- Sarah Crean on Exclusive: Proposed policy would allow industries to self-audit pollution-generating activities
- David Howard King on Bronx senator's health quest
- Cristian Salazar and Carla Murphy on Stops lawsuit given class status
- Cristian Salazar on NYC Council passes banking bill
- David Howard King on Senate Dems Look to Nat'l Issues
Immigrants Reports:
Gaps In Financial Services For Low Income Immigrant Households
More than half of Mexican - and over a third of Ecuadorean - immigrants in NYC do not have a bank account, according to this study by the Department of Consumer Affairs and the Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs. But 80 percent of immigrant survey participants who make less than $300 a week report having savings. 2013-04-23
Benefits Of Extending Tuition Benefits To Undocumented Immigrants
This new report - by the New York State Youth Leadership Council and NYU Law School’s Immigrant Rights Clinic - outlines the economic and social benefits that would accompany passage of the New York DREAM Act. The act would provide that all New Yorkers, regardless of status, have access to financial assistance for higher education. 2013-03-27
Sandy's Impact on Immigrant Communities in NY Area
More than a month after Superstorm Sandy, many New Yorkers continue to struggle with the devastation of their homes, neighborhoods and livelihoods. One group that has faced particular challenges, but has received little attention, are the region’s thousands of immigrants. 2012-12-19
Immigrant detention and deportation in NYC
From October 2005 through December 2010, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency apprehended over 34,000 New Yorkers, according to this report by the Immigrant Defense Project, Families for Freedom, and the NYU School of Law Immigrant Rights Clinic. The agency deports 91 percent of those detained. 2012-07-25
Demand for temporary foreign workers
The New York metropolitan area has the highest demand for H-1B workers in the nation, according to this report by the Brookings Institution. 2012-07-18
Immigrants Half of Small Business Owners
Immigrants make up 48 percent of all business owners living in New York City, according to this report by the Fiscal Policy Institute. Among small businesses owners in the city, immigrants make up 84 percent of small grocery store owners, 69 percent of restaurant owners, and 63 percent of clothing store owners. 2011-10-04
Local Investment by Banks Declines
In spite of a $38 billion increase in local deposits at the city's 20 largest banks over the past two years, reinvestment in the city's communities by those banks declined by $4.4 billion according to this new report by the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development. 2011-09-29
Ethnic and Cultural Diversity Boost Brooklyn's Economy
Immigrants account for half of all workers and half of all self-employed individuals in Brooklyn, according to this analysis of the American Community Survey by the Fiscal Policy Institute.
2011-06-23
Homes for Immigrants
Although housing conditions vary widely among immigrant groups in the city, immigrants are -- on average -- likely to pay a larger share of their income for rent than other New Yorkers, according to a policy brief by the Community Service Society. In addition, they tend to live in more crowded conditions. Affordability, the report found, is a particular problem for New Yorkers coming from Mexico, the Dominican Republic and the former Soviet Union. 2011-04-25
Supporting English as Second Language Programs
This paper by the Center for an Urban Future and the Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy includes eight recommendations for supporting and strengthening the state's English for Speakers of Other Languages programs. 2010-04-08
Immigrant Parents and Education
Despite city efforts to reach out to immigrant parents, many still feel excluded from the public schools, according to a new report by Advocates for Children. Some 60 percent of city students are immigrants or the children of immigrants, but the report said, these families "face significant obstacles to participating in their children's education." The group offers recommendations for increasing involvement. For more on immigrants in the city schools, see the March issue of Gotham Gazette's Citizen. 2009-03-23
Non-Citizens Lack Health Insurance
Non-citizen New Yorkers are three times more likely than citizens to lack health insurance, finds a new report by New Yorkers for Accessible Health Coverage and the New York Immigration Coalition. The report proposes ways to expand coverage through lowering various barriers of entry. 2009-02-25
Immigrants' Housing Squeeze
Immigrants living in New York City are faced with more housing problems than natives in most every respect, according to a new report by the Pratt Center for Community Development and the New York Immigrant Housing Collaborative. They put more of their income towards rent, are more likely to live in overcrowded and illegal dwellings, and have less access to affordable housing. 2008-12-04
Immigrant Voting on the Rise
City Limits Magazine and the New York Immigration Coalition released preliminary exit poll data for New York City that suggests that more than 40 percent of first-time voters on Tuesday were foreign born. Gains this year could influence 2009 elections for city offices. The authors expect to release hard numbers next month. For more on immigrant voting rights in Gotham Gazette, see links in the news and coverage of the campaign to let non-citizens vote in local elections. 2008-11-11
Low Food Stamp Access in Immigrant Communities
A recent report by the Urban Justice Center, Nourishing NYC: Increasing Food Stamps Access in Immigrant Communities, shows that hundreds of thousands of low-income immigrants and their children in New York City are not receiving the food stamps for which they qualify. 2008-10-06
Lead Poisoning and Immigrants
Immigrant children are five times more likely than other New York City children to suffer from lead poisoning, according to a report by the city health department. Because children who have arrived in this country recently are the most likely to be affected, the health department thinks the children may have been exposed to lead in their countries of origin, where the toxic metal might be less tightly regulated. Exposure to lead is linked to learning and behavioral problems in young children. 2008-01-07
Immigrant Access to the Food Stamp Program
One fourth of those eligible for food stamps but not participating in the Food Stamp Program are immigrants, according to FoodChange’s Immigrant Access to the Food Stamp Program report. Due to this lack of food stamp participation, New York City forgoes $646 million every year in federal funds. While hunger and food insecurity are widespread among New York City’s immigrant populations, the highest concentrations of eligible but not participating immigrants reside in Queens and Brooklyn. 2007-04-02
Immigrant Entrepreneurs
Businesses started, owned and operated by immigrants are boosting the city’s economy according to A World of Opportunity, a new report by the Center for an Urban Future. The reports finds that many immigrants are self-employed and that their businesses have created jobs and play a key role in neighborhoods throughout New York. However the report says there is more that government, businesses and non-profit organization could do to help these entrepreneurs. 2007-02-07
English Class Shortage
The number of English as a second language classes provided by New York State’s English for Speakers of Other Languages program has not kept up with the increasing demand for the courses, according to a new study by the Center for an Urban Future and the Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy. In 2005, there were more than 1.6 million adults in the state with limited English skills, but just 86,433 seats in state-run English programs, the study, “Lost in Translation,” says. And in New York City, the program had only 41,585 places for the 1,230,866 adults with limited English skills. 2006-11-15
Immigrant Health
New immigrants are in better health than native New Yorkers by some indicators, this report by the city's health department finds. But the longer immigrants stay here, the more health problems they develop. 2006-07-24
Language Barrier To Housing Complaints
Housing code violations and complaints against landlords are going unreported because of the limited English of many tenants, according to a report by the Urban Justice Center on behalf of a coalition of housing, community and immigrant groups. Entitled “Hear This: The Need for Multilingual Housing Services in New York City,” the survey of 697 New York residents “from diverse immigrant communities” throughout the city found that 60 percent lived in buildings with significant housing code violations, yet only 18 percent complained to the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development, some saying it was because they did not speak English well enough to feel comfortable complaining. 62 percent said they did not even know the agency existed. 2006-06-13
Immigrant Students: Is There a "Nativity Gap"?
This report written by two professors from New York University compares how well immigrant students in the New York City public schools perform on reading and math tests in comparison to their native born counterparts. 2006-05-12
Principles for Immigration Policy
The Drum Major Intitute describes this report on immigration as a "primer for policymakers and advocates." Immigration policy, it writes, must be connected to larger discussions about the middle class and those aspiring to attain a middle-class standard of life. Priorities of any immigration policy should be bolstering the contribution that immigrant workers make to the economy and strenthening the rights of immigrants in the workplace. 2005-12-09
Mexican Health Campaign Fact Sheet
This short fact sheet gives an overview of the results of a survey of the health of Mexican immigrants conducted by New York University’s Center for Community Problem Solving. Almost all of those surveyed were undocumented immigrants without health insurance. Over one third reported going “nowhere” for health care. (in .pdf format) 2005-11-18
Rise, Peak and Decline: Trends in U.S. Immigration 1992
The number of immigrants to the United States each year, legally and illegally, grew very rapidly starting in the mid-1990s, hit a peak at the end of the decade, and then declined substantially after 2001. By 2004, the annual inflow of foreign-born persons was down 24 percent from its all-time high in 2000, according to this analysis of data by the Pew Hispanic Center. The immigration to New York City is the lowest it has been in 15 years, the report says. 2005-09-30
Survey of Mexican Immigrants
A survey, conducted by The Pew Hispanic Center, provides detailed information on demographic characteristics, living arrangements and work experiences of Mexican migrants in the United States. The survey sample is comprised of 4,836 Mexican adults interviewed as they applied for identity cards at Mexican consulates in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Dallas, Atlanta, Raleigh and Fresno. Those surveyed in New York were more likely to say they were in the country illegally, to be under 30 and to be employed in hotels and restaurants than the applicants surveyed in other cities where Mexican settlement has a longer history. 2005-03-08
The Newest New Yorkers, 2000: Immigrant New York in the New Millennium
This study by the Department of City Planning attempts a comprehensive description of New York City's foreign-born population – whether legal, undocumented, or temporary. It examines the countries of origin of the foreign-born, their paths of entry, residential distribution, and demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. While the complete report is available only in hard copy, the Department of City Planning has put online a long "executive summary,” an “illustrated guide of the major findings”, and almost two dozen tables, such as “Ten Largest Sources of the Foreign-born by County” 2005-01-25
Getting In The Door: Language Barriers To Health Services In NYC Hospitals
New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. issued a report finding that New Yorkers whose primary language is not English encounter significant barriers navigating the city's complicated health care system, with nearly 75 percent of hospitals surveyed failing to provide Spanish-language services to callers to one or more departments. 2005-01-12
How Deporting Immigrants Has Affected Families and Communities
This report, published by the American Civil Liberties Union, focuses on the impact of post 9/11 deportation of immigrants on their families and their communities. It does so by recounting the individual stories of ten men. 2004-12-14
