by Michael Marcell

A diverse group of Hispanic and other small business leaders assembled at Washington’s Capitol Hilton Hotel June 9 to sort out obstacles they are facing in winning lucrative and sustainable government contracts in fields ranging from information technology security to office cleaning services.

Thirty percent of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds were dispended to small businesses, according to the Small Business Administration,.Of that figure, only 3.5 percent went to Hispanic-owned small businesses, amounting to $972 million as of June 4.

Hispanic small business owners face a substantial number of challenges in pursuit of procurement action, Stephen Denlinger, president of The Latin American Management Association and advisor the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, told the assembled entrepreneurs. “For a small Hispanic firm starting out in the federal market,just to find out where your product or service is purchased is a daunting challenge. How large are they? Are they in a position to go after a prime contract? Do they have a track record that would enable them to qualify even to bid on requirements?”

In 2002, the Census Bureau reported there were more than 1.5 million Hispanic-owned businesses operating in the United States, and Hispanics constitute 6.6 percent of all U.S. business ownership.

Denlinger said that a lot of small Hispanic businesses start out by getting subcontracts to build their company’s reputation and capital to apply for prime contracts. “They’re forming businesses at four times the national norm. It’s just amazing, the contribution the Hispanics are making to the free enterprise system.”

Bernardo Cardenal, president of Rocamar Engineering Services in Delray Beach, Fla., agreed that government paperwork has been a constant obstacle.

“Usually the RFPs (requests for proposal) are so out of my reach that I have to team with other companies,and while trying to put the teams together and write everything up in a timely fashion, you usually run out of time.” Cardenal said, warning that when companies fail to fill out their proposals properly or on time, they are disqualified.

In addition to paperwork,a constant menace to small business owners trying to operate with the government is the government itself.

President Obama sent out a memo 15 months ago directing all federal agency heads to “clarify when governmental outsourcing is or is not appropriate.” Since its release, there has been a push to turn over “inherently governmental functions” to federal agencies.

Procurement attorney Robert Burton represents companies whose contracts are in jeopardy by what he calls “quota driven” restructuring.“The President has set a goal to reduce procurement spending by seven percent in the next two fiscal years. A dramatic percentage,” he called it.

Burton said procurement spending has gone up naturally because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and recent natural disasters,all “unprecedented events that call for unprecedented spending.” To meet Obama’s seven-percent quota, federal agencies are primarily going after small businesses.

“Unfortunately, small businesses are easy targets, because some of the work they do can probably be performed by the government,but it’s not inherently governmental,” he said.“We are seeing functions such as janitorial services, maintenance services, food services and information technology services. These are not inherently governmental functions. “Burton said.

Burton said in addition to canceling contracts, the government recruits away small business employees because, in some instances, it does not have the expertise.

Burton said he plans to form a small business coalition to lobby Congress to draft legislation that would prevent the government from terminating contracts for convenience and to prevent competing against small business for employees.

Earl Hubbard, CEO of Orion Technology in Huntsville,Alabama, said his company lost $8.6 million in revenue this year from government in-sourcing. “We’re recommending we be exempt as small businesses by aggregate sales of $35 million or less with fewer than 1,000 employees,so we can prosper. “ Hubbard said.

Senator Robert Menéndez (D-NJ) spoke to the some of the small business people who attended the Minority Roundtable Luncheon during a separate reception held at the Russell Senate Office building.Menéndez serves on the Senate’s banking and finance committees, and he is the chairman of the Senate Democratic Hispanic Task Force.

Asked by Hispanic Link about in-sourcing and how it affects small businesses, he said it seemed “counter-intuitive to the President’s goal of creating opportunities in the federal contracting system for diversity.”

“We already have a much more limited universe than we should, and if that is being pursued, then it is only going to erode what exists,so it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me,” Menéndez said. Hispanic Link News Service.

(Michael Marcell is a reporter with Hispanic Link News Service in Washington, D.C. Email him at Michael.Marcell306@wku.edu.)

by Marisa Treviño

The premise for the Web site PostSecret is simple enough. People mail in their secrets anonymously on the back of postcards.

When you read the scanned cards on the site, why these people want to remain anonymous is usually apparent.

One postcard has left no doubt. It bares more than a simple secret, Its message reads:

“I have lived in San Francisco since I was young…I am illegal…I am not wanted here, don’t belong anywhere. This summer I plan to jump off the Golden Gate…”

Since its posting on June 6, there has been a global outpouring of kindness toward the writer. Strangers have proffered advice, assurances and even offers of new places, other cities, to call home.

A Facebook group called “please don’t jump” was quickly created. In one day, 11,000 people joined. The “wall” is filled with short posts of support and love. The last time I checked, the figure passed 60,000 members.

Kimberly Furnell of British Colombia, mother of an infant child, created her page on the day the secret was posted. She wrote, “I found this secret so dev astating, I couldn’t stand to just read it and navigate away from the page, so I figured I would start a group here in hope that the person who wrote it would see it and reconsider.”

Another, Katelyn Roberts, created a video of members on the bridge holding balloons, writing messages with colored chalk.

In this age of social media, the postcard continues to invite passion. The organizer of a page called Together for Life! (Come Together on the Golden Gate Bridge) wrote: “I am hoping that this will help the writer of the postcard understand that it doesn’t matter who you are or what others say, but where you feel at home that determines where you belong.”

For undocumented immigrants— especially those still very young who were brought to this country as infants — this sense of not belonging or, worse, not being wanted, is an all too real emotion. It is compounded by insensitive state legislators and ignorant, often vicious rhetoric.

It’s hard enough for an adult to remain strong in the face of such attacks, but for a young person who has known no other country but the United States, it is a nightmare with no way to wake up.

The media and the public they feed have allowed the immigration debate to be stripped of its human factor. The hurt is being inflicted on the most vulnerable of our population.

The San Francisco girl’s secret — her cry for help — opened the floodgates.

Immigration-restrictionist “patriots,” as they like to refer to themselves, can’t be as many as the growing list of compassionate people who keep posting their words of encouragement and love on that Facebook wall.

Even if a small group is doing its best to rip it from foundation, this country still has heart. Hispanic Link.

(Marisa Treviño, of Rowlett, Texas. founded the site www.LatinaLista.net several years ago. She is a contributing columnist to Hispanic Link News Service.) ©2010

by the Unviversity of Michigan

Interventions needed to reduce bullying of obese children, researchers say

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Obese children are more likely to be bullied regardless of gender, race, socioeconomic status, social skills or academic achievement.

Those are the findings of the study “Weight status as a predictor of being bullied in third through sixth grades,” which is available online now and will be published in the June issue of the journal Pediatrics. Julie C. Lumeng, M.D., assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics and Communicable Diseases at the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, is lead author of the study.

Childhood obesity and bullying are both pervasive public health problems. Obesity among children in the United States has risen to epidemic proportions with 17 percent of 6 to 11 year olds estimated to be obese between 2003 and 2006. In addition, parents of obese children rate bullying as their top health concern and past studies have shown that obese children who are bullied experience more depression anxiety and loneliness.

The objective of this study was to determine the relationship between child-hood obesity and being bullied in third, fifth, and sixth grades. While studies on bullying and obesity in children have been con-ducted before, none had controlled for factors such as socioeconomic status,race, social skills and aca-demic achievement.

Further, this study is unique in that it specifi-cally looks at the age range when bullying peaks – ages 6 to 9.

Researchers studied 821 children who were participating in the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development.These children were re-cruited at birth in 10 study sites around the country.

Researchers evaluated the relationship between the child’s weight status and the odds of being bullied as re-ported by the child, mother, and teacher. The study ac-counted for grade level in school, gender, race, family income-to-needs ratio, racial and socioeconomic composi-tion of the school, and child social skills and academic achievement as reported by mothers and teachers.

Researchers found that obese children had higher odds of being bullied no matter their gender, race,family socioeconomic sta-tus, school demographic profile, social skills or aca-demic achievement.

Authors conclude that being obese, by itself, in-creases the likelihood of being a victim of bullying.Interventions to address bul-lying in schools are badly needed, Lumeng adds.

“Physicians who care for obese children should consider the role that be-ing bullied is playing in the child’s well-being,” Lumeng says. “Because perceptions of children are connected to broader societal perceptions about body type, it is important to fashion messages aimed at reducing the premium placed on thinness and th negative stereotypes that are associated with being obese or overweight.”

While the study did not look into interventions to ad-dress bullying in this popu-lation, the hope is that these results could prove useful in doing so, Lumeng says.}

by the El Reportero news services

Juan Manuel Santos of the ruling Partido de la U (PU) and Antanas Mockus of the Partido Verde (PV) closed their presidential campaigns on June13, ahead of the June 20 second round runoff amidst news that the army had successfully raided a Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) camp and liberated three so-called ‘exchangeable’ hostages.

The success of ‘Operación Camaleón’ was immediately seized upon by Santos, who pitched himself as the obvious successor to maintain President Alvaro Uribe’s Democratic Security Policy (DSP).

OAS debates Honduras and “the limits of multilateralism”

Delegates from the 33 active members of the Organization of American States (OAS) met in Lima between 6-8 June for an annual general assembly to discuss military spending and related security concerns.

The agenda of the last annual meeting in Hon-duras, also about regional security, was hijacked by a debate over lifting the suspension of Cuba’s membership of the OAS. In a neat irony, the agenda this time around was overshadowed by the issue of Honduras’ membership of the OAS.

Then, the U.S. cut a lonely figure in opposing Cuba’s re-admittance to the OAS; now it is in the minority of countries calling for Honduras to be allowed to rejoin. But, in a visit to Ecuador after the summit, the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, sought to move beyond Honduras and re-engage the region.

Mercosur under fire in Brazil

The Southern Cone Common Market (Mercosur/Mercosul), the imperfect customs union comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay (with Venezuelan membership pending), has lately taken centre stage in the 2010 presidential contest in Brazil, after the main opposition candidate, José Serra, dismissed it as a “farce”, “cumbersome” and a “barrier” to Brazil’s international trade ambitions.

He hinted Brazil might be better off without it. It’s not the first time such suggestions have surfaced. Leading voices in Brazil’s private sector,tired of dealing with what they consider a self-interested and disruptive Argentina, argue that Brazil would be better off signing bilateral free trade agreements with key trade partners like the European Union (E.U.) and the US (this is not permissible under Mercosur rules).

In contrast, President Lula da Silva has always vociferously defended Mercosur as key to regional economic and political integration, even in the face of mounting domestic opposition.

Unexpected US opposition overshadows Lula’s successful Iran nuclear dealBrazil’s President Lula da Silva has, together with Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, persuaded Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to drop many of his objections to International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) proposals and enter a fuel swap agreement.This deal, which was hailed by the Brazilians and Turks as a means of defusing the confrontation over Iran’s nuclear programme has been strongly criticised by the US, to the disappointment of Brazilian officials who believed they were acting in line with US demands.

Crowded agenda for Clinton in Latin America

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton travels to Latin America and the Caribbean with a crowded agenda awaiting: lingering tensions over last year’s coup in Honduras, U.S. immigration policy, security issues and concerns over Iran and the Middle East. Clinton was to depart Sunday on her seventh trip to the region as the top U.S. diplomat

by Alex Galbraith

A nationwide wave of layoffs in public schools is expected in coming weeks, placing 150,000 to 300,000 education jobs in jeopardy, with Hispanic teachers and students more likely than others to feel the sting.

With midterm elections threatening Democratic control in both the House and Senate, legislative relief action stalled May 27. So far, a bailout bill to aid school districts that are most affected has received only mild support from the White House.

The bill, sponsored by long-time education advocate Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), will extend federal funding for school personnel whose salaries were subsidized by stimulus funding passed Feb. 13. 2009. It will expire at the end of this school year.

Federal money accounts for 10.5 percent of the $1.1 trillion spent on elementary and secondary education this year. U.S. Department of Education spokesperson Sandra Abrevaya says that while no formal deadline has been set for an additional stimulus package, she expects one to pass in June. “We need to act with a real sense of urgency,” she told Hispanic Link News Service, adding that if schools don’t find ways to keep teachers in the classroom, the results can be devastating.

Arts, afterschool care, physical education summer school and other activities which are considered beneficial to Hispanics are included among programs likely to be cut from underfunded schools.

Hispanic activists cite the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest district whose enrollment of 617,000 is 75 percent Hispanic, as an example of what can happen to a system in crisis.

Over the last few years, massive LAUSD budget cuts have caused a sharp increase in pink slips. Latino education advocates maintain that the layoffs are not adequately balanced between district schools in the richer and poorer communities.

LAUSD spokeswoman Lydia Ramos explains that inner-city schools, with greater percentages of Hispanics and blacks in their administrative and classroom ranks and a higher concentration of young teachers, experience higher personnel turnover rates.

California law states that all personnel layoffs must be based on senior-ity. Long-standing “last hired, fi rst fi red” contract provisions protect veteran teachers from dismissal. This creates a buffer from layoffs for schools in suburban neighborhoods with lower turnover while leaving inner-city schools, predominantly attended by Hispanic and Afri-can-American students, targeted.

In more affluent West Los Angeles, most schools have lost 10 percent or fewer of their credentialed teachers. Meanwhile, half of the credentialed teach-ers at urban Markham Middle School, which is 71 percent Hispanic, have been laid off. Only 64 percent of Markham’s re-maining teachers are fully credentialed, a figure 31 percent lower than the state average. “It’s un-fortunate what’s happen-ing to these schools, but until the law is changed, this is how it has to be done,” Ramos says.

If the projected 26,000 California teachers are laid off, the Hispanic teacher will become an increas-ingly rare individual.

“The ‘last hired, first fired’ category is where we see the bulk of people of color,” says David Hernández, a community outreach specialist with the California Teachers’ Association, adding that the lack of Hispanic role models in teaching posi-tions is harmful for the development of Hispanic youths.

One education official characterized the situa-tion as “grim and getting grimmer.” SB 995, a bill to allow schools to retain non-veteran teachers based on performance, has been proposed in the California Senate. It is supported by Gov. Arnold Schwarzeneg-ger. Hispanic Link.

by Jorge Mujica MuriasNorthern Mexico

Yes, there will be amnesty and all outstanding immigration cases will be given a fair and immediate resolution. Or that we hope, because there was already was a case and that means there might be another 12 million.

The case is Barack Obama’s aunt, a woman with an almost unutterable name for us, Zeituni Polly Onyango, who came to this country in the year 2000. Two years later she requested political asylum (for fear of violence among the tribes in Kenya, since she is a member of a minority tribe,) which was refused and she was ordered to leave the country. Not strange, because the judge of the case, some Leonard I. Shapiro,has about the worst record in the country in asylum cases. Between 2004 and 2009, Shapiro rejected a 67 percent of the cases he saw, a percentage higher than the national (57 percent) and greater than Boston (61 percent), where he works.

Thus, Onyango became a fugitive from justice (or the Immigration authorities,which is not the same because they are not very just,), and became another Elvira Arellano. But the long arm of… not the law, but newspapers, cached up with her, living in Boston, a few days before the 2008 elections in a subsidized apartment. Obama declared again that he wanted a full immigration reform, and deportations were suspended during the elections so nobody could deport “by mistake,” the aunt of the guy who could be the next President of the country.

Onyango escaped again. She moved to Cleveland and hired a lawyer. Striking news is that her case was reopened, despite being a fugitive and all, and in six months she won arguing on this occasion that in case to return to Kenya because, being as she is, the aunt of the President of the United States, things could go wrong for her. Good argument,but common, because of the lack of popularity of USA in many places.

Onyango will be provided with a work permit, Social Security number, driver’s license, and she can apply for full permanent residency in a year and for citizenship in five more years

PA ‘ your aunt and the MIA

What I say is that if you can do it for one, you can do it for 12 million. As the popular chant in the immigration marches goes, “We Want Amnesty for Your Aunty and Mine.

For example, we want amnesty for the courageous young immigrants without papers and without fear, whom this week created a ruckus at John McCain’s office in Tucson, Ariyan-zona, sitting on the floor and stating that they were not leaving until McCain “declares its support for the DREAM Act.” Lizabeth Matthew and Mohammad Abdollahi were not only arrested, but put on deportation process.

As arguments to release them and give them work permits, social security,driver’s license and the chance to apply for permanent residence and then citizenship, would be that all that was already given Obama’s aunt. No more, no less. If needed, it can be also argued that Mohammad is gay, and in Iran, where being gay is illegal and punishable with the death penalty,there’s more reason to fear. In Mohammad’s case, is not that “things could go wrong for him” but absolute certainty they will, as Iranian laws state. At the very least, legally, Mohammad would receive “at least 100 lashes”.

The laws are clear, both here and in Iran. And the one here grant asylum for proven “fear of persecution in their native land based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a social group.”

In Lizbeth’s case, and any Mexican for that matter,in our “native land” we can be fearful for many reasons,and if someone does not believed, just go ask the recently kidnapped “Jefe Diego,” Diego Fernandez de Cevallos, former Senator and former presidential candidate. Nobody knows if he was kidnapped by the Narco, the drug dealers, or by the governing PAN, or the radical right-wing group el Yunque, or the PRI. It could even be worse for people who “suddenly become famous,” as it also argued Onyango’s lawyer. These young guys are already famous.

Of course the ultra-right fascist who govern in Arizona and have offices in Washington are already crying heaven, but as they like to say, “the law is the law” and must be respected.

The problem here is that one alone cannot open an immigration case. You have to be arrested to initiate your case. But the solution is simple: Let’s all go to Arizona and sit down in the offices of John McCain and be arrested!

www.mexicodelnorte@Yahoo.com.MX