Did I Learn?

I have spent the last eight weeks in Tucson, Arizona and Nogales, Mexico. At the beginning of these eight weeks, I challenged myself with this goal:

“So, why am I here? I am here to learn. To learn in order to better understand. To learn in order to be able to make informed decisions regarding immigration. To learn in order to be better able to serve. But especially, to learn in order to be qualified to educate for change.”—blog post To Learn June 6, 2010

I did learn.

I learned during the first two weeks we spent on the border participating in an educational delegation, the first week of which we spent in Tucson, Arizona where we met with activists in the community, served breakfast at a local church, met with a Border Patrol agent and a public defender, and watched a Streamline trial. The second week of the delegation, we spent in Nogales, Mexico where we visited a maquiladora; held a camp for neighborhood children; visited Altar, Mexico, a common migrant stop before entering the US; and lived in homestays.

I learned during the next six weeks we spent in Tucson, Arizona working at our nonprofit placements. I worked at a Southside Day Labor Center in South Tucson. The Center is a place where people can come and negotiate employment. Every morning at 6:30, laborers participate in a raffle which determines the order in which they will get work. First raffle ticket, first job. They then spend the rest of the morning waiting for bosses to come by and pick them up.

During our six weeks at the Center, the two other volunteers and I did what we could to best fill these waiting hours. We first talked to the laborers and tried to determine how we could best serve them. We did one-on-one English tutoring, watched the World Cup, held computer classes, talked with the laborers, gave a health presentation, helped make Center IDs, helped with leadership and community development activities, made an orientation video for new laborers, put together an orientation packet for new volunteers, and gave a presentation to the congregation of the church that houses the Day Labor Center in the hopes of recruiting volunteers to fill our shoes once we left Tucson.

And I learned during out last two days of delegation at the end of our stay in Arizona. We spent these two days planning how we would take what we had learned in Arizona home, attending the SB1070 hearings in Phoenix, and visiting the Florence Project, a nonprofit organization that provides legal services to men, women, and children being held in detention for “immigration removal proceedings.”

I learned more in these past eight weeks than I ever thought I would. But I also know that there is still more to learn, that a lifetime on the border wouldn’t be enough. In my blog posts, I have recorded what I could of these last eight weeks. When I return to Duke, I hope to take what I have learned and to work with my peers to pass this knowledge on to others. I also know that it remains my responsibility to keep on learning.

Part 4: Images of the Wall

The collage above depicts several views of the border wall dividing Nogales, Mexico from Nogales, Arizona. All pictures are from the Mexico side as the US will not allow art on the US side of the wall.

Part 3: Law and the Border Wall

In 2005, the Real ID Act was passed by Congress. Section 102 of this act gave the US Department of Homeland Security the authority to “to waive all local, state and federal laws that the secretary deems an impediment to building walls and roads along U.S. borders.” The result is that thirty-six laws have been waived since 2005 in the construction of the border wall. They are listed below:

• National Environmental Policy Act
• Endangered Species Act
• Clean Water Act
• National Historic Preservation Act
• Migratory Bird Treaty Act
• Clean Air Act
• Archaeological Resources Protection Act
• Safe Drinking Water Act
• Noise Control Act
• Solid Waste Disposal Act
• Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act
• Archaeological and Historic Preservation Act
• Antiquities Act
• Historic Sites, Buildings, and Antiquities Act
• Wild and Scenic Rivers Act
• Farmland Protection Policy Act
• Coastal Zone Management Act
• Wilderness Act
• Federal Land Policy and Management Act
• National Wildlife Refuge System Administration Act
• Fish and Wildlife Act of 1956
• Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act
• Administrative Procedure Act
• Otay Mountain Wilderness Act of 1999
• California Desert Protection Act
• National Park Service Organic Act
• National Park Service General Authorities Act
• National Parks and Recreation Act of 1978
• Arizona Desert Wilderness Act
• Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899
• Eagle Protection Act
• Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
• American Indian Religious Freedom Act
• Religious Freedom Restoration Act
• National Forest Management Act of 1976
• Multiple Use and Sustained Yield Act of 1960

The Real ID Act has set a dangerous precedent. What other laws will be waived in the future? Will we know they are being waived?

Sources: The Sierra Club, http://www.sierraclub.org/borderlands/realID.aspx

"No one deserves to die in the desert for lack of a glass of water"

(Gallon jug left along migrant routes in the Arizona desert, photo taken by Sarah)

It is virtually impossible for a migrant to carry enough water to make it through the desert from Mexico to Tucson without becoming severely dehydrated. Humanitarian groups such as No More Deaths and Samaritans put out gallons of water such as the one above along well known migrant trails in the hopes of reducing the number of deaths that occur in the desert due to dehydration and other heat related illnesses.

In July alone, 57 bodies have been brought in to the Pima County morgue. The majority had died within the previous week. The morgue is so overrun with bodies that some have to be stored in cooler trucks outside. Many of these bodies have been rendered unidentifiable by exposure. Others lack any identifying documents or characteristics. The New York Times released a recent article on this topic: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/us/29border.html?scp=1&sq=immigration%20deaths&st=cse.

Though the number of people crossing the desert has decreased this summer due to increased border enforcement, high summer temperatures, and a poor US economy, the number of deaths has increased. This is because the border wall and increased border militarization is forcing migrants in to more hostile and dangerous territory where they are forced to walk for days through the desert in order to enter the US. Those who cannot make it--whether they are injured or otherwise physically unable to walk--are left behind. The result is that more people are dying because they are unprepared for the harsh conditions of the desert.

(Humane Borders truck with water barrels, photo taken by Sarah)

Humane Borders, another humanitarian group that maintains water stations throughout the Arizona desert (see image above), has compiled a map indicating the location of migrant deaths throughout the desert. The map can be found here: http://www.humaneborders.org/news/documents/cumulativemap20002007.pdf. As can be seen on the map, a majority of the deaths occurring in the desert happen in a specific valley called the Baboquivari Valley on the Tohono O'odham Nation. This high death rate may be due to the fact that Nation leaders will not allow humanitarian groups to leave water along this valley.

When you look at the death statistics, whether or not migrants should be entering the United States becomes irrelevant. What matters is that people are dying and that they are often dying because they need a drink of water.

(Socks left by migrant along trail in Arizona desert, photo taken by Sarah)

Part 2: The Environmental Impact of the Border Wall

(Picture of Border Wall from Nogales, Mexico side)

They are trashing the desert. They are polluting the environment. They are damaging vegetation. They are disturbing wildlife. These arguments are used by some to argue for a closed border. The migration through the deserts of Arizona is damaging the environment and therefore needs to stop. The migrants and their journeys are to blame for the environmental destruction scarring the Arizona desert.

According to the Sierra Club, though, it is not the migrants who are causing real and long lasting damage to the many and priceless ecosystems of the border region. It is the border wall that is doing so. The trash can always be picked up. The trails can be repaired. The vegetation can grow back. But animals that go extinct will not come back. Cities that are buried under meters of water won’t ever be the same.

(Arizona Desert Landscape)

Research conducted by professors at the University of Arizona and the University of California, Berkeley with the help of the Defenders of Wildlife and the US Fish and Wildlife Service have found that natural movement of the pygmy owl and the bighorn sheep is affected by the border wall. The result is that natural migration of animals is stymied and gene flow is impeded, thus decreasing the diversity of the border region and changing natural wildlife patterns. Images and videos of javelinas and deer stopped at the wall show that owls and sheep are not the only animals affected by the wall. The wall is changing the natural environment of ecologically sensitive and unique areas, such as the Cabeza Prieta Wilderness Refuge, Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, the Barry M. Goldwater Range, Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve, and the Sonoran Desert, among others.

Migrants will enter the US regardless of the size of the walls built. As I said in my earlier post, the wall slows migrants down by only 5 minutes. Instead of keeping migrants out, the border wall is instead pushing migrants in to more ecologically sensitive areas, such as mountain ranges and National Wildlife areas. The Border Patrol in turn builds roads to pursue these migrants, roads that cause even greater damage to the environment. Without the border wall, the damage caused by migrants would be limited to trash collection and trail use, both easily repaired.


(Trash left by migrants along trails in the Arizona desert)

Before Arizona

I didn’t know most of this before I came to Arizona.

It is not easy for a migrant to enter the US. They must pass through an incredibly dangerous and hostile environment to get in to the country. This year, to date, 130 people have died crossing the desert in Arizona alone. 5000 have died since 1994. 209 died last year. These numbers reflect only found bodies. These found bodies in turn are believed to comprise only 25 percent of the total number of migrant deaths that occur in the desert each year. Many who die are not found. Therefore, the adjusted number of deaths could mean that 520 people have died in the desert this year and 20,000 people have died since 1994. Most Americans don’t know these numbers. I didn’t. This story is not discussed in the media.

(Migrant belongings left behind in desert)

On a perfect journey through the desert, a migrant would suffer at the very least from dehydration. There is no thing as a perfect journey. All migrants face the risk of being caught by Border Patrol. Many suffer from heat sickness; exploitation at the hands of their coyotes; risk of attack by drug traffickers, human traffickers, or bandits; rape; life-threatening blisters that cover their whole feet; hunger; thirst; fear. All pay inordinate fees to their coyotes, the “mafia,” and other exploiters along the route. And this is all just in the walk through the desert to get in to the US. Most Americans don’t know this story. I didn’t. This journey is not deemed newsworthy.

(Wackenhut bus waiting in desert to deport migrants back to Mexico)

If a migrant successfully enters the US, they have to start a new life from nothing. Among other hardships, they often end up working for less than minimum wage, and that is only if they are lucky enough to find work. They may be exploited by their bosses. Many cannot afford health insurance. They pay taxes and social security, yet they do not benefit from them. If they are abused by their fellows, by their bosses, by the cops, by the border patrol, they often do not seek legal recourse. They are afraid they will be caught by Border Patrol. The result is that crimes go unsolved and unpunished. Justice does not prevail. Fear does. Most Americans don’t know this life. I didn’t. This life does not make headlines.

These numbers, this journey, and this life are real.

Yet they are not the narrative we are presented. They are not the stories we read. I didn’t know them before I came to Arizona. I didn’t know this narrative. Now that I do, it is my duty to tell it.

Part 1: Putting a Price Tag on the Border Wall

The wall captured in the image above is made of pieces of metal once used as landing strips at bases in Iraq. It costs roughly $12 million per mile to construct and $6 million per mile, per year to maintain. And it is only one of 647 miles of already existing border wall.

Construction on the border wall between the US and Mexico began in 1994 shortly after the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). According to a long time resident of Nogales, Mexico, before 1994 there was merely a chain link fence marking the US-Mexico border.. At other points, barbed wire fence marked the border. In others, only the occasional geological marker showed where one country ended and the other began. The cost of building and maintaining the border was little to nothing.

Today the wall is made of everything from landing strip walls to barbed wire fences to vehicle barriers to metal bars to nothing. The cheapest segment of wall costs $431,000 per mile to build. The most expensive, $12 million per mile. As of today, roughly $2.4 billion dollars has been spent on wall construction. That is roughly $6.5 million dollars per day.

In addition to basic construction, though, any calculation of the cost of the border wall must consider the cost of land acquisition. Customs and Border Patrol estimates this cost at at $.8 million per mile. Environmental mitigation costs roughly $50 million a year. The constantly changing costs of fuel, labor, and materials are not measurable, but could raise the price of wall construction even further. Wall maintenance ranges from $5 to $8 million per mile per year. In seven years, the cost of maintaining the fence will have exceeded the cost of primary construction.

And all this cost is to what end?

The Border Patrol admits that the wall slows migrants down by an average of only five minutes. Without a ladder, it may take a few more. Is five minutes worth 2.4 billion dollars?

The wall is supposed to keep out terrorists and drug runners. If an average migrant is slowed by only 5 minutes, is a trained terrorist or a drug runner really going to be hindered?

Data shows that there has been a drop in immigration over the past few years, but can this drop in immigration be attributed to the wall or the economy? At Southside Day Labor Center in Tucson, AZ seventy to eighty men used to be picked up for work each day. This summer, we are lucky to see eight men go out. Some days, only two leave. There is no work. Is the bad economy the real wall?

The border wall comes at a high monetary cost. What if this money were spent on employing US citizens, teaching our children, opening rest stops, or repairing roads instead? What if it were spent on supporting local economies in Mexico so people didn’t need to migrate? $2.4 billion dollars can go a long way. Five minutes does not seem worth the cost.

Quotes

Below are a selection of quotes I have heard or read in the last five weeks. Some are original quotes from people I have met, others are taken from pamphlets, others are cited from secondary sources.

“Nobody deserves to die in the desert for lack of a cup of water.”

“I want my voice back because you have criminalized me.”

“Mass migration reflects real problems […] people have a right not to migrate just as they have a right to migrate.”—Isabel Garcia

“I think there is no harder thing in the world than seeing your kids crying from hunger and having nothing to give them.”—Polita

“Give everything for what you have—your family.”—Polita

“Walls turned on their sides become bridges.”—Border Wall quote

“Walls are scars on this earth.”—Border Wall quote

“It is just as false to say, ‘I know nothing’ as to say, ‘I know everything.’”

“None of us is an expert, none of us is ignorant.”

“Are you going to try and cross back in to the US?”
“Yes.”—Man tried in a Streamline Trial, charged with a felony, and deported to Nogales. Streamline trials are meant to deter migrants from attempting initial entry and reentry to the US.

“I am sorry for entering the US illegally. I promise I will not try it again.”—man being tried in a Streamline trial for illegal entry in to the US.

“No human being is illegal.”—Derechos Humanos pamphlet

“But now the Bracelets’ upturned noses suggested there was another America to which we [immigrants] would never gain admittance. All of a sudden America wasn’t about hamburgers and hot rods anymore. It was about the Mayflower and Plymouth Rock. It was about something that had happened two minutes four hundred years ago, instead of everything that had happened since. Instead of everything that was happening now!”— Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex, pages 298-299

“In December 2009, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that Operation Streamline’s group hearings in Tucson violate Federal law.”—Joanna Lydgate from the Warren Institute on Operation Streamline, for full article see:
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/Operation_Streamline_Policy_Brief.pdf

“None of us is free if one of us is chained.”

Southside Day Labor Center

91 minutes. 0-0. 25 day laborers and 3 students. The US scores the winning goal against Algeria in the first round of the World Cup allowing them to advance in to the next round. The room explodes in to noise.

Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson, AZ houses the Southside Day Labor Center. Its mission is:

“To provide a safe place for workers and employers to negotiate employment while maintaining a healthy relationship with the surrounding neighborhood. Employers in need of workers with a variety of skills are able to come to the center where a volunteer is available to help negotiate the hiring of a worker.”

At six in the morning every day Monday to Saturday, twenty to thirty men ranging in age from 16 to 60 congregate outside the church located at the corner of West 22nd and S. 10th Avenue. They toss their Center issued ID cards in to a pile and drop their raffle ticket in to a bucket. They wait for their number to be called. They hope they will be one of the first numbers drawn. Anybody past the ninth or tenth person on the list probably won’t get work that day. I haven’t seen more than eight men get picked up each day. The last two days only two men have gone to work. The state of the economy is being felt here too.

The men sign a contract when they join the program. They agree to not accept less than eight dollars an hour for work. Really, though, any amount is better than nothing. I talked to a father of three today. He said with 50 dollars a week he can feed his three daughters at home in Mexico. But he won’t find work if no one is hiring. And no one has been hiring. As the laborers wait, they sit inside the church or out in the parking lot. Patiently, hopefully, these days, watching the World Cup, cheering for the US.

The men come from all walks of life. Many of them have lived in the US for a majority of their lives and have families here. Others have recently arrived. Some are here on tourist visas, others are residents, others citizens, others are without “legal” documentation. We don’t really know. We aren’t allowed to ask. And it doesn’t matter. Many have held permanent jobs for extended periods of time in the US. Others haven’t. Some speak perfect English. Others are learning. Some don’t plan on leaving Tucson. Others are willing to hop on the next bus to anywhere if there is work there. All they want is to work and unfortunately, there just isn’t much work around.

So, to fill the hours of waiting between 6:30 when the raffle starts and 11 am when the center shuts down, two other volunteers and I are trying to give them something to do. For now, this mostly entails watching the World Cup from 7 to 9. After the morning game ends, we have provided English classes and computer classes. In the next few weeks, we hope to continue these classes as well as to do Know Your Rights sessions, health workshops, a soccer tournament, and workshops on SB1070. While doing so, I hope we can listen to these men and learn from their stories.

Shopping Cart: Comparison between the US and Mexico

Soriana is Mexico’s Wal-Mart. It sells everything from Mexican soccer team jerseys to eggs to mangoes to shampoo. While in Mexico last week, we went through the Soriana and recorded the prices of items that are commonly found on a very basic shopping list for a Mexican family of four. The analysis below considers these prices in relation to the income of a Mexican family whose primary breadwinners make minimum wage working in a maquiladora. Minimum wage is 57 pesos for an 8 hour day of work, or about 7 pesos an hour. The conversion between pesos and dollars is about 12.80 pesos for one dollar. This means that a maquiladora worker makes about 4.45 US dollars a day or 55 US cents an hour.

The first column of the table found at the top of this post lists the contents of a basic weekly shopping cart for a Mexican family of four. The second column in the table indicates the price in pesos of each product. The third column calculates the equivalent price in US dollars given an exchange rate of about 13 pesos per 1 US dollar. The fourth column calculates the number of hours a maquiladora worker would have to work in order to make enough money to be able purchase each product. This column was calculated by dividing the cost of each product by the hourly wage of 7 pesos. The final column indicates how much the product would cost in the US (in dollars) given that minimum wage is roughly 7 dollars an hour. It was calculated based on the number of hours a Mexican employee must work to pay for each product.

Example of calculation for beans:

Beans cost 15 pesos a kilogram.

15 pesos/13 pesos = 1.15 US dollars for a kg of beans.

Number of hours a maquiladora worker must work to buy a kg of beans = 15 pesos/hourly wage of 7 pesos= 2.14 hours.

Equivalent cost in US = number of hours a Mexican worker has to work to buy the beans in Mexico times the minimum wage in the US = 2.14 hours x $7 = $15 for a kg of beans in the US.

The same calculation was repeated for each column.

A Mexican family of four with two parents who work 8 hours a day five days a week in a maquiladora earning minimum wage, make 570 pesos a week. The shopping list in this survey indicates that food alone would cost this family 567 pesos a week. A single working parent would not be able to afford the contents of this minimal shopping cart.

With US dollars purchasing power, a US citizen could go to Mexico and purchase this shopping list for only $43.65. If prices are converted to equivalent prices in US dollars, though, the cost of this shopping list in US dollars goes up to 567 dollars, a price way beyond what US families would be willing or able to pay for food.

The result of these high prices is that many families in Mexico cannot afford a sufficient and well rounded diet. Many children suffer from malnutrition and anemia. There are organizations that provide children with at least one full meal a day, but there aren’t enough. The cost of food locks many families in to an inescapable poverty.

While in Mexico last week, we met two cousins about to walk through the desert to pick strawberries in California. We met a mother of three girls who couldn’t bear to watch her daughters suffer from hunger any more. We met another mother who told us: I can’t imagine a worse feeling in the world than watching your kids cry from hunger and having nothing to give them. People risk their lives in the desert coming to the US because they cannot afford to pay for food for their families in Mexico. The choice for many is between the following: risk dying in the desert to get to the US where you can make enough money to feed your family back in Mexico or stay in Mexico and watch your family die of hunger. It should not be surprising that so many choose the former.

It is clear that something needs to be done. Wages need to be raised or the cost of food needs to be decreased, so that people can feed themselves and their families without having to leave them behind in order to do so.

To Learn

In 1994, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed. In that same year, construction of the wall between the US and Mexico began. NAFTA was designed to benefit the US, Mexico, and Canada economically. It was also supposed to solve immigration issues. Since 1994, six million Mexicans have left their country to come to the US. Many of them have come through Arizona.

Seventy-five of these migrants are tried each day for illegal entry in to Arizona through a mass trial known as Operation Streamline. The trial will go on their permanent record. The process costs the US government 3.5 billion dollars a year. That is more than 9 million dollars a day. The trials are meant to find and stop terrorists. An additional 800 plus migrants are returned to Mexico each day by the Border Patrol.

The Tucson Sector Border Patrol has a 70 man unit called BORSTAR dedicated to search and rescue missions in the desert. Additionally, there are a number of EMTs within the Border Patrol. Their goal is to save lives. During the Streamline trials, migrants thanked the Border Patrol for saving their lives.

Mike, a member of the Tohono O’odham Nation, places jugs of water along the deadliest migrant route in to Arizona, the Babakiri Valley. Forty-two percent of all migrant deaths that occur in the Tucson Sector occur in this valley which bisects the Nation. His bottles are punctured and emptied by Nation police.

Migrants entering the US by crossing the Arizona desert are of increasingly different ethnicities. Recently, many Chinese have been apprehended.

The above barely scrape the surface of the many faces of the immigration issue facing this country. They reflect just a few sides of an infinitely complex problem.

I have been in Arizona for a week. In that week, I have been challenged by a public defender, a lawyer, a Tohono O’odham Native American, a farmer, members of the YWCA, human rights groups, and my professors with educating and through educating, serving as a catalyst for change. And no matter where you stand on immigration—no matter where I stand—it is clear that something needs to change.

So, why am I here? I am here to learn. To learn in order to better understand. To learn in order to be able to make informed decisions regarding immigration. To learn in order to be better able to serve. But especially, to learn in order to be qualified to educate for change.

I hope that using this blog I can take what I learn here this summer and begin this process of educating both myself and others. I hope you will continue to follow this blog and those blogs of the other students with me in Arizona this summer.