More than 600 immigrants from 90 countries slated to be sworn in as citizens today in Denver signal a surge in both applications and approvals nationwide.
But federal and local authorities increasingly question whether newcomers are assimilating into U.S. society.
A new Colorado Trust initiative aims to ensure that immigrants adapt and sink roots in Denver, where one in eight residents is foreign-born. Plans in the making by state officials call for increased use of interpreters, volunteer service projects and improved English classes.
“You can’t enforce assimilation, but you can effectively encourage it,” said Alfonso Aguilar, chief of citizenship for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, who lauds the nascent Colorado effort as an example of what he’d like to see nationwide.
“If diversity is the only value we have in this country, then you have no unifying values. You’re going to have a very divided country. That is precisely what’s happening in Europe. … We need to start talking publicly about celebrating our civic values and national identity.”
Federal statistics show record numbers of immigrants seeking citizenship, a record average- processing time of seven months and an upward trend in the numbers sworn in.
The average annual number of new citizens has increased from 210,000 in the 1980s to 500,000 in the 1990s to 625,000 from 2000 to 2006, the statistics show. The 607 new citizens today will join 7,401 others naturalized in Colorado over the past year.
At today’s ceremony in Civic Center, federal officials plan to feature a few immigrants they regard as paragons of swift, exceptional adaptation:
Helena Ny, 33, who as an abandoned child in Cambodia was shuttled among strangers, now runs a hair salon in Denver.
“If you put me back in Asia, I’d be lost,” said Ny, who also studies at Community College of Denver. “My friendliness, my way of talking with everyone, I got that from American culture – the unconditional love America shows,” she said.
The first thing she’ll do as a citizen, she said, is obtain a passport so she can visit Cambodia. For years, she’s been waiting to go there to thank the dozens of strangers who risked their lives to save her when she was a terrified child.
Paul Freeman, 52, once a paperboy on a U.S. air base in his native Britain, is now principal of Glenwood Springs High School. “The process for me has been gentle,” Freeman said, noting that he imports Tetley tea bags now and then. Once a teacher at a London school where students spoke 50 languages, he said, “America still stands head and shoulders above other countries in the way it seems to integrate newcomers.”
Jose Garcia-Perez, 30, who as a child immigrated to the U.S. with his parents from Mexico, today prosecutes criminal cases for the U.S. Army.
“Some people want everything from here, but they refuse to become part of it,” said Garcia-Perez, who grew up speaking Spanish at home. “To me, it’s important that you know everything about the place you are going to be and accept it. Obviously, this is the place you want to be, or you wouldn’t be here. Otherwise, it can get kind of hard for you, trying to keep everything you know from where you came from. I don’t think you can do that.”
Community leaders say they’re grappling with growing concerns that traditional “melting pot” adaptation is weakening. Diverse cultural affinities – cheering for foreign teams in stadiums, waving foreign flags at festivals – fan perceptions that immigrants may fail to embrace common values, shared history and political responsibilities.
“The risk is these people can feel alienated. They can feel it’s ‘Us vs. Them’ instead of one strong community,” said Susan Downs-Karkos, senior program officer at the Colorado Trust, which is funding the initiative to boost immigrant adaptation in Denver. “Given the levels (of immigration) we are experiencing now, we really do need to think more deliberately about it.”
State refugee- and immigrants-services workers, with a $10,000 grant, are planning how best to encourage swift adaptation. Soon a grant of $75,000 a year, for four years, will be awarded to a state or city agency to carry out the campaign in Denver, she said.
Federal citizenship officials say they want to rev up integration of immigrants nationwide. They’ve proposed setting up “integration councils” in each state and using $100 million to fund local projects, such as neighborhood cleanups done by immigrants and volunteers.
Congress this summer failed to act on these and other immigration-related proposals. Now, federal officials say they’ll support local efforts anyway by providing educational civics and history materials to 12,000 public libraries.
