Thread: TN:Deportation policies steer illegal immigrants to shadows

Deportation policies steer illegal immigrants to shadows
Gathering comes with risks

By Janell Ross and Chris Echegaray • THE TENNESSEAN • July 2, 2009


When the Martinez family drives the half-hour from home into Nashville, wife Deanna is behind the wheel every time.

It's not because of some standing debate between husband and wife about who is the better driver. It's because Deanna Martinez's husband is one of the estimated 130,000 to 170,000 illegal immigrants living in Tennessee.

He can't renew his driver's license since Tennessee tightened the documentation requirements a few years ago. And Davidson County is the only place in the state where the sheriff's office participates in a federal program in which a traffic stop can lead to deportation.

"Imagine sitting at the breakfast table one day and your husband saying, 'I'm going to be deported because I forgot to use my blinker when I changed lanes the other day.' That's just not a risk we like to take," Martinez said.

Even so, Martinez didn't consider leaving Tennessee until recently, when her husband lost his landscaping job and she learned hers was headed overseas.

Supporters of the driver's license restriction, the sheriff's office 287g immigration program and a 2-year-old state law that allows increased reporting of employers who hire illegal immigrants, say those policies were aimed at forcing illegal immigrants out of the state.

They also say it hasn't worked.

"I think we need a real solution," said state Rep. Bill Ketron, R-Murfreesboro, who sponsored the state's Illegal Alien Employment Act. "We need the federal government to do something real on immigration. But I will continue to introduce legislation as long as the federal government continues to turn a blind eye."
Trying to ride out storm

What has happened, immigration advocates and immigrants themselves say, is that illegal immigrants already in Tennessee are making themselves less noticeable, avoiding large day labor sites and businesses and other places that immigrants gather.

It's hard to generalize what's happening in immigrant communities, but there seems to be a typical ebb and flow in the population, said Stephen Fotopulos, executive director of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition.

"Most immigrants are doing what every American is doing," he said. "They're trying to wait it out and ride out the storm."

One way to measure whether illegal immigrants are moving is through the number of foreign-language speakers in public schools, but it's not perfect because children of legal immigrants also are counted, and some children of immigrants speak English. The most recent statewide figures showed a 6 percent increase to 30,680 students enrolled in English Language Learner classes between the 2006-07 and 2007-08 school years.

Metro Nashville Schools, which had more up-to-date numbers, enrolled 6,400 students in the English Language Learner classes in the 2007-08 school year and 7,200 last school year.

The trends in Tennessee reflect those in other states, an April report from the Pew Center for Hispanic Studies showed. The Washington, D.C.-based research organization found that 2008 marked the first year since 2000 that the flow of new immigrants did not grow and may have even been smaller than the previous year, said Jeffrey Passel, the organization's senior demographer.

The report also found that it was the economy, not increased border patrol or worksite enforcement, that prompted the change. But the economy isn't prompting more immigrants to return home than those who do so in good economic times, Passel said.

"Over half of the illegal immigrants are part of families, and about 80 percent of these same immigrants have kids," he said. "So they are in situations where the decision to sort of pick up and leave and go back is a much more costly and more momentous decision than people might imagine."
Staying under the radar

On Wednesday, Armando Ramirez walked quickly through a South Nashville parking lot frequented by day laborers. These days, he said, they try not to congregate, drawing attention to themselves. They look for places police aren't likely to pick them up for loitering, which can lead to deportation through the Davidson sheriff's 2-year-old 287g program.

"It's one of those things that some people are seen and then don't return," said Ramirez, who came to the U.S. illegally five years ago from Oaxaca, Mexico. Half of Tennessee's foreign-born population is here illegally, the Pew Center estimates, and the largest group is from Mexico.

Ramirez said he is contemplating a return to Mexico. He hasn't sent money to his family there in a couple of months, and jobs here are scarce. "I told my 21-year-old son, who wants to come here, that it's bad right now," he said. "I may have to go back home."

Fear of driving and being seen in places where their peers congregate is making it hard for businesses that serve mostly immigrants — legal and illegal — to survive, said Yuri Cunza, president of the Nashville Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

At El Manjar, a Nolensville Road restaurant and soccer-fan gathering spot, the dining room has rarely been full this year. Owner Ariceli Lopez, a legal immigrant from Mexico, has been forced to cut back the money she sends her father and son in Mexico.

"Like our customers, we are just trying to hold on," Lopez said.

Even with the financial and legal challenges, one illegal immigrant who declined to give his name said he wouldn't be leaving.

Born in Venezuela and brought to the United States by his parents when he was 2 years old, he graduated from a Nashville high school early. He only learned that he was here illegally after announcing his plans to go to college.

Those plans were cut short after he started to fear police presence on campus. He dropped out after three years. But in January, the 21-year-old married father started a college fund for his 2-year-old daughter.

"I may have been the first in my family to have gone to college, but she will get the chance to be the first in the family to graduate from college," he said.

"Most immigrants are doing what every American is doing," he said. "They're trying to wait it out and ride out the storm."

One way to measure whether illegal immigrants are moving is through the number of foreign-language speakers in public schools, but it's not perfect because children of legal immigrants also are counted, and some children of immigrants speak English. The most recent statewide figures showed a 6 percent increase to 30,680 students enrolled in English Language Learner classes between the 2006-07 and 2007-08 school years.

Metro Nashville Schools, which had more up-to-date numbers, enrolled 6,400 students in the English Language Learner classes in the 2007-08 school year and 7,200 last school year.

The trends in Tennessee reflect those in other states, an April report from the Pew Center for Hispanic Studies showed. The Washington, D.C.-based research organization found that 2008 marked the first year since 2000 that the flow of new immigrants did not grow and may have even been smaller than the previous year, said Jeffrey Passel, the organization's senior demographer.


http://www.tennessean.com/article/20090 ... to+shadows

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-161819.html

duplicate post