The Colony Leader (The Colony, Tex.), Vol. 11, No. 31, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 16, 1993 Page: 4 of 39
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: The Colony Newspaper Collection and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the The Colony Public Library.
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Page 4A — The Colony Leader — Wednesday, June 16, 1993
gent: More than 150,000 illegal aliens in North Texas
By VALERIE BARNA
Staff writer
No one knows how many un-
documented persons are living in the
Dallas suburbs.
But Jim Norton, who once owned
a concrete construction business,
said he can make some educated
guesses based on his own experi-
ence.
From 1971 to 1987, Norton own-
ed the construction business in Pla-
no. When profits went down, Norton
turned to a wholesale seafood busi-
ness. His company delivers seafood
throughout the Metroplex.
Norton estimates that between
3,000 and 4,000 illegal aliens either
live or work in Plano during peak
seasons.
The figures, he said, are the re-
sult of research by Plano’s day-
laborer task force. Norton was a
member of the now-disbanded
group, charged with investigating
whether facilities could be provided
for the hundreds of day laborers who
flock to Plano seeking short-term
employment each year.
Roy Frady, director of Plano’s
“His Hands” Ministry, estimates the
number of Plano’s illegals at be-
tween 4,000 and 6,500 (3-5 percent
[mmigrants
From 1A
“Things haven’t worked out (in
the United States),” Maria said
through an interpreter, Christian
Community Action Center counse-
lor Angie Moore. “We need to go
back to Mexico — even though
things are better here.”
Moore explained that last remark:
“In some areas of Mexico, there is
no work and no food. People are
starving.”
Maria, an illegal immigrant using a
fictional name, retraced her journey
to “the promised land.”
There was no Moses (paid
“coyote”), she said, to part the Rio
Grande where she and six others
crossed one night at Piedras Neg-
ras. “I wasn’t afraid of anything,”
Maria said, “except the snakes. It
was summer and there were a lot of
snakes at the river. We swam
across.
- ’
Maria said she and her compan-
ions walked seven days through
woods to arrive in Texas. “There
were wells and springs for water,
but after four days, our food ran out.
We all lived on the seeds and dried
food some of the others had
brought.”
There was no contact with the
U.S. Border Patrol, Maria said.
There were no snake bites either.
Texas was a long way from home
for the 20-year-old senorita who had
been scratching out a living cleaning
other peoples’ houses. Mexico
Illegals
From 1A
But there are from five to seven
times that many illegal immigrants in
this country.
And they come from nations
around the globe. In 1991, for exam-
ple, the U.S. Border Patrol’s El
Paso office apprehended illegals rep-
resenting 75 nationalities.
A week ago, a freighter packed
with 300 undocumented Chinese im-
migrants beached itself outside New
York City. Eight died when they
jumped overboard into the 53-
degree waters of the Atlantic. Most
of the others were captured and in-
terned at camps on the East Coast.
Earlier this month, un-
documented Chinese flooded ashore
at San Francisco and at a beach near
Monterey, Calif. According to ex-
perts, from 10,000 to 30,000 un-
documented Chinese are coming to
America each year.
El Paso immigration rights activist
Debbie Nathan estimated in a
Christian Science Monitor report
last February that the United States
was accommodating from 3 million to
5 million undocumented foreigners.
“They’re the backbone of such in-
dustries as food service, apparel
manufacture and domestic child
care,” she said.
In the 1980s, according to CQ Re-
searcher, 55 percent of the illegals
came from Mexico and another 22
percent came from other Latin
American countries; nearly half
were between the ages of 15 and 27;
about 53 percent were male; nearly
half located in California; and about
9.1 percent settled in Texas.
No one knows the exact number
of undocumented persons in the Dal-
las suburbs. But those who work
with immigrants and minority groups
estimate there are at least 8,000
illegals in Plano and Carrollton alone.
Passage of the 1986 Immigration
Reform and Control Act stanched
the flow of illegal immigrants for a
few years, but a new hemorrhage
has formed.
According to CQ Researcher,
three factors are mainly to blame:
the rise of a cottage industry in
phony Social Security cards and
other documents necessary for em-
ployment, the increase in labor con-
of Plano’s overall population.)
Frady, an ordained minister, has
been working with the poor in Plano
since 1988.
Mark Jorgensen, senior agent
with the U.S. Border Patrol Office in
Euless, however, had the biggest
estimate: 5,000-10,000 in Plano.
Norton said while a few of Plano’s
illegals are from Guatemala, “99 per-
cent are from Mexico.”
He estimated that “maybe 2 per-
cent” stay in the United States per-
manently.
“And every single one that stays
has bought property in Mexico for
retirement, or for whenever their
kids are raised,” he said.
Norton noted that in U.S. Border
Patrol actions in Plano, illegals con-
stitute about 15 percent of any group
raided. But another 35 percent of
the illegals fool the authorities with
bogus documents, he said.
Fake Social Security documents
and Green Cards are readily avail-
able for $40 at flea markets, accord-
ing to Norton.
According to last April’s Volume 2
of CQ Researcher, a nationwide cot-
tage industry in bogus documents
has sprouted since passage of the
Immigration Reform and Control Act
(IRCA) of 1986. Illegals use the
offered no future for such unmarried
women with only sixth-grade educa-
tions.
Maria had taken heart, however,
from the stories she heard about life
in el norte. It was hope that made her
bold.
In Texas, a labor contractor en-
countered Maria and the small group
of immigrants. He offered them
work and a ride to Broken Bov,
Okla., for $300 apiece.
Maria said no one had any money.
But they accepted the offer; the
$300 was deducted from their future
wages at a chicken ranch in Broken been tough. “The hardest part has
Bow. been being away from our country
At the ranch, Maria met Juan, a and our countrymen,” she said. “We
Mexican national who had been cros- don’t have any family support.”
sing back and forth into Texas since Maria explained through the inter-
he was a child. The couple soon had prefer that no one else in her Lewis-
a child — a bright-eyed, perpetually ville community is from the same
curious little girl now 2 years old. region of Mexico. “They isolate you
Maria said she tried to resolve her if you’re not from their particular
immigration status while working in area of Mexico,” she said.
Broken Bow. An American of Mex- Moore, the interpreter, explained
ican descent came by and offered to that illegal families here survive by
file the necessary government docu-
ments, she said. The charge was
$600.
Maria and about 50 other illegals
at the ranch accepted the man’s
offer. They paid their money, but
never saw him again.
Maria, Juan and the baby stayed in
Oklahoma about two years, then
hitched a ride to Lewisville with a
woman who said day laborers could
find work there.
They were taken to an apartment
complex, where the managers were
willing to wait until jobs were found
to pay the rent money. The couple’s
tractors acting as middle men for
employers and weak Immigration
and Naturalization Service enforce-
ment of penalties against those who
hire undocumented workers.
About 50 percent ot employers
are not obeying the law, according to
a 1991 study. The understaffed and
underbudgeted INS cannot cope.
Another problem is foreigners
who overstay their visas. According
to CQ Researcher, legal visas pre-
viously were held by about 40 per-
cent of the 200,000-300,000 people
who become permanent illegal resi-
dents each year. Many with the ex-
pired visas are natives of Ireland or
Eastern European countries, the
Researcher said.
Also contributing to the skyrock-
eting numbers is refugees’ legal
right to apply for political asylum.
“Though relatively few illegals have
any realistic hope of gaining asylum
status, an increasing number are ap-
plying, knowing the system can’t
handle them,” according to CQ Re-
searcher.
Typically, it takes from a year to
18 months for a political asylum case
to be adjudicated. In the interim, re-
fugees just disappear, melding into
the underground economy.
In 1992, according to CQ Resear-
cher, there was a backlog of a quar-
ter-million political asylum cases.
A look at immigrant traffic at New
York airports in December 1991
sheds light on the problem.
In that month, 1,250 people from
India, Bangladesh and Pakistan re-
quested political asylum upon arrival
at the airports. According to CQ Re-
searcher, they had boarded flights
with phony documents and then des-
troyed them while en route to the
United States. The foreigners
vanished into New York City after
filing for political asylum.
The one solution proposed to halt
the phony document scam — a
national identification card — gener-
ally lacks support among Americans
leery of “big brother” intrusions.
Money leaves economy
Some Americans, however, be-
lieve competition from illegal immig-
rants is hurting low-skilled American
workers.
According to CQ Researcher, bil-
counterfeit cards to pass as legal im-
migrants seeking jobs. IRCA levies
fines and jail terms for employers
who knowingly hire illegal aliens.
Norton said McKinney “has a big
problem (with illegals) in its down-
town, older section.” He estimated
the number of illegals in McKinney
during peak working seasons at ab-
out 1,500. About 99 percent are
Mexican, he said. Norton listed
“personal knowledge” as the source
of his information.
Border Patrol agent Jorgensen
estimated 2,000-3,000 illegals are
living in McKinney and 4,000-6,000
work there.
According to Norton, the majority
of illegal aliens in Mesquite tend to
come from India. But Border Patrol
agent Jorgensen was unable to sub-
stantiate that. He estimated that
5,000-10,000 illegals of Hispanic de-
scent are either living or working in
Mesquite.
Lewisville “has one little com-
munity — 100 maximum — of illegal
residents,” Norton said.
But Angie Moore, a counselor at
the Christian Community Action
Center, had a different estimate.
She put the figure at about 200, “that
we know of.”
Agent Jorgensen estimated that
reeessoo-oee-o-------HHH===
“There were wells and
springs for water, but af-
ter four days, our food
ran out. We all lived on
the seeds and dried food
some of the others had
brought.” — Maria,
on her travel to Texas from
Mexico
second child — now 3 months old —
was born in Lewisville.
Maria said life in Lewisville has
helping each other since they know
members of each others’ extended
families back home. But no one
knows any relatives of Maria and
Juan, so the couple is left alone,
Moore said.
“They survive only with the help
of CCA (Christian Community Ac-
tion).”
But CCA can offer only limited
help because of its guidelines,
according to Moore.
One help it offers that’s available
to all, however, is an open-door poli-
cy when the Border Patrol comes.
“They all run to CCA when Im-
lions of dollars worth of wages are
being sent out of the United States
economy, and American workers’
benefits are being undermined by
the illegals’ willingness to work for
substandard wages in intolerable
conditions.
Illegals employed above-board,
however, do pay federal income
taxes and Social Security deductions
through employer withholding prog-
rams. Illegals are barred from feder-
al welfare, food stamp and unem-
ployment compensation programs.
Out of fear of being discovered, few
file for the income tax refunds owed
them, according to CQ Researcher.
Children born to illegals in the Un-
ited States, however, can and do re-
ceive services. The Supreme Court
in 1982 ruled undocumented immig-
rant children have a right to go to
school.
In Los Angeles, a mecca for illeg-
als on the West Coast, children born
to illegals account for more than 65
percent of the births at county-run
hospitals, CQ Researcher said. The
cost to taxpayers is about $28 million
a year. Children of illegals also re-
ceive about $250 million a year in
Los Angeles County welfare pay-
ments, according to the Researcher.
People from other countries are
willing to risk everything to get to
America because of the freedom
offered and the economic opportuni-
ties available. On average, according
to the Researcher, U.S. jobs pay
eight times their equivalent in
Mexico.
Most of the illegals, the Resear-
cher said, are “bread and butter mig-
rants hoping to trade poverty for
prosperity.”
According to statistics, fewer
than 10 percent of illegals become
permanent U.S. residents.
Many of them are seasonal work-
ers coming and going from Mexico
— just as they did when the bracero
(guest worker) program was in
effect up until 1964. That program
established a pattern that has been
difficult — if not impossible — to
stop.
Proposals for change
Changing immigration laws to
accommodate such patterns has
been proposed by some.
about 5,000 illegal aliens are living has been its manager the last two
and/or working in Lewisville. years.
Jorgensen and Moore agreed that Jorgensen estimated the number
most of the illegals are from Mexico, of illegals living or working in Car-
But there are also large numbers of rollton at 3,000-5,000. “You’re
Hondurans, Guatemalans, El Salva- going to find a lot of illegals any place
dorans and Peruvians, they said. you have a lot of new construction,”
Norton believes the number of he said.
illegals in Carrollton and Farmers Jorgensen estimated at “100 or
Branch is relatively small. And they so” the number of illegals living in
would tend to be Korean or Chinese,
he said.
But Eudelia Medina, manager of
the Metrocrest Thrift Store in Car-
rollton, gave an estimate of at least
3,000 illegals in Carrollton alone.
Most, she said, are from Mexico.
But there are also sizable popula-
tions of El Salvadorans, Hondurans
and Nicaraguans.
Medina said she thought —
erroneously — that all Koreans and
Chinese automatically received leg-
al-refugee status.
In Carrollton, Medina said, there
are at least six apartment complexes
where half or more of the residents
are in the United States illegally. “A
lot of the men are living together,”
she said. In other apartments, three
or four families crowd in.
Medina has worked at the Met-
rocrest Thrift Store since 1989 and
migration comes,” Moore said. Bor-
der Patrol authorities are not sup-
posed to enter homes or private faci-
lities, Moore said.
But that axiom is not always fol-
lowed.
Moore recalled one incident in
which a terrified man fled into the
president’s office at CCA and hid
under the desk. Two Border Patrol
officers entered the building in hot
pursuit. Moore said she stood in the
doorway to bar entry. The two tried
the door knob, but the door was
locked. “It’s never locked,” Moore
said. “That was a kind of miracle.”
The child of Mexican immigrants
herself, Moore described conditions
in Lewisville for some of the new
arrivals. She talked about the 11
people from El Salvador squeezed
into a mobile home.
In another mobile home, she said,
there were 14 people — seven of
them children. Moore recalled being
emotionally affected when one of the
men from the mobile home carried
into the CCA office his lame, 14-
year-old son. She said she suspected
the boy had cerebral palsy and had
never received any treatment.
Like Maria, Moore said conditions
in some parts of Mexico are even
worse than the immigrants’ situation
in Lewisville. She said she’s been
told that in some Mexican villages,
people with corn or flour for tortillas
hide it in the trees so no one will
steal it to feed their children.
“If you could see what it’s like
back there,” Moore said. “It’s so
much better here. They come here
to get a better life for their children.”
They point out that numbers of
immigrants automatically are admit-
ted to the United States because of
their country of origin: a previously
communist nation.
But “when a Haitian family risks
its life to come to America in an old
boat and is apprehended on the sea,
our laws do not recognize them as
refugees,” an editorial in The New
Republic pointed out in August 1989.
Such perceived inequities promp-
ted the Sanctuary Movement by
some churches and U.S. communi-
ties in the 1980s. By 1985, more
than 200 parishes of all denomina- year.
tions were participating in an Anoverpass at SH 121 and Inter-
“underground railroad” for migrants national Parkway near Coppell has
from Central America. been proposed and the preliminary
Many communities have set up design has been worked on, but the
formal programs to help find jobs for project is still in the planning stages
day laborers — the majority of and is subject to change, Macias
whom are undocumented. Plano, for said.
example, has been trying to estab- The stretch of North SH 121 from
lish day-laborer facilities for years, the Trinity River to the Burlington
Questions have been raised as to Northern Railroad tracks will be-
the criteria for deciding legal admis- come a four-lane divided highway. It
sion. Should certain countries be currently is under construction and
given preference? Should higher is scheduled to be finished Febuary
priority go to immigrants wishing to 1994, Macias said. State Engineer
be reunited with family members David Hensley said the project is ex-
already here, or should those with pected to cost the state more than
capital to invest in the country, or $12 million.
others with the skills needed by sci- The portion of SH 121 from the
ence and industry be sent to the Burlington tracks to Legacy Drive is
head of the line? scheduled to be completed in De-
The 1990 Immigration Act and cember 1993, Macias said.
amendments to it in 1991 increased There should not be too many sur-
priority for employment-based im- prise detours along the roadway this
migration. week, said Tim Massey, the high-
ln a 1991 position paper, Popula- way department’s chief inspector for
tion-Environment Balance, a SH 121. Traffic will be moved over
Washington-based advocacy group, onto a newly completed lane on SH
argued for keeping legal immigration 121 at Legacy, but Massey said he
levels low. expects the detour to cause no major
“Dissatisfied people (immigrants, traffic snarls.
for the most part) are often the most Chris Behnke, a civil engineer
motivated and best able to rectify with the SH 121 project, said work-
the problems of their own ers will be performing structure
societies,” the group declared, chores involving asphalt and grading
“What, for example, would have (loosening dirt for elevation pur-
happened to the Polish reform
movement had Lech Walesa decided
to emigrate to the United States?”
A Wall Street Journal editorial in
1990 took the opposite tack: “The
yearning masses offer us their ta-
lents, ambitions and obviously un-
breakable spirit. In return, we ac-
quire a renewed view of our own
difficult past and, if we are true to
the past, a reason for confidence in
our future.”
Coppell, Allen and The Colony.
“There are too few places there for
them to live,” he said. “But we can
catch them (illegals) anywhere. In
places like Allen, it would just take a
little longer.”
Jorgensen explained the difficul-
ties his office encounters in
apprehending illegals.
“We can only apprehend the num-
ber we can get rid of,” he said.
There is no money in the budget to
hold illegals in local jails until they can
be deported.
Also, the Euless office must rely
on the availability of transportation
to Laredo for those it apprehends.
Sometimes, there’s a bus, some-
times there’s a van and sometimes
(Saturdays and Sundays), there’s
nothing, he said.
“So we have to turn them loose.”
Jorgensen said even aliens pre-
viously arrested for such crimes as
‘Cheap labor’ cited in
business, union failures
By VALERIE BARNA
Staff writer
In the cut-throat competition
among area cement contractors in
the 1980s, firms employing illegal
immigrants reportedly came out the
winners.
According to former concrete
contractor Jim Norton of Plano, the
immigrants’ relatively cheap labor
helped put under some area firms as
well as the local of a cement masons’
union.
Norton operated a concrete con-
struction business in Plano from
1971-87. He said he switched to
wholesaling seafood when he could
no longer make money pouring con-
crete.
A major problem in the concrete
business, Norton said, was the cost
of the labor force. “I never hired
illegals, though I couldn’t compete
with those who did. I was paying
(laborers and finishers) $8 to $14 an
hour; they (other firms employing
undocumented workers) were
paying $3 to $4 an hour.”
Day-laborer forces in the Dallas
area consist almost entirely of un-
documented workers, according to
Norton.
Willie Copeland, a Dallas cement
contractor since 1980, agreed with
Norton’s recollections of the 1980s.
In the Dallas local of the Labor and
Cement Masons Union, Copeland
said, cement finishers were being
paid about $16 an hour while labor-
ers were making $9 to $10 an hour.
But some firms hired un-
documented workers and paid
finishers $6-$8 an hour and laborers
$4-$5 an hour, he said.
“Illegal aliens sure closed it (the
union local) down. They (un-
documented laborers) work for
Projects
From 1A
Corrections
In the June 9 edition of The Col-
ony Leader, John A. Woods of
Carrollton, who was arrested in
connection with the assault of two
15-year-old boys from The Col-
ony, was incorrectly identified as
James A. Woods.
driving while intoxicated or public in-
toxication are turned loose if there is
no transportation available. Those
arrested on drug-related charges,
however, are kept in jail.
Before turning loose an un-
documented alien, Jorgensen said,
paperwork is initiated for an im-
migration hearing in Dallas. But it
takes from a year to 18 months for
the hearing to take place. By that
time, the illegal may have dis-
appeared again.
Jorgensen said the Border Patrol
Office in Euless was to have had a
staff of 35 when it was opened in
1988. But it actually has a staff of 10.
Of the 10, one is a supervisor and
one is secretary. Two are assigned
to pick up illegals from Dallas and
Fort Worth jails; another is on
national duty. That leaves five
agents at most for field work,
Jorgensen said.
He estimated the number of illegal
aliens living in the Metroplex — his
office’s coverage area — at 150,000-
200,000. Since the Metroplex office
in Euless opened in 1988, about
23,000 illegals have been
apprehended by staff from his office,
Jorgensen said. The illegals have
hailed from more than 56 different
nations.
whatever you pay them —just about
nothin’!”
Copeland said the union, which
provided masons to construct build-
ings, pour parking lots and pave
streets, still has a small office some-
where in the Metroplex. “But no
one’s working out of it,” Copeland
said.
Harte-Hanks’ attempts to contact
firms that allegedly hired illegal
workers have been unsuccessful.
Copeland conceded that the eco-
nomic recession and spiraling health
insurance costs also took their toll on
the 1980s cement construction busi-
ness locally.
According to Allen Ward, the
owner of an automotive upholstery
shop in Plano, independent contrac-
tors in the fencing, landscape, swim-
ming pool, sprinkler system, roof-
ing, and general maintenance
businesses have been the ones most
likely to hire undocumented
workers.
For the most part, said Ward, the
contractors offer the illegals under-
the-table deals.
Ward believes there are two
reasons for hiring undocumented
workers: cost and availability.
“You can’t find people willing to do
that work for that amount of
money,” he said. “Students won’t do
it, like they used to. And these peo-
ple (the undocumented workers) are
hungry. Anything we have to offer is
better than what they have.”
Ward said he hired illegals himself
on three occasions for odd jobs
around his home. He said he’s used
undocumented workers for help
with landscaping, to dig a sewer line
and help with roofing.
“I've worked with them. It’s
stout,” he said.
poses) on SH 121 at I-35 in Lewisvil-
le. And along SH 121 near The Col-
ony, workers will be constructing
storm sewers and grading, he said.
Several other major highway con-
struction projects are underway in
the Lewisville area, including the
addition of a new highway to connect
Round Grove Road in Lewisville
with Hebron Parkway in Carrollton.
A six-lane divided highway is
being constructed to link Hebron to
Round Grove, and it is scheduled to
be open for use Jan. 1, 1994, said
Tim Tumulty, Carrollton City En-
gineer. The joint venture has cost
Denton County $9.5 million and the
city of Carrollton $1.5 million, he
said.
“It will be a more direct route to
Vista Ridge Mall from Carrollton,”
Dingler said. “Also, it probably will
take traffic off (State Highway) 121.”
Currently, the only connecting
roads from Carrollton to Lewisville
are SH 121 and Frankford Road.
Hebron Parkway will be situated be-
tween the two.
One final construction project
underway in the city of Lewisville is
the expansion of Farm-to-Market
Road 1171, also known as Main
Street. Dingler said the $11 million
project will widen the street into a
six-lane divided highway west of
Stemmons Freeway into Flower
Mound. It is scheduled to be com-
pleted by the end of this year.
Staff writer Nancy Donisi contributed to
this report.
It is the intention of The Colony
Leader to be accurate in all of our
reports.
If we make a mistake, please let
us know. It will be corrected in the
next edition after it has been cal-
led to our attention.
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Epperson, Wayne. The Colony Leader (The Colony, Tex.), Vol. 11, No. 31, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 16, 1993, newspaper, June 16, 1993; The Colony, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1666752/m1/4/?q=denton+history: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting The Colony Public Library.