82 percent of the people in El Paso County are Hispanic

Census figures: El Paso exceeds population estimates

By Adriana Gómez Licón / El Paso Times
Posted: 02/17/2011 02:37:49 PM MST

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In the last decade, El Paso County increased its population by 18 percent, hitting the 800,000 mark and going beyond projected estimates.
New U.S. Census figures show the county added 121,025 people and was ranked the sixth largest with 800,647 people after Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Bexar and Travis counties.

The city grew at a smaller pace and went down in rankings from the fifth to the sixth largest in the state. Fort Worth outpaced the growth in El Paso.

El Paso's population went up by 15 percent to 649,121 people. Houston, San Antonio, Dallas and Austin are the fourth largest cities before Fort Worth and El Paso.

Statistics also show that 82 percent of the people in El Paso County are Hispanic. The percentages of Hispanic also grew at a state level from 32 percent in 2000 to 38 in 2010.

In West Texas, Culberson, Pecos and Terrell lost people. Culberson was among the biggest losers decreasing its population between 10 and 21 percent.

Texas grew in population by 20 percent from 2000 to 2010 and earned four congressional seats - the largest gain in the country. Now, 25.1 million people call Texas home.

For a full story read Friday's edition of the El Paso Times.

http://www.elpasotimes.com/newupdated/ci_17413645

El Paso County, TX
51% of population are illegal aliens. UTEP March 2006 study.
Ranked number 4th highest population living in poverty. US Census.

Dixie

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Study: 30 percent of El Paso working population lacks proficiency in English

By Vic Kolenc / El Paso Times POSTED: 09/25/2014 08:04:38 AM MDT

http://extras.mnginteractive.com/liv...925~p5_300.jpg
El Paso Community College student Suky Roque works on an assignment in a reading and writing class Wednesday. ( VICTOR CALZADA — EL PASO TIMES)

›› Photos: ESL course at EPCC

Almost 30 percent of El Paso's working-age population lacks proficiency in English — the second largest percentage among 89 large metro areas in the United States, a new study shows.

McAllen, Texas, had the largest percentage at 32 percent.

By contrast, Albuquerque only had 8 percent of its work-age population with limited English proficiency, and Austin had 11.1 percent.

The economy can be hurt by having large numbers of workers with limited English skills because those workers tend to have lower paying jobs, which means they spend less and that also lowers tax revenues, the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C., research and advocacy organization, reported in a study released Wednesday.

El Paso had an estimated 156,506 people, ages 16 to 64, with limited English proficiency in 2012, the latest data available. An estimated 63 percent of that population, or almost 99,000 people, were in the labor market in 2012, the study found.

Nationwide, an estimated 19.2 million working-age people had limited English skills in 2012, or 9.3 percent of the working-age population.

El Paso's population of working-age people with limited English skills increased almost 18 percent from 2000 to 2012, while that population increased 20 percent nationwide.

Brookings recommended that federal, state, and local funding be increased nationwide for English instruction. It also recommended that employers initiate English education programs, especially in industries with large numbers of workers with limited English skills.

"The lack of English proficiency represents a lack of opportunity for those in the workforce to advance for themselves and their children," said Jill Wilson, senior analyst at Brookings and the report's author.

The current and future economy of an area with large numbers of limited English workers can be hurt, and it can also hurt the future economy because children of limited English workers have low academic and economic outcomes, she said.

http://extras.mnginteractive.com/liv...925~p4_300.jpg
Myshie Pagell instructs students in her English reading and writing class Wednesday at El Paso Community College. EPCC officials say there isn't any waiting list for classes designed to teach people English, unlike the situation in other parts of the country. (VICTOR CALZADA — EL PASO TIMES)

Workers with limited English skills earned an average of 85 percent less than workers who are proficient in English in the 89 metro areas studied. People with limited English skills also tend to have lower levels of education, the study reported.

The manufacturing, retail, health care and social services sectors employ the largest share of El Paso's limited English workers, the study found. The construction, hotel and restaurant sectors in El Paso also have a large share of such workers. Those industries also have the largest share of workers with limited English skills nationwide.

"In places like El Paso, McAllen, or Miami, where Spanish is dominant, sometimes people can get by without English (more) than in other places," Brookings' Wilson said. "The fact still holds that English proficiency is the door to economic opportunity for immigrants" and others, Wilson said.

Spanish is the language spoken by 97.1 percent of the El Paso working-age population without adequate English skills, the study reported.

"Given El Paso's proximity to the Mexican border and levels of migration, it is not surprising that there would be higher percentages of persons with limited English proficiency" here, Joyce Wilson, interim chief executive officer of Workforce Solutions Upper Rio Grande, this area's public employment agency, said in a statement.

"We concur with recommendations in the study to increase resources and focus on improving English proficiency," she said. "It is incumbent upon all local training institutions to focus on that skill to improve the competitiveness of our workforce."

Joyce Wilson also noted that having a large bilingual population proficient in both English and Spanish is one of this area's big selling points when El Paso recruits businesses here.

The Brookings' study noted that past surveys found many English instruction classes around the country had waiting lists for the classes.

Workforce Solutions sends job seekers to English as a Second Language, or ESL, classes, when necessary, and has no problems getting people into those classes, an agency official said. It also sends job seekers to GED tutoring in English or Spanish when needed.

ENGLISH-LANGUAGE EDUCATION

Should employers initiate English-language education programs for workers with limited English skills? Read story

Yes, this will help improve the economy in the long run. No, workers should take the initiative to learn English.

Steve Smith, vice president of instruction at El Paso Community College, said the college offers a variety of ESL and other English instruction classes that have plenty of capacity. Thousands of students are in those classes, he said. The problem is that sometimes students have trouble qualifying for financial aid for those classes, and that makes it difficult for some students to take the classes, he said.

"We'd welcome additional funding to serve that population," he said.
"Certainly this is a challenge for this region, and it may contribute to our low economic status, and we (El Paso) are trying to address it" with a number of programs at Community College and at area school districts, Smith said.

For more information, visit brookings.edu.
Vic Kolenc may be reached at 546-6421

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_26601174/el-paso-no-2-nation-share-limited-english

7/26/15

http://www.alipac.us/f12/more-people...cities-321565/

7/27/15

http://www.alipac.us/f12/wisconsin-t...spanic-321581/

These are probably the same towns that the feds are dispensing $100 million worth of teen sex ed. to, also.

Texas gained nine Hispanic residents for every additional white resident last year