| HCM Initiatives - 11.05.2007 |
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This weekly summary of media articles about the Hispanic Consumer Market (HCM) and Latino community issues and related private/public sector initiatives are provided as a courtesy to ECG clients and network members. It is intended to demonstrate the variety of published information about efforts, activities and issues affecting the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. population.
Week of November 5, 2007:
- Documents Show Police Stereotyping, Plaintiffs Say
- GOP's Top Tier to Join Univisión Debate
- 2008 Is All About Hispanic Choice
- Pair Accused of Robbing Undocumented Immigrants
- Dell Launches Sales & Support in Spanish
- Univision & Red Cross To Aid Latin American Weather Victims
- La Opinión Tops the List of Fastest Growing U.S. Daily Newspapers
- 'La Política' Counting On The Hispanic-Vote Counters
- Cleaning Service Chief Pleads Guilty in Immigrant Worker Case
- Children's Hospital's Cordova Elected Chair of TRPI
- Latinos Seek the Good Life in Suburbia
- Cruz Reynoso: Champion of Latino Civil Rights From the Bench
- Drivers' License Issue Figures Large in Local NY Races
- Hispanics Grabbing the Keys
- Pro-Immigration Ad Airs in VA
- Raw Look at Immigration Crucible
Documents Show Police Stereotyping, Plaintiffs Say
Washington Post, November 10, 2007
BALTIMORE, MD - There, among thousands of pages the Maryland State Police turned over to civil rights groups in connection with a racial profiling lawsuit, were four offering guidance on how to interact with Latinos. "The majority of Hispanics are not criminals," one undated document said. "They are just seeking a better way of life."
But that same document cautions: "Hispanics generally do not hold their alcohol well. They tend to drink too much and this leads to fights," according to records in Baltimore County Circuit Court. Latino males are raised to be " 'MACHO' and brave," while females are "raised to be subservient," the documents state.
Attorneys for the Maryland NAACP say the documents appear to have been used in lesson plans for the agency's Pro-Active Criminal Enforcement program, in which specially trained troopers try to catch drug couriers and organized criminals on Maryland highways.
State police officials referred questions to Betty A. Stemley, the agency's head attorney, who said she did not know who produced the documents or whether they had been used for training. "They definitely don't appear to be part of any kind of formalized manual or training document," she said.
The plaintiffs said the documents came as a response to their request for police training documents. Stemley said that in general, the police agency has tried to cast as broad a net as possible when providing documents in the case. The state police have been accused of producing incomplete responses to other requests.
She suggested that the documents could have been gathered by a trainer collecting material on the subject and might not have been disseminated to troopers at all. "They appear to be very random to me," Stemley said of the documents.
Eliza Leighton, a staff attorney for Casa de Maryland, an immigrant advocacy group in Silver Spring, said she was "deeply troubled" by the documents, which she said contain "startling examples of racial stereotypes." She said the documents could undermine her group's cooperative work with law enforcement in Latino communities.
Leighton took issue with a number of the documents' assertions, including the notion that Hispanics do not want to learn English. "The Latinos we deal with at Casa de Maryland take pride in being Marylanders," she said.
One of the documents, titled "Dealings With Hispanics," says that knives are "the preferred weapon of Hispanics." Another says, "Hispanics are reluctant to learn English because they fear they may lose some of their heritage."
"As police officers," one of the documents says, "we tend to misinterpret their language and act unfair due to the lack of communication. ... Quite often Hispanics fear the police."
The documents surfaced in a legal battle that began in 1993, when a lawsuit was filed in federal court. The plaintiffs alleged they had been victims of racial profiling, a practice in which police stop motorists or search vehicles on the basis of the drivers' race.
In 2003, under a consent decree, the state police agreed to far-reaching changes aimed at preventing troopers from singling out [non-Anglo] motorists. The agency, which did not admit to engaging in systematic racial profiling, has said it acts in compliance with the consent decree.
The ACLU of Maryland, which is collaborating with the NAACP in aspects of the litigation, said yesterday that troopers continue to search black and Latino motorists along Interstate 95 at rates disproportionate to their presence in the general population. In 2006, according to the plaintiffs, 51.2 percent of those searched were non-Hispanic black (NHB), 17.1 percent were Hispanic and 27.9 percent were non-Hispanic white (NHW).
As part of the litigation, the ACLU filed a lawsuit earlier this year accusing the agency of improperly withholding documents about racial profiling. The plaintiffs attached the documents about how to deal with Latinos as exhibits with a legal filing this week.
Stemley, the state police attorney, questioned their motives. "The plaintiffs are using this as an opportunity to just speak against the state police," she said.
Opinion: 2008 Is All About Hispanic Choice
Albuquerque Journal, November 9, 2007
SAN DIEGO, CA - You've probably heard that Republican presidential candidates have blown their chance with Hispanic voters because of their hard line on immigration and other hardheadedness.
Unfortunately, too much of the conversation has been about the effect of all this on the party - about whether the GOP is condemning itself to years in the electoral wilderness by alienating an influential constituency.
What I haven't heard enough about is how this neglect hurts Hispanic voters. In politics, the surest path to irrelevance and powerlessness is to be taken for granted by one party and written off by another. That is the road Latinos are on now, thanks to some major blunders by the Republicans running for president.
All but one of the candidates - John McCain - refused to commit to a debate on Spanish-language television in September, forcing its cancellation. In June, all but one - Duncan Hunter - blew off an invitation to address the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO).
Suddenly, the issue became whether Republicans respected Latinos enough to ask for their support. That bothered Republican strategist Leslie Sanchez, who wrote the book "Los Republicanos: Why Hispanics and Republicans Need Each Other." Sanchez is convinced the Hispanic vote is in play and that every candidate should be vying for it.
"With Hispanics, we don't make connections to parties," she told me. "Hispanics make connections to individual people. Politicians have to earn our respect."
Latinos are big on respect, and the more they move up the ladder, the more they insist on it. So the very Hispanics who might be attracted to the GOP because of its economic policies are being turned off by its insensitivity to Hispanic issues.
A USA Today/Gallup poll found that Latinos identify with Democrats by a margin of nearly 3-1.
One reason is that the Democratic frontrunner - Hillary Clinton - is aggressively going after the Hispanic vote by racking up the endorsements of seemingly every Latino officeholder from East Los Angeles to the South Bronx.
Polls show Clinton earning about two-thirds of the Hispanic vote among Democrats and making up ground lost by the two previous Democratic nominees, John Kerry and Al Gore. Both flunked Hispanic Outreach 101, in part because they had that deadly combination of ignorance and arrogance.
You see something similar in John Edwards, Joe Biden and Chris Dodd, who either don't realize they've lost the Hispanic vote or don't care.
Barack Obama is doing a bit better. He is trying to target younger Latinos. But he discovered this constituency too late and Clinton is already on her way to cornering the market.
Then there is Bill Richardson, who made history by being the first Latino to run a credible campaign for the presidency but seems to be losing Hispanic support, perhaps because he is too preoccupied with trying to prove himself acceptable to non-Hispanics.
Among Republicans, Rudy Giuliani has morphed from a champion of immigrants into a Tom Tancredo impersonator. Giuliani even promised that he could end illegal immigration within three years by securing the borders and identifying every non-citizen in the United States.
To those of us who live along the border, such talk is a signal that this city slicker doesn't understand the phenomenon he is promising to tackle - and so it'll probably tackle him.
Mitt Romney's sin isn't naiveté, but hypocrisy. This is the guy who spouts off about how immigrants should speak English and we should end bilingual education while his campaign sends out weekly dispatches to Latino journalists - in Spanish. One wonders: If Romney strips Latino kids of their Spanish, how will they read his press releases when they grow up?
Meanwhile, McCain has a history of appealing to Latinos in Arizona and earned more than 70 percent of the Hispanic vote in his 2004 U.S. Senate re-election bid. The maverick stood his ground on immigration reform and took on the dishonest arguments of those who opposed it, such as the insistence that [U.S. citizens] would happily do the hardest and dirtiest jobs if the wages were right.
McCain dared a roomful of angry union members in the Midwest to spend the summer picking lettuce in Yuma, AZ, for $50 an hour, much more than the minimum wage most pickers earn. There were only a few takers, who apparently know little about picking lettuce and even less about Arizona summers.
Don't tell me that Hispanic voters don't have choices in this election. They do. And it's only by exercising them and spreading their support among members of both parties that they'll stay relevant and earn the respect they crave.
Pair Accused of Robbing Undocumented Immigrants
Los Angeles Times, November 8, 2007
LOS ANGELES, CA - They drove the streets of Southern California in a black Hyundai compact, dressed in green Sheriff's Department-style clothing and flashing "deputy" badges that looked as if they came from an amusement park. Authorities believe that Steve Leo and Sabrina John stopped dozens of undocumented immigrants walking home from work over the last six months, patted them down and stole money and valuables.
Detectives arrested the couple in connection with 21 such robberies that stretched from the San Fernando Valley to Orange County. But authorities believe they are responsible for many more.
Officials say the couple primarily targeted immigrants, including day laborers, toward the end of the day - when they had just been paid. In one case, they are accused of taking $1,900 from a man walking down a street in Silver Lake.
The suspects carried a replica handgun and a scanner and even used a laptop in the Hyundai to simulate background checks on people they had stopped, authorities said. While the setup looked suspicious to many witnesses, officials said victims have been afraid to step forward for fear they could be deported.
"They wore green uniforms like the one I am wearing and ordered victims to submit themselves to a pat-down search. The suspects removed the victims' wallet and/or cash and instructed the victims to continue walking," Sheriff Lee Baca said. "There are other victims out there."
Leo, 34, and John, 32, who live in the San Fernando Valley, were captured only when Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) vice detectives saw the pair harassing a teenager Oct. 24 on Glendale Boulevard, authorities said. The officers noticed that Leo was patting down the teenager while John sat in the car eating. Detectives say officers are usually both out of the vehicle whenever a suspect is searched.
This is just the latest allegation of criminals preying on undocumented immigrants. Earlier this year, police arrested several private security guards on suspicion of shaking down street vendors in South L.A. Gangs have also extorted vendors and merchants in the heavily immigrant areas near MacArthur Park.
But this case, officials said, is particularly egregious. "They did it to undocumented people because they felt it was easy," said LAPD Lt. Jimmy Grayson. "They weren't only doing it to undocumented people; they were doing it to minors."
The alleged shakedowns have occurred since June across the region, including in Artesia, Norwalk, Garden Grove, Whittier, Burbank, Glendale, East L.A. and various parts of Los Angeles.
Sheriff's Deputy Marcelo Quintero said most of the victims told investigators that "they knew something was fishy with the black Hyundai and the garb, but they didn't want to cause any confrontation or cause a problem."
Besides victims who have come forward, authorities have received calls from witnesses saying they noticed a couple in a Hyundai stopping people. "People would be driving by and feel it wasn't 100% right," Quintero said, adding that detectives are still looking into those cases.
Leo and John used uniforms and equipment available at local swap meets, said Sheriff's Capt. Steve Johnson. Two badges retrieved, according to investigators, looked as if they could have been purchased at a theme park and bore Leo's first name, saying "Sheriff Steve."
Local police have long struggled with how to gain the cooperation of undocumented immigrants victimized by crimes. Because of their status, some fear that authorities will turn them over to immigration officials and that they will be deported.
For more than two decades, the LAPD has tried to maintain an arms-length relationship with immigration officials, hoping to spur more cooperation in immigrant communities. But some critics believe local police need to work more closely with the federal government to crack down on undocumented immigration. One conservative group has sued the LAPD, saying the department should fully cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on immigration matters.
On the streets, Latinos said they were not surprised by the alleged shakedown operation, but their reactions to it were mixed. "I think this is part of the life of being an immigrant," said Arnulfo Godoy Chamale, who was waiting for work outside a Home Depot store off Studebaker Road in Norwalk. "We don't have any protection."
A few weeks ago, Chamale said, he finished working a two-month job building a house and was promised an average of about $100 a day for the work. His boss never paid him, instead telling him he could not be paid because he was an immigrant. Now, Chamale says he takes only jobs in which the money is paid after each day's work.
In Pico Rivera, 38-year-old Manuel Camacho was pushing his 3-year-old daughter on the swings. The city of Los Angeles employee said he thinks undocumented immigrants need to educate and empower themselves so they are not taken advantage of.
"Who is the easiest to target?" said 37-year-old Eric Malegar, who was standing Wednesday afternoon on Fletcher Drive in Atwater Village. "It's illegals."
Dell Launches Sales & Support in Spanish
HispanicAd.com, November 8, 2007
AUSTIN, TX - Dell launches access to personalized computing through dedicated Spanish-language sales and support, along with a financing program.
"It's now easier than ever to get your Dell notebook or desktop computer exactly the way you want it as we extend preferred-language support services to Spanish-speaking customers," said Michael Tatelman, Dell's vice president of consumer sales and marketing. "Sales and support services in Spanish is one more way in which Dell demonstrates that we're listening to the communities that buy our products, and building services that create customer delight throughout the purchase and ownership experience."
Dell Credito Plus, a financing program developed exclusively for Dell's Spanish speaking customers, features three- or six-month deferred interest, no annual fee and credit lines of up to $5,000.(1) All documentation is available in Spanish, so Spanish-speaking customers can better understand financing options and the terms and conditions of their application and contract. The program will be offered in partnership with Alliance Data.
A Spanish-language newspaper, radio and outdoor advertising campaign publicizing the new sales and support initiatives is under way in Houston, Chicago and Atlanta, with a national rollout planned for early next year.
Univision & Red Cross To Aid Latin American Weather Victims
HispanicPRWire, November 7, 2007
NEW YORK, NY/WASHINGTON, DC - Univision Communications Inc., the nation's leading Spanish-language media company, announced today that it has partnered with the American Red Cross to help the fundraising efforts for the victims of the recent disastrous weather that has caused massive flooding in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Central America.
Univisión has enlisted its national and local television and radio stations, as well as its online platform in order to reach U.S. Latinos interested in contributing to these efforts. As part of the multi-platform outreach effort, the Univisión networks are taking full advantage of their cross-promotion capabilities to promote the fundraising efforts through public service announcements (PSAs) and special reports.
"The recent destruction caused by disastrous weather in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Central America has hit very close to home for many of our viewers, listeners and online users," said Joe Uva, Chief Executive Officer of Univision Communications Inc. "We have once again collaborated with the American Red Cross to provide our audience with a means to support family, friends and compatriots in their time of need."
"The American Red Cross is grateful to Univisión for providing their audiences with the ability to make a difference and touch the lives of thousands of people through their generosity," said Mark W. Everson, President and CEO of the American Red Cross. "This is yet another great example of Univisión's longstanding and continued support of our humanitarian mission."
In its multi-platform efforts, Univisión is featuring the following Spanish-language toll-free phone number (1-800-842-2200) set up by the American Red Cross. Additional efforts include:
Television: Univisión has produced on-air PSAs featuring Univisión's talent that encourages viewers to make a donation to the American Red Cross. The PSAs are airing on all three Univision Television Networks - Univisión, TeleFutura and Galavisión. In addition, Univision continues its extensive news coverage across its three television networks.
Radio: Univisión Radio has also produced PSAs that will air on all AM and FM stations featuring Univisión radio talent that encourages listeners to make a donation to the American Red Cross. In addition, Univisión Radio stations across the country continue to provide extensive news coverage as well as special segments on public affairs programs.
Online: Univision.com has extensive coverage of all news, testimonials, videos and photos related to the flooding and its effects. Users are visiting the website daily to share their stories and post photos in the local forums. The link and toll-free phone number to the American Red Cross is also provided to facilitate donations.
Univision Communications Inc. is the premier Spanish-language media company in the United States. Its operations include Univisión Network, the most-watched Spanish-language broadcast television network in the U.S. reaching 99% of U.S. Hispanic Households; TeleFutura Network, a general-interest Spanish-language broadcast television network, which was launched in 2002 and now reaches 89% of U.S. Hispanic Households; Galavisión, the country's leading Spanish-language cable network; Univisión Television Group, which owns and operates 62 television stations in major U.S. Hispanic markets and Puerto Rico; Univisión Radio, the leading Spanish-language radio group which owns and/or operates 70 radio stations in 16 of the top 25 U.S. Hispanic markets and 5 stations in Puerto Rico; Univisión Music Group, which includes Univisión Records, Fonovisa Records, La Calle Records and Mexico-based Disa Records as well as Fonomusic and America Musical Publishing companies; and Univisión Online, the premier Spanish-language Internet destination in the U.S. located at http://www.univision.com.
Univisión Communications also has a 50% interest in TuTv, a joint venture formed to broadcast Univisión pay television channels in the U.S., and a non-voting 14.9% interest in Entravision Communications Corporation, a public Spanish-language media company. Univisión Communications has television network operations in Miami and television and radio stations and sales offices in major cities throughout the United States.
For more information, please visit http://www.univision.net/
La Opinión Tops the List of Fastest Growing U.S. Daily Newspapers
EnBreve.com, November 6, 2007
LOS ANGELES, CA - La Opinión, the largest Spanish-language daily newspaper in the country, ranked #1 in net daily paid circulation growth among the 200 largest U.S. newspapers for the six-month period ending September 2007, based on the latest FAS-FAX Report from the Audit Bureau of Circulation. The daily average is based on Monday-Friday.
Net paid daily circulation of La Opinión rose by 3.57 percent, the largest increase of any newspaper in the country with circulation over 50,000. Adding to the list of #1's, La Opinión also ranked #1 in percentage growth for its Saturday edition when compared to newspapers with a circulation of 100,000 or higher. La Opinión's Saturday circulation rose by 4.76 percent, making it the fastest-growing Saturday large-circulation newspaper in the country.
"We are delighted with our overall results. While other newspapers are struggling with declines in circulation, La Opinión's focus on news that is relevant to our audiences, along with deep community connections have clearly translated into increased circulation and readership," stated Monica Lozano, CEO & Publisher of La Opinión. "This is another strong indication that La Opinión is the premier source of news and information for the country's Hispanic community," she said.
This same reporting period offered some insights into the difficulties English language newspaper's face. During this same ABC Audit period, large circulation dailies saw an average drop of 2.9% in paid circulation.
ImpreMedia's New York daily El Diario La Prensa ranked No. 9 in growth with a 1.1% increase for its daily edition.
The Audit Bureau of Circulation is a non-profit industry organization that provides media buyers, publishers and financial institutions with verified circulation data for paid publications. The ABC is widely considered the authoritative source of circulation data.
La Opinión is the leading Spanish-language daily newspaper in the country, distributing 124,784 copies throughout the five-county Southern California area and reaching 538,509 readers on a daily basis. It was founded in 1926 in Los Angeles to provide daily news and information to a Hispanic population that has grown to become the nation's largest. In 2000, La Opinión Digital was launched, creating not only an online publication of the newspaper, but also a premier Spanish-language website. La Opinión is owned and operated by ImpreMedia LLC. For more information, please visit our media kit website at www.laopinion.com/mediakit.
La Política, Counting On The Hispanic-Vote Counters
Washington Post, November 6, 2007
Just in time for Hillary Clinton's bilingual Web page, Barack Obama's three-part telenovela, Christopher Dodd's discursos en español, Craig Romney's Spanish testimonials for papí Mitt, John McCain's immigration reform fracaso, Tom Tancredo's "amnesty" outrage and the simple fact of Bill Richardson: Here comes La Política, turning it all into a beat and a business.
The Web-based newsletter and blog debuted yesterday, dedicated to covering "the business of reaching Hispanic voters." Published in English for a prospective audience of campaign insiders, consultants and media types, the newsletter takes its name from the Spanish word for "politics." The blog is called Platicando - "chatting."
This is the moment when all the thumb-sucking and hyperventilating over the potential political power of the nation's largest minority goes meta. Until now it was enough to figure out who Latinos are and how to reach them. Now the process of discovery and outreach is itself the subject.
The presidential campaigns are already reacting - sending tips, getting quoted. But then, we already knew from Heisenberg that the act of scrutinizing can influence what is being scrutinized. The larger question about La Política is whether its advent signals a material change in Latinos' status in the political calculus. Does something become more real when attention is paid?
The people behind La Política are too much old-school-journalist types to make brash claims about Latinos swinging the election. They're just walking the beat.
"We aren't advocates, we aren't activists," says Luis Clemens, the editor, a Cuban American and a former Buenos Aires bureau chief for CNN en Español. "We'll watch and report on the way this plays out."
But he does insist something new is afoot. "Iowa, Iowa, por Dios!" he says. "Who would have thought there would be competing [Latino] voter outreach efforts in Iowa?
"There's a sea change. But whether it's surf's up or a tsunami, I don't know. We'll see over the course of this electoral season. It could end up being a relatively minor political force. It could be heavy on symbolism but lighter in the ballot box. It could turn out that the election is a landslide and it doesn't really matter how Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado go, how Florida goes."
Either way, La Política is having fun making it a story. It tut-tuts grammatical errors on campaigns' Spanish-language Web sites - even fluent Spanish speaker Bill Richardson's! It tracks canny gambits on behalf of Obama, such as the candidate singing "México Lindo y Querido" on a Los Angeles radio show. Obama supporters not affiliated with the campaign just launched a "Web-based mini-novela," a fictional, serialized political drama about a Latino family that realizes marching in the streets is not enough; one must also vote - for Obama. The supporters group earlier recorded a reggaetón Obama theme song.
La Política also directs readers to the origins of Latino outreach, posting a video clip of a seminal moment in 1960 when Jackie Kennedy stared wide-eyed into a television camera and spoke for a solid commercial minute in finishing-school Spanish: "Les habla la esposa del senador John F. Kennedy. . . . Que viva Kennedy!"
The publisher is Arturo Villar, a former magazine and feature syndicate editor who was born in Spain and who also is publisher of Hispanic Market Weekly, a 10-year-old publication that reports about 3,000 subscribers and 15,000 readers. The inspiration and model for La Política do not spring from political or social activism - the instinct to protest that sometimes animates [non-Anglos] staking a claim on the U.S. stage. Rather, La Política owes more to the capitalist and commercial soul of that sister publication, also based in Coral Gables, FL. Villar's market weekly is an analytical insider's tip sheet about the work of reaching Hispanic consumers.
At bottom, voters are consumers - and selling cars and selling candidates involve parallel sorts of machinery, protagonists, values and drama. "In politics, you can't separate the marketing from the issues," Clemens says.
"The idea is to cover both the mechanics, if you will, and the politics of the issues, and the philosophy behind the issues." Clemens does much of the reporting and writing himself, also relying on stringers in California and Florida.
"I think this country has awakened to the fact that Hispanics can make a difference in many, many places, if you know how to reach them," Villar says.
After the first eight weeks or so of free content, the newsletter will cost $89 a year. An initial list of 14,000 elected officials, campaign staffers, marketers, consultants, media players and so on will receive e-mailed links, while anyone else can also log on to the site. Once the fee kicks in, Villar says if he can retain 5,000 or more paying customers initially, La Política will be off to a good start. He is mulling whether Platicando, the blog, will remain free.
The first edition declares Clinton and Romney the leaders so far in Latino outreach efforts. It includes pieces on the role of Latino evangelicals and the use of cellphones in political mobilizing. While appeals to evangelicals were key to President Bush's success with Latino voters, now some evangelical leaders are disenchanted with the GOP's harsh immigration rhetoric, Clemens says. As for cellphones: It turns out that eligible Latino voters are less likely to vote than non-Hispanic whites (NHW) or non-Hispanic blacks (NHB), yet market research suggests they are avid users of cellphone features - so some partisans plan to incorporate text-messaging to get out the vote.
There's also a Q&A with Lionel Sosa, the legendary GOP ad man who worked for Ronald Reagan and both President Bushes. This year? He's backing Richardson, "the best qualified man for president. I had always hoped the best qualified Latino for president would be a Republican, but it didn't turn out that way," he says in the interview.
Injecting a dash of skepticism into the notion of Latinos automatically becoming a political force is an op-ed by Roberto Suro, former director of the Pew Hispanic Center and former Washington Post reporter, now a journalism professor at the University of Southern California. "I've lost track of how many times the sleeping giant was supposed to be waking up," Suro writes. "In fact, this election is as much a test as an opportunity, and the outcome is in doubt."
It's a long way from Jackie Kennedy's Spanish pitch to Clinton's bilingual Web page, launched last month. Other campaigns have separate pages in Spanish, but Clinton's may be the first purposefully to offer English and Spanish content on the same screen.
It points up one of the subtleties of Latino political marketing: Do you pitch in English or Spanish? The answer is that it depends, says Villar.
The younger generation is handier in English - but the under-30s don't vote as much. English is more prevalent in some states, such as New Mexico, where Latino families go back generations. But sometimes it's smart to pitch in Spanish, on say, Univisión, to reach a family member who may not even be eligible to vote, but who is a respected tía or an abuelo, an "influencer" of other family members and friends, says Villar.
These are secrets that car [and beer] companies already know and political candidates are starting to learn - secrets La Política aims to spill.
Cleaning Service Chief Pleads Guilty in Immigrant Worker Case
Houston Chronicle, November 6, 2007
GRAND RAPIDS, MI (Associated Press) - The controller of a nationwide janitorial service faces up to five years in prison, accused by authorities of hiring-out cleaning crews staffed with undocumented immigrant workers to a Michigan resort.
Christina A. Flocken, 59, of Longwood, FL, entered a guilty plea Monday in U.S. District Court. Under an agreement with federal prosecutors, she pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the federal government and to harboring undocumented aliens, said Hagen W. Frank, an assistant U.S. attorney.
Flocken could be sentenced to up to five years in prison and ordered to pay a $250,000 fine, plus a share of a restitution judgment exceeding $15 million, Frank said.
The government's investigation into Rosenbaum-Cunningham International Inc., or RCI, a Florida-based cleaning contractor, led to the nationwide arrests in February of more than 200 undocumented immigrants, mostly Mexican nationals. The investigation began at Grand Traverse Resort and Spa in Acme, in Michigan's northwestern Lower Peninsula.
Owners Richard M. Rosenbaum, 61, and Edward S. Cunningham, 44, pleaded guilty to identical charges under plea agreements with federal prosecutors. Cunningham, of West Palm Beach, FL, entered his plea Friday. Rosenbaum, of Longwood, FL, entered his plea Oct. 17.
Rosenbaum's sentencing hearing was set for Feb. 4. Sentencing hearings for Cunningham and Flocken were not scheduled as of Monday, Frank said. Rosenbaum faces up to 10 years in prison and a $500,000 fine. Cunningham faces a 5-year prison term and up to $250,000 in fines. Both also will have to pay a share of the restitution judgment.
The practice of paying cash wages to workers deprived the U.S. government of about $18.6 million in employment taxes, according to the indictment against the three. The government said RCI contracted with the resort between June 1997 and March 2006.
A telephone message seeking comment on Flocken's plea was left Monday at Grand Traverse Resort.
Children's Hospital's Cordova Elected Chair of TRPI
TRPI News, November 5, 2007
LOS ANGELES, CA - Richard D. Cordova, president and CEO of Children's Hospital-Los Angeles (CHLA), was elected chair of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute's Board of Trustees during a special meeting of the Board on October 3, 2007. He joined the TRPI Board of Trustees in 2006.
"Rich comes to the helm of the TRPI Board at a very exciting and critical time for the Institute," said TRPI President and CEO, Dr. Harry Pachon. "Through objective, non-partisan research, TRPI has helped shape public policy on key issues of concern to Latinos across the USA for more than 20 years. As we plan our course for the next few years we are particularly pleased to be able to benefit from Rich's proven leadership ability."
Mr. Cordova was named president and CEO of CHLA in April 2006. He had been president and COO at the hospital the previous year.
CHLA is acknowledged throughout the United States and around the world for its leadership in pediatric and adolescent health. It is one of America's premier teaching hospitals, affiliated with the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California for more than 75 years. It is a national leader in pediatric research.
"The research and of the Tomás Rivera Policy Institute, and its relationships with academic institutions and scholars through the country, is very, very important to this nation for any number of reasons," Mr. Cordova said. "I'm delighted that I will be able to continue support this work and the activities of TRPI through these new responsibilities."
Prior to his assignment at CHLA, Mr. Cordova was president of the Southern California Region of the Kaiser Permanente Health Plan and Hospitals, with responsibilities for 11 hospitals with a licensed capacity of 2,300 beds, as well as a health plan with more than three million members, including 45,000 employees. His responsibilities also included marketing, strategic planning, finance, quality and patient safety.
Mr. Cordova is a Fellow of the American College of Health Care Executives (ACHE). Hispanic Business Magazine named him one of the "Top 100 Most Influential Hispanics" in 2005. He was selected as one of the "100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare" by Modern Healthcare magazine in 2006."
Mr. Cordova is a member of the board of both the California Children's Hospital Association and the National Association of Children's Hospitals and Related Institutions. He has also served as a board member of the California Healthcare Association, the California Chamber of Commerce, the Hospital Association of Southern California, the California Association of Public Hospitals and the National Association of Public Hospitals. He was also appointed to the Council of Graduate Medical Education by Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala, on which he served from 1996 to 1998.
The new chair of the TRPI Board of Trustees will continue to serve as a member of the board for a number of other community organizations, including as chair of the Institute for Diversity in Health Management. He is a founding member of the National Forum for Latino Healthcare Executives, which was organized in 2005 to promote Latino issues in healthcare and create opportunities for future Latino healthcare executives.
Throughout his career Mr. Cordova has provided [people of color] with opportunities to advance in healthcare management by creating and supporting internships, medical residency positions and fellowships.
Mr. Cordova received a bachelor's degree in business administration from California State University, Los Angeles, and an MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University.
He is a native Southern Californian, born and raised in Montebello. He is married and has three daughters.
Latinos Seek the Good Life in Suburbia
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, November 5, 2007
ST. CHARLES COUNTY, MO - Just a few miles from some of the county's newest and most expensive homes, the alphabet lessons begin promptly at 7 p.m. in a fluorescent-lit classroom inside First Baptist Church of O'Fallon.
"We are going to go over our ABCs here," says O'Fallon resident Irma Ordoñez to her class of seven Latino students. Most are adults, but some are as young as 10 and toting stuffed animals.
To Ordoñez, a retired kindergarten teacher and a seventh-generation U.S. citizen, teaching English to Latino immigrants is all about taking "baby steps."
"A. Aaaah. Apple," she begins.
The challenges of integrating the United States' growing Hispanic immigrant population isn't playing out just in the cities anymore. Mirroring a national trend, St. Charles County is one of hundreds of suburban areas in the country that's becoming home to Latino immigrants who must struggle to learn English in a place with few bilingual services.
"When I came here seven years ago, there were very few Latino people, but now you see Hispanics most everywhere," Ordoñez said.
The suburbs are now providing a steady stream of food service, cleaning, construction and landscaping jobs to immigrants, many of whom come from rural, central Mexico. Others are also moving from cities as far away as New York and Los Angeles because they want what many others want out of the Midwest: a quiet, safer life.
"What's happening is not much different than what happened in Missouri 100 years ago," said Domingo Martinez, coordinator of the Cambio Center at the University of Missouri-Columbia, a think tank looking at immigration trends and their impact in the state. "They were German and they came for cheap land and looking for a good place to raise their kids."
Instead of near Cherokee Street in south St. Louis, Latino immigrants are now more likely to be settling in smaller, more spread-out pockets in the St. Louis region. These include areas such as St. Ann and Hazelwood in north St. Louis County.
But many are also going farther out to places such as St. Charles, O'Fallon and Wentzville, said Joel Jennings, an adjunct professor at St. Louis University who is mapping the immigrant Latino population in the region. Some are going even farther into Lincoln and Warren counties to work farming and landscaping jobs, he said.
Recent U.S. Census Bureau statistics put the growth rate of Hispanics in St. Charles County from 2000 to 2006 at about 68 percent, for a total of just over 7,000 people. Statistically, that amounts to about 2 percent of St. Charles' nearly 339,000 people.
Jennings said that the number of Hispanics in the county is probably double the census estimate, and that most of those additional residents who aren't being counted are working-class Mexican immigrants, many of them undocumented.
The state's estimated 161,000 Hispanics still make up only 2 percent of Missouri's population. However, every county in Missouri - rural, urban or suburban - now has a Hispanic population, Martinez said.
According to census figures, the most marked increases in the St. Louis region are in the suburbs in places that until a few years ago were nearly all non-Hispanic white (NHW). In St. Charles County there are now two Hispanics per every 100 people - up from about 1.5 people per 100 in 2000.
In that same time period the Hispanic population in Lincoln County grew by about 91 percent to almost 850. In Warren County, the number more than doubled, to 650 people. Jefferson County also had a 31 percent increase, to 2,630 people. The Metro East saw marked increases, with a 24 percent growth rate in St. Clair County. That county has the largest estimated Hispanic population, nearly 7,000, or about 2.7 percent of the nearly 261,000 people there. Madison County also grew by 1,214 Hispanics, an increase of about 31 percent. In Monroe County, with 450 Hispanics, the population also more than doubled.
St. Louis County, which has seen a steady flow of immigrants into northern areas such as Hazelwood over the past several years, had a nearly 33 percent growth in its Hispanic population, to more than 19,300.
Although the Hispanic population also increased in the city of St. Louis to nearly 9,000, the number of Latinos relative to its population stayed nearly the same at 2.5 per 100 people.
This new suburban population puts new demands on localities that lack most simple bilingual services. Many Latino immigrants have difficulty in everyday places such as banks, license bureaus, police departments and even doctors' offices.
Much of the slack is being taken up by area churches. Currently about 20 churches in the region are offering religious services in Spanish, and several are developing programs to teach English as a second language. The programs are run mainly by volunteers who not only teach, but drive students to and from classes, said Patrick Regalado, a pastor with First Baptist Church of O'Fallon and head of the Hispanic Pastors and Leaders of the Greater St. Louis Area.
"I see the county is not ready," said Regalado, who was born in Ecuador. "They don't have the equipment and resources to face these situations."
Even getting the word out about programs is tricky, because the region's Spanish-language radio station starts to falter at the eastern edge of St. Charles County.
Lupe Plaza, a Head Start caseworker at the St. Charles branch of the children's service agency Youth In Need, works with many Latino families. Her agency recently hired a third bilingual caseworker based in Wentzville to handle the demand for Spanish-speaking home visitors.
Plaza said she dealt with a tightly knit, insulated and hardworking community that's committed to making life better for their children. "They have such a strong work ethic. It doesn't matter what you ask them to do, they'll do it," Plaza said, noting that many of her families juggle three and sometimes more jobs to make ends meet.
Plaza and other members of a growing Mexican middle class in St. Charles County have different views on immigration, but all of them agree that people have a tendency to assume that because someone is poor and Latino, he or she is in the country illegally. They are asking for tolerance and fairness - especially on work sites.
"The reason we're all here is we want a better opportunity. We want a better life for our kids and our families," said Gloria Garcia as she tended the cash register at her family's grocery, Tienda Mexicana El Caporal, off First Capitol Drive in St. Charles. Garcia's family store offers everything from an increasingly popular lunch counter with Mexican favorites, to colorful votive candles, piñatas, cowboy boots, CDs of Latino pop stars and ballooning bags of chile peppers. The store is a slice of home for many, she said.
"You have to have the chiles," she said of the store. "We have to have the spice."
Cruz Reynoso: Champion of Latino Civil Rights From the Bench
Agencia EFE, November 5, 2007
LOS ANGELES, CA - At 16, Cruz Reynoso stood up for two Latinos who were denied entry to a school dance, an episode that turned out to be just the beginning of a long career fighting civil rights battles.
Because of his extraordinary contributions to the Latino community, Reynoso - who in 1982 became the first Latino judge on the California Supreme Court - last week received the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund's (MALDEF) Valerie Kantor Award for Extraordinary Achievement.
Reynoso, now 76 and retired, told Efe about what drove him to become a civil rights champion: "When I saw something that seemed to me to be unjust, there was something inside me that forced me to do something."
"Once I saw that two boys were standing in front of the school and I asked them why they weren't inside at the dance and they told me it was because they were Mexican," Reynoso said. "So I went in and asked the person in charge and he told me that they thought there could be some trouble if they let them in."
Reynoso was just 16 years old at the time, but he went to look for the school principal, who was surprised that some "little brat" was taking this matter up with him. Following the incident, Reynoso was told he should organize a committee of adults so they could express their disagreement with the policy of segregation.
"So with my father, my godparents, my neighbors, the school superintendents they held hearings (in La Habra, California) and finally we succeeded in having the officials announce that they were going to end segregation," he recalled.
Reynoso, born in California to Mexican immigrants, noted that in the first half of the 20th century there was no Latino representation in the state's bastions of political power.
"Very few of us had the resources and the formal study to make our way up to certain positions," said Reynoso, who graduated in 1958 from the prestigious Boalt School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, an education he financed with G.I. Bill benefits after serving in the Korean War.
Reynoso said that at the time of his graduation there were only about two dozen Mexican-American judges in the entire state of California.
"The situation in many of the systems had to be changed to reach the point where people like yours truly could be named to the courts," said Reynoso, who in 2000 was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his career defending the rights of non-Anglos.
"In 1977, when I was named to the state Court of Appeal, I was the first Latino appointed to that position and five years later I was the first Latino named to the Supreme Court, which had existed for 150 years," Reynoso said.
The former state judge became a professor at the UCLA law school in 1991 and subsequently joined the faculty at the University of California-Davis School of Law, retiring from that institution at the end of last year.
Speaking in reference to the situation of the immigrant community in the United States, Reynoso said that "in the United States we haven't adhered to the United Nations' regulations regarding how workers from other countries should be treated, whether they be documented or undocumented."
"And the basis (for those guidelines) is simply that we're all human beings and all workers should be respected by paying them what they deserve," he said.
License Issue Figures Large in Local NY Races
New York Times, November 4, 2007
BUFFALO, NY - When she arrived at an assisted living center for a candidates' forum here recently, Kathleen C. Hochul, the Erie County clerk, spent a few minutes explaining what county clerks do.
As the audience listened sleepily, Ms. Hochul (pronounced HOKE-ul), a no-nonsense lawyer, quickly reeled through an explanation of housing permits, business registrations and her plan to shorten lines at the downtown auto bureau.
And then, Ms. Hochul, a Democrat, made a point - as she often does these days - of describing one service she most definitely does not intend to offer. "I do not support the governor's plan to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants," she said to whooping cheers and applause. "I have a problem with that, ladies and gentlemen."
So do lots of other local office seekers across the state. The plan, which Gov. Eliot Spitzer unveiled with little warning in September, has triggered widespread opposition and injected into the normally sedate off-year elections volatile debates over immigration policy and terrorism.
And much anger remains even after Mr. Spitzer revised his plan last Saturday, saying the state would also offer two other kinds of licenses, neither of which would be available to undocumented immigrants and both of which would satisfy new federal security rules. Even under the new plan, critics point out, undocumented immigrants could still get a state license.
"Nothing's changed," Ms. Hochul said in an interview on Tuesday. "It's all anyone wants to talk about."
None of the state's top officials or legislators is on the ballot in Tuesday's elections. But dozens of clerks, county executives and town supervisors are. And in some areas, Mr. Spitzer's proposal has the potential to overwhelm the more parochial concerns on which such contests usually turn.
For Mr. Spitzer himself - now struggling to regain the overwhelming public support that sent him to office in a landslide - Tuesday's election will be the first chance to gauge whether the anger he now faces is merely a passing storm, or something more lasting.
Republicans have seized on the controversy and say it is energizing their voters. In Nassau County, for example, the issue has come to dominate the tight race for a seat on the County Legislature that, if won by the Republican candidate, would swing control of the body back to that party, dealing a significant blow to state Democrats. The Democratic incumbent, David L. Mejias, said he opposed the initial plan, and he called the governor's revised version "unworkable."
But his Republican opponent, Joseph Belesi, has nonetheless painted him as a close ally of the governor - and his license plan - in a series of fliers and mailings that have blanketed the district. "This issue resonates with the people here because they see it as illegal, and immoral, and I think it has shifted things in my favor," said Mr. Belesi, a retired police officer.
Mr. Spitzer's new policy has sent a particular shudder through the ranks of county clerks, 23 of whom are up for re-election Tuesday. In most counties, the clerks process driver's license applications on behalf of the State Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV).
A majority of those clerks voted for a resolution condemning the policy during a hastily called meeting of the state clerks' association last month, and some have said they would refuse to enforce the policy, which is scheduled to take effect late next year.
Ms. Hochul went a step further. If anyone comes to the main clerk's office seeking a license with a foreign passport but without a valid visa stamp, Ms. Hochul said, she will process the application - and then pass the person's name on to the county sheriff as a possible violator of immigration law.
The clerk of neighboring Niagara County is making similar plans, and others may follow. Kathleen A. Marchione, the clerk of Saratoga County and head of the clerks' association, said that the governor's revised plan had done little to allay the clerks' concerns. "Our position as an association has not changed," Ms. Marchione said. "This is still a major issue for us."
But perhaps no local official has been put on the spot quite like Ms. Hochul. Though Erie County residents seem to support one part of Mr. Spitzer's new plan - the introduction of two kinds of federally recognized licenses, one of which could be used by United States citizens to cross the Canadian border without passports - Ms. Hochul said that they continued to oppose allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain the new plan's third tier of license, akin to the current standard driver's license.
"This has really become the centerpiece of this race," Ms. Hochul said. Buffalo is a border city, she notes, and memories of the six Al Qaeda recruits, U.S. citizens of Yemeni descent, who once lived in nearby Lackawanna are still fresh.
In fact, Ms. Hochul's husband, an assistant United States attorney for the Western District of New York, was the lead prosecutor on the case. The six men, who had traveled to an Al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan in 2001, pleaded guilty three years ago to charges of providing support to a terrorist organization.
Moreover, Ms. Hochul is herself a Spitzer appointee; she got the job in April after Mr. Spitzer appointed David J. Swarts, the previous Erie clerk, to be the new state commissioner of DMV. Ms. Hochul even held a meet-and-greet for Mr. Spitzer at her home during last year's campaign.
"I support him on the environment. I support him on worker's comp reform. I support him on job creation. I support what he's doing on the waterfront here," Ms. Hochul said. "But this is an issue I disagree with him very strongly on. And he knows that."
Ms. Hochul abstained from voting on the clerks' resolution last month. But she has since registered her disagreement with Mr. Spitzer in myriad ways. She has asked the State Legislature to hold hearings in Buffalo on the issue, sent letters of protest to the governor and to Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo. She also requested a formal opinion from the Erie district attorney on whether the new policy is legal and enforceable.
But her Republican challenger, William A. O'Loughlin Jr., whose otherwise uphill bid for the Erie clerk's job has received a boost from public outrage over the licensing issue, has said that is not enough. Mr. O'Loughlin, a local businessman and councilman on the Amherst town board, had previously built his campaign around promises to extend the office hours at satellite bureaus and to root out patronage in the operation.
Now Mr. O'Loughlin tells campaign audiences that he, unlike Ms. Hochul, will go to jail rather than enforce Mr. Spitzer's driver's license policy. If the governor "brings along a contingent of state police and says, 'Here's two illegal immigrants, give them a driver's license or I'll put you in jail,' I'll say, 'Show me the handcuffs,' " Mr. O'Loughlin said in an interview.
Though no public polling is available on the race, interest in the licensing issue is intense. The two candidates spent most of a recent 90-minute debate discussing Mr. Spitzer's policy, which has dominated local talk radio. Their positions on the issue are often the first thing the candidates are asked about, and each is running television advertisements explaining how they will oppose the policy.
"We wanted to talk about our record during the last seven months," said Ms. Hochul, sounding wistful. She noted that she had expanded electronic filing, created a new call center and added satellite auto bureaus during her brief tenure. But the license issue, she said, is "all anyone wants to talk about."
The clerks' protests are not likely to have much practical effect on undocumented immigrants seeking licenses. The Spitzer administration estimates that about 80 percent of those seeking licenses will do so in the 10 counties - including Nassau, Suffolk, Onondaga and the five boroughs of New York City - where the state runs its own DMV offices rather than relying on county clerks to process the paperwork.
But the issue has brought a swift response from local lawmakers and candidates. About 20 county legislatures are considering resolutions condemning the new policy or orders to their county clerks not to comply, and several have already passed such legislation, according to Ms. Marchione, the Saratoga County clerk.
Meanwhile, candidates who may never have mentioned immigration now find their positions on the licensing issue closely scrutinized. Mr. Belesi, for example, has been arguing that Mr. Mejias spoke against the governor's plan only after Mr. Belesi made an issue of it - a criticism that seems to frustrate Mr. Mejias.
"As a county legislator, I never spoke out against the genocide in Darfur, either. I had no reason to raise the issue of the governor's license plan because it had nothing to do with the business of the Legislature."
Ms. Hochul, for her part, is not about to let anyone mistake her position. "I feel very strongly that the Erie County Auto Bureau should not facilitate violations of immigration law," Ms. Hochul explained.
Asked how many undocumented immigrants she expects to come in seeking licenses, Ms. Hochul responded with a single word: "None."
Hispanics Grabbing the Keys
HispanicBusiness.com, November 4, 2007
SANTA BARBARA, CA - Hispanics are buying more new cars and trucks than ever before, scooping them up at a faster pace than the overall market.
In 2005, Latino households spent nearly $22 billion on new vehicles, up from the $9 billion they spent in 1994, according to the recently released "Consumer Expenditure Survey, 2005," from the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The survey also found Latino spending on new vehicles increased at an annual rate of 9.2 percent, while the overall national rate grew by an anemic 1.9 percent - below the rate of inflation during that same period.
And it doesn't look like Latinos will put the brakes on new vehicle purchases anytime soon, especially since they are, in general, younger than the average [non-Hispanic] purchaser. New cars and truck sales to Hispanics are projected to grow 29 percent by 2010, according to J.D. Power & Associates. The Hispanic Consumer Market (HCM) is expected to spend $40 billion a year on motor vehicles and parts by the end of this decade.
So who is this Latino car buyer? Despite major automotive manufacturers' growing interest in the Hispanic consumer, research on whom is buying what is still scarce.
One thing is certain: The HCM cannot be lumped into one category. Its members are as varied as the new car models rolling off the production lines, from the upwardly mobile and educated single man or woman, to recent arrivals with large families. They are as likely to buy a Range Rover as they are a Chevy Silverado, and are as likely to do their research on the Internet to find a car dealership as the print media.
Plus, Latinos are getting wealthier. The last decade has seen a 126 percent increase in U.S. Hispanic households making more than $100,000 per year, which represents a total net worth of $500 billion.
"With the Hispanic median age being so much lower than the general market's, the Latino influence will only continue to grow," says Carlos Martinez, vice-president and general manager at Conill Advertising, where he is in charge of marketing for Toyota brands to the HCM. "I can't say down the road that manufacturers will be designing cars for Hispanics, but I think if you are making cars for the U.S., you will have to take the Hispanic into consideration."
This consumer is buying newer and more expensive cars, increasingly choosing imports over domestics. While some reports show Toyota as being the current top brand of choice for new vehicles purchased by Latinos, others point to Ford or General Motors and its Chevrolet brand.
How Latinos approach car buying is also evolving.
"They're more educated and so that brings a level of empowerment to the Hispanic consumer, so what you have is a much more informed buyer walking into our stores," says David Rodriguez, the multicultural marketing manager for Ford Motor Co.
Latinos are also very comfortable spending money on new luxury vehicles, even more so than non-Hispanics at the same income level. They're also buying luxury automobiles at a faster rate than the overall market. Vehicle registrations for luxury vehicles increased 53 percent from 2002 through 2006, while non-Hispanic registrations only rose 13 percent during that same time period, according to R.L. Polk & Co. figures that were provided by Conill.
Luxury carmakers are paying attention. This year, Ford's Land Rover unit rolled out marketing campaigns that included advertising in Hispanic publications and Web sites, and event sponsorships in cities such as Dallas, Miami and Los Angeles.
"Land Rover values the affluent Hispanic consumer target, because he embodies many of the values that define our brand authenticity, worldliness, determination and a spirit of adventure," says Alexandre Acey, national communications manager for Land Rover North America.
In 2006, Toyota's Lexus brand stepped up efforts to target well-to-do Hispanics by launching its first ever web site in Spanish. Starting this month, Lexus will sponsor Miami's Casa Décor 2007, a six-week event featuring the country's leading interior designer.
"Latinos making $50,000 plus are definitely in the market for luxury cars," says Andrew Speyer, vice-president of account planning at Zubi Advertising, a Miami-based advertising agency in charge of marketing Ford's Lincoln Navigator and F-150 brands to Hispanics. "We noticed that with the Lincoln Navigator's success.
"That's the interesting part of this whole story - our clients make certain assumptions of people's ability to spend based on the way that looks in the general market, but for Hispanics it's different."
For example, many younger Latinos tend to live at home longer and, in turn, have more disposable income than their general market counterparts.
"We all over-estimated what the minimum income requirement would be for people who would buy the [Lincoln Navigator]," Mr. Speyer says. "What we found was that people we thought couldn't afford this car could afford it. The 28-year-old guy who stills lives at home could probably afford the Navigator."
Meanwhile, the Hispanic car shopper of today is also doing more of their auto research online.
According to the 2006 AOL Latino/Hispanic Cyberstudy, online Hispanic households were four times more likely to buy a new car via the Internet than the general online population. The study also found that Latinos are also more likely to locate a dealership online. Forty-five percent of Latinos said they researched their car dealer through the Internet, compared to only 25 percent of non-Hispanic car buyers.
When it comes to what features they look for in their cars and trucks, style and design is at the top of their shopping lists. Latinos want their new cars and trucks to stand out and they don't mind spending extra for added features like a state-of-the-art sound system or high performance tires.
"Hispanics like a loaded vehicle, style is very important to them," says Mike Shaw, chief executive of Mike Shaw Automotive, a Denver, Colorado-based dealership that ranks No. 21 on the Hispanic Business 500. "That's higher on the list than the general consumer."
This applies to their trucks, too, Mr. Shaw says. "A lot of them use their truck for work, but when they go home Friday night they clean it up and use it as their personal vehicle, too," he said. "They take a lot of pride in their vehicles." That hasn't gone unnoticed at Ford, whose F-150 pickup ranks as one of the top sellers among Hispanics.
"What we've seen in terms of the prioritization of vehicle attributes is the notion of design and styling being more of a higher criteria compared to the total automotive audience," Mr. Rodriguez says. "Also certain parts of the HCM have a tremendous interest in customizing."
Customizing cars and trucks is more popular among younger Latino consumers, say industry observers, and that car buyer happens to be younger than other ethnic groups.
A recent survey by Torrance, California-based market research firm AutoPacific Group found that Latino and Pacific Asians new car buyers are among the youngest of all ethnic groups.
"They are substantially younger than in the other markets," says George Peterson, director of the AutoPacific Group.
The study also found Latinos pay around $27,000 for new vehicles, compared to $28,000 for the overall market. Price and monthly payments are their top criteria when purchasing a new car.
The AutoPacific Study, which surveyed 24,758 new motor vehicle registrants in 2006, also found that 47 percent of the Latino new car buyers were college educated. "This is a very young and educated group of people," Mr. Peterson says. "They're the ones buying new cars as opposed to buying cars in general. They're younger, more educated, and relatively more affluent than they were 20 years ago. That's why all the major car manufacturers have major ad campaigns."
The top carmakers are among the country's biggest spenders on Hispanic advertising. At $102 million, General Motors spent the most among automotive advertisers, Ford came in second at 85.7 million and Toyota was third at 81.8 million for the period of July 2006 to June 2007, according to Nielsen Media Research.
The decade ahead, say industry observers, will be a close race for market dominance among car manufacturers.
Toyota, which has been reaching out to the U.S. Hispanic consumer for 20 years, has recently focused its marketing efforts on its Toyota Tundra pickups, specifically targeting the Mexican consumer by sponsoring charreadas [Mexican rodeos]. Earlier this year, Toyota rolled out a Spanish-language campaign for its Highlander SUV targeting affluent Latinos.
General Motors, whose Chevrolet brand and the Silverado are top picks among Latinos, is currently pushing its cars and trucks by focusing on the Latino music lover. The automaker is one of the sponsors for the 2007 Latin Grammys.
And Ford is positioning its F-150 as a brand for the Latino who "lives in two worlds." "We designed a spot for the F-150 Ford that we designed to reflect the sort of dichotomy of people who live in two worlds," Mr. Speyer says. "The dichotomy that a Latino man faces - that the culture he grew up in and the one he lives in are different and the expectations are different."
Mr. Rodriguez adds: "It's very much trying to capture the spirit of that and respecting the traditional values of this audience. The ad performed very well. The proof is obviously in what kind of market share we've been able to accomplish."
Pro-Immigration Ad Airs in VA
Washington Post, November 3, 2007
PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, VA - A regional group of Latino business leaders is launching a television advertising campaign this weekend in hopes of countering anti-undocumented immigrant measures they fear will spread throughout Virginia.
The centerpiece is an ad that claims to show what happened when Riverside, NJ, passed a resolution penalizing employers who had hired undocumented immigrants. Images of empty buildings and signs of shop liquidations and closures flash across the screen. The ad explains that Riverside rescinded its measure one year later.
"The moral: Virginia, let's be careful what we wish for," a narrator warns.
The ads are scheduled to air throughout Virginia on CNN several times over the weekend and on Tuesday, when the state is scheduled to hold elections.
In buying the commercial time, the business group, Ayuda Business Coalition, is taking a decidedly different approach in its fight against recent crackdowns on undocumented immigrants than other groups, which have organized work boycotts and demonstrations. "We want to do this in an organized way that doesn't expose us to look like we aren't respectable or disciplined," said Mariano Claudio, a coalition member.
Coalition members fear the recent passage of an anti-undocumented immigration resolution in Prince William County has created momentum for state legislators to introduce similar measures in the General Assembly when it convenes in January. Prince William lawmakers limited some social services to undocumented immigrants and stepped up enforcement efforts against those who have been convicted of crimes.
"Some call what happened in Prince William a success. Our longer-term goal is to start building effective arguments for what we know is a fight coming in Richmond," said Mauricio Vivero, executive director of DC-based immigrant advocacy group Ayuda, which is running the project.
The Ayuda Business Coalition encompasses about 100 business leaders and includes the head of the Salvadoran American Chamber of Commerce and Carlos Castro, the owner of Todos Market. The group said it has raised $100,000 for lobbying and media advertising. Sosa and Associates, a Latino-owned public relations firm, produced the TV commercial free of charge.
The Republican Party of Virginia has proposed a five-part plan for dealing with the issue that includes proposals for targeting criminal activity by undocumented immigrants and for punishing businesses that hire them, according to John Hager, the state's GOP chairman.
Already, some candidates have made enforcement of immigration laws a centerpiece of their campaigns. Jackson Hunter Miller, a Republican delegate who represents District 50, which includes parts of Prince William County, has sponsored several bills. One would cut state and local funding to charities and other organizations that provide services to undocumented immigrants. He vows to sponsor additional measures that would allow the deportation of such immigrants charged with crimes and penalize businesses that knowingly hire undocumented immigrants.
Miller is running against Democrat Jeanette M. Rishell, who has also has called for action. "Because our federal government has failed in its responsibility to address illegal immigration, the states must now find solutions that are long-lasting and legal," Rishell said.
"Things are different this year in that Republicans and Democrats are both running on platforms that address illegal immigration," Miller said.
Raw Look at Immigration Crucible
Washington Post, November 3, 2007
PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, VA - In one video, a man furious about hearing Spanish at a hardware store berates a group of Latino families with a lecture on U.S. history, telling them "my ancestors were here before the Constitution."
A little girl shyly reminds him: "The Indians were here before the [British]."
In another clip, a woman asks county officials not to forget "who was responsible for 9/11 - illegals," while a man tells them, "Don't confuse the 9/11 with the 7-Eleven. . . . The guys at the 7-Eleven just want to work."
Other scenes show worried, frustrated residents denouncing a "foreign invasion" and warning of "civil war," to which one scowling young man taunts: "Bring it."
The immigration clash that has consumed Prince William County residents, neighborhoods and government halls is now showing up in serial form on YouTube, archived and freely available in all its raw intensity.
The footage, posted by local filmmakers Annabel Park and Eric Byler, is neither pretty nor polished. But the couple adds a chapter nearly every day, offering all sides a chance to be seen and heard, as well as a forum for well-mannered debate to those willing to engage in it.
Park and Byler describe their project as an interactive documentary that aims to defuse tensions and explore the complexity of the issue. Their clips are loaded with the unfiltered emotions that have flooded county streets and county politics, but the filmmakers allow the material to stand on its own, without narration or commentary. A more complete documentary might come later, they say, but for now their goal is to edit and upload the footage as fast as possible to their site, http://www.youtube.com/9500Liberty.
"What you normally do is shoot, then edit, then enter film festivals," said Byler, 35, a Gainesville resident. "On that trajectory, people would see this film for the first time next summer. That's a long time to wait. If the movie is meant to create dialogue, why release it after things may have already shifted?"
With little more than a basic video camera and laptop computers, Byler, Park and a third partner, Jeff Man, have spent the past few months filming Prince William's efforts to enact the region's toughest measures targeting undocumented immigrants. Before the county supervisors voted last week to cut off certain services to these immigrants and increase immigration enforcement by the police, Byler and Park recorded the session of emotional public testimony, which lasted more than 12 hours.
Excerpts of the testimony have been posted in installments on their site, along with their most-viewed clip, set at the so-called Liberty Wall in Manassas, which has been viewed more than 38,000 times.
The five-minute video tracks the fate of a large banner in Manassas that reads "Stop Your Racism to Hispanics" and hangs from the last wall of a recently demolished house at 9500 Liberty St. - "at the intersection of Liberty and Prince William Street," the filmmakers note. The banner has been a symbol of the county's tension, as well as a target for it, having survived a dud Molotov cocktail attack only to later be ripped in half by vandals.
"People are writing to us and saying, 'What can we do?' " Park said. "They want to get involved."
Park, 39, was born in Korea but grew up in Houston and Rockville. Before Prince William became a flashpoint for the nation's immigration debate, she led a successful campaign for a U.S. House resolution urging Japan to apologize for the sexual enslavement of "comfort women" during World War II.
Since then, Park said she has declined several job offers from lobbying groups, opting instead to follow Prince William's rocky effort to rid its communities of undocumented immigrants. Park said she and Byler, as Asian Americans, are able to bridge the conflict's undercurrent of antagonism between non-Hispanic whites (NHW) and Latinos.
"We went into this feeling it was about election-year politics and racism," she said. "But the more we learn about it, the more we see how multifaceted it is."
In one video viewed 26,000 times in its first week, a group of Latino children run and play outside the chambers of the Board of County Supervisors, seemingly oblivious to the charged debate unfolding indoors. A Woodbridge high school teacher cautions the board's chairman, Corey A. Stewart (R): "The very people you are trying to oppress today, their children may rise up tomorrow and stand in judgment of you."
For Byler, an independent director whose 2002 film "Charlotte Sometimes" was hailed as a "breakthrough for Asian American filmmaking" by critic Roger Ebert, the roots of the 9500 Liberty project trace to George Allen's calling an Indian American "macaca" last summer.
Byler, the son of a white U.S. Army officer and a Chinese American mother, spent much of his childhood in Burke. He said he was teased often about his appearance.
"Watching George Allen look into the camera and point and say you are not the real Virginia, the real Virginia is the people who are laughing with me at you, reminded me of this whole thing that was never resolved," Byler said.
"I've always been sensitive to situations where people are being singled out."
After the macaca incident, Byler and Park moved back to Virginia from Los Angeles and volunteered for Democrat James Webb's Senate campaign against Allen, helping to raise money among Asian Americans.
Although they worked on a Democratic campaign and their video clips show a sympathy for Latino immigrants' fears about racism and discrimination, Byler and Park have sought to capture all sides of the debate on undocumented immigration. One of their most-viewed videos shows a meeting of the anti-illegal immigrant group Help Save Manassas, and others include interviews with Stewart, whose re-election campaign slogan is "Fighting illegal immigration."
"They're really trying to do a service," said George Taplin, director of the Virginia chapter of the anti-illegal immigrant group Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, who appears in two videos about the now-defunct Herndon day-laborer center. Taplin praised the videos' fairness but said he thought the couple's editorial balance was missing in their administration of viewer comments on their YouTube page.
"What I'm seeing as far as the reaction is rhetoric and people calling each other names. That's not going to help anything," Taplin said. "You don't get dialogue going by fanning hatred and discontent."
Like Taplin, some viewers have accused Byler and Park of censorship for rejecting their comments on the 9500 Liberty page. Byler and Park maintain that they are trying to keep the discussion free of hate speech or racism, especially as viewings of their videos have increased and comments have begun arriving from viewers elsewhere in the United States and abroad.
"We don't approve the ones that are going to lead to violence," Byler said. Some of the hate-filled diatribes that arrived in the past week were so disturbing that they notified federal authorities, he said.
Byler says that viewers need to watch several of the videos to understand the larger picture of Prince William's immigration debate. The clips have appeared on blogs and elicited hundreds of comments. But despite the couple's efforts at peacemaking, there is little sign of reconciliation in their videos, though no shortage of resentment, fear and bitterness.
Still, Park said she is not discouraged. "I see a lot of hope in this," she said.
"Ultimately, the only way to heal the community is to work together to end the fighting and to collaborate on solutions that address the real grievances people have."
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