Inland Valley Daily Bulletin

Latino leaders look to help immigrants
Education, communication are key
By MIRA KATZ
STAFF WRITER

Saturday, July 10, 2004 - ONTARIO - Community leaders and activists from across the state came together Saturday in hopes of creating a plan of action to protect undocumented workers from U.S. Border Patrol immigration raids.

Leaders and representatives of Mexican and Latino organizations, community leaders, clergy and business people came from as far south as San Diego and as far north as Santa Maria to develop better communication and coordination of efforts among the organizations dealing with the Border Patrol raids conducted last month.

"We need to continue to work to preserve the rights of immigrants,' said Armando Navarro, coordinator of the National Alliance for Human Rights, which hosted the event.

"We should not take comfort in the fact that the raids have stopped. Too much we respond to crisis situations and then when the crisis subsides so does the activism.'

Border Patrol officials have arrested about 450 people since early June for immigration violations, including 79 in Ontario and 75 in Corona, igniting both cheers and protests from the local community.

But officials from the federal Department of Homeland Security have since said the arrests of undocumented immigrants did not follow departmental procedures.

The department is reviewing operations of the newly formed mobile patrol group at the Border Patrol station in Temecula, which arrested more than 420 people last month, said Suzanne Luber, a spokeswoman from the Department of Homeland Security.

Operations will be reviewed and authorized by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Formerly, when the Border Patrol fell under the authority of the U.S. Department of Justice, agents did not need headquarters approval to conduct interior operations, she said. That changed, however, after the creation of Homeland Security in March 2003.

"I hope we sue the INS for full and complete discrimination,' said James P. DeMaegt, an attorney for the Latino-American Truckers and Workers association. "I also hope we can create emergency response teams to respond to the total and completely illegal stops.'

Much of Saturday's discussion centered on how to organize the various groups throughout the state to protect undocumented immigrants from future raids.

Leaders also discussed the need to educate immigrants in their communities on their rights.

To that end, the Training Occupation Development Educational Center Legal Center has been distributing fliers in Spanish explaining the rights of detainees.

Representatives for both Rep. Joe Baca, D-Rialto, and state Sen. Nell Soto, D-Ontario, who attended the meeting were careful to state that the lawmakers supported the group's work, and objected to how the immigration raids were carried out, but not that the raids occurred.