Many immigrants live in poverty--Thousands in region fight just to survive

Posted May 04, 2003 By Ben Jones Gannett Wisconsin Newspapers

The roads in the United States may not be paved with gold, but they have long beckoned to immigrants seeking something better.

The roads have led many to the Fox River Valley and the Green Bay area, where thousands have put down new roots.

But despite the area’s reputation for high-paying jobs, the paychecks of more than 3,500 immigrants in the region tell a different story — they still live in poverty.

“People move up north for a better chance,” said Federico Sotillo, a native of Venezuela who lives in Green Bay.

“Because too many people are coming, the job situation gets harder. The competition gets harder,” he said.

Recently released figures from the 2000 census show that 18.4 percent of the approximately 19,444 foreign-born residents in Brown, Outagamie, Calumet, Waupaca and Winnebago counties live in poverty.

That’s more than three times the rate of poverty for the area’s overall population. Nationwide, the immigrant poverty rate is 15.4 percent.

The federal poverty threshold varies depending on the size of the family. In 1999, the threshold was $16,895 for a family of four with two children. The median family income in Wisconsin that year was $52,911.

Sotillo also said the wages of some Hispanic workers are lower because of exploitation by employers.

“They use the Hispanics because they know they are illegal,” Sotillo said. “So they pay them whatever they want to pay them. They fire them whenever they want to fire them.

“How are they going to argue about it? They have no rights here.”

Chungyia Thao, president of Universal Translation and Staffing in Appleton, came to the United States in 1987 at the age of 15 from a refugee camp in Thailand.

Thao arrived with few possessions and no English skills. He lived with family in Seattle while attending school.

He said that while life in the refugee camp was hard, life in the United States presents other challenges. He said a lack of English skills puts daily activities and jobs out of reach for many immigrants. He said it is particularly difficult for older Hmong.

“Most of the older generation, they are just finding jobs in factories, but there are not many good jobs,” he said.

Sotillo, who is minister of a United Pentecostal Church in Green Bay, said many new immigrants come from rural areas and don’t have the education and technical skills to obtain high-paying work.

“If we find a job, it has to be a manual job like working in a factory or farm work, because we don’t have the skills,” Sotillo said. “We don’t know how to use a computer, we don’t speak good English.

“So, of course, we don’t get good jobs.”

Lo Lee, director of the Hmong American Partnership in Appleton, said a cultural difference may account for part of the high immigrant poverty level reflected by the census.

Lee said many Hmong households, for example, are large and extended families. They may be surviving but not faring well by the federal standards.

“I don’t think anyone is going be foodless or homeless, but they may not have the quality of food or the quality of life,” Lee said.

Some immigrants come to Northeastern Wisconsin to earn money by working in farm fields.

But many migrant workers instead find themselves unemployed and waiting.

Deanna McGill, a case manager at the Emergency Shelters of the Fox Valley in Appleton, said that between 12 and 15 percent of the people in her shelter are migrant workers, including many from Mexico.

“They come up for work, but what happens sometimes is maybe the fields aren’t ready or the crops are delayed,” McGill said. “Their employers might not have housing.”

Amparo Baudhuin, an immigration caseworker for the Catholic Diocese of Green Bay, said immigrants in general are hard-working.

“It’s fantastic,” she said. “The majority of folks from Mexico, Central America and South America have an incredible work ethic. They have a great instinct of self-preservation.

“If they don’t work, they don’t eat.”

Baudhuin said immigrants can’t take advantage of many federal assistance programs unless they have been in the country for years.

And acceptance of certain programs now could jeopardize someone’s chances of becoming a citizen later because the application process takes such things into account.

“The bottom line is the government wants immigrants that are coming of their own free will to basically survive on their own strengths and not take advantage of anything,” she said.