To immigrants, US reform bill is unrealistic

For the Senate reform plan to work as intended, illegal immigrants would need to embrace its rules – not opt for business as usual.

from the May 21, 2007 edition

Page 3 of 3

Page 1 | Page 2 | 3

In North Phoenix, where Salvador Reza runs a work center where some 85 to 110 immigrants wait in a graveled parking lot for employers to pick them up for landscaping, painting, and housecleaning jobs, Mr. Reza is somewhat more optimistic – he calls the proposal "a good start" – but is still skeptical.

In addition to the steep requirements for visa applications, he worries that adding more agents and infrastructure to the border control will further criminalize activity there.

"This will corrupt even more," Reza says. "It will create better networks of mafia that control it and become even more sophisticated."

And some immigrants say the plan, if implemented as is, may simply encourage them to return to their home country for good.

"Work is slow right now," says Ramiro Ruiz, a young man from Chiapas who's worked in Phoenix for the past two years, mainly as a landscaper. And he misses his family. Paying $5,000, he says, is out of the question. "I will maybe stay here two years, three maximum."

Margarita Medina, who crossed the border 19 years ago and has since earned a resident alien card by marrying a resident, says she's horrified by the proposed requirements, particularly the trip back to a home country.

"For families, this is terrible," she says, as she fills out a citizenship application – her second – in a South Phoenix office. "I don't ever want to go back, and it would be so hard to break up families."

The fragile Senate bill, which already has some lawmakers distancing themselves from it, will likely face significant changes even if it survives and makes it through the House. It's a process that some immigrant advocates see as a chance to improve the bill's weaknesses, though retaining bipartisan support could be tough with more measures favorable to illegal immigrants.

"We understand the value of this being introduced and moving forward, but we really need to have these problems fixed," says Roslyn Gold, chief counsel for the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. "If you have a program that the immigrants don't apply for, you don't have an effective program."

• Amanda Paulson reported from Chicago, Faye Bowers from Phoenix, and Daniel B. Wood from Los Angeles.

1 | 2 | Page 3

Click to enlarge AP