Hondurans, Nicaraguans Voice Relief at INS Deportation Delay

The Honduran and Nicaraguan communities in Los Angeles on Thursday reacted with relief to the U.S. government’s decision to delay deportations because of Hurricane Mitch, even as some immigrant groups expressed disappointment that other Central Americans were not granted similar reprieves.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service announced Wednesday that about 150,000 Honduran and Nicaraguan immigrants from the storm-whipped countries--an estimated 40,000 in Southern California--can stay and work in the United States for 18 months while recovery efforts continue in Central America.

The temporary protected status affects immigrants here illegally and those with temporary visas.

“It’s a great relief,” said Marlon Portillo, who works with Honduran and Nicaraguan day laborers through IDEPSCA, a Boyle Heights-based community organization. “Eighteen months is not a lot, but it’s something. Now people can work, and not worry.”

Many immigrants have been concerned about being deported back to chaotic situations in the wake of Hurricane Mitch’s destruction, community workers said.

“There is a great economic crisis that would get more aggravated if thousands of people were deported back there,” said the Rev. Tomas Lopez of the Pico-Union United Methodist Church, who recently returned from two weeks in Honduras. “There wouldn’t be a way to stabilize the countries.”

Central American immigrants in the United States are also helping relief efforts with the money they send home, supporters of the ruling said. Nicaraguans in California send about $250 million a year back to their homeland, about half the total sent from those living in the United States, said Silvio Mendez, Nicaraguan consul general for the Western United States.

“This gives a lot of relief to our countrymen and also to our country,” Mendez said. “This will provide needed funds sent by all these people to their families back home.”

But happiness over the respite was tempered by some frustration that immigrants from El Salvador and Guatemala were not included in the delay.

Immigrants from those countries, which U.S. officials decided had not been damaged as badly, will be allowed to remain in the United States until March 8. Many were hoping they would get protected status as well, because in November officials had temporarily suspended deportations involving all four countries.

“We welcome our brothers from Honduras and Nicaragua, but we’re sad to see there is discrimination against others,” said Luis Hernandez, program coordinator with ASOSAL, a Los Angeles Salvadoran organization. “Thousands of Salvadorans are in a precarious situation. They’ve suffered a lot as well.”

For Julio Escobar, 36, a Honduran national who has been in this country illegally since 1985, the reprieve was welcome news. But as he sought immigration counseling Thursday at the Central American Resource Center in Pico-Union, he voiced concern about his Salvadoran wife, who was left out of Wednesday’s ruling.

“My wife is in limbo,” said Escobar as he tended his two U.S.-born daughters, ages 10 and 2. “She’s afraid. It would be catastrophic if any one of us would get deported.”

U.S. officials said that all Central American countries hurt by the hurricane are receiving some type of relief assistance, but that 95% of the devastation occurred in Honduras and Nicaragua, where the fierce storm ripped apart the countries’ infrastructures, tore up farmland and left millions homeless.

“Because the damage and destruction was so severe in Honduras and Nicaragua, we feel as part of the [aid] package we should allow their nationals to remain here and work,” said Paul Pierre Jr., INS deputy assistance district director for adjudication in Los Angeles. “Essentially, they don’t have a home to go back to because their countries were so devastated.”

Some community leaders said they fear that 18 months will not be enough time for the ravaged countries to rebuild. Central American officials believe it could take 10 to 30 years to restore the infrastructure obliterated by the hurricane, the most destructive storm in the Western Hemisphere in the last 200 years.

“What’s going to happen after 18 months?” said Max Ocon, a Nicaraguan American who works with Amigos en Action, an organization sending relief to hurricane victims. “The solution should be permanent residency. We’re talking about the two poorest countries on the continent. It’s going to take a long time.”

That is the fear of immigration critics, who said the humanitarian gesture could result in thousands of immigrants remaining here indefinitely.

“The problem with these temporary grants is that they have consistently turned into permanent immigration programs,” said Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “Everybody has to recognize the devastation that Hurricane Mitch caused. But the answer may not be letting large numbers of people stay here.”

Barbara Coe, founder of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, a Huntington Beach-based group that co-sponsored the anti-illegal immigration Proposition 187, called the ruling a fiasco.

“I don’t want anyone to be shipped out of here to go home to a state of starvation where they cannot function; no, absolutely not,” Coe said. “But I feel this whole scenario is nothing but another pawn by the pro-alien lobby to play on the emotions of the American people and make an issue of it when, in fact, we have no idea exactly what is involved.”

INS officials said the temporary protection for Honduran and Nicaraguan immigrants could not be used to obtain permanent resident status, although the 18-month reprieve could be extended by the attorney general.

Meanwhile, some community workers worried that newly arrived immigrants will not hear about the opportunity to avoid deportation and will fail to apply within the six-month deadline. Others may be stymied by the $175 processing fee, they added, which will be waived only in cases of extreme financial hardship.

INS officials said that information packets about the program will be distributed to the Honduran and Nicaraguan consulates and community organizations as early as next week. Officials said INS offices are backlogged with citizenship requests and applicants seeking the protected status should call a special INS toll-free number or get information off its World Wide Web site.

Wilfredo Garcia, a 23-year-old Honduran national who works as a valet parking attendant in Culver City, said the extension has relieved him of trying to evade the INS. Now he can concentrate on working and providing for his parents who live near El Progreso Yoro, a city that was flooded by Hurricane Mitch.

“They depend on me,” Garcia said. “If I don’t work, they have no one to help them.”

Working with legitimate documents also means that he can apply for a better paying position at companies that have stricter hiring policies, Garcia said.

“In the past I would use false documents to work,” he said. “Now, under the reprieve, I can go with my head held up high and tell them, ‘Here are my working papers.’ ”

* Applications for temporary protected status are available by calling (800) 870-3676, and from the INS World Wide Web site at https://www.ins.usdoj.gov

Times staff writer Esther Schrader contributed to this story.