obesity among the Children of Immigrants, go to:
http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?id=739
Cronkite students push innovation on the Web
Arizona State University students are part of a national experiment showcasing how journalism can be done in innovative and in-depth ways on the Web.
Ten students in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication produced a series of multimedia reporting projects on “Latino America” that are featured on a national Web site for the Carnegie-Knight News21 Journalism Initiative. The work also is being distributed to news organizations around the country via McClatchy-Tribune News Service and Gannett Digital.
The projects look at the social, economic, cultural and political impact of the surging Latino population in the United States.
http://asunews.asu.edu/20090901_news21
To view the series Latino America, go to:
http://asu.news21.com/
Mexican consulates educating workers on rights
ATLANTA - Mexican consulates around the country plan to launch an effort next week to educate their citizens on their labor rights when working in the United States.
The "Semana de los Derechos Laborales," or "Labor Rights Week," will feature events in 11 of Mexico's 50 consulates in the U.S., including Atlanta, Los Angeles, San Diego, Dallas, New York, Chicago, Phoenix and Houston.
"We believe that this is an area of information that our community is in great need of," said Salvador De Lara, consul general in Atlanta. The consulate in Atlanta gets at least five to 10 complaints a week from workers whose labor rights have been violated, he said.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-ga-immigrants-laborr,0,724586.story
An Airing of Border Issues, but No Coverage for ‘Illegal Immigrants’
The plight of people underserved by the nation’s health care system will get an airing next week in El Paso, Tex., at a meeting where the health care debate in Washington will provide the context.
“When people don’t have health insurance, they live sicker and they die younger,” Dr. J. James Rohack, president of the American Medical Association, said in an interview Friday. “And when you look at racial and ethnic disparities, the numbers are even worse.”
The meeting of the association’s five-year-old Commission to End Health Care Disparities begins Wednesday and will feature talks by Dr. Willarda V. Edwards, president of the National Medical Association, which represents black doctors, and Dr. Elena Rios, president of the National Hispanic Medical Association.
http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/29/an-airing-of-border-issues-but-no-coverage-for-illegal-immigrants/?scp=4&sq=immigrants&st=cse
Harvard-educated American helping Mexico's 'lost'
MALINALCO, Mexico — In the fresh mountain air of this ancient community that once served as a spiritual training ground for Aztec warriors, a displaced Mexican American teen has grasped the helping hand of an Ivy League-trained humanitarian.
Jennifer Amilpa, 13, born and raised in a small Virginia city, moved here last year and now finds herself immersed in the bewildering society of her mother's hometown in central Mexico.
Ellen Calmus, the Harvard-educated American founder of a small volunteer agency that aids immigrants and their families, is the woman who will try to pull Jennifer through her struggles.
Jennifer arrived in this picturesque getaway about 65 miles southwest of Mexico City in November after her mother and stepfather decided the family needed to return to Mexico. Socorro Echeverria, her mother, had migrated illegally to Culpeper, Va., 16 years ago.
“She really doesn't read or write Spanish,” Echeverria said. “The teachers don't really understand her.”
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/mexico/Harvard-educated_American_helping_Mexicos_lost.html
Reforma escolar en marcha para Los Ángeles
Las escuelas secundarias Francisco Bravo y Óscar de la Hoya graduaron el pasado año al 96% de sus alumnos. En la secundaria Wilson de Los Ángeles, el 77% de los estudiantes terminaron con el diploma en la mano.
Entre los dos primeros planteles suman un 7% de deserción, mientras que en la escuela Wilson 18 de cada cien alumnos de secundaria abandonan los estudios.
Los tres campus se ubican en la misma partición del Distrito Escolar Unificado de Los Ángeles (LAUSD) y sirven en su mayoría a estudiantes latinos de bajos recursos. Las diferencias en los resultados deben entenderse bajo el modelo de enseñanza que aplica cada uno: la secundaria Wilson es una escuela regular mientras que de las dos primeras una es una mágnet y la otra una chárter, respectivamente.
http://www.impre.com/laopinion/noticias/primera-pagina/2009/8/31/reforma-escolar-en-marcha-para-145230-1.html#
Opinion: 'Jobs that Americans won't do'
With fewer jobs for Americans these days, are there fewer jobs that Americans won't do?
The answer will influence whether Congress decides to grant amnesty to some 11 million illegal immigrants in the US, perhaps by next year.
Most illegal workers in the US are Mexicans who mow lawns, clean motel sheets, butcher hogs, pick strawberries, and otherwise toil away at tasks that, as George W. Bush once said, "Americans won't do." And they often are paid less than the minimum wage.
A widely held assumption in Washington's debate about immigration is that native-born Americans avoid menial and dirty work. Laid-off autoworkers wouldn't really wash dishes at a Denny's or milk cows on a dairy farm, would they? Such a notion has long helped justify a flow of foreign workers into the US – or possibly an amnesty for those hiding from the law.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0901/p08s01-comv.html
Navarrette: The paradox facing American workers
Immigration restrictionists have been nursing this fantasy that, confronted with hard economic times, American office workers would swap their briefcases for pruning sheers and head to the fields to do those tough and dirty jobs that - it is rumored - Americans won't do.
And yet, there have been few sightings. Having just returned from a trip home to Central California, I saw plenty of workers picking fruit in 100-degree temperatures. But none looked like native-born Americans - unless, of course, they were Mexican-Americans. The fruit pickers all appeared to be Hispanic. What are the odds?
Actually, they're pretty good, according to a recent article in The Wall Street Journal about the California dairy industry. It talked about how farmers can't get Americans to work as "milkers," so they have to rely on Hispanic immigrant labor. The work is hard, dirty and tedious - and the hours are brutal.
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_13271142
Yes, immigrants get sick too
WHEN IT COMES to healthcare for immigrants, it’s hard not to think of Shylock’s famous lines from “The Merchant of Venice’’ by William Shakespeare: “If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?’’
Do newcomers to America not get sick? Do they not fall off ladders, get struck by reckless drivers, break arms or collarbones or noses?
To judge by the way immigrants are denied access to health coverage in the current system, you’d think they were made of Kryptonite.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/09/04/yes_immigrants_get_sick_too/
Immigration talks seek consensus for Miami-Dade policy
With only her face and neck poking above the dais, a 13-year-old girl Wednesday talked about how the deportation of her bread-winning father to Guatemala tore asunder her family.
``I know our lives wouldn't have been like this had our dad not been deported,'' said Ashley Guerra, of Sweetwater, citing the loss of her parents' home. ``They deported him because he didn't have his papers, but I don't think that's a good reason.''
Ashley's first-hand testimony about the effects of immigration policy on her family was delivered Wednesday at Miami-Dade County Hall as local leaders and immigrant advocates gathered to study a proposal that aims to articulate a single county position on federal immigration reform.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/sfl-miami-immigrationc-bn090309%2C0%2C6321597.story
Hate crime unnerves Chicago family who won lawsuit
The two-story brick home on Chicago's Northwest Side has become a prison for her family, says Alisa Rodriguez.
She has trouble sleeping and shuns taking prescription medication so she's always alert. At 120 pounds, she's lost about 25 pounds from the stress. She finds herself constantly checking to make sure the doors and windows are locked.
"This is the first time in my life where I don't feel safe," said Rodriguez, 37, a mother of two. "It's really hard to explain to a child what hate means."
Rodriguez said the source of her family's anguish is a neighbor, Joseph Marrone, who has intimidated, threatened and harassed them for two years.
He called the Rodriguezes ethnic slurs and repeatedly threatened to sexually assault their children, ages 9 and 6, and their mother, according to the court complaint. At one point he placed a derogatory sign in his backyard.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-hate-crime-04-sep04,0,4722079.story
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