3/16 – AJC – Hispanic population doubles across metro area | ajc.com

Hispanic population doubles across metro area  | ajc.com.

By Jeffry Scott

7:36 p.m. Thursday, March 17, 2011

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The growth of the Hispanic population in metro Atlanta nearly doubled since the 2000 census, outpacing the huge Hispanic population surge statewide, despite the slump in the housing industry that employed many Hispanics.

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Miguel Martinez/Mundo Hispanico The Hispanic population grew 96 percent in Georgia between 2000 and 2010, with more than a 152 percent increase in Gwinnett County; about 100 percent in Clayton County; and about 80 percent in Cobb, the Census numbers show.

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In a core nine-county metro area, the Hispanic population grew from 247,477 in the 2000 census, to 477,891, a jump of over 93 percent.

The greatest boom in the 9-county area was seen in Henry County, where the population swelled a whopping 338 percent, from 2,693 up to 11,813. Gwinnett had the greatest increase in number of Hispanics, growing from 64,136, to 162,035, an increase of 97,899.

State-wide, Hispanics accounted for 853,689, or 8.8 percent of all Georgians.

Among the metro cities that showed the greatest increases in the Hispanic population were Roswell (plus 5,507), Sandy Springs (4,852), Lawrenceville (3,683), Canton (3,292), Atlanta (3,084), Alpharetta (2,576), Lithia Springs (2,144), Forest Park (2,022), Stockbridge (2017) and Lilburn (1,647).

The numbers surprised some leaders in the Hispanic community who believe, based in part on anecdotal information, that the local Hispanic population had declined as jobs went away with the housing bust.

They also said the lack of a hard count and only an estimate (approximately 820,000 statewide) from the U.S. Census Bureau during the peak of the housing boom could mean thousands of Hispanics, many of them illegal immigrants, could have come and gone from the state and metro area between 2000 and 2010.

Census-takers did not ask respondents whether they were in the country illegally.

“I find it hard to believe that that number is up as much as it is,” said Teodoro Maus, president of Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights. “From what we understood, from what people were telling us, they have been leaving, not coming.

“This surprises me and I still do not believe they have the numbers right. Many Hispanics will not tell the census workers how many live in a home, because they are afraid they will be kicked out.”

Hispanic and minority group organizers over the last two years have worked hard for a thorough count of minorities. Jerry Gonzalez, executive director of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials, on Thursday praised the campaign as a success and announced the group’s next goal – gaining a seat in congress.

“GALEO looks forward to working with the Georgia Legislature during the upcoming redistricting process to ensure Latino interests will be able to influence future elections at the congressional, state legislative and local levels of government,” he said in a statement.

Another grass roots organizer for the full count, Helen Butler, executive director for the Coalition for the Peoples’ Agenda, wasn’t quite so eager to praise.

“I still have to go over the numbers,” she said. “And I’m still concerned about legislation that is being considered right now targeting Hispanics in the state.”

An immigration bill, considered in the Georgia Legislature this session that would ban noncitizens from colleges, failed. But another bill that would require law enforcement to check immigration status of suspected illegal immigrants and require E-verify for employers is still in place in the final weeks of the session.

Jesus Brito, the Mexican-born owner of Brito supermarkets, said that he believed the population boom is mostly the result of the birth rate in the Hispanic community. From his observation, based on customer traffic, many Hispanics came and went in the last decade.

“I have seen a reduction in the Hispanic population in the last three years,” he said. “That reduction starts in Cobb and then in Gwinnett. That was one of the most affected [counties]. [I know this] for businesses that have been closed, for clients, by walking in the streets. You notice that the people are not there.”

Former state senator and Hispanic Sam Zamarripa said Thursday the near doubling of the state’s Hispanic population, despite all the politics around the issue of immigration, bodes well for Georgia economy.

“That’s a lot of buying power for groceries, cars and goods that drive commerce,” he said. “It’s a lot of home owners, apartment rents and people who pay property taxes and help our cities. We are just getting a glimpse at the remarkable contribution this community is making to our state.”

Mundo Hispanico reporter Johanes Rosello contributed to this article.

3/17 – New York Times – Rights Group Faults U.S. on Detained Immigrants – NYTimes.com

Rights Group Faults U.S. on Detained Immigrants – NYTimes.com.

 

By KIRK SEMPLE

Published: March 17, 2011

Immigration enforcement in the United States is plagued by unjust treatment of detainees, including inadequate access to lawyers and insufficient medical care, and by the excessive use of prison-style detention, the human rights arm of the Organization of American States said Thursday.

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The group, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, issued those findings in a report that also took aim at a federal program that allows county and state law enforcement officials to enforce federal immigration laws. The report said the government had failed to ensure that local police were not singling out people by race or detaining illegal immigrants on the pretext of investigating crimes.

The commission recommended that the federal government cancel the program, known as 287(g).

While many of the findings reiterated criticisms that have been made before by immigrant advocates and others, the report appeared to be the first comprehensive review of American immigration enforcement in recent years by an international body of the organization’s stature.

The commission, based in Washington, has no enforcement powers, but it has considerable moral authority and a record of cooperation by member countries, including the United States.

The 155-page report was based on hearings and research that began in 2008, including visits in July 2009 by a team of investigators to six American detention centers in Arizona and Texas.

Since much of the research was completed, however, the Obama administration has begun a major overhaul of the detention system. A month after the commission’s visits, immigration officials announced a sweeping plan to establish more centralized authority over the system and to renovate centers designed for penal detention to make them more appropriate for detainees facing deportation, particularly those accused of administrative violations.

The administration said it would also close centers that were rarely used or failed to meet its standards, and would consolidate the nation’s patchwork of detention centers to meet increasing demand in specific areas, especially near big cities. It also said it would explore alternatives to detention.

Felipe González, president of the commission, acknowledged those plans but said the commission would withhold judgment on the efficacy of the reforms. “According to the information that we have so far, it’s not clear that it’s been implemented or will satisfy the international standards” of human rights, he said in an interview.

The commission will continue monitoring immigration enforcement to ensure that its grievances were addressed, Mr. González added.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees enforcement, said Thursday that the department would review the report, and made no further comment.

Earlier, however, the Obama administration was given a draft. In their response, according to the report, administration officials pointed out that they had conducted their own comprehensive review of immigration enforcement and made “important changes.”

Still, the commission said it was “deeply troubled by the continual and widespread use of detention in immigration cases,” the report said.

“The Inter-American Commission is convinced that in many if not the majority of cases, detention is a disproportionate measure and the alternatives to detention programs would be a more balanced means of serving the State’s legitimate interest in ensuring compliance with immigration laws,” the report said.

Mr. González also expressed skepticism that the administration would provide less penal settings for immigrants held on administrative, rather than criminal, charges. “It’s not clear to us whether the new system will really mean that the facility will provide migrants in detention with a system that is fully respectful of human rights,” he said.

Mr. González said his commission was inspired to investigate the system after receiving numerous requests from human rights advocates and civil society organizations. The group, he added, is now planning to investigate other immigration detention systems in the hemisphere.

3/15 – Huffington Post – Janet Murguía: Georgia: On Immigration, Speeding Down a Dead-End Street

Janet Murguía: Georgia: On Immigration, Speeding Down a Dead-End Street.

Georgia: On Immigration, Speeding Down a Dead-End Street

Posted: March 17, 2011 10:12 AM

Last year, Arizona set off a national firestorm when it passed SB 1070, legislation widely seen as unconstitutional and condemned for legitimizing racial profiling. The brand of politics that led to this law pushes all the buttons of a public legitimately frustrated with federal inaction on immigration. Sadly, it delivers no solution to the issue, nor does it help the state with its catastrophic budget woes unless distraction is regarded as help. Why, then, would legislators in Georgia choose to drag their state down this same rocky path?

Consider what has happened in Arizona. The law has been decried by prominent leaders in the state, including the mayors of Phoenix and Tucson, as well as the National League of Cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, and more than 55 city councils and state legislatures. Various boycotts of the state by performing artists and civil rights organizations, plus travel bans by a variety of entities, have cost the Arizona tourism industry dearly. To date, cancellations and a decline in bookings have lost the state as much as $217 million in tourism and convention business. Moreover, the state has racked up legal fees of well over $1 million in just the first three months following the law’s passage, and the state’s image has suffered incalculable damage. And all of this comes after several other harsh anti-immigrant laws were already passed in Arizona under the same pretext as SB 1070, namely, that they would “fix the problem.” They ended up being false solutions, just like this new racial profiling law.

The anti-immigration bills in Georgia suffer from many of the same problems as those in Arizona. They would open up any official, agency, or subdivision of the state to lawsuits if a private citizen feels that they failed to use employment verification, even though the system in question is still in its pilot phase. They would also subject a priest, family member, or Good Samaritan to criminal sanctions for transporting an undocumented person, expose banks, landlords, and others to criminal sanctions if they engage in transactions with people in the country illegally, and shift the focus of local law enforcement from criminal behavior to a person’s legal status.

Many states are already putting the brakes on SB 1070 copycat legislation due to its troublesome consequences. Kentucky, for example, estimated that implementing such a law would cost the state “a net $40 million a year in court, prison, and foster care fees,” which excludes business, tourism, and related losses already reported in Arizona. And those losses would be even greater in Georgia since Atlanta is a renowned international business center, home to some of the most important companies in the United States, including Coca Cola, UPS, NCR, Delta, and CNN, and it has a rich and unique civil rights history. Indeed, Atlanta will host the annual Civil Rights Game on May 15 between the Atlanta Braves and the Philadelphia Phillies. Let’s hope the governor does not choose to welcome this celebration by passing a law that codifies racial profiling and trades our tradition of civil rights for cheap politics and empty solutions.

Some believe that capitalizing on Americans’ frustration with Congressional inaction on this issue is good politics. We don’t. If Georgia’s legislators want to see a real solution on immigration, we encourage them to join business, law enforcement, religious, and civil rights voices demanding that Congress, which has the jurisdiction to fix this problem, take action. Perhaps then, State Senator Jack Murphy (R-Cumming) could answer his own question — “Do you want immigration reform or not?”–truly in the affirmative. Sadly, his bill does not.

The Georgia Legislative Black Caucus overwhelmingly voted against the current Assembly bill and previous iterations. Prominent state voices representing a diverse set of views, including the Georgia Catholic Conference, the state’s Restaurant Association, and the Georgia Farm Bureau, have openly opposed these measures while urging federal reform. We urge Governor Deal to heed these voices — and those of many Americans who have chosen to shun Arizona — by vetoing this legislation and demonstrating that speeding down a dead-end street is not a smart choice for his state.

Wade Henderson is the president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition of more than 200 national organizations working for an America as good as its ideals.

Janet Murguía is President and CEO of the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States, which works to improve opportunities for Hispanic Americans.

Follow Janet Murguía on Twitter: www.twitter.com/jmurguia_nclr