http://www.heraldnewsdaily.com/stories/ ... 83388.html

Some Hispanic immigrants lack US hurricane relief
Staff and agencies
09 October, 2005

By Hilary Burke 34 minutes ago

NEW ORLEANS - New Orleans is known for its jazz and blues, not its salsa music.

But the area is home to tens of thousands of Hispanics who were uprooted by Hurricane Katrina along with everyone else in late August. Some are immigrants who may get little or no government help, and may not even look for it, depending on their legal status.

When Oscar, an illegal immigrant from Honduras who feared having his last name published, first evacuated with his family to Houston, he did not even consider seeking help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency .

"Why would you go put your head in the wolf‘s mouth?" he said.

But Oscar later found he could apply for FEMA relief on behalf of his 4-year-old daughter, who is a U.S. citizen.

Not everyone is so lucky. Most temporary residents, even those working legally, aren‘t eligible for cash assistance. In general, federal and state disaster aid is reserved for U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents.

In the greater New Orleans area, the 2000 Census counted about 60,000 Hispanics. But community activists put the population at between 80,000 and 100,000 people, mostly Hondurans, Mexicans, Nicaraguans and Cubans.

Many Hispanics were born here and, as U.S. citizens, have no barriers to getting disaster relief such as housing or unemployment assistance. But some are undocumented or stuck in a legal limbo.

"If we work and pay taxes, why don‘t we have a right to get help?" asked Alejandrina Perez, a 53-year-old Honduran who has a legal work permit.

Perez put that question to former President Bill Clinton when he visited a Baton Rouge shelter last week. Clinton, studying how to spend $100 million raised by the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund that he set up jointly with former President George Bush , said private money should fill this kind of gap.

Federal officials not that many volunteer organizations, such as the American Red Cross , the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities, help people regardless of their immigration status.

Perez spent four weeks in a Red Cross-run shelter and praised the group for opening its doors to everyone. But she said many illegal immigrants left the shelter as soon as they could out of fear of deportation.

A group of Senate Democrats recently urged the federal Department of Homeland Security to assure immigrants that they will not be kicked out of the country if they sought aid, after reports that some storm victims face deportation hearings.

"Some in the Gulf Coast‘s immigrant communities will no doubt be too afraid to seek assistance as they evacuate or look for shelter if they believe they might be deported as a result. For many, this could be a matter of life and death," the Senators wrote in a letter last month.

Another problem is that undocumented immigrants are just that: undocumented. Oscar said some people were turned away by the Red Cross because their only identification was the Western Union receipts they got after wiring cash overseas.

Martin Gutierrez, director of a Catholic outreach group called the Hispanic Apostolate, said that even though these people live in the shadows, family and friends provide support.

"I‘m guessing that they also evacuated, and they will come back as opportunities arise," Gutierrez said.

He expects the overall Hispanic population to grow in coming months, because men with carpentry and construction skills are already moving to New Orleans in search of jobs.

"They‘re coming from other states and working in the construction field. They‘re rebuilding the city," Gutierrez said.