EL PASO, Texas — The charisma and the poise of El Paso basketball legend Nolan Richardson resonated in the entire room with the first few words he spoke in a deep commanding voice.

“There was times when I wished I could just take my skin and just peel it off and turn white so I could be accepted because I knew I could do the job,” Richardson said.

From a very young age, life was not easy for a young African American boy growing up in a predominantly Hispanic city

The former college basketball national champion coach and El Paso’s Segundo Barrio own son returned to The Sun City to keynote Black History Month at the University of Texas at El Paso and to help promote his new biography, “40 Minutes of Hell” by Rus Bradburd.

Richardson addressed Miners of the past, present and future on his heritage, where he came from and how those things led him to become the sports star and humanitarian he is today. Richardson, famous for his powerful and motivational speeches delivered a message reminiscent of Martin Luther King Jr. He said King was influential in his life.

Circumstances will force people to question their own life choices and their abilities, he said. Raised by his grandmother, Richardson said he was pushed to be a better person everyday and never give up on what he wanted to accomplish. He said, “Believing what you can do is what’s important. If it is to be, it’s up to me.” And those strong words really do tell it all. “Everything that you want to do in life is up to you, and only you can effect the outcome of who you are going to become.”

El Paso basketball legend, Nolan Richardson. (Adrian Aguirre/Borderzine.com)

Everyone goes through seemingly impassable moments when they think they can’t get through the difficulty. There were times in Richardson’s life when things did not go well for him. Whether it was growing up as an African American, being fired from the University of Arkansas for speaking out against racial discrimination, or the loss of his daughter to leukemia, he has fought and overcome many obstacles in his life.

In the biography, Bradburd and Richardson pay tribute to all the people that came before Nolan who did not receive recognition because of the color of their skin. Not being afraid to question authority and speaking out against injustice, Richardson distinguished himself as a great basketball coach and a wonderful humanitarian.

“If I couldn’t stand for something, then I would fall for anything, “said Richardson. He knew that who he is today, had everything to do with the people who made a difference in his life. And still regardless of his achievements, Richardson never has forgotten the town he grew up in and the people that loved him every step of the way.

Richardson told stories of his youth in Segundo Barrio, going to Bowie High School, coaching basketball and success at every level of coaching. He also recalled that the late UTEP basketball coach Don Haskins taught him what “40 Minutes of Hell” really means.

At every step of his career, Richardson said he wanted to teach his players one main thing. “When you come back tomorrow, be better than you were the day you left.”  Richardson said he taught them that today is always the most important day of their lives and they were responsible for making it count.

Seeking safety by immigrating to the United States, thousands of Mexicans are fleeing the violence of Juárez. They represent a new trend in Mexican immigration. Making the most of legal immigration visas available to middle and upper economic classes, some may push those visas beyond legal usage. Recent estimates of the increased numbers of new immigrants in El Paso range from 5,000 to 60,000.

It is clear to see why they flee. The rapid decline of Ciudad Juárez, the narco war-zone sister-city from which they escape, is stark:

• The city saw 4,600 murders in 2008-09,
• 110,000 abandoned houses–estimates suggest 30% of the population is gone,
• 75,000 people are newly unemployed,
• 10,000 businesses are closed–approximately 40%, due to demands of extortion payments from organized crime or due to assaults resulting from not paying extortion demands.

Signs of an influx of Juárez’s white-collar workers, equipped with visas, now quietly appear around El Paso: newly rented houses or apartments and new businesses opening. If patterns seen in the past prevail, at least some of those visas are destined to be overstayed.

The risk taken by breaking U.S. immigration law by overstaying a tourist visa pales in comparison to the opportunity to escape one of the most dangerous cities on earth by relocating in the city next door, one of the safest cities of its size in the nation. El Paso tallied 12 murders in 2009, compared to 2,643 in Juárez.

There are two U.S. visas at play in this new movement.

Tourist Visa Entrance

Many Mexican citizens who cross into El Paso have tourist or “laser” visas. Legally this allows them to visit the U.S. but not to work in the country.

Laser visas comprise most of the 1.5 million visas the U.S. government issued at its Juarez Consulate from 2000-09. They’re good for ten years, usable for legal U.S. visits of no longer than six months. Only Mexicans who prove they have a steady income and a Mexican residence are eligible for the $130 tourist visas.

Once foreigners legally enter the U.S. they may blend into the fabric of the country and elude detection. It is difficult, even impossible, to account for them in our current system unless they attract attention by engaging in illegal activity. It is thought that between 40-75% of foreigners now present in the U.S. without authorization actually entered the nation with proper documents.

By living in El Paso, laser visa holders from Juarez elude immigration detection systems and can still present the appearance of being “commuters.” If they lack a criminal record, they are apt to avoid detection, staying under the radar of border surveillance.

Investor Visa Entrance

Another avenue of legal entry to the U.S. is open to the wealthy and ambitious. Mexicans who can show their ability to invest at least $500,000 to open a business and hire at least 10 full-time employees are eligible for an investor’s visa.

Bringing start-up money and jobs, Mexican entrepreneurs are another important faction of the new wave of immigrants.

Last year more than 200 business people from Mexico reportedly investigated opening operations in El Paso, according to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Successful Juarez businesses commonly expand operations into the sister city of El Paso.

The number of investor’s visas granted rose from about 800 in 2007 to nearly 1,400 in 2008, the last year documented by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to information reported by the El Paso Times.

Facing threats of kidnapping and extortion fees, as evidenced in the previously cited Juarez 40% business closure rate, business owners are fleeing threats and attacks by escaping into El Paso.

El Paso’s New Look — Not so Different

Chihuahua license plates, formerly in the city for weekend shopping, are now visible daily throughout El Paso. But in a city already over 80% Hispanic, new arrivals from Mexico blend right in. How many are there? No one knows for sure.

“The El Paso Regional Economic Development Corporation estimates 5,000 recent arrivals in El Paso. Allen puts the number at 30,000. Juárez’s Autonomous University calculates that 60,000 have made the move,” reports Alfredo Corchado in The Dallas Morning News.

Everyone agrees: El Paso’s population is growing significantly in this largely immigrant-friendly city.

Mexican immigrants have been traditionally regarded as economic refugees who flee poverty in desperate search of survival. But in these days of the narco war, the new immigrant wave brings refugees who are wealthy enough, or well-connected enough, to escape a war zone.

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Editor’s note: This column was previously published on All Voices

LAS CRUCES, N.M. — Whether it’s a giant fence separating Mexico and the United States or a less tangible barrier like language between people, borders are evident in most of director Guillermo Arriaga’s films. His latest, The Burning Plain, is set in the city of  Las Cruces, New Mexico near the U.S.-Mexico border.

“We’re tired that this is just a place of drugs and immigration. It’s also a place of love stories,” said Arriaga, at a press conference for a screening of his new film in Las Cruces. “Of course, there are also tensions because of it, but they are not the only reality.”

Arriaga has made a career telling the stories of ordinary people whose lives are intertwined in ways they never realized. The Burning Plain is no different and follows the story of several different people in different parts of the country. In The Burning Plain, the stories of Sylvia, a woman in Oregon with a dark past; Mariana and Santiago, two teenagers piecing together the shattered lives of their parents in Las Cruces; Maria, a little girl who crosses the border to find her mother; and Gina and Nick, a couple, each who are married and having an intense affair.

Arriaga has used the border as a backdrop for his stories in the past. A previous film he wrote, The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada was also shot in New Mexico, off of Interstate 10. He has long had a self-proclaimed love affair with this part of the southwest. To prove it, he took out his phone and read a message he received from his daughter: “Wow! I would be so excited to go back to Las Cruces! I love that place!” Arriaga pointed out that his daughter was currently in Paris.

Filmmaker Guillermo Arriaga at a press conference in Las Cruces (Arthur Perez/Borderzine.com)

The border influence is evident not only in the setting of the film, but also in the music. Omar Rodriguez of the Mars Volta (an El Paso native) worked with Hans Zimmer to score the film. “We made a film together before,” said Arriaga. When asked, during the adaptation of one of his novels, The Night Buffalo, who he’d like to do the music, Arriaga chose the Mars Volta. Since then he has become good friends with Rodriguez. “Now by obligation, he has to do the music of anything I direct,” joked Arriaga.

Lately, several films have been shot in Las Cruces, among them, both “Transformers” films and most recently “Due Date” starring Robert Downey, Jr.

With an estimated population of about 93,000, Las Cruces, while the second largest city in New Mexico is not the most well known. After seeing that Albuquerque’s terrain was no what he was looking for, Arriaga went searching for another place to shoot.

“We drove 600 miles everyday,” said Arriaga, in describing their search for the perfect place in New Mexico to shoot “The Burning Plain.” “We were mesmerized by Las Cruces.”

The locals appreciate it when a film is shot and set in their city. “They use Las Cruces. Not like ‘Transformers’ where they use White Sands for something else,” said Jeff Berg with the Mesilla Valley Film Society, referring to White Sands standing in for Iraq in the Transformers films. “They use the Kmart on El Paseo (St.) as a Kmart.”

Filming in Las Cruces seemed to be a very organic experience, for Arriaga.  “…we always say ‘we’ wanted because this is not my film. This is a film made by a group of people. It’s not mine.” It is evident, when this group of people come together to tell a border story that is isn’t just a story about drugs or immigration, that it is the product of where it was made and the people who made it.

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Related links:

New Mexico State Film Office

Mesilla Valley Film Society

“Again?” was my immediate reply. At this point in my life I was not as conscious of the hip-hop scene as I would be a short time later. Sure I had heard about Tupac, heard his music, and somewhat naively knew about his celebrity.

Everybody in the locker room got back to putting on football pads and went about their business, not giving too much thought to it since everybody knew he would survive the attack.

But later in the week he died.

This did not affect me too much at the time. I was as a fan of his, but I was maturing into music that was not shoved down my throat by the corporate entities. Once I really sat down and actually listened to his music I was hooked. I was hooked by the passion in his work and in his delivery. Maybe I was also infatuated with his “me against the world” persona and the idea that death was always “around the corner.”

It turns out that Tupac did have that effect on people much like Elvis did because almost immediately there were rumors that he did not die. He was a force to be reckoned with not just because of his so-called gangsta rap image but also because of his ideals, which at the time may have been revolutionary and maybe still are. He was and actually still an icon in the hip-hop community and even those who do not listen to hip-hop still have a general idea of who he is.

There are many discussions about his death and circumstances surrounding it. Any idle discussion can turn into a debate on whether or not he was that great to who actually killed him. All you have to do is play one of his songs to a group of hip-hop listeners standing around and the discussion will inevitably turn to one of these topics.

A recent discussion held in Dr. Maceo Dailey’ black history class with guest speaker Asher Underwood, a scholar on Tupac’s legacy chronicled the impact Tupac had through his songs. Most of the time was taken by a video containing some lost interviews where Tupac speaks about religion and other social themes.

Throughout the video some of his lyrics were put on the screen in order to illustrate what Tupac might have meant or what direction he was going for — asking the correct questions about the time that we lived in, making us raise a collective eyebrow and not accept the status quo. There was also an interview with “Freeway” Ricky Ross, a notorious drug dealer who was in the heart of the Iran-Contra Affair. Snippets of Tupac’s songs were played for him and since he had been locked up since the 80’s he exclaimed that Tupac was ahead of his time.

The masses did not listen. The masses heard him but did not listen until it was too late. The media and other naysayers may look at his reputation as a bad boy, with the exuberant image that he portrayed and his jail stints. The video also shed light on this with interviews from people who did know him personally who talked about the kindness that was Tupac, not just his bad boy “acting.”

Where would Tupac be now if he had not been gunned down near the Las Vegas strip that cold September night? Would he still have the same impact that he has now? Did his legendary status come as a tag just because his artistic life was cut tragically short, while he still had so much to say? Would he still be put on a pedestal, an untouchable of sorts because it is almost blasphemy to talk ill about the legend that is Tupac?

According to youngsters today, his music is still relevant, even though they might not have been aware of him before he died. “Of course you have to listen to him,” says Jesus Garcia, 21 “every artist that is out now has been influenced by him so you have to go back and listen to why he was so important.”

The question is, though, would the “game” be different if he were still here? The general consensus is “yes, of course it would be different if he was still alive.”

The direction of the hip-hop movement shifted after his death and while he is still considered an icon, the reality is that his music is not listened to as much today. He was an artist ahead of his time so it would only be natural that if he were alive now, he would still be a trendsetter. West Coast “gangsta rap” surely did decline in the years after Tupac’s death with only a few notable artists from that region.

One must remember that behind the iconic image and legend that is Tupac, he was also a son, friend, and activist trying to do right for his people. A true artist, he was ahead of his time and surely will be remembered by generations to come.

“We are delighted to partner with Borderzine and the University of Texas at El Paso in the 2010 multimedia journalism training academy,” said Rich Holden, executive director of Dow Jones Newspaper Fund, which supports a variety of national journalism programs. “It’s essential that students are well-versed in multimedia as they enter the profession. This seminar will provide their professors with the tools necessary to make that happen.”

During this challenging period of transition to multimedia and web journalism, college professors attending the academy will learn how to use video, audio and digital photography in storytelling to better prepare their students to produce top notch cutting-edge journalism.  The trainers for the academy will include media professionals skilled in audio, video as well as traditional media disciplines.

Journalist Nick Miller talking to students at Borderzine's multimedia lab.

Borderzine Director Zita Arocha, a senior lecturer in Communication at UTEP, said: “This grant makes it possible to train journalism teachers from across the country in cutting-edge tools and technology so they, in turn, can better prepare 21^st century Latino journalists for jobs in multimedia newsrooms.”

The $23,000 grant will cover airfare, room and board, and training costs for the Multimedia Journalism Training Academy, June 6-12, 2010, held in the multimedia journalism lab at the Cotton Memorial Building on the UTEP campus.

Application forms for the training academy will be available soon at borderzine.com.

Borderzine.com is a project of the University of Texas at El Paso, with participation by the Department of Communication and the Sam Donaldson Center for Communication Studies. The Dow Jones Newspaper Fund is a nonprofit foundation supported by the Dow Jones Foundation and other news organizations.

Contact: Angel Cancino (915) 226-2616 aecancino@miners.utep.edu; or Esther Barragan (915) 747-8475 ebarragan@utep.edu

Although the Hispanic community is receiving news coverage in major media outlets, the information listeners and readers receive is often “event-driven,” with Hispanics just one of many elements.

An analysis by the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Pew Hispanic Center covering Feb. 9-Aug. 9, 2009, found that 18% of the stories studied (645 out of 34,452) “contained substantial references to Hispanics.

The nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court gained the most news coverage, followed by the Mexican Drug War, H1N1 outbreak and Immigration.

For the full report visit journalism.org.

NAHJ DEADLINE

Deadline to apply for the National Association of Hispanic Journalists student projects and student campus at the annual NAHJ convention has been moved to March 31.

This year’s convention will run June 23-26 in Denver. Students selected for the student projects will work with professional journalists to produce multimedia reports. Students who would like to learn more
about careers in journalism, especially freshmen and sophomores who haven’t had internship experience, should apply for the student campus. It allows them to gain journalism training, and participate in tours and
mock press conferences.

While applying for the student projects or campus, they can also apply online for various scholarships funded through the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
Those who are majoring in broadcasting or print journalism may apply. Each scholarship has its individual requirements. They range from $1,000 to $5,000.

To apply for student projects or scholarships, visit NAHJ.org

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Editor’s note: This column was previously published on Hispanic Link News Service.

EL PASO, Texas — Equipped with a sniper rifle and shotgun, a Spartan II soldier takes one furtive step at a time under a blistering sun, trying to elude the enemy. Suddenly, he sees an enemy soldier and he goes to fire his weapon — but it’s too late — and a kill-shot to the head drops him on the spot.

“Headshot,” the sniper yells out as six friends — all in their 20’s — in two teams of three players battle in the virtual warfare of Halo3. Playing video games, a way of life for the six of them, dominates their free time. But parents and doctors wonder if this behavior amounts to a dangerous addiction or just social interaction.

Arthur Smith, 23, former UTEP student who has been gaming since the age of four, plays video games 25 to 30 hours a week. “It’s my drug, because I’m always playing and I’m always finding out more information on gaming everyday… I would say I’m addicted,” Smith said.

Video game addiction is a phrase that has been used in the last couple years, but is not recognized by the American Medical Association as an actual addiction. As technology improves, the games become more realistic. Graphics transport the players to a complex world and intricate story lines challenge their minds. The online-play feature allows players to fight others anywhere in the world.

In a study described in the May 2009 edition of the Journal Psychological Science, Iowa State University Assistant Professor of Psychology Douglas Gentile said that more than 8 percent of youngsters ranging in age from 8 to 18 in the U.S. show symptoms of an addiction to video games, which he calls “pathological behavior.”

When he analyzed data from the 2007 study obtained from a survey of 1,178 American boys and girls from ages (8-18) what he found was staggering. “Although the general public uses the word ‘addiction,’ clinicians often report [the behavior] as pathological use,” Gentile said.

The average “addicted” gamer played 24 hours a week, which is twice as much as casual gamers. He also found that 25 percent of the surveyed gamers reported turning to video games in an attempt to escape problems, or instead of doing homework.

Maria Luisa Hernandez-Lopez, a counselor at UTEP’s University Counseling Center who counsels students on addiction said, “addiction is engaging in a behavior that becomes compulsive and harmful for an individual.”

According to Hernandez-Lopez, students might have a problem if a person tries to stop before and change their behavior, but they continue going back and making promises to themselves that they are going to stop. Those promises almost always never work and they end up broken.

Justin Gibson, 23 year-old for UTEP student plays video games 30 hours a week and even has competed in gaming tournaments that he has won or has finished second. He believes that there is no such thing as an addiction to video games. “No, I am not addicted to video games. I go through phases that I don’t play for weeks. I think people who say they are addicted are just saying excuses,” Gibson said.

Lists of symptoms of addiction include using something to escape from reality, increased usage, and engaging in the behavior at any cost. When engaged in the behavior players feel happy and secured, but afterwards may feel guilty.

Eric Biernacki, a 23 year-old, who currently attends UTEP admits to playing video games 20 hours a week, but loves gaming because of the competitiveness. “I can quit playing but I don’t want to. I guess I am addicted but it’s not a bad addiction it doesn’t run my life, plus I can do things I wouldn’t get to do in real life.”

Only time will tell if the American Medical Association will recognize video game addiction as an medical addiction, but for the six who play video games whether they are addicted or not do not seem to be bothered by it.

“Kids all across the world are on the streets getting involved in things they shouldn’t be doing, so I don’t mind staying inside on my free time playing games and knowing that I am being safe,” former 24 year-old UTEP student Troy Henckel said.

Dr. Maceo Dailey reviewing the influence of Booker T. Washington (Sergio Ramírez/Borderzine.com)

El director del programa de Estudios Afroamericanos de la Universidad de Texas en El 
Paso (UTEP), doctor Maceo Dailey, señaló en una de la serie de pláticas libres que realiza El Museo de Historia de El Paso
 en el marco de las actividades por el Centenario de la
 Revolución Mexicana, que Washington vino a El Paso y a Ciudad Juárez para incitar a una comunidad afroamericana
 dinámica y progresista en El Paso a que “abrieran más negocios que les generaran ingresos
 y con esas ganancias invirtieran en viviendas, educación y servicios de 
salud”.

En su presentación desarrollada en inglés, el catedrático Dailey, quien 
obtuvo su doctorado en la Universidad de Howard y se ha desempeñado en las 
universidades de Howard, Brown y Nueva York, hizo una magistral
 disertación sobre la fugaz e imperecedera visita que hiciera el líder 
norteamericano.

“La llegada del escritor, educador y orador afronorteamericano a esta 
ciudad tenía el propósito de consolidar su liderazgo y apretarle el nudo de
 la corbata al presidente de turno William Howard Taft”, dijo, el también 
profesor adjunto del Departamento de Historia de UTEP.

Dailey explicó la visión que tenían ciertos sectores de políticos de la
 época sobre B. T. Washington, los cuales lo catalogaban como “un negro 
conservador”.

“Los 
anglos no les permitían trabajar en sus negocios, ir a sus iglesias, o ser 
atendidos en sus hospitales.”

 Propuesta que aseguró fue defendida con el paso del tiempo y para dar fe
 de ello, el orador mostró fotografías de la primera iglesia y el colegio 
(Douglas High School) afronorteamericano de El Paso.

A su vez, insistió en que hasta el día de hoy, la herencia que B.T. Washington 
dejó a los afroamericanos fue la de ayudar a su comunidad y defender su 
espacio en la sociedad. Idea que fue respaldada por los representantes de
 diversas generaciones paseñas de esa minoría, presentes en la repleta sala
 de conferencias del Museo de Historia de El Paso.

Al final de su alocución, Dailey, hizo un recorrido breve por la Revolución
 Mexicana, de la participación de los afroamericanos, muchos de ellos
 mártires y otros prisioneros de guerra. Personas que apoyaron la causa
 sobreponiéndose a disímiles barreras, incluido, el idioma.

Al atender preguntas del público, tras dictar su conferencia magistral, el 
también ex profesor de los Colegios Smith, Boston, Spelman, Colby y 
Morehouse, logró arrancar sonrisas y largos aplausos. 

De igual forma afloraron, incidentes discriminatorios sufridos por el
 representante de la última generación de líderes negros nacidos en la 
esclavitud.

 “Solo se quedó en El Paso un día y medio; llegó un domingo y se fue lunes a
 las 10 a.m. y partió desde Ciudad Juárez”, narró.

De su estancia en la vecina localidad, queda un reto profesional que el 
doctor Dailey añora esclarecer. 

”Encontrar documentos históricos que avalen el encuentro entre el líder afro
norteamericano Broker T. Washington con el mexicano Guillermo Álvarez”,
 confesó.

 El hallazgo pudiera arrojar luz entorno al posible vínculo del 
estadounidense con la Revolución Mexicana, entre otros aspectos de 
significación.

Sin embargo, concluyó: “Hasta el momento no se ha descubierto ninguna interacción de Washington con ningún icono de ese levantamiento armado”.

One of President George W. Bush’s final acts in office was to push the bill containing the budget request for the U.S. Border Patrol which totaled just fewer than $11 billion of tax payers money. With more funding, the U.S. borders have seen a sudden increase in the numbers of agents patroling high traffic areas. Just in The El Paso/Las Cruces area about 400 new agents were hired for the stations of the El Paso sector which are located in El Paso, Fabens, Fort Hancock, Ysleta, Alamogordo, Albuquerque, Deming, Las Cruces, Lordsburg, Truth or Consequences, and Santa Teresa, New Mexico.

400 new Border Patrol agents hired for El Paso sector since 2007 (Stock photo)

Drug busts have yielded about 100 tons of illegal narcotics since this sudden increase in funding for the Border Patrol nationwide, with big contributions coming out of the El Paso sector.

“Total narcotic seizures decreased 12 percent. This includes a 44 percent decrease in cocaine seizures and a 33 percent decrease in marijuana seizures. The El Paso Sector also prosecuted a total of 8,144 individuals, which includes 3,120 felony and 5,024 misdemeanor cases. These numbers are up from 6,386 in the previous year”, states the Border Patrol website.

According to the BP website there has also been a 60 percent decrease in the flow of undocumented immigrants into the U.S. from the local sectors. Along with that, the statistics show a 68 percent decrease in the number of immigrant deaths compared with last year. This means that the agents have saved more than 50 more people from the harsh elements or dangerous human smugglers.

While some may consider this increase in funding to be an overkill, some agents felt as if it is a good thing for the border communities.

Ex Border Patrol agent Rene Barrios is one of those people, “I think it’s a good thing, but it is not really the agents that are the main deterrent, it is actually the wall”. He also feels that the extra tax money is well spent because of the big drug trade from the south. “I think it is well spent because it keeps bad things like cocaine and heroin from coming over, but one of the goals that people forget about is that we were also there to prevent terrorists from coming over the borders and causing more American casualties”.

There is also a difference in activity when it comes to the certain sectors stresses the ex agent, “It all depends what sector you’re in but the Las Cruces sector saw a lot more activity from undocumented people but we were there for a very important reason. We are there to stop drugs from going farther north where there a smaller chance of them getting caught with big amounts of drugs. They aren’t looking for big shipments as much as we are here close to the border”.

Catching more drug smugglers is a positive aspect for the increase in agents but many people in El Paso feel that there is more of a chance for negative treatment among the detainees.

Concern from local El Pasoans about the treatment of the undocumented people that the agents detain is not uncommon. Sergio, who requested his last name to be kept anonymous, is the son of an undocumented man who has been detained on more than one occasion. “My dad would tell me stories of how the agents would sometimes be unfair to them because they were from Mexico. They would call them names like “tonks”, which is the sound they said the baton made when they hit them, my dad knew very little English so they would say mean things and he understood some of the phrases,” he said.

But Barrios disagrees with that particular view on the treatment of the detainees, “Hell no, when I was there we treated them with respect. If they did not cooperate, it’s like resisting an arrest, then of course we had to be a little meaner. But as long as they respected the agent they would respect them back. They are human beings too.”

“I really hope that the stories that my father told me are exaggerated but the more people you give power the more people that have a chance to abuse it. And it is especially worse because these people are just looking for a better life because of their hard lives. They don’t need any more bad treatment”, says Sergio.

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Editor’s note: This story was previously published on The 3311 Journal.

El Buró del Censo Federal reportó que el porcentaje de hispanos sin seguro médico es de 30.7, lo que según las estadísticas de los Centros para el Control y la Prevención de Enfermedades (CDC) representa unos 15 millones de hispanos. De esa cifra, unos  3.3 millones son menores de edad.

Ciudad Juárez, la única opción para los que carecen de seguro médico. (Angélica Herrera/Borderzine.com)

Las cifras del CDC indican que el acceso a seguros de salud privados a nivel nacional entre los subgrupos hispanos se dividía de la siguiente manera: 39.1% de mexicanos, 47.3% de puertorriqueños, 57.9% de cubanos y 45.1% de otros grupos hispanos y latinos. Las cifras también oscilan en el caso de los hispanos sin seguro médico: 37.6% de mexicanos, 20.4% de puertorriqueños, 22.8% de cubanos y 32.3% de otros grupos hispanos o latinos.

De acuerdo con la Comisión de Servicios Humanos y de Salud de Texas, en El Paso, TX,  unas  19,000 personas están inscritas en el seguro social dentro del programa de Medicaid, siendo la mayoría hispanos de escasos recursos residentes de zonas en las afueras de la ciudad.

Para Margaret Olivas, portavoz del Centro Médico Universitario de El Paso, antes Hospital Thomason, la falta de seguro médico ocasiona que un mayor número de personas lleguen a las salas de emergencia por no poder atender sus enfermedades en consulta regular.

“Los hospitales de la comunidad, en el caso de El Paso el Centro Médico Universitario,  los contribuyentes de los condados seremos quienes tendremos que pagar por la cuenta médica de estas personas”, aseguró Olivas.

En un estudio realizado en 2007  titulado Cross-border Utilization of Health Care Services by United States Residents Living Near the Mexican Border, la Organización Panamericana de la Salud apuntó que, debido a los altos costos en atención medica privada en la ciudad, muchas personas optan por cruzar a Cd. Juárez para obtener atención médica a un menor costo.

Los habitantes de El Paso que han cruzado a México en busca de algún tipo de atención sanitaria en los dos años previos al estudio fueron de 32,5%. De los que cruzaron la frontera, 27,1% utilizaron servicios médicos; 63,2% servicios estomatológicos; 82,0% farmacéuticos y 9,8% curanderos. Las razones ofrecidas además de un menor costo, fueron no tener seguro de salud, las barreras idiomáticas y la conveniencia. Los factores asociados con el cruce de la frontera fueron ser hispano, haber vivido en Ciudad Juárez, no tener seguro y una menor edad. La mayoría de las personas se manifestó satisfecha con los servicios de salud recibidos.

Dada la elevada proporción de personas sin seguro médico en los Estados Unidos y los requisitos cada vez más rigurosos para obtener un seguro, se necesitarían políticas de salud que permitan la atención sanitaria transfronteriza, con el uso de un sistema alternativo de salud más fácil y seguro, se informa finalmente en el estudio de la Organización Panamericana de la Salud.

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Editor’s note: This story was previously published on The 3311 Journal.