Dr. David Hayes-Bautista set out to show that the growing Latino population, whose increase is mostly because of higher birth rates, plays a key role in balancing retiring baby boomers Tuesday evening during a University of the Pacific public forum.
"Latino babies are going to grow up and pay (Social Security) for these baby boomers," Hayes-Bautista said. "I see this is one of the best things that happened, ... so we need to invest in it."
Hayes-Bautista also challenged labels of Latinos as idle, unhealthy and public assistance-prone people. READ FULL STORYRead more…
The Sonoma County Grand Jury is embarking on a recruitment campaign to draw more Latinos and younger people to the jury.
"Basically, grand jurors are older, gray-haired people who are white, and they really do not reflect accurately the population of Sonoma County," said current jury foreman Richard Klein of Santa Rosa. "There are significant issues in Sonoma County that have to do with Hispanics and Latinos and things that have interest to younger people, and we just don't have those (jurors)."
The jury examined its own makeup in an investigation and has begun reaching out to community groups of active young people and Latinos.
The group is also on a quest to generate more applicants from all county residents. The goal is to receive 80 applications, but only 30 have been submitted to date, and the deadline is April 19.
"Last year, we had so few applicants to the grand jury that we ran the risk of not having a complete jury," Klein said. "It's an untenable situation." READ FULL STORYRead more…
Hispanics made up nearly half of the more than 1 million people who became U.S. citizens last year, according to a Hispanic advocacy group.
The National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials said the number of Latinos who became Americans in fiscal year 2008 more than doubled over the previous year, to 461,317. That's nearly half of the record 1,046,539 new citizens overall in 2008, a 58 percent increase from 2007.
"Latinos who naturalize are eager to demonstrate their commitment to America by becoming full participants in our nation's civic life," said NALEO president Arturo Vargas, whose nonpartisan group works to improve the citizenship process and increase Latino participation in civic activities.
NALEO based its findings on Homeland Security Department data on the number of new citizens last year who immigrated from predominantly Spanish-speaking countries.
In a report released in March, the agency attributed the record number of new citizens to the nearly 1.4 million citizenship applications it received in 2007. Most were from people who wanted to beat a $265 increase in the citizenship application fee, from $330 to $595.
But the department also credited "special efforts" by Hispanic media, community groups and a union with high immigrant membership, all of which urged eligible permanent residents to pursue citizenship. READ FULL STORYRead more…
For Patricia Gandara, Co-director of the Civil Rights Project at the University California at Los Angeles, the educational outlook for Hispanics is grim: Although Latinos are the largest and fastest-growing minority group in the nation, they drop out of high school at alarming rates and have made virtually no progress in the level of college completion in the last 30 years.
During a lecture at Teachers College on February 26, Gandara said that the percentage of 25- to 29-year-old white Americans attaining a bachelor’s degree or higher increased from 24 to 34 from 1975 to 2005. The numbers for Hispanics, however, remained essentially flat, increasing only from 9 to 11 percent over those same 30 years. Meanwhile, Latino communities have become among the most segregated and isolated throughout the Western states, and half of all Latino babies are now born to single mothers. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Lecturing a conscript conclave of Justice Department bureaucrats, Attorney General Eric Holder called America a "nation of cowards" last week for not spending more time talking about race.
Reading his speech, however, one recalls the sage counsel of Pat Moynihan to President Richard Nixon in 1970: This whole subject might benefit from a long period of "benign neglect."
One point Holder did allude to, without specifics, was this: "It is not safe for this nation to assume that the unaddressed social problems in the poorest parts of the country can be isolated and will not ultimately affect the larger society."
Fair point. And what are some of those social problems?
A 70 percent illegitimacy rate in black America, an incarceration and crime rate seven times that of white America, a 50 percent dropout rate in many urban high schools, African American graduates reading and computing on average at eighth-grade levels. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Open almost any urban newspaper to the foreclosure notices and you’ll find the list heavy with Hispanic names. Times are tough for Americans of every demographic, but for Latinos they are grimmer still.
Is this the end of the Latino-American Dream? The answer, in Spanish and English, is “no.”
President Obama has unveiled a $75 billion plan that includes helping homeowners who are behind in their monthly payments but could keep up if their mortgage terms were eased a bit. Many Latinos would fit this category. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Creating trust and assuring confidentiality are the biggest challenges facing the U.S. Census Bureau in gathering an accurate count of Latinos for the decennial population count next year.
Those were among the key points raised at a briefing on the 2010 census organized Wednesday by the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) in Washington, D.C. Latinos have been under-counted in previous census counts and efforts by LULAC and other national Latino organizations are aimed at making the next population count more accurate. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Today's economy is putting a strain in many people's pocket books. Several Latino families are finding themselves cutting back on many expenses including their regular check ups at the doctor's office.
Maria Gonzalez watches her spending very closely. "It's a drastic change," said Gonzalez. READ FULL STORY & VIDEORead more…
What does the worst recession in a generation look like?
It is both deep and broad. Every state in the country, with the exception of a band stretching from the Dakotas down to Texas, is now shedding jobs at a rapid pace. And even that band has recently begun to suffer, because of the sharp fall in both oil and crop prices.
Unlike the last two recessions — earlier this decade and in the early 1990s — this one is causing much more job loss among the less educated than among college graduates. Those earlier recessions introduced the country to the concept of mass white-collar layoffs. The brunt of the layoffs in this recession is falling on construction workers, hotel workers, retail workers and others without a four-year degree. READ FULL STORYRead more…
When "NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams" producers looked for faces to illustrate their upcoming weeklong series on Latinos in the United States, they found one portrait in a well-known Waukesha family.
Waukesha County Circuit Judge Ralph Ramirez, his mother, Margaret, and his oldest daughter, Alicia, were interviewed for hours this month, with film shot in their homes, in Ramirez's court and in the Fitchburg store where Alicia recently started her new management job after college.
The series is called "We the People." Given the news show's time limits, footage will inevitably wind up on the cutting room floor. But producer Maria Alcon said in an e-mail that Monday's segment, set to air at 5:30 p.m. on WTMJ-TV (Channel 4), will use the Ramirez family to demonstrate the Hispanic population's growth and roots established by generations finding opportunity in places you wouldn't necessarily expect, like Wisconsin. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Puerto Rican and various Hispanic groups are upset with the carrier, Spirit Airlines, for using a cartoon image of a ‘dark skinned’ Latina judge "Justice Ochita Supreme,” to promote their recent $8 ticket campaign, reports El Diario La Prensa. This was launched the day after President Obama named Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. Madelyn Lugo, chair of the National Puerto Rican Day Parade, who filed a complaint against the airline, said she understands that companies want to promote their product, “but not at the expense of the Hispanic community." READ FULL STORYRead more…
It has the makings of a telenovela: A handsome Cuban-American priest and TV personality caught cavorting with his girlfriend on a Florida beach. After much soul-searching, he decides to leave the Catholic Church for his love.
Even as many Americans scratch their heads and ask "Father who?" the saga of the Rev. Alberto Cutie has become a media sensation in the Latino community, both here and in Latin America.
"It's in all the papers in my country," said Costa Rican masseuse Karla Nolee, herself the daughter of a former Roman Catholic priest. "He is so famous internationally, it's touched people."
Around office watercoolers and over afternoon coffee, people are talking about "Padre Alberto," even those who barely knew of him before the scandal. READ FULL STORYRead more…
When Luz Reyes moved to Central Oregon last year from Salem, she was surprised at the lack of diversity in the area.
"Wow, I'm the only bean in a field of rice," she said.
Though she found everyone welcoming at Central Oregon Community College where she studies nursing, she still felt a little left out.
"You're pretty much on your own in terms of diversity," she said.
Reyes, 20, is part of a growing population of Hispanics in Deschutes County who are changing the fabric of the area. From libraries to police, agencies are adapting to more diversity in the area and an influx of Spanish speakers. READ FULL STORYRead more…
A report released last week by the National Women's Law Center (NWLC) and the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF) examines the high dropout rate of Latina high school students. The report found that 41 percent of Latina students do not graduate from high school in four years with a standard diploma, according to a NWLC press release.
Through surveys, focus groups and interviews, the study found that Latina students have high aspirations. A vast majority of the students surveyed said they valued education, with 98 percent desiring to graduate from high school and 80 percent hoping to graduate from college. The study found barriers to these achievements include poverty, immigration status, lack of parental involvement, limited English proficiency and schools with limited resources. Latinas also face the highest teen pregnancy rates of any ethnic group, and, according to the study, this causes many to leave school. READ FULL STORYRead more…
Recently in the media a couple of articles have been printed that paint a pretty bleak picture of the prospects of the GOP winning back Hispanic voters (“Republicans Sound Alarm on Hispanic Voter Gap,” May 18; “RNC Hiring Chafes Top Hispanics,” May 20, http://www.politico.com). I was quoted in both articles and felt it necessary to expand on my remarks and add some observations.
While it is true that many Hispanic Republican leaders are anxious to see progress on efforts to regain lost ground among Hispanic voters, this should not be confused with a lack of support for the core values of the party or the inspirational leadership of RNC Chairman Michael Steele.
Let me be very clear: The Republican Party must recapture a material portion of the Hispanic vote or we will not win national elections in the future. I make this stark prediction based not on emotion but, rather, on facts. Mistakes have been made in recent years, and we have a lot of work to do to earn back the interest and the trust of Hispanic voters; the good news is that it can be done. Let us examine why this is so imperative.
Hispanics are the fastest-growing demographic group in the country. By 2050, we are projected to swell from 15 percent of the population to 30 percent (132.8 million people). Non-Hispanic whites will shrink from 66 percent today to only 46 percent in 2050. The effect beyond 2050 will be even larger. In 2050, 62 percent of children are expected to be minorities, up from 44 percent today, with 39 percent being Hispanic and 38 percent non-Hispanic white. READ FULL STORYRead more…
With the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor for the U.S. Supreme Court, conversations quickly turned into debates about race and, in particular, about the term ‘Hispanic’ and what it means, or may not mean, to be called a Hispanic.
Many newspaper articles, television editorials, and blogs about Sotomayor question whether or not it is even relevant that she is Hispanic. Is she a Hispanic, a Latino, a Puerto Rican, or just an American? There has even been a question as to whether or not she would even be the first Latino/Hispanic on the Supreme Court!
Some pundits wonder why race is even a part of the conversation. The confirmation process of Sotomayor should be based purely on the basis of her qualifications, her judicial track record, and her judicial demeanor. Race should not be a part of the process. Sounds good in a color-blind society, but in the real world it doesn’t work that way.
The question of what we call ourselves: Latino, Hispanic, or Mexican-American is a debate that has been swirling around for some time now. Here at La Prensa San Diego we have often been asked the questions, “What do you call yourselves? What is a Hispanic? Where does the term Chicano comes from?” READ FULL STORYRead more…
The ax fell without sound or shadow: Tatiana Gallego was suddenly called into human resources and laid off from her job as an admissions counselor for a fashion college.
"The way people tried to explain it to me was, I was the last one hired so I was the first one out," said Gallego, 25, who had worked there for 17 months.
Last hired, first fired: This generations-old cliche rings bitterly true for millions of Latinos and blacks who are losing jobs at a faster rate than the general population during this punishing recession. READ FULL STORYRead more…
After moving to the U.S. 10 years ago, Juana Carabarin still wanted to cook Mexican food for her family but often didn't have time to go to specialty shops for the ingredients.
Now the Publix grocery in Norcross, Ga., near her home carries products used in Mexican cuisine — including corn husks for tamales, chilis in the spice aisle, chorizo and queso fresco in the refrigerator case and some branded items. And she no longer has to make do with stand-ins. READ FULL STORYRead more…
What's best for Latino students who struggle with English? Should they be taught through bilingual education or are English-only programs the way to go? The answer for a school district in Charlotte, N.C., seems to be a strong combination of both.
At the Collinswood Language Academy (kindergarten through sixth grade) students spend half their day learning subjects like math and science in Spanish and the other half being taught history and social studies in English. The program has been around for a decade and in Charlotte, home to a huge influx of Latinos, it is in great demand. READ FULL STORYRead more…
After Cheryl Green, a black teenager, was gunned down, allegedly by Latino gang members, near her house after school, her mother was approached by several African Americans offering to retaliate violently for her daughter's death.
Earlier this week, Charlene Lovett recalled the moment, looking back on how tense relations between blacks and Latinos had become in the section of Harbor Gateway known as "The Strip." READ FULL STORYRead more…
