Farmingville "Community Resource Center" wants to teach spanish
Lets Roll
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-lifarm253866514jun25,0,77160
85.story?coll=ny-top-headlines
By Bart Jones
Staff Writer
June 25, 2004
After the attempted murder of two Mexican day laborers, the firebombing of a
Mexican family's home and a brutal battle over a proposed hiring center,
Farmingville seemed like a place of little hope for a peaceful solution to
the controversy over illegal immigration.
But now community organizers say they are excited about a new project that
they are revealing after keeping it under wraps for a year. They have opened
a community resource center mainly for day laborers who take English classes
and create art, and they plot strategies for going after contractors who
don't pay the laborers their owed wages.
Organizers hope the privately funded center also will serve as a bridge
between the newly arrived immigrants and residents angry over everything
from overcrowded housing to men standing on street corners.
"It's a place that will help build a new community where everyone respects
each other and understands each other," said Irma Solis, a community
organizer with the Workplace Project who oversees the center. "Hopefully
we'll be able to live together without the tension and provide some healing
to the community."
The Workplace Project, the Brookhaven Citizens for Peaceful Solutions civic
group and the United Day Laborers association opened the center in April of
last year but have kept it quiet until now because they were concerned about
attacks against it. Those worries were confirmed by the firebombing last
July that displaced a family of five and led to the arrest of five local
teenagers. Four pleaded guilty and one's case was handled in family court
because he was a juvenile.
Until now the center has operated without problems, and organizers say many
members in the community are welcoming it and hoping it marks the end of
strife that has drawn national attention to Farmingville.
"It's like a sign of hope for the future," said Charles Funk, a member of
Peaceful Solutions group. In one sign of support, insurance agencies in
Nassau and Suffolk have donated 20 computers to the center and a similar one
that opened quietly in Farmingdale in October.
Both communities tried to create hiring centers aimed at getting day
laborers off street corners where they wait for daily jobs in landscaping
and construction. Such sites exist in Freeport, Glen Cove and Huntington
Station.
But the proposals met fierce resistance from some Farmingville and
Farmingdale residents who opposed them because many of the men are
undocumented immigrants who often work off-the-books for contractors. So
organizers settled on the less controversial option of community resource
centers that do not - and according to Solis - never will serve as hiring
sites.
Not everyone is convinced the Farmingville center will ease tensions.
Resident William Murphy said that while he isn't opposed to the project, it
won't address the root problems of illegal immigration, overcrowded housing
and off-the-books jobs that have so many people seething. "We want the laws
enforced that are on the books," he said.
Solis said that is mainly an immigration issue only the federal government
can resolve, and in the meantime the community needs to heal, not feud. She
said, for instance, that organizers hope to attract more English class
volunteers who can also learn Spanish from the workers.
Those kinds of activities can help the immigrants and longtime residents
find common ground, said one worker, Pablo Sandoval. He said in Spanish that
the center is "a place that is working for the well-being of the community."
Iconoclast
"Lets Roll" <lets...@meet-me-in-hell.com> wrote in message
news:10do6fq...@corp.supernews.com...
>
>
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-lifarm253866514jun25,0,77160
> 85.story?coll=ny-top-headlines
> By Bart Jones
> Staff Writer
>
> June 25, 2004
>
> After the attempted murder of two Mexican day laborers, the firebombing of
a
> Mexican family's home and a brutal battle over a proposed hiring center,
> Farmingville seemed like a place of little hope for a peaceful solution to
> the controversy over illegal immigration.
>
> But now community organizers say they are excited about a new project that
> they are revealing after keeping it under wraps for a year. They have
opened
> a community resource center mainly for day laborers who take English
classes
> and create art, and they plot strategies for going after contractors who
> don't pay the laborers their owed wages.
>
> Organizers hope the privately funded center also will serve as a bridge
> between the newly arrived immigrants and residents angry over everything
> from overcrowded housing to men standing on street corners.
>
> "It's a place that will help build a new community where everyone respects
> each other and understands each other," said Irma Solis, a community
> organizer with the Workplace Project who oversees the center.
That's what ZANU PF promised for Zimbabwe, LOL! They're stealing Robert
Mugabe's thunder. They have no shame.
> "Hopefully
> we'll be able to live together without the tension and provide some
healing
> to the community."
Awe. Shucks. They have all the PC cliches memorized. This same drama
seems to play out all over Aztlan these days.
>