Far from border, a migration flash point

They've come for plentiful jobs in construction and landscaping in neighboring and wealthy Fairfield County. Danbury is also a better place for immigrants to raise their families than, say, the Lower East Side of New York. And that's why they come, says Wilson Hernandez, past president of the Ecuadorian Civic Center. "They want to come here so they can make a living, just to provide some bread to keep their families stable," he says.

But for some longtime residents, like Lydia Yaglenski, a mother who runs a body-shop business, they are lawbreakers, plain and simple. She contends that the presence of the undocumented workers has overburdened the local schools with a large number of children who can't speak English.

"It's not only the education," she adds. "We have to have more police. These people park their cars everywhere; a landlord buys a house, two people come to rent it, and before you know it, there are 20 living there."

Such frustrations came to a head at a meeting last month of the newly formed Connecticut Citizens for Immigration Control. More than 150 people turned out to voice concerns about the impact that undocumented workers are having on the community - everything from the large volleyball games some immigrants play in their backyards to the decrease in local wages.

"The illegals have a distinct advantage economically over legals: They displace workers who would otherwise have those jobs," says Paul Streitz, cofounder of Connecticut Citizens. "They accept wages that are so low that it eventually gets to the point that contractors and others can't but use illegals. Otherwise, they can't effectively compete for business."

But some of Danbury's residents, old and new, see such concerns as shortsighted and uninformed at best, and bigoted at worst. These residents note that undocumented workers make it possible for many traditional businesses to survive: They do jobs, such as cleaning toilets, that others shun. They also help keep consumer prices low on everything from a dinner out to a new jacket at the mall.

Residents making these arguments maintain that the real economic culprits are not immigrants, but the large corporations that outsource better-paying manufacturing jobs to places like China and India, as well as the local ones that exploit immigrant laborers.

Some are concerned that groups like Connecticut Citizens are scapegoating Danbury's newcomers. "These men are really talking pure nonsense. What they're saying about the immigrants is so poisonous and vile, it's so anti-everything," says Maria Cinta Lowe, executive director of the Hispanic Center of Greater Danbury. "What they're really trying to do is damage the situation in our community. They're instigating evil."

One thing is clear: The inflamed emotions on both sides are indicative of what the nation has to come to terms with.

"The bottom line is that we have close to 11 million unauthorized residents in the country today," says Lindsay Lowell, director of policy studies at Georgetown University's Institute for the Study of International Migration in Washington. "We have to decide either to regularize it or combat it. But what you're seeing is a normal reaction to a huge population."

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