Speaking Up for Asian Pacific Communities

After Jo Ann Kanshige’s two sons were beaten to a pulp in a hate crime more than three years ago, a sense of helplessness gnawed at her.

No group, said Kanshige, a Japanese American, stepped forward to raise awareness of attacks against Asian Americans.

Recalling that sense of frustration, Kanshige recently joined a group of Asian Pacific parents, educators and social service advocates to form the Council for Asian Pacific Americans, a coalition that they hope will become a collective political voice and advocacy organization for the various and diverse ethnic communities in Orange County.

There are dozens of agencies, mostly in the social services realm, that serve the needs of local Asian American communities, but no one umbrella group that consistently speaks out on political and social issues with a unified voice. The lack of cohesion lies, in part, with the very reason that leaders say is the impetus for a coalition: the diversity and the different needs of the ethnic groups.

According to the 1990 U.S. census, there are 249,100 Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in Orange County, making up 10% of the population. Those of Vietnamese, Chinese and Korean descent, respectively, make up the largest groups.

With such large numbers, advocates said, the time was right for the groups to work together to, among other things, promote awareness about issues of common concern, such as anti-immigration fervor that they say threatens their communities.

“We want to provide a forum in which the diverse leaders could come together to hear issues of concern regarding our community, to mobilize for community action and to provide leadership opportunities,” said Alan Woo, executive director of the Asian Pacific Community Services, a job-training agency in Westminster. “The movement has been started in other places. We can no longer be invisible if we want to be a part of all these changes and make a difference.”

In forming the coalition, organizers have turned to the more established groups in Los Angeles County for guidance. Late last year, Kanshige, Woo and a handful of Asian Americans met with representatives from the Asian Pacific Planning Council, a federation of about 50 multiethnic agencies, to discuss the launching of a similar organization in Orange County.

Since that meeting, about 20 Asian Americans--including entrepreneurs, educators, parents and social workers--have become involved with the coalition. It has been meeting monthly to define issues it would tackle and approaches to gain legitimacy in the Asian American communities.

“We have a long way to go. We realize we can’t just say, ‘Here we are,’ and expect people to accept us as representative,” Kanshige said.

Given the current political climate in California as well as in the rest of the country, organizers believe a common cause that would unite the different Asian Pacific communities is the battle to retain affirmative action and to fight anti-immigration sentiment.

“Perhaps the greatest challenge against our collective community is the anti-immigration fervor that has pervaded the country,” Woo said. “We are diverse and we are different from one another, but mainstream society chooses to see us as one and label us all as one--Asians. The only way to fight the anti-immigration feelings effectively is to turn that image around so that it would work in our favor.”

Although many representatives from different ethnic organizations have expressed interest and optimism for such a grass-roots pan-Asian coalition, a few remain skeptical that it could be effective, given the different needs among the diverse communities.

“I think there is a definite need for such a movement at the community level,” said Nghia Tran, executive director of the nonprofit Vietnamese Community of Orange County, a social services agency in Santa Ana. Tran has declined to join the Council for Asian Pacific Americans until he learns more about what the group will do, he said.

He added: “I think what this coalition aims to do in terms of being a political voice may be a bit ambitious for right now because we have very fragmented new immigrants who dominate the makeup of the Asian community here.”

Acknowledging such criticism, organizers of the coalition said they will make a continuous effort to meet with the many communities’ leaders and convince them that the different ethnic groups would be better represented if they have one strong agency.

The coalition is in the process of applying for state and federal grants to hold seminars to train more leaders for the community. And it is also fine-tuning its mission statement to define issues that would garner the support of the various ethnic groups.

“If we band together and unite and speak as one voice, we would become more visible,” Woo said.

He and other organizers said they would use such visibility in discussions on race relations with law enforcement agencies and municipal and county government.

“One percent of this community here, 2% of that community there--we’re too small to be effective as individual groups,” said Dan Tsang, a founder of the Alliance for Asian Rights and Responsibilities, which monitors police activities. “It’s time to come together.”