Thread: Hanover's underground Hispanics

http://www.eveningsun.com/localnews/ci_4114939

Hanover's underground Hispanics

The Evening Sun
Evening Sun

By CHRISTINA KRISTOFIC

Evening Sun Reporter

She handed out fliers in restaurants and stores. She gave them to doctors' offices and churches.

But nobody came to Dr. Carol Vidal's focus groups.

Nothing on the fliers seemed threatening to Vidal, herself an immigrant and native Spanish-speaker. But almost anything is threatening, she said, "when there's so much fear about what might happen."

Like being arrested and deported to your home country. (Or worse, being deported to the wrong country.)

Hispanics in Hanover keep themselves well hidden, a community leader told Vidal. When they do gather together, it's in churches, stores and shopping malls.

So that's where Vidal went to meet Hispanics face-to-face.

Vidal visited St. Joseph's Catholic Church and St. Vincent's Catholic Church – two places where she knew Hispanic people would gather regularly. She went to stores that were "obviously Hispanic."

"Usually within any population that's underground, there are gatekeepers, and you talk to them and they drive you to the rest of the population," Vidal said.

The store owners and Hispanic community leaders pointed Vidal to streets where Hispanics live. So she started going door to door.

Vidal needed to talk to a broad group of Hispanics – community leaders, day laborers, men, women, children – for a study she was doing for Hanover Hospital and Adams-Hanover Counseling Services. She needed to identify the community and its needs.

And Vidal learned many Hispanics' needs are not being met locally because the community is underground.

Vidal's report is based on the perceptions and experiences of the people she interviewed. They are not named because many of them are undocumented.

One community leader told a story about a woman who didn't have money or insurance but needed medical care. A social worker at the hospital asked the woman if she was illegal.

"She had a Social Security card, which was a fake. It was an obvious fake," the community leader told Vidal. "It didn't even look like Social Security, but she had paid something for it in Miami. But I don't know how that ended up, probably not well."

Hispanic community leaders said many Hispanics go to York Hospital, Gettysburg Hospital or Mission of Mercy Clinic.

"All of the people that nobody in this community wants go to Mission of Mercy," a Hispanic community leader said.

"I mean, we have had people at Mission of Mercy that had cancer that would see, other than what they can get at Mission of Mercy, no services É There are a lot of people that do try to get services, do go to the emergency room, do go to state health, do go to migrant health, do go everywhere É and are turned away."

Some Hispanics believe they are turned away because they don't speak English.

"The secretary at the office is saying that if you don't have a translator, then you have to go back," said a Hispanic community leader. "And they are treated like they don't count."

Many Hispanic adults rely on their children, who study English in school, to translate for them. This reverses the traditional parent-child roles and prematurely empowers the children.

One Latino community member said, "Children are growing up too fast É They are losing respect for their parents. Many of them complain about their children because they say, 'He has told me that he will tell the police if I yell at him.'"

Doctors have another concern – the child-translator's lack of knowledge in medical terminology preventing doctors from providing proper care.

A Latino physician said, "On one occasion, it has happened that bowel or colon diseases have been translated as 'enfermedades del punto,' which means 'diseases of the point.'"

Hanover Hospital and Adams-Hanover Counseling Services decided last year they needed to develop a better understanding of the community because they saw more Hispanics coming for services, said Flavius Lilly, vice president of organizational and community development for the hospital.

The two agencies got a $10,000 grant from the state Department of Health and a $3,000 grant from the York County Community Foundation. They agreed in October to hire a psychotherapist and full-time bilingual coordinator for mind-body health to do the study – Vidal – and to share her services.

When she took the job, Vidal knew she would work with the Hispanic population in Hanover. But she didn't know exactly what she would be doing.

She spent a month just trying to find people to interview for her study. It took another four months to interview 10 key Hispanic community "informants" and two focus groups.

Vidal's report was done in May. But the hospital waited to release it until this month because hospital officials wanted to make sure their findings were accurate, Lilly said.

Vidal organized her findings based on the weight Hispanics gave them in conversation, listing their primary concerns as the community's isolation, its limited access to services and poor English skills.

Many of Hanover's Hispanics come from Mexico and about 80 percent of them don't speak English, Hispanic community leaders told Vidal.

"There are more men than women that come, because of the apple," said a Hispanic community member. "And although they come being migrant workers that go around picking up the fruit, many stay here because it is quiet, the schools are very good."

But Hispanics don't always have good feelings about the places where they live. One community member told Vidal, "Hanover is dead."

Other Hispanic community members said they feel Hanoverians and even other Hispanics discriminate against them.

One Latino community member remembered experiencing racism when she first arrived in Hanover with her daughter five years ago:

"I had to go to get her vaccinated and people are very racist, like very closed É In the elevator, we entered not saying anything and everything was fine. But as soon as we started talking in Spanish, boy, I almost wanted to go out running. People are, like, very narrow-minded."

Another Latino community member said some Hispanics who legally immigrated don't want to help illegal immigrants "because they fear they might not be accepted by their neighbors and are afraid that the increasingly growing population of immigrants will bring more problems."

The poor English skills and feeling of segregation from the community, real or perceived, increase illegal immigrants' sense of isolation and feelings of fear. Hispanics interact with the community as a whole and only seek medical and social services in emergencies.

But Hispanics are not passive, Vidal said. They are struggling to adapt to American culture and learn English so they can communicate and move more freely in the community.

Vidal said Hispanics in Hanover were very cooperative with her (once she found them) and she enjoyed doing the study.

"For me, it was really interesting because I really like learning about other cultures," she said.

Contact Christina Kristofic at ckristofic@eveningsun.com.

I don't even know where to start.

In the elevator, we entered not saying anything and everything was fine. But as soon as we started talking in Spanish, boy, I almost wanted to go out running. People are, like, very narrow-minded."

In a small confine like an elevator, this would, like, probably irritate me. But knowing how LOUD they speak, I, like, KNOW it would.