2011, The Buffett Project: Stateless in the Dominican Republic

Stateless in the Dominican Republic

Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication Arizona State University 2011

Stateless in the Dominican Republic

Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication Arizona State University 2011

Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication cronkite.asu.edu/buffett/dr

The Cronkite School has been covering immigration and border issues since 2006 with the generous support of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation.

Buffett student projects include: South Africa: At the Crossroads of Hate and Hope | South Africa Documentary | Borderlands Photo Essays | Divided Families | Divided Families Documentary | Children of the Borderlands Copyright Š 2012 Arizona Board of Regents.

Published January 2012.

Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication 555 N. Central Ave. Phoenix, AZ 85004-1248 cronkite.asu.edu Editors: Rick Rodriguez, Jason Manning and Kristin Gilger Art Director: Linda O’Neal Davis On the cover: Henry Joseph, 1, was born in the Dominican Republic but is not considered a citizen.

Photo by Brandon Quester

Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication

About the Project

In March 2011, 17 student journalists from the

Sacramento (Calif.) Bee, is the Carnegie Professor

Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass

of Journalism at the Cronkite School, where he

Communication at Arizona State University traveled

teaches a seminar on Latino issues and a depth

to the Dominican Republic to report on immigration

reporting class. Manning, former political editor

and border policies and their impact on the coun-

for washingtonpost.com, is the director of student

try’s large Haitian population.

media at ASU and teaches a freshman seminar

The students, all members of a depth reporting

as well as assisting with the depth reporting class.

class, spent eight days reporting in Santo Domingo

The two have guided students in previous in-depth

and nearby bateyes as well in communities along

reporting projects on immigration and border issues

the border with Haiti. They conducted dozens of

in the U.S. and Mexico.

interviews, shot more than 30 hours of video footage

Cronkite Associate Dean Kristin Gilger and Steve Crane, chief of the school’s Washington bureau,

and took thousands of photographs.

The student journalists were Joshua Armstrong,

copy edited the project. Cronkite technologist Nic

Serena Del Mundo, Michel Duarte, Lauren Gilger,

Lindh built the website, and Cronkite graduates Lisa

Carie Gladding, Joanne Ingram, Bastien Inzaurralde,

Ruhl and Grant Martin served as webmaster and

Brandon Quester, Erin Lough, Tarryn Mento, Nick

fact-checker, respectively.

Newman, Nathan O’Neal, Whitney Phillips, Cristina

“Stateless in the Dominican Republic” was made

Rayas, Lisa Ruhl, Stephanie Snyder and Dustin Volz.

possible by a grant from the Howard G. Buffett

The students worked under the direction of

Foundation, the Illinois-based nonprofit organization

Cronkite faculty members Rick Rodriguez and Jason

founded by the international photojournalist, author

Manning. Rodriguez, former executive editor of the

and philanthropist.

Documentary: Stateless in the Dominican Republic Cronkite students produced a 30-minute documentary about their

experiences

covering

immigration

and

border

issues

in

the Dominican Republic. The documentary can be viewed at cronkite.asu.edu/buffett/dr

A guard checks Haitians attempting to enter at one of the busiest border crossings between the Dominican and neighboring Haiti. Photo by Lauren Gilger

Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication

Table of Contents

‘You are Nobody’ ........................................................1 Thousands find themselves stateless in the Dominican Republic, without a country to call their own.

By Whitney Phillips A Place to Cross..........................................................8 Border markets provide passage for undocumented immigrants two days a week.

By Stephanie Snyder Cheap Labor.............................................................. 14 Despite an official stance against illegal immigration, demand for low-paid Haitian workers has not abated.

By Dustin Volz Fight for Citizenship.................................................24 Dark Skin and “strange” name lead to landmark ruling for those seeking birthright citizenship.

By Joshua Armstrong Newborn and Stateless ...........................................31 Haitian women cross the border to give birth, putting their children in citizenship limbo.

By Lauren Gilger Dying in Childbirth ...................................................39 Haitian women, many already in labor, are taxing an already stressed health care system.

By Tarryn Mento

Educational Roadblock .......................................47 Without proper documentation, thousands of Haitian youngsters find their education blocked after grade school.

By Joanne Ingram

Laws of God and Country .......................................53 Religious groups extending help to poor Haitian immigrants find themselves in opposition to the government.

By Nick Newman Coffee and Clothing .................................................65 Two business ventures are testing new approaches to labor and markets that could diversify the Dominican economy.

By Cristina Rayas The Street Children ..................................................72 Hundreds of children live out their lives on the treacherous streets of the capital city of Santo Domingo.

By Bastien Inzaurralde and Brandon Quester HIV Roulette...............................................................83 Despite one of the highest HIV rates in the world, HIV funding on the island of Hispaniola is in jeopardy.

By Serena Del Mundo Dirty Water.................................................................90 Contaminated water supplies threaten the health of the country’s impoverished residents.

By Bastien Inzaurralde Student Reporters .................................................. 97 Leadership Team ...................................................108

Miledis Juan, a 25-year-old Dominican with a teaching degree, has been unable to find work as a teacher after being denied access to her birth certificate because her parents are Haitian.

1

By Whitney Phillips Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Brandon Quester

Thousands Find Themselves Stateless in the Dominican Republic

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – While

attorney and law professor, puts it another way:

politicians in at least 14 states are arguing the merits

“Here a civil genocide is being committed,” he said.

of birthright citizenship in the U.S., this country is already ruling out citizenship for thousands of

No Future

people.

Miledis Juan looks down at her 1-year-old son

Over the past seven years, the Dominican

Henry, his nose running and eyes swollen from a

government has re-written its Constitution, re-

cold. His arms stretch upward, and Juan picks him

interpreted old laws and passed new ones, effec-

up.

tively eliminating birthright citizenship. Today, a child

She and her son were both born in this country,

born in the Dominican Republic is no longer auto-

and that, Juan says, gives them every right to be

matically a citizen; citizenship goes only to those

Dominican citizens. But the Dominican government

who can prove they have at least one documented

has another view of the matter, and that leaves Juan

parent.

worried about her son’s future and her own.

Further, vigorous enforcement of the new rules means that hundreds of thousands of people, mostly

“He practically doesn’t exist,” she said. “Without documents you are nobody.”

of Haitian descent, are finding it increasingly diffi-

Dominican officials say the country’s laws were

cult to get access to their birth certificates, which

never meant to grant birthright citizenship to the

are required to get married, obtain a high school

children or descendants of illegal immigrants. And

diploma, start a business, get a driver’s license

they argue against the term “stateless” as applied

or passport or even sign up for a phone plan. It is

to those of Haitian descent born in the Dominican

also needed to get a cédula, the national identity

Republic.

card that is essential for voting and conducting a licensed business activity such as banking.

José Ángel Aquino, a magistrate for the country’s civil registry, the Junta Central Electoral, said Haitian

Without proper documentation, these residents

descendants can go back to Haiti and obtain citi-

have no legal status in the Dominican Republic, and

zenship as long as they can prove their parents are

many who have been in this country for years are

Haitian.

unable to prove they are legal citizens of Haiti, either.

“Because of this, in the case of the Haitians, for

They are, in effect, stateless – citizens of no

us, you can’t speak of the ‘stateless,’” Aquino said

country.

Cristobal Rodríguez, a Dominican human rights

in Spanish. “These Haitian citizens always have the possibility of declaring themselves in their 2

Miledis Juan makes dinner in her small two-room home in Batey Esperanza, a mostly Haitian-Dominican community on the outskirts of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

consulate…or simply in Haiti.”

But for many Haitian immigrants, like Juan, the situation is more complex.

Born in December 1985 when laws and attitudes were different, Juan was granted a Dominican birth

purpose and expires in a few months. Juan said that when she went to the civil registry, she was told her she should never have been registered as a Dominican citizen because her parents came without documents from Haiti.

certificate and a national identification card. She has

“Practically, my hands are tied,” she said. “There’s

no papers proving she is from Haiti, and to become

nothing I can do because without that birth certifi-

a naturalized Haitian citizen, she would have to go

cate, I’m paralyzed.”

through a five-year application process, said Liliana

She also needs her birth certificate to get Henry

Gamboa, a project director for the Open Society

one of his own. Without it, he cannot access public

Justice Initiative in Santo Domingo.

health services or attend school past the eighth

Besides, Juan doesn’t want Haitian citizenship;

grade.

she has never lived in the country. “I know that Haiti

“My biggest fear is that he’s in the country without

exists because there is a map that I can see where

documents,” Juan said. “He is nobody in the

it is, but I actually have no connections with it,” she

country.”

said.

Her life is in Batey Esperanza, a poor, mostly

Changing the Ground Rules

Haitian-Dominican community just outside the

Before birthright citizenship was abolished, the

nation’s capital, Santo Domingo, where she works

Dominican Constitution stated that anyone born

long days at an embroidery machine in a free-trade

in the country was a citizen, with the exception of

zone.

children born to people “in transit,” a term generally

Although she went to college to become a teacher,

interpreted to mean those in the country fewer than

she is unable to get a teaching job because she

10 days. The first of the changes passed in 2004

can’t get a new copy of her birth certificate. The

redefined “in transit” to mean those in the country

country’s civil registries retain every citizen’s original

illegally. A year later, the Dominican Supreme Court

birth certificate and issue duplicates upon request.

upheld the 2004 law as constitutional.

Official duplicates are necessary for every legal act,

Six years later, the Dominican government revised

from applying to a university and purchasing prop-

its Constitution to further limit citizenship. Since Jan.

erty to obtaining a marriage license and securing

26, 2010, citizens must prove they have at least one

most jobs. Each duplicate can be used for only one

parent of Dominican nationality to be recognized.

3

At the same time, the Junta Central Electoral, which oversees the civil

Henry Claude Joseph worries

registries, issued an order known as Circular 17, which directs govern-

that his son Henry, 1, will

ment employees not to give duplicates of birth certificates and other

have no citizenship rights

identity documents if they have any reason to believe the person should

in his country of birth.

not have Dominican citizenship.

According to Gamboa, this means the JCE “decides …if you are worthy of your documentation” and has led to the targeting of people with French-sounding last names and dark skin.

That’s what Modesta Michel believes happened to her. Michel applied for her national ID card when she turned 18 in 2007. Cédulas are issued at age 18 and must be renewed every six years or when the government issues a new version.

At first, all went well. She had an approved copy of her birth certificate, and the civil registry office approved her cédula, giving her a receipt that verified the information that would appear on her identification card.

But then she was told that she would not get the official, laminated card after all because her parents immigrated from Haiti, she said.

And shortly after, when she needed a copy of her birth certificate to take the national test for a high school diploma, that, too, was denied, she said.

“Every year goes by, and I sometimes feel like hope is going away, but I have to trust God that eventually this will get solved because studying is the only way that I can actually move forward in life,” Michel said through a translator. “It’s the only option that I have.”

Mounting Challenges Government officials say Circular 17 simply upholds the original intent of the Constitution. People who are in the country illegally were never meant to have Dominican citizenship and some have gotten it only because of errors and corruption on the part of civil registry employees, 4

Residents of Batey Esperanza,

JCE magistrate Aquino said.

a mostly Haitian immigrant

But many advocates for the stateless, including Gamboa, contend that

community on the outskirts

retroactive application of the new law is forbidden by international trea-

of Santo Domingo, walk from

ties to which the Dominican Republic is party, including the American

home to home on a humid

Convention on Human Rights under the Organization of American States.

afternoon. With dirt streets and

The Open Society Justice Initiative and other human rights organiza-

minimal access to basic utili-

tions have begun fighting the changes in court. They won a key victory in

ties, the community seems far

the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2005 with Yean and Bosico

removed from the fast-paced

v. Dominican Republic, which led to the granting of Dominican citizen-

streets of the nearby capital.

ship to two young girls of Haitian descent.

More recently, they’ve taken up the case of Emildo Bueno. Born in the Dominican in 1975, he had several citizenship documents, including a birth certificate and passport. Even so, in 2007 when Bueno went to obtain a copy of his birth certificate for a visa to join his wife in the U.S., he was turned down because his parents were Haitian nationals.

With Rodríguez, the Dominican human rights attorney, representing him, Bueno took his case to a Dominican national court in 2008, claiming a violation of his basic human right to nationality. The case was unsuccessful.

“In spite of all evidence and proof and the fact that legally I was good, the judge took a decision against me,” Bueno said in Spanish.

He submitted an appeal to the Dominican Supreme Court in 2009, but the court has yet to rule. Meanwhile, Francisco Quintana, a deputy program director and litigator for the Center for Justice and International Law, has submitted the case to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

Gamboa said a favorable ruling from the international could draw attention to the problem and pressure the Dominican government into changing its policies.

“At the end of the day, it will be political pressure that will bring the

5

result we expect, which is the recognition of nationality of people of Haitian descent,” she said.

But in the meantime, they have another worry. The Dominican Republic is working on a new national identity card system aimed at eliminating fraudulent citizenship by requiring residents to submit fingerprints and biometric photos that are entered into a national data bank. Aquino said the JCE has received fingerprints and photos from 4 million people so far.

The JCE is “15 years behind” in fully implementing the system, Aquino, said, but is working hard to make up the time. He said the JCE also has presented a proposal to the Dominican government asking for approval to do a full “biometric census” of all foreigners in the country.

Gamboa and other human rights activists fear that these new programs will lead to every person of Haitian descent being classified as illegal.

“The problem is going to be huge,” Gamboa said. “I hope, and maybe

A group of residents from Batey Esperanza start construction on a

I have faith, that it will not happen, that the DR realizes before that that it

Community of Christ Church

cannot commit such a crime.”

to serve the neighborhood.

“I think people without an identity, without a nationality, are really the ones who are most unprotected in the world,” she added. “When no country wants to recognize you as a citizen, then there’s nobody to protect you.”

Though the political situation for Haitian immigrants and their children has been bleak, there may be a glimmer of hope on the horizon. Aquino said that he supports a regularization program for Haitian workers. In late July another JCE magistrate, Eddy Olivares, said in a television interview that the children of Haitian immigrants should be given identity papers — especially those that came to the Dominican Republic under labor agreements with Haiti. He further stated that the Dominican Republic’s immigration agency, not the JCE, has the authority to make decisions on the validity of identity documents and the JCE, therefore, should not 6

Batey Esperanza, near Santo Domingo, is filled with children of Haitian immigrants, many of whom lack citizenship even though they were born in the country.

Juancalo Sabino, 3, (above) and Christina Ceird, 5, are among them.

“At the end of the day, it will be political pressure that will bring the result we expect, which is the recognition of nationality of people of Haitian descent.”

–­ Liliana Gamboa, project director for the Open Society Justice Initiative, Santo Domingo

be invalidating documents because a person’s parents are immigrants.

In the end, however, a major political and legislative shift would have to occur, throughout the Dominican government, to turn the tide against immigrant rights.

Their Future There isn’t much Juan, Michel or Bueno can do while citizenship continues to be redefined in the country of their birth.

Juan goes to work each day at the clothing factory, although she would much rather be teaching.

On the web: Two women share their harrowing tales of how they tried to prove their Dominican citizenship. http://cronkite.asu.edu/ buffett/dr/the_stateless.

7

Bueno made it to the U.S. after finally obtaining his visa. He works at a security company in Florida while his case for Dominican citizenship is being appealed. He has temporary residence in the U.S., but has no official citizenship anywhere.

Bueno spoke for them all when he said, “We have no country now.”

Along with thousands of others, they hope they are not wrong when they call themselves Dominican. ■

By Stephanie Snyder Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Michel Duarte

Border Markets Provide Passage for Undocumented Immigrants

COMENDADOR, Dominican Republic – Haitians

whole.

stream through a low-lying metal gate into the

“It’s the quickest way for us to survive,” said

Dominican Republic, past uniformed and armed

Meran, who estimates that 2,000 people cross into

guards who give them only a casual glance.

the town every market day.

It’s market day, when Haitians don’t have to

But the economic gulf between Haiti and the

present a visa or passport to cross into this capital

Dominican Republic – where the average Dominican

city, one of the Dominican Republican’s poorest,

earns seven times more than the average Haitian –

or into two other Dominican cities, Dajabon and

means that some Haitians who cross the border on

Pedernales.

market days never return. They disappear into the

But there is a catch: Haitians without documenta-

Dominican Republic, squeezing into poor bateyes

tion are not permitted to travel more than about 100

in crowded cities like Santo Domingo or Santiago or

yards into the Dominican Republic, and they are

settling near plantations where they can find work.

expected to return to their country by 6 p.m.

Some come because they have lost their homes

Every Monday and Friday, the border between

and livelihoods in last year’s earthquake; others are

the two countries opens for the simple reason of

escaping cholera outbreaks in Haiti. Virtually all

commerce. Commerce, in fact, links the border

are fleeing poverty. And because they are a cheap

towns of the Dominican Republic and Haiti in much

source of labor, Dominican businesses welcome

the same way that it binds the towns that lie on

them.

either side of the U.S.- Mexico border. People cross to sell goods, and they cross to buy them.

Undocumented Haitian migrants work in agriculture, tourism, construction and other industries,

Comendador is a city that revolves around the

“which now make a lot of money on cheap Haitian

market, and it is a city that would very likely wither

labor,” said Bernardo Vega, a former Dominican

without it, said Cruz Dalis Ramon Meran, super-

ambassador to the U.S. and a prominent econo-

visor of the city’s General Directorate of Migration.

mist.

It provides a major source of income for both

But unlike the U.S., the open borders on market

Dominicans and Haitians and creates jobs not only

days provide easy access into the country. There is

for the border community but for the province as a

no need to hire a coyote or risk a dangerous desert 8

9

Haitians crowd around a vendor to buy rice at a market set up in a dirt lot just a few yards from the border.

Photo by Michel Duarte 10

crossing: A Haitian simply waits for market day, then hopes to avoid teams of Dominican military, police and border security agents that scour the countryside, set up checkpoints and search buses.

Many slip through, according to Adolfo Mercedes Medrano, head of customs at the Comendador border crossing.

“The widespread border facilitates the penetration of Haitians, so it is very difficult for us to control (immigration),” he said.

Border enforcement is made even more difficult because some illegal immigrants pay off military police to avoid being sent back to Haiti, according to a 2010 report by Nuestra Frontera, an organization whose goal it is to create economic opportunities along the border.

Others are legal when they cross into the Dominican Republic, but, as Haitians trade at a

is the case with many illegal immigrants in the U.S., they overstay their

market in the border

visas.

town of Comendador, Dominican Republic.

That’s what Jean Ludovie Louissain did in 1978. Louissain had a sixmonth visa to work in construction and stayed on in Comendador. Like thousands of others, he lives without documentation, working and living

Previous page: Haitians crowd

under the official radar.

around a vendor to buy rice at

When it came time to register his two young daughters for school,

a market set up in a dirt lot just

Louissain was afraid that his last name – distinctly French – would flag

a few yards from the border.

the family as foreigners and the school would refuse to enroll the children. So he registered them under a Dominican surname instead.

While pleased that his daughters are in school, Louissain laments the loss of his family name. He has been in the country for more than 30 years, so why, he asks, can’t he become a Dominican citizen?

Haitians, he said, are no more than “material” for Dominicans to use.

11

The border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti is porous, with people allowed to cross freely on market days.

The Dominican government says it has a difficult time controlling immigration.

New Market Restrictions Security along the border between Haiti and the

Dominicans are especially reluctant to come because of concern about cholera, Meran said.

Dominican Republic was tightened in late 2010 after

Rosita Cabrera, who sells bedding and clothing

a cholera outbreak in Haiti was confirmed in mid-

at the primary market in Comendador, said she

October. By the end of May 2011, 321,000 cases

and other Dominican vendors stay away from the

and 5,300 deaths were recorded, according to the

border market. “The market at the border is narrow,

Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Officials

dirty and dusty,” she said. “If we go there, we’re

in the Dominican Republic, fearing the outbreak

going to get cholera faster.”

would spread to their country, began mass depor-

Cabrera is paying a price for her precaution. Her

tations in the country’s larger cities and temporarily

sales have fallen significantly since the cholera

shut down the bi-national markets in Comendador,

outbreak because the majority of her customers

Dajabon and Pedernales.

were Haitians crossing the border.

When the market re-opened in Comendador in

“Without the Haitians, we are nothing,” she said.

December, it took a different form. The local government set up a temporary market in a compound just

Haitian Vendors

a few feet past the gate between the two countries.

In addition to the economic importance of

Undocumented Haitians now must do their buying

the markets to its businesses, the government

and selling there, rather than traveling a few miles

of Comendador relies on the markets for direct

further into the heart of the city, where the main open

revenue.

air markets are situated.

As a result, fewer people are coming across the border on market days, and business for both Haitian and Dominican vendors is suffering, said Meran, the migration supervisor.

The city auctions off the main market each year to local Dominican businessmen, who then have the right to control it and collect taxes from vendors.

While Dominican vendors are typically taxed 50 to 100 pesos per market day, Haitian vendors are

“The restrictions affect the vendors a lot because

taxed 10 to 20 times that amount, depending on

people used to come from all over Haiti to buy and

the amount of space they use, a practice that was

sell goods,” she said. “Less people are coming now.”

confirmed by several Dominican vendors, although 12

Parishioners wait for a service to begin at Open Arms, a Haitian Protestant church, in Comendador, Dominican Republic.

“The United States has strict security so that all

fearful Haitian vendors declined to comment.

On a day in March, when Haitian vendors, who

Mexicans that want to come to the United States

are predominately women, were unable to pay the

– without documentation or without permission –

tax, a group of Dominicans working for the market

can’t cross,” Medrano said. “In a way, that’s the

owner, led by “el cobrador,” or the collector, confis-

same as what we have here in the Dominican

cated their merchandise and stuffed the items into

Republic.”

And whenever there are great disparities in

sacks.

Cabrera said few speak up about the inequitable system or the way Haitians are treated.

“If I speak the truth, I am hated. This is what

income, as there are between the U.S. and Mexico and between the Dominican Republic and Haiti, people will keep trying to cross, he said.

Medrano said his country can no more support

happens here in this town,” she said. “If you talk about what’s happening, they hate you for your

unlimited immigration than can the U.S. “If the door is opened, everyone will want to

entire life.”

Medrano, the head of customs, along with

come here,” he said.

But Rosario Espinal, a Dominican sociologist at

Comendador Assistant Governor Abraham Nova, denied that there are problems.

Temple University in Philadelphia, said that simply

“Here in (Comendador), if you go through the

trying to keep people out ignores the complexity

street, there are more Haitians than Dominicans –

of the situation. The border is too porous, the two

no one is offended and no one is trampled on and

countries are too economically intertwined and

no one is mistreated,” Medrano said. “There may

there are already too many Haitians living in the

be particular cases, but in broad terms, there is no

Dominican Republic for that to work, she said.

“What you have is an immense population of

Dominican mistreatment of Haitians.”

poor people who happen to be immigrants who Border Policy

don’t have rights, and the (Dominican) system itself

The problems the Dominican Republic faces in

is unwilling legally and unable socially to integrate

trying to control illegal immigration are not unlike

them,” Espinal said. “This is a formula for disaster.”

those in the U.S., Medrano said.

■

13

By Dustin Volz Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Illegal Haitian Workers in Demand

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – Carlo

near Port-au-Prince. Government officials have

Collin knows his story is a familiar one. In 2005

estimated that the number of Haitians living in

when he was just 15, he emigrated from Haiti to the

the Dominican Republic increased by 15 percent

Dominican Republic to find a job and a better life.

following the earthquake and they now account for

Today, Collin works six days a week in construction for what he calls an unlivable wage in an

more than a tenth of the nation’s 10 million inhabitants.

industry that employs primarily Haitians, many

Although there is a long history of strained rela-

of whom, like him, are in this country illegally.

tions between the two countries that share the

Because his passport has expired and his dark

island of Hispaniola, the Dominican Republic was

skin identifies him as Haitian, Collin lives in fear of

the first country to provide Haiti with humanitarian

being caught and deported.

aid and to help with rescue efforts after the disaster.

He said he’s been detained seven times by

U.S. President Barack Obama praised Dominican

Dominican soldiers while crossing the porous

President Leonel Fernandez during a White House

Haiti-Dominican Republic border. He has paid

visit last July, saying the Dominican Republic’s

bribes as high as 500 pesos – about $13 – to mili-

response “saved lives, and it continues as we look

tary guards at immigration checkpoints on the road

at how we can reconstruct and rebuild in Haiti in a

to Santo Domingo in order to be allowed back into

way that is good not only for the people of Haiti but

the country.

also good for the region as a whole.”

“When you see (the military guards) your heart is

But while demand for cheap labor keeps many

scared,” he said. “If you don’t have money they will

Haitians employed in the Dominican Republic,

call immigration and send you back to Haiti.”

increased immigration is placing unbearable

Collin stays in the Dominican Republic so he can

strains on a country struggling to provide health

send money home to his family. Finding a job in

care, education and social services to its own resi-

Haiti these days, he said, is almost impossible.

dents.

In fact, more Haitian immigrants than ever have

Earlier this year, a cholera outbreak in Haiti trig-

crossed into the country looking for work and

gered an aggressive resumption of immigration

refuge since last year’s devastating earthquake

raids and deportations of immigrants following 14

15

Opposite page: Many Haitian workers are employed building a metro subway system in Santo

Domingo.

Photo

by

Lindsay Erin Lough

a one-year moratorium after the earthquake.

undocumented Haitians who have just crossed or

Government officials reported nearly 7,000 Haitians

those who have lived and worked all their lives in

were deported through mid-March. In May, new

the Dominican Republic.

outbreaks of the cholera threatened to exacerbate the issue.

“Deportations are being used as a blunt instrument to regulate migration when it is by no means

To some extent, “compassion fatigue” has set

clear that the people being deported are those

in as more and more Haitians have entered the

people who recently entered the country,” said

country in the year following the earthquake.

Dominican-based author and migration researcher

Dominican immigration director Sigfrido Pared

Bridget Wooding.

rebuked requests from human rights groups such

Wooding said that amid tough rhetoric, there is

as Amnesty International to halt deportations

“an open secret” that exists within the Dominican

because conditions in the poorest country in the

government and among the Dominican people

western hemisphere are still so bleak.

regarding migrant labor. They understand that key

Dominican officials are well aware of the lack of

industries – construction, agriculture and tourism,

improvement in Haiti but insist there’s only so much

for example – rely heavily on cheap Haitian labor.

support they can provide their island neighbor.

As a result, government officials straddle the fence

“The solution for Haiti is not that they immigrate to

between appeasing ultranationalists who call for a

the Dominican Republic, just as the solution for the

stricter border policy and satisfying business and

Dominican Republic is not that we immigrate to the

economic interests deeply invested in maintaining

United States,” said Jose Angel Aquino, magistrate

the status quo.

of the Junta Central Electoral, the country’s central

“There’s always been complicity on both sides

electoral board responsible for issuing legal docu-

in terms of how people can cross,” Wooding said.

ments to citizens. “The solution is that here and

“The informality of crossing comes to be seen as

there we build more democracy, more institutions,

completely normalized. It’s part of the culture.”

more development for our people.”

Bernardo Vega, a prominent Dominican econo-

Human rights groups are especially incensed that

mist and historian who served as the country’s

immigration police make no distinction between

ambassador to the U.S. from 1997 to 1999, agreed 16

Ricardo Yand has work building an apartment complex in downtown Santo Domingo. Photo by Lindsay Erin Lough

that the complicity is rooted in economic interests.

serious tensions in communities where there are

“We don’t want them, but we need them,” Vega

many Haitians settled,” Espinal said this spring. “It

said. “The politicians say we don’t want them. But

was a different story decades ago when Haitians

the economy needs them. And there are no jobs

were mostly located in sugar fields and for most

in Haiti. There’s a great difference between the

Dominicans, they were non-existent.”

political discourse and what the law says and what

A comprehensive survey conducted a month after the earthquake found that a little more than 48

happens in practice.”

Vega

percent of Dominicans thought children of Haitians

believes that Dominicans are relying on Haitian

born in the Dominican Republic should be allowed

labor more than ever. Until about 30 years ago,

citizenship rights. Only about 42 percent were in

most Dominicans were rarely exposed to Haitians

favor of the government providing work permits to

because they largely lived in desperately poor

undocumented Haitians.

Despite

the

immigration

crackdown,

rural shantytowns called bateyes, located outside

Those numbers are slightly higher than what

the cities close to the sugar cane fields where they

was gleaned from similar surveys conducted in

worked.

2008 and 2006, but Espinal, who co-authored the

As the country has become more urbanized

most recent report, said the bump was likely due

and the economy more diversified, Haitians have

to post-earthquake sympathy expressed by many

moved to the cities, finding jobs in construction, the

Dominican citizens.

tourism industry and other labor-intensive fields.

Vega, the former ambassador, agreed. For as

Only 20 percent of Haitian migrants now work in

long as the Dominican Republic has been allowing

the sugar fields, Vega said.

Haitians to cross the border, Vega said, the country

Rosario Espinal, a Dominican sociologist at

has been expelling them back where they came

Temple University, believes this urban migration

from – but not fast enough to keep up with the

– compounded by the influx of immigrants after

in-migration.

the earthquake – has led to increased animosity between the two groups.

“In the past couple of months, there have been 17

“There’s never been a moment where we’ve had a net outflow of Haitians,” Vega said. “The few that get deported are much less than the numbers who

come back.”

Haitian

construction

worker

The Dominican labor code mandates that 80 percent of laborers

Carlo Collin, 21, who first

for any company must be Dominican citizens, but the law is loosely

emigrated to the Dominican

applied in practice, acknowledged JCE magistrate Aquino. The other

Republic when he was 15,

20 percent are supposed to be legal residents from other countries,

works at a construction site in

but in construction the numbers are often reversed: 80 percent to

Santo Domingo. Collin earns

90 percent of construction workers in big cities are Haitian, legal or

about $17 U.S. dollars a week.

otherwise, while Dominican nationals make up the remaining fraction,

Photos by Stephanie Snyder

according to Vega.

The reliance on a Haitian workforce is pervasive in a number of industries, but in construction, it is openly visible and accepted. In fact, the Dominican government itself increasingly employs Haitian laborers.

“All public works construction uses Haitian labor, so the government is a big employer of Haitian labor,” Vega said.

A glaring example is the workforce on the construction of a metro subway system in Santo Domingo, a prime project of President Fernandez’s administration. The underground construction sites are mostly staffed by Haitians, leaving the government with a contradictory message about its immigration policy.

Chiero Ferristal is a subway construction worker from Haiti. He crossed the border after the 2010 earthquake but said he had trouble finding work even with a passport. Eventually, Ferristal got a job working on the subway for 350 pesos – almost $10 – a week. He has been unable

In the Dominican Republic’s

to acquire a cedula – a national identity card required of legal residents

largest cities, up to 90 percent

over 18 – and because of that he has no right to health insurance.

of construction workers are

Ferristal and his co-workers, some of them Dominican, toil away in dust-filled underground sites, working without breathing masks

Haitian or of Haitian descent.

Photo by Lindsay Erin Lough 18

19

Ricardo Yand, left, and Jacinto Mnoves Pona are at work on a construction project in downtown Santo Domingo.

Photo by Lindsay Erin Lough 20

to build the subway’s second line. Ferristal and

According to former ambassador Vega, illegal

other workers said Dominican and Haitians work

Haitian labor in the Dominican Republic pulls down

together as if they were brothers.

wages, which contributes to a wide disparity of

That is unsurprising to former transportation

income in the country. Additionally, a reliance on

minister and economist Hamlet Hermann who

cheap labor stunts advancements in technology

believes the use of cheap Haitian labor is not a

because businesses have no need to invest when

matter of racial exploitation but of economic inter-

the human resources available are so affordable,

ests.

he said.

“Haitians and Dominicans, they deal one with the

Carlo Collin, the construction worker, is a prime

other and so we are friends,” Hermann said. “But

example. He earns 600 pesos a week or about

the interests – I mean, military, politicians, busi-

$17 in the U.S. And that’s double what most of

nesspeople – they are the ones that violate all the

his co-workers earn: Because he has six years of

laws to force the (open) migration.”

experience, he is considered more skilled by his

Hermann used to work in the government during

supervisors and helps manage other laborers.

Fernandez’s first presidential term from 1996 to

“If you’re Haitian, you don’t have any value in

2000 but has since become an outspoken critic

this land,” Collin, now 21, said in his native Creole

of several governmental policies, including the

language during a break from renovating an old

subway project, which Hermann says has cost

government building in Santo Domingo. He wipes

$1.5 billion thus far. Hermann points to what he

sweat from his brow as he peeks out from under a

calls a double standard with regard to immigration

purple President “Leonel” baseball cap. His dark

and Haitian labor policy.

eyes appear distant.

“In the building he lives in, the janitors are Haitian,” Hermann said of the president.

Collin says he wants to go back to Haiti because his family is there and he is treated better, but he

The subway’s technicians are Europeans or

can’t because there are no jobs, especially after

Dominicans, Hermann said, but the hard, manual

the earthquake. It’s precisely this sort of despera-

labor is done almost entirely by Haitians because

tion that many Dominican employers rely on.

they come so cheap.

21

“If we had a good president in our country who

“The most dangerous (thing we can do) is to leave Haiti to the will of God. We share the same rivers, the same everything. If Haiti is allowed to be lost to violence, drugs, to the lack of natural resources, this will come back to the Dominican Republic.” ­– Jose Angel Aquino, magistrate, Junta Central Electoral, Dominican Republic

was helping us, we would never come here to be

are hired for construction work because they have

mistreated, to be looked at like animals, to not be

no rights and are therefore cheaper. Most of the

cared for,” he declared.

Haitian workers don’t have proper citizenship or

Collin has a family to support back in Haiti, but

residency papers, Mejia said, so he sometimes will

no wife or children. He said he is afraid to start

hide his workers when immigration police raid his

a family in the Dominican Republic because his

construction sites.

salary wouldn’t be enough to support them unless

Mejia and others like him perpetuate the open

they moved back to Haiti, where 600 pesos a week

secret Wooding speaks of by employing Haitians

can carry a family a lot farther.

like Collin who, desperate to support his family,

“In Haiti, if you have 100 pesos you will eat,” said

have nowhere else to turn.

Collin, adding that what most of his co-workers

For his part, Collin says he wants to return home

make – 300 pesos a week – is not enough to

to Haiti some day, but until the country recovers

survive on in the Dominican Republic.

from one of the worst natural disasters in human

Like thousands of other Haitians working in

history, he will stay and work in Santo Domingo.

the Dominican Republic, Collin sends what little

The hardships that come with being stateless,

money he can spare to his family in Haiti. As his

a phenomenon caused in part by the flood of

countrymen struggle to overcome the earthquake

illegal migrant labor into the Dominican Republic,

devastation that brought what was already the

is something Collin says he has seen too many

poorest country in the western hemisphere to its

times to count. Children of undocumented Haitians

knees, Collin works a job he doesn’t particularly

born in the Dominican are deported back to Haiti,

like in a country he doesn’t call his own for a wage

where they don’t speak the language, don’t know

he can barely survive on.

anyone and don’t know how to survive in a country

“The little money I make, it is money to eat only,” Collin said. “You’re obliged to take the money to send it back to family in Haiti.”

destroyed by natural disaster, he said.

The swinging-door migration policy employed by the Dominican government may not be keeping

William Mejia, one of Collin’s Dominican supervi-

Haitians out, but the high volume entering has put

sors on the renovation project, said Haitian migrants

strains on a country ill-equipped to handle many 22

of its own issues. The only solution, said Vega, is for the international community to keep the promises it made following the 2010 earthquake and support the rebuilding of an entire country. Money has been pledged, Vega said, but not dispersed due to a variety of political and economic concerns.

“It’s so easy to start building houses and yet very few houses have been built,” Vega said. “And if there was a huge project to build thouMany

Haitian

Jesus

Alberto,

workers,

like

sand of houses in Haiti, some of the Haitians that are here would go

above,

are

back to work there.”

employed building a subway

That’s something JCE magistrate Aquino agrees with. Problems in

in Santo Domingo. Photos by

Haiti spill over to the Dominican Republic, concedes Aquino, as the

Lindsay Erin Lough

two countries are linked by history, geography and economic dependence.

“The most dangerous (thing we can do) is to leave Haiti to the will of God,” Aquino said. “We share the same rivers, the same everything.

If Haiti is allowed to be lost to violence, drugs, to the lack of natural resources, this will come back to the Dominican Republic.”

Until the country is rebuilt, Haitians will keep crossing the border to find work in the Dominican Republic, where, devoid of other options, they will continue going through the motions of being deported and paying bribes to come back again. Why? Because anything is better than Haiti, said Temple University’s Espinal.

“There’s nothing in Haiti,” she insisted. “Nothing. There’s no agriculture; there’s no industry. There’s absolutely nothing.”

For migrants like Collin, Haiti is unable to offer even hope. ■

23

By Joshua Armstrong Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Brandon Quester

Dark Skin and ‘Strange’ Name Lead to Landmark Ruling

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – For eight years, Violeta Bosico fought for her name and a permanent place in this country.

alist extremists.

Bosico, now 26, clenches her fist as she talks softly about the judgment. “This was not just about

But she still doesn’t like people to know who she is.

me,” she said through an interpreter. “This was

Bosico was one of two girls at the center of an

important to a lot of people.”

international court case hailed as a landmark for

Six years after the ruling, the Dominican govern-

stateless people – those not recognized as citizens

ment has paid $22,000 in damages: $8,000 to

of any country. After eight years of legal battles,

each girl and $6,000 for their legal fees. It arranged

the Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruled

a publication of the facts of the case in a national

in 2005 that Bosico and Dilcia Yean, both born in

newspaper. And it gave Yean and Bosico citizen-

the Dominican Republic of Haitian ancestry, were

ship.

unfairly denied citizenship.

But the government has not taken the more far-

But in the Dominican Republic, which shares a

reaching steps that might help remedy the problem

border with Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western

of statelessness in this Caribbean country of nearly

Hemisphere, any threat to the nation’s ability to

10 million. The judgment requires a public apology,

police immigration – real or perceived – raises

which has not been issued, and broadly calls for

passions among its citizens.

reform in Dominican citizenship laws that would

“There was a point where the case and the topic

prevent a person from becoming stateless.

became very contentious in the country,” said Sonia

Jose Angel Aquino, a top official in the Junta

Pierre, founder of the Movement of Dominican-

Central Electoral, which issues domestic identi-

Haitian Women, which helped Bosico and Yean,

fication documents, said the human rights court

“especially because there was this whole myth

misconstrued Dominican laws when it ruled that the

created around the case that it was meant to do

girls’ proof of birth in the country should have been

damage to the Dominican Republic.”

enough to prove their citizenship. He said Yean and

So neither Bosico nor Yean has ever been publicly

Bosico should have been granted birth certificates

photographed. They remain highly guarded to

not because they were born in the country but

protect themselves from being targeted by nation-

because their mothers have Dominican citizenship.

24

Violeta Bosico does not want

This is a major rift between the Dominican government and the court.

her face shown in photographs

“Clearly, there is a decision of the court that we do not agree with and it

because she fears retaliation

is not in agreement with our legal and constitutional disposition,” Aquino

from those who opposed her

said in Spanish. “And that is that the court says that the situation of the

fight against the Dominican

parents cannot affect the children.”

government. Her case drew

International human-rights advocates favor birthright citizenship,

worldwide attention when an

which guarantees rights to children of immigrants, no matter their legal

international court ruled that the

status. And for decades, the Dominican Constitution was interpreted to

Dominican government violated

guarantee citizenship to those born on Dominican soil. But as Haitian

basic human rights laws when

immigration increased, the Dominican government began to move away

it denied her a birth certificate.

from that interpretation and, in some cases, sought to retroactively deny citizenship rights to Dominicans of Haitian descent. This touched off a number of legal battles, including Yean and Bosico’s.

Limited Impact The court ruling in their case, while a victory, appears to have had limited impact. Indeed, an estimated 90 percent of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights’ rulings has not been enforced, raising questions about the effectiveness of the court and its parent, the Organization of American States.

Above and opposite page:

The Inter-American Court is the top level of the OAS’s human-rights

Bosico’s case files cover an

system. Based in San Jose, Costa Rica, it has an annual budget of

eight-year court battle.

slightly more than $3 million – half from the OAS, the rest donated by governments and organizations. Human-rights advocates see it as a court of last resort without definitive remedial powers.

“In this system, we’re talking about the worst of the worst cases being handed to a court that has no army, that has no coercive possibility of

25

enforcing its decisions,” said Roxanna Altholz, asso-

because the decisions of the system only apply to

ciate director of the International Human Rights Law

countries that have accepted the jurisdiction of the

Clinic at the University of California, Berkeley, and

court.”

Yean and Bosico’s lead attorney. “It is frequently questioned by states.”

The court also faces a rising caseload while relying on unpaid judges and a donor-dependent budget.

At the top level of the OAS, the Washington-based

From the court’s founding in 1979 until 2002, a total

General Assembly, a single ruling rarely spurs major

of 49 cases were submitted. From 2003 to 2010,

dialogue. The Dominican Republic’s OAS ambas-

the court received 102 cases. Sixteen alone were

sador at the time of the Bosico-Yean ruling, Roberto

submitted in 2010, the most ever in a single year.

Alvarez, said it had no effect on his diplomatic business in the organization.

Despite those troubles, Altholz and others involved in the Dominican case say the court’s judgments are

But the Inter-American court and its sister

important tools in fighting human rights problems. In

commission have a large influence on governments,

most cases, it takes many rulings and incidents for

he said, and the court’s influence could be dramati-

an issue to spur public and international attention

cally increased if all OAS members agree to its juris-

and action.

diction.

The U.S., Canada and most of the Englishspeaking Caribbean countries have not ratified the

“If you look at it as a snapshot, it’s quite a depressing picture, but the arc of justice is long,” Altholz said.

Inter-American Convention on Human Rights, which

Francisco Quintana, a deputy program director

would put them under the court’s jurisdiction. When

and litigator for the Center for Justice and

the court was created in 1979, President Jimmy

International Law, said the Bosico-Yean judgment

Carter signed the pact, but the Senate has never

“is really important because it’s the starting point,

ratified it.

the stick that we use to measure the application of

“You have a gulf that exists between the Latin

the law.”

American countries and the common-world coun-

People who are not recognized as citizens of any

tries that do not have a stake in the system,” Alvarez

country are, in effect, stateless, lacking the basic

said. “That gulf is becoming wider over the years

rights and recognition that governments guarantee.

26

By Joshua Armstrong Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – Adorfo

Adorfo or Adolfo?

One Letter Makes a Difference

Vasquez was exhausted as he sat outside the civil

In the Dominican Republic, a birth

One letter, one L, had taken two weeks to change.

certificate is needed for everything from a marriage license to a phone plan.

registry in the National District of this capital city.

In 2007, the government issued Vasquez a birth certificate and ID card with the first name Adolfo.

The slip-up didn’t bother him until recently, when he

In a legal sense, they do not exist. This is especially

Rincon Miesse, a lawyer.

true in the Dominican Republic, where a certified

What happened next depends on whose testi-

birth certificate is required to go to universities, get

mony is correct. Thelma Bienvienidas Reyes, the

jobs or marry.

registrar, said Miesse never gave her identification documents for the girls’ parents. Miesse said he did

A Proud Citizen

and that Reyes commented on the girls’ “strange”

Bosico was once stateless, but now she has her

and “Africanized” names.

name on a Dominican birth certificate and is proud of that name – Haitian roots and all.

The case first went to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights – another arm of

“When I was young, I would always wonder, ‘Oh,

the OAS human-rights system – which oversaw the

my God, how am I going to say my last name in

Dominican Republic until the country came under

public?’ because I know that I’m going to be made

the Inter-American Court’s jurisdiction in 1999.

fun of or pointed at,” she said through a translator.

At the center of this effort on the girls’ behalf were

“But then one day I said, ‘No, this is my last name.

Pierre and her Movement of Dominican-Haitian

I can call myself what I want. It’s mine and it’s what

Women, known by its Spanish acronym MUDHA.

I’m going to say everywhere I am.’”

From the time of her rejection, Bosico was a regular

Today, Bosico attends a university in this capital

in MUDHA’s drafty office about a half-mile north

city, spending several hours on public transporta-

of the Caribbean Sea, and she made friends with

tion to and from her home in Batey Palive, where

many of its staff.

she lives with her mother, Tiramen.

“They were very patient and they explained to me

Bosico’s eyes are alert, and she wears a shy smile

step-by-step what was happening,” said Bosico,

that can grow surprisingly wide. She also is very

who was 11 when the case started. “They also

dark-skinned, and that may have been a problem

explained to me – and I was able to understand –

on March 5, 1997, when she and an infant named

that this was not just about me, and there were a lot

Dilcia were sent away from a civil registry without

of people like me and that this was important to a lot

birth certificates. They had been rejected before,

of people.”

but this time they were accompanied by Genardo 27

When MUDHA committed the two girls’ names to

applied to buy a house and was denied because of

banking. Cedulas are issued at age 18 and must be

the mistake.

renewed every six years or when the government

In the Dominican Republic, a birth certificate is

issues a new version.

required nearly every time a person deals with the

The agency responsible for distributing birth

government. A birth certificate is needed to get

certificates and overseeing citizenship issues is the

married, attend school, start a business, get a driv-

Junta Central Electoral, which operates a series of

er’s license or passport, sign up for a phone plan

civil registries around the country.

and much more.

Human-right groups such as the Open Society

It is also needed to get a “cedula,” the national

Justice Initiative and a Jesuit-led group called the

identity card that is essential for voting and

Social Action and Agrarian Center have accused

conducting a licensed business activity such as

the civil registries of denying birth certificates and

court documents, it tried the girls’ names and their

by herself, so I fear for her life.”

connection to the case as quiet as possible. The girls and their parents were shielded from being

Tougher Citizenship Laws

photographed by media and international organiza-

Less than a year after the September 2005 judg-

tions.

ment in the girls’ case, the Dominican Supreme

Pierre said she feared retaliation from Dominicans

Court upheld a revision to citizenship laws that

who oppose birthright citizenship. Even a sugges-

classified illegal immigrants in the same manner

tion of violence could keep people from speaking

as foreign diplomats and tourists – as people “in

out in the future, she said.

transit.”

The ages of the two girls presented unique chal-

In 2010, the country’s constitution was amended

lenges. Yean, just a toddler when the case was

to define citizenship by parental status: If one parent

accepted by the court, was especially vulnerable,

is Dominican, the child is Dominican. But if a child

and not just physically. At one point, Pierre said,

is born in the Dominican Republic to parents who

Yean told a psychologist that she felt different from

are not citizens, the child no longer has citizenship

the other children and didn’t want to have Haitian

rights.

roots any longer.

The Dominican government is working with

Bosico, meanwhile, was maturing rapidly and

some longtime immigrants to gain legal residence,

running out of ways to get an education. At 14, she

Aquino, the JCE magistrate, said. He was careful

had to attend night school with adults for a year until

to note, however, that not every undocumented

she received her birth certificate, which allowed her

person will qualify – only those who were registered

to return to school in the daytime with students her

legally in the eyes of the government.

own age.

“We are proposing that these people in this

Bosico said she no longer fears an attack, but

circumstance regularize their birth certificates so

she still does not want to be photographed. Her

that they can have full rights and, in spite of these

mother is more worried.

irregularities, they can access the benefits of

“She walks around on her own,” Tiramen said through a translator. “She goes to school, usually

Dominican law without limitation,” he said.

David Baluarte, a former legal counsel for Yean 28

identity cards to people of Haitian descent because

you can’t necessarily control. You can have a deter-

of their darker skin and French Creole-based

mined policy and an employee can depart from it.”

Hortensia Guzman, personnel director of the

names.

Jose Angel Aquino, one of five magistrates who

civil registry in the National District, denied that

determine JCE policy, said there have been cases

her office discriminates. Yet she said through a

of discrimination, but it is not institutionalized and

translator that a JCE agent could place someone

there are training programs that aim to prevent it.

under investigation for falsifying documents if the

“We have sanctioned employees, and we have

agent had a general feeling that the person wasn’t

given the corresponding apology to the people

Dominican: If a blond, Caucasian woman with

affected,” he said in Spanish. “It can happen. …

a U.S. accent were to present Dominican docu-

Racism and, in this case, elitism are feelings that

ments, Guzman said, that woman would likely be

and Bosico, said such programs address part of

large, unless you have cases that point to a pattern

the problem. But “I think there needs to be a lot

in a particular country, it’s highly unusual that you

of attention and focus on that and support for the

would have an immediate impact on the political

Dominican Republic to ultimately do the right thing,”

organs.”

And if judgments have broad remedies, like the

he said.

Some Dominican officials have begun to focus

legal reforms ordered in Yean’s and Bosico’s case,

on the problem. In late July, JCE magistrate Eddy

they can provide a framework for a country to solve

Olivares said in a television interview that the chil-

its problems when the time comes, said Thomas

dren of Haitian immigrants should be given identity

Antkowiak, a former senior attorney in the Inter-

papers — pointing out that many of them came to

American system.

the country through labor treaties with Haiti. Olivares

“Many studies have shown that what victims want

also said that the Dominican immigration agency,

most is justice and recognition from the state, and

not the JCE is should be take the lead in deciding

these remedies – like apologies, recognition of

whether someone is in the country illegally.

responsibility, publishing the judgment, rehabilita-

Meanwhile, Dominican

citizenship Republic

are

cases

against

mounting

in

the Inter-

tion – they go more directly to those needs,” he said.

American human rights bodies. The commission

But even without recognition from the govern-

has declared three cases against the Dominican

ment, judgments can have long-lasting effects,

Republic admissible and applied for one of them to

such as the $8,000 paid to Bosico. With that money,

be heard by the court.

Bosico has become a university student. Now, she

If the court continues to rule against the Dominican Republic, the country’s problems are more likely to be recognized at the top level of the OAS, said Alvarez, the former Dominican ambassador.

“One case by itself does not have that impact unless there are specific conditions in the case that have far-reaching implications,” he said. “By and 29

hopes her story will inspire others without citizenship to persevere.

“I do believe that the more people hear about it … that maybe can help,” she said. ■

placed under investigation and her papers would

multiple sets of requirements for a late birth certifi-

be confiscated.

cate application. Recently, Ramon Tibo, who has

An investigation typically takes a few hours but

filed a suit against the government, had his birth

can sometimes last overnight, Guzman said. She

certificate revoked in a Santo Domingo civil registry

said she has never seen an investigation last more

yet easily received another in the country’s second

than 10 days, although plaintiffs in cases against

largest city, Santiago.

the Dominican Republic have claimed they were under investigation for years.

Charges of inconsistency also have plagued the JCE. When collecting evidence a decade ago,

“We have 300 offices, and it could be that at some time in a particular office there is different treatment,” Aquino said, “but in general the policies are implemented the same way.” ■

the Inter-American Court on Human Rights found

30

The Jimani public hospital near the border of Haiti and the Dominican Republic is flooded with Haitian women who come to give birth.

31

By Lauren Gilger Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Lauren Gilger

Haitian Women Cross Border to Give Birth

JIMANI, Dominican Republic – A doctor sits on

hospitals and health care in Haiti, especially after

the porch of her clinic, the only one in Jimani, the

last year’s earthquake. They come to have their

Dominican city that serves as the busiest border

babies in hospital beds instead of on the floors of

crossing between Haiti and its neighbor.

their homes.

Just beyond the quiet porch, everything is chaos:

But many come too late. In the Dominican

dust, smoke, heat and the angry roar of motorbikes.

Republic, 17 of every 1,000 newborns died in 2009,

Suddenly, one of the bikes kicks up dirt and heads

according to the latest numbers available from

directly for the clinic. It is driven by a teenage boy

UNICEF. And the lifetime risk of maternal death is

in shorts and on the back sits a woman wearing

one in 320.

spandex pants, a pink scarf tied around her head.

Still, those odds are much better than what women

The woman struggles to get off the bike.

face if they stay in Haiti, where 27 of every 1,000

“I’m bleeding,” she tells Dr. Camila Perozo.

newborns died in 2009 and the odds of a woman

The woman, three months pregnant, has just

dying giving birth is one in 93.

crossed the border from Haiti to see the Dominican

So the women cross the border. Their children

doctor. She has no immigration papers or money to

may have a better chance of survival, but they also

pay a fee. The same is true for thousands of preg-

end up in a legal no man’s land they may never

nant Haitian women, many of them ready to give

escape.

birth, who cross the border each year.

In Arizona, these children might be called “anchor

Haitian women make up a large portion of the

babies.” They might be born on U.S. soil to immi-

patients giving birth in Dominican hospitals. In the

grants from Mexico or Guatemala who illegally

capital of Port-au-Prince, hospitals estimate that up

came to this country. They might become the center

to 35 percent of the patients in their maternity wards

of the emotional debate about immigration and the

are Haitian. On the border, the numbers are higher

U.S. Constitution that’s being waged in 14 states, in

still. One hospital director estimated that three out

the halls of Congress and on the streets of Phoenix.

of four of his patients are Haitian women who come

But the children will be U.S. citizens.

there to give birth.

In the Dominican Republic, these children have no

They come because they don’t have access to

“anchor.”

32

Poor women from both Haiti and the Dominican Republic seek health care at Centro Clinico Diagnostico in Jimani, Dominican Republic.

In a series of changes to its Constitution over the past decade, the Dominican government has done what some powerful conservative politicians are attempting in Arizona and around the country – revoke birthright citizenship. A child born to illegal immigrants in the Dominican Republic is no longer a citizen of that country. At the same time, without registration in their parents’ home country, they are not citizens there Ludia Baptiste, 25, left Haiti after she lost everything in the devastating 2010 earthquake.

either. They are stateless.

But that doesn’t stop a pregnant Haitian woman from getting on the back of a motorbike and making the dusty crossing into the Dominican Republic. She knows the doctors there won’t turn her away: Although the Dominican Republic is a relatively poor country, it treats everyone needing medical assistance regardless of immigration status.

As a result, these women are overwhelming an already stressed Dominican health care system.

“We are poor,” said Jose Delancer, director of the Ministry of Health with the Department of Women and Children. From money to beds to doctors and nurses, “the Dominican Republic was not set up to handle this.”

On the web: Many Haitian women who cross the border to give birth in the Dominican

Still, Delancer understands why they come – and why they will keep coming.

“If I were Haitian,” he said. “I would do the same thing as them.”

hospitals don’t realize that their children may end up

Refugee from an Earthquake

without citizenship rights.

“Life in Haiti is hard,” said Ludia Baptiste. She sits upright on the side of her bed in a one-room shanty in Bateye San Isidro, a tight-knit, impov-

http://cronkite.asu.edu/ buffett/dr/giving_birth_full.

33

erished Haitian community outside of Santo Domingo.

The walls of her room are covered in newspaper and magazine clip-

pings written in English; American celebrities smile out from the pages.

A

Nothing is out of place: A small Bible sits on her pillow and a sheet

Dominican

serves as a curtain separating the kitchen from her bed.

Jimani, one of the busiest

Baptiste came to the Dominican Republic along with thousands of

woman

walks

into

Republic

the near

border crossings between the

other refugees after the earthquake in early 2010 left Haiti – already the

Dominican

poorest country in the Western hemisphere – devastated.

Haiti.

and

neighboring

“The house in Haiti collapsed,” she said in broken French. “The people who live in Haiti have a hard life. The house collapsed. And the food – everything people had in Haiti – they have no food anymore.”

The hospitals are gone, too, she says, which is why she crossed the border. Five months pregnant with no father in sight, she is waiting for her baby to be born. Then she will return home.

“I want to go back to Haiti because my family is there,” she said, nodding and adding an emphatic “Uh huh.”

Here, she lives alone in this small, tidy room. She cannot work because she has no papers, and hunger has followed her across the border.

Still, Baptiste smiles widely and laughs as she looks at the sonogram she’s just pulled out of her purse. She has been to Centro Materno Infantil San Lorenzo de Los Mina hospital five times since she found she was pregnant. “Each month,” she said with pride.

“You get free vitamins here, and you get free consultations here. You get a lot of things for free, which is better than in Haiti.”

This will be her first child and she laughs at the suggestion that she might have another in the future. But if that happens, she will come back to this country to give birth – if she can. “If I have papers,” she said.

But this child, she’s not worried about. “The baby will be Dominican,” she said.

34

New and expectant mothers wait to be seen at Los Mina Hospital in Santo Domingo.

35

Opposite page: Luiz Mena, 34, recovers from giving birth at Hospital General Melenciano in Jimani.

“Your baby will be Dominican?”

zied pace. And then there are the women who walk

“Yes.” She nods her head and frowns. “Uh huh.”

to the dusty border crossing and pay a man with a

Here’s the truth:

motorbike to drive them into the Dominican Republic

Children born to illegal parents in the Dominican

when their babies are about to come.

Republic are not citizens of that country.

They arrive in the throes of labor and with a myriad

Nor are they citizens of Haiti.

of other health problems: malnourishment, anemia,

They are stateless.

septicemia and poverty. Few have had any prenatal care.

A Place for Women

“Here we call them ‘time bombs,’” said Francis

“I picked this area because it is too poor.”

Moquete, director of Hospital General Melenciano,

Camila Perozo’s voice is drowned out by a motor-

Jimani’s public hospital. He’s watched for years as

bike that is circling her clinic for the third or fourth

countless Haitian women come to the hospital and

time, the engine screaming.

leave with newborns.

Perozo worked for four years as a doctor in Haiti

“They come here; this is where they want to come.

before she and her husband spent their life savings

One wants to go where there is better service,” he

building a clinic on a dirt road one block from the

said. “This is how it is.”

public hospital in Jimani. They painted it clean

Of the 40 or so deliveries performed at his hospital

white and baby blue with the words “Centro Clinico

each month, about 30 are Haitian births, Moquete

Diagnostico, Dra. Perozo” painted in gold lettering

said. “And of those 30, at least four come without

on the front. Her name is in cursive.

any type of (medical) check,” he said.

“There are other border crossings. But this is the one that takes people directly from the capital,”

“This is what most worries us when they come like this – suddenly, with nothing, absolutely nothing.”

Perozo said in Spanish. “This is why we have so much movement.”

Overwhelming the System

Jimani is just an hour’s drive from Port-au-Prince.

Across the country, on their half of this small

Food, trucks, cars, goods and workers move across

island, Dominican hospitals and clinics are being

the border between these two countries at a fren-

overwhelmed by Haitian women.

36

“The border is imaginary. It’s just a door,” said

whomever – no matter their creed or race, their

Delancer of the national Ministry of Health, sitting at

color – it does not matter,” he said as he sat inside

his desk in a crowded office with bright blue walls in

the hospital, a fan buzzing behind him to stave off

Santo Domingo. “There are clinics and hospitals that

the Caribbean heat.

are 100 meters away from the border line, and 50 to 60 percent of the births that occur here are Haitian.

“It’s a problem of poverty; it’s a problem of education; it’s a problem of empowering of women.”

“You have to give service to the person,” he added with conviction. “This is what is important.”

But what is important comes up against a harsh reality: The Dominican health care system

And it’s a problem of access. In the Dominican

is designed to care for about 7 million people,

Republic, medical treatment is provided free of

according to Delancer. There are nearly 10 million

charge whether the individual has documentation or

living in the Dominican Republic, and more than

not, Delancer said.

a million of them are Haitians – with more coming

More than 150 miles away on the border, Moquete

every day.

nods his head in agreement. “In this we are clear

Delancer worries about those numbers: “How

– no matter a person’s poverty, religion, race, they

many of them are in reproductive age? How many of

have to be given medical attention,” he said.

them need health care?”

He spins his cell phone between his two hands on top of a spotless desk and frowns. “This is a right of all human beings.”

Joaquin Recio, vice director of nursing at the public hospital in Jimani, was born inside these walls. He has worked here for nearly a quarter-

How can the system support so many?

“There isn’t a system that counts the total number of Haitian citizens who live in this country,” Delancer said. “Everyone knows that.”

“How do you count an illegal population, a population that is registered nowhere?”

century and brings a religious fervor to the care he provides to Haitians.

Clinging to Citizenship

“If God has given you this gift to give service to

At the Jimani public hospital an hour from Port-au-

others – this special service, of health – then you

Prince, two women, still in their street clothes, lie on

have to give it with quality, warmly, with love, to

small cots.

37

Opposite

page:

Querida

Missou, 25, a Haitian immigrant, lies next to her newborn son in Hospital General Melenciano in Jimani.

Left: Luiz Mena’s daughter sleeps hours after her birth at Hospital General Melenciano.

A nurse in a tight, white uniform uses a needle to inject a clear liquid

Women wait to see a doctor at

into their IVs. A baby lies next to each woman on her bed. They are

a maternity hospital in Santo

hours old. Neither yet has a name.

Domingo.

“Where are you from?”

“Here,” they both say.

“My husband is Dominican,” one woman offers without being asked.

This is an important detail: If it is true, her child is legal. The new Dominican law says that if one parent has Dominican citizenship, the child is Dominican.

The nurse doesn’t blink; she hears such claims every day. But she clarifies that the women are of Haitian descent. The two women agree.

The nurse files birth certificates for every child born in the hospital.

A boy wanders the hallways of

“She fills out a record – a card,” Recio said. “And she puts her name,

Hospital General Melenciano in

what she is called, her last name. And with this, nothing more, the baby

Jimani.

is registered.”

The nurse writes down whatever name the mothers give her on the certificate – Spanish or French. She’s not an immigration officer.

She doesn’t tell them that their children won’t be citizens until they are officially registered with the Dominican government and that they can be officially registered only if they can prove that they or their husbands are legal residents of the country. It’s a complicated process, fraught with challenges and delays that can be triggered simply by a surname that sounds more French than Spanish.

By that afternoon, the women are gone, taking their new babies with them. The beds are stripped and the hallways quiet. The babies have their birth certificates, but they are not citizens – not yet.

They are stateless. ■ 38

By Tarryn Mento Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Lauren Gilger

High Numbers of Maternal Deaths Plague Health System

SANTO

DOMINGO,

Dominican

Republic

–

Abraham’s mother was just 17 when she died. The same day that he came into this world was the day she left.

free, people come from everywhere, from all the surrounding villages.”

Wagner said the hospital is equipped to handle 1,500 to 2,000 births a year. Instead, it is handling

Abraham was delivered by Cesarean section at

12,000 to 13,000 births annually. Many of the

Hospital Materno-Infantil San Lorenzo de Los Mina,

mothers are poor, undocumented women who have

a bustling public hospital in the Dominican capital

had little or no prenatal care. Many of these are from

city. His mother, Nana Charlie, died from excessive

Haiti, where the maternal death rate is even worse –

bleeding.

three times higher than in the Dominican Republic.

Maternal hemorrhaging is one of the main reasons

Those are the facts Los Mina deals with every day.

for the Dominican Republic’s relatively high maternal

So is this one: 24 mothers died in childbirth at the

mortality rate.

hospital last year. That’s about the same number of

But many come too late. In the Dominican

deaths per 100,000 live births in the U.S.

Republic, the lifetime risk of maternal death is one

To medical professionals in the Dominican

in 320, according to UNICEF. That’s almost seven

Republic, health care is a human right. No woman in

times higher than in the U.S.

need of maternal care will be turned away, regard-

Medical experts say a high maternal mortality

less of her immigration status or ability to pay.

rate usually correlates to limited medical access.

“We have had always an open door policy that we

But in the Dominican Republic, skilled medical

would take anyone who comes,” said Leonard Ziur,

personnel attend nearly 98 percent of births, only

a Los Mina doctor from Cuba who has also prac-

one percentage point less than in this country.

ticed in Miami. “We don’t send them back.”

So many women die in childbirth in the Dominican Republic not because they can’t get to a doctor, but

Haitians Flood System

because they get there so late – and because they

Three strangers and their newborns, just hours

come in such great numbers.

“These hospitals are free,” said Los Mina Hospital Director Pablo Wagner. “And because they are 39

old, share a bare, dimly lit room at Los Mina. Water leaks onto the tile floor.

Yirandy Contrera sits on a narrow hospital bed,

Abraham Axicinean, 5 months old, takes a nap at the home of Eriana Alce in Batey San Isidro. His mother was 17 when she died giving birth to him.

40

Deborah Juan Medlete, 15, holds her infant son, Solomon Felipe.

wearing a pink cotton baby doll dress, her inflated belly still visible beneath the thin fabric. Her newborn son, wrapped in white terrycloth embroidered with his name, lies on the mattress next to her.

There is no recognizable chime of a hospital gadget monitoring vitals.

No hospital bracelets or visitors’ badges. No call button to ensure a nurse is just a ring away. There are just the familiar cries of infants and the comforting coos of their mothers.

The care is mediocre by U.S. standards, but it is far superior to what is available in neighboring Haiti, and, as a result, pregnant Haitian women Dr. Pablo Wagner directs the

regularly cross the border illegally into the Dominican Republic to have

Los Mina hospital, where many

their babies.

Haitian women come to give birth.

No one knows how many of them come – only that it’s many and that the numbers have grown substantially since last year’s devastating earthquake in Haiti, which destroyed many hospitals.

“The cost of this hasn’t been estimated because there isn’t a system that counts the total number of Haitian citizens who live in this country,” said Jose Delancer, director of the Department of Women and Children within the Dominican Ministry of Public Health. “How do you count an illegal population, a population that is registered nowhere?”

“The Dominican laws and the Constitution of the Republic guarantee universal access to health care to anyone, no matter their descent, their races, their nationalities, their immigration status,” Delancer added. “We as a health care system are not here to question immigration policies.

We are here simply to provide quality services to the extent that our capacities allow us to, to anyone who asks for it.”

Delancer said the Dominican government has budgeted for public health services for 7 million people in a country with a population of 10

41

A child runs to his house in Bateye San Isidro, an impovershed Haitian community on the outskirts of Santo Domingo.

42

Annabelle and Cristina, both 2, play next to the only bed in Eriana Alce’s home. Annabelle is the daughter of a neighbor who died and Cristina is one of Alce’s two children.

43

million, although wealthier segments of the population mainly use private

Eriana Alce, 23, is three months

health care. The undocumented Haitian population is estimated to repre-

pregnant. She cares for four

sent at least a tenth of the population, some who enter the Dominican

children – two of whom she

solely to deliver their babies.

took in after their mother died

Many of them have never had a pre-natal check-up, and, as a result,

and two of her own – Cristina,

doctors are often unable to anticipate problems and are unprepared for

2, (above) and Veronica, 4,

complications that could have been prevented.

(below), who chews on the arm

Approximately one third of Los Mina patients are Haitian and arrive in

of a doll.

poor health, said Wagner, the Los Mina hospital director.

“They don’t have a monthly examination, and when they come to the hospital, they come in an awful condition, in a bad situation,” he said.

“They are mothers that don’t have the proper conditions to support nine months of pregnancy. They are without nutrition, without education.”

Abraham’s mother was one such patient, according to local religious leader Malia Duval and other members of the community who are familiar with the case. When she arrived at the hospital to give birth, she was in poor condition. She was undernourished and battling sickle-cell anemia and wasn’t strong enough to survive surgery. She bled to death after undergoing a Cesarean section.

Language Barriers More than five months after the death of his mother, Abraham sleeps on a bed in a home in Batey San Isidro, an impoverished community made up mostly of Haitian immigrants on the outskirts of Santo Domingo.

Flies drift freely around his head.

With the whereabouts of their father unknown, Abraham and his 2-year-old sister, Annabelle, live in the care of Eriana Alce, a neighbor of 44

their deceased mother. At 23, Eriana is four months pregnant and already has two children of her own.

One of them, a toddler, sits on the dirty cement floor, biting and occasionally swallowing pieces of a torn plastic bag.

An immigrant from Haiti, Eriana does not have Dominican citizenship and can’t legally work.

Her husband works at a nightclub, but the couple

“They are without nutrition, without education.” ­– Dr. Pablo Wagner, director, Los Mina hospital

struggle to feed the children they have.

Asked what she is going to do with another baby coming, Eriana replies, “Nada.”

to overcome the language problems by adopting a

There is nothing she can do.

common form for perinatal histories and translating

Like many immigrants from Haiti, Eriana speaks

it into Creole. The ministry has disseminated the

only a little Spanish. Her native language is a dialect

translated document throughout Dominican hospi-

of French-Creole, and that presents yet another

tals and also has sent the form to Haiti.

challenge to health care professionals.

“Usually they come when they are almost at time

Common Problems

of delivery,” said Ziur, the Cuban doctor at Los Mina.

The maternal health problems in the Dominican

“They live in Haiti. They get here and they tell you,

Republic are not unique, and, in fact, many are the

‘No, I don’t speak Spanish. I don’t speak English. I

same as those facing immigrant populations in the

don’t speak anything, only Creole.’”

U.S.

Translators are sometimes available at the hospital,

Many undocumented women in the U.S. have little

but not always. Ziur said he handles an average of

or no access to pre-natal care during pregnancy,

40 patients a day. In a typical eight-hour day, that’s

according to a 2010 Amnesty International report.

five patients per hour, and nearly one third do not

Private insurance is too expensive, and they don’t

speak Spanish.

qualify for Medicaid because they are in the country

The Dominican Ministry of Public Health is trying 45

unlawfully.

Opposite page: (From left to right) Yirandy Contrera, Yatrona Santos and Rosalba Castillo share a room with their newborn babies hours after giving birth at Los Mina hospital.

Staff members clean medical equipment in front of Los Mina hospital in Santo Domingo.

Although U.S. law requires that all women in active labor have access to medical care regardless of immigration status, many arrive at hospitals in poor condition, according to the report. They frequently lack prenatal care and don’t speak the language.

Medical care for undocumented immigrants is being increasingly debated in the U.S. In Arizona, for example, a bill introduced in the state Legislature last year would have required hospitals to identify suspected illegal immigrants. While those in need of emergency services would get

Used syringes sit on the bed

them, the bill would have denied services to others.

at the feet of a patient hours

The bill failed to pass after hospital and medical associations voiced strong opposition to checking patients’ immigration status. However,

after she gave birth in the public hospital in Jimani.

state Sen. Steve Smith, a Republican who represents a large district south and east of Phoenix, has said he intends to reintroduce the bill

Medical supplies are kept on

next session.

a metal stand at the hospital.

Such a debate has not yet surfaced in the Dominican Republic, despite evidence that treating illegal immigrants has stretched the health care system beyond its capabilities and even though the two countries – the Dominican and Haiti – have a long history of antagonistic relations.

Ziur is typical of doctors who say that if the Dominican Republic adopted a law requiring hospitals to notify authorities of a patient’s immigration status, he would refuse.

Treating undocumented population may be hurting the Dominican health care system, but not treating people in need would be more painful.

“I will not do it. I will just resist,” he said.

Medical care, he said, is not about policy or politics.

“Your duty’s not that. I’m here to save lives.” ■ 46

By Joanne Ingram Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Carie Gladding

Educating Children Proves Daunting Challenge

SANTO

DOMINGO,

Dominican

Republic

–

director of the Instituto Dominicano de Desarrollo

Fate dealt teenagers Maria and Theresa Cajou a

Integral,

devastating hand in 2010. Their parents were killed

Development. “Consequently, after eighth grade

in the Jan. 12 Haitian earthquake. Their school was

they can’t . . . continue to go to school, they can’t

destroyed. They lost all contact with friends and

take out a loan, they can’t vote. And that’s probably

family.

the best recipe for them to continue in a level of

Three days after the earthquake, the twins left their native Haiti and headed across the border into the Dominican Republic.

or

Dominican

Institute

for

Integral

critical poverty.”

The Dominican Republic already has troubling numbers of people living in poverty and who lack

They were lucky. The girls, both 16, found refuge

literacy and a high school degree. Fewer than 10

at the Dominica Orphanage and School in the

percent of its 3.7 million children will graduate from

capital city, where they are doing well.

high school, according to the organization Save the

But without proper documentation, the Cajous will hit a dead-end once they graduate.

Children.

Many of the neediest children are orphans, some

“I know that the laws, our laws, won’t allow them

of them orphaned by last year’s earthquake in Haiti.

to go to university without birth certificates,” said

In all, approximately 170,000 Haitian and Dominican

Dominica orphanage founder Dominica Rosario. “I

orphans live in the Dominican Republic, according

don’t even know what will happen with them when

to UNICEF.

they finish.”

While education in the Dominican Republic is

Making Education a Priority

mandatory and free for children ages 5 through 14,

Education advocates working in the country

regardless of their immigration status, many children

believe the government is not doing enough. They

do not continue to ninth grade because they lack

point out that only 2.3 percent of the nation’s gross

a Dominican birth certificate or other official docu-

domestic product is spent on education, even

mentation that proves they are citizens.

though the law calls for 4 percent of the nation’s

“A lot of the kids, even the Dominicans, don’t have birth certificates,” said David Luther, executive 47

GDP to go to schools. By comparison, the U.S. spends 5.4 percent of its GDP on education.

Fewer than 10 percent of children in the Dominican Republic will graduate from high school.

48

“For me it’s the biggest problem the country has,” said Kevin Manning, a business consultant who sits on the executive board of directors for the Dominican Republic Education and Mentoring (DREAM) Project, a nonprofit hoping to improve educational opportunities. “The poor are condemned to their poverty as a result.”

The Ministry of Education did not respond to calls and emails to discuss the country’s support for education. But Dominican President Leonel Fernandez’s administration has spoken about the need to improve the educational system.

In March 2008, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development held its second Global Forum on Education in the Dominican

“We very strongly believe that a quality education is the best way to lift all of these kids out of poverty. When we say ‘all of these kids,’ we also mean the Haitian kids.”

– Jonathan Wunderlich, director of development, DREAM Project in Cabarete, Dominican Republic

Republic at Fernandez’s suggestion. During the

public schools, opening up 417 new classrooms

opening session, Ligia Amada Melo de Cardona,

before the 2011-2012 school year, according to

state secretary for higher education, science and

Dominican news reports. The school expansion

technology, “emphasized that President Fernandez

project is expected to cost $20 million.

sees education as the key for driving moderniza-

Still, Manning insists that not enough is being

tion and sustainable development in the Dominican

done. Most classrooms lack desks and chairs, he

Republic,” the OECD reported.

said, and some teachers are barely literate. In other

Cardona added that Fernandez wants to make the

cases, teachers are in such short supply that classes

education system more “efficient and effective, in

are taught by the most advanced students, he said.

order to drive innovation and technological develop-

“Teaching has become the terrain of the lower

ment.”

The Ministry of Education plans to build 41 more 49

classes in this country,” he said.

Jonathan Wunderlich, director of development for

Opposite page: Children at the Armando

Rosenberg

Home

and School in Santo Domingo receive an education thanks to charitable donations.

Left and below: Maria Cajou and her twin sister Theresa have lived at the Dominica school since losing their parents in the 2010 Haitian earthquake.

the DREAM Project in Cabarete on the country’s north coast, agreed that the “quality of the teachers is very low” in public schools.

Schools for the Poor Originally from New York, Wunderlich came to the Dominican Republic almost eight years ago after spending several years teaching in a number of countries. He planned to write a novel but instead got involved with the DREAM Project, which has helped provide education to underprivileged Dominican children since 2002.

Teachers, parents and volunteers help run DREAM Centers located in six cities across the country. A total of nearly 500 students from ages 3 through 6 attend school in small classes. About 1,000 others, mostly older, participate in summer camps and youth development programs that teach computer literacy, music and health.

Jonathan

Wunderlich

came

Most expenses are covered by U.S. donors, and no tuition is charged,

to the Dominican Republic in

Wunderlich said. Children who enroll must come from the community

2004 to write a novel. He now

where the school is located and have a family member willing to volun-

helps educate underprivileged

teer for two weeks each year.

children.

No legal documentation is required – a fact that has encouraged many local Haitian families to enroll their children.

“We very strongly believe that a quality education is the best way to lift all of these kids out of poverty,” Wunderlich said. “When we say ‘all of these kids,’ we also mean the Haitian kids.”

In Santo Domingo, Dominica Rosario also is doing what she can to educate the poorest of the Dominican Republic’s children, including those who are from Haiti.

Rosario said she and her brother, Alexis, grew up in an orphanage, 50

Many students of Haitian descent are unable to complete their education because they can’t prove their Dominican citizenship.

51

where they received just one meal a day.

When her brother died in 2002, Rosario took over the school and has been running it by herself since. She also teaches two days a week at a

A student waits Dominica

outside the

Orphanage

and

School in Santo Domingo.

college in San Pedro de Macoris, about an hour east of Santo Domingo.

The Dominica school relies on a combination of tuition and donations to operate – a dicey proposition in a poor global economy. Some longtime contributors have been unable to help in recent years, and the orphanage is in a precarious financial situation, Rosario said.

She has asked for financial help from the government but has received nothing so far. She does her best to understand and to be patient.

“They are focused on other things first,” she said. “I can see that they’re trying.”

Dominica Rosario ran the Dominica Orphanage and

Rosario said she increasingly relies on members of the local commu-

School with her brother,

nity for help. Some take children for overnight stays since there is not

Alexis, until his death in

always enough room at the orphanage for everyone to sleep, she said.

2002. She is now the sole

Every day, she said she turns away three to four families who bring

director of the facility.

their children to live or to learn. Demand has grown since last year’s earthquake in Haiti.

“We have always had children from Haiti, but after the earthquake we got more children,” Rosario said. “We received about 30 children from

On the web: Many students

the (Santo Domingo) hospital.”

of Haitian descent are unable

All told, about 60 children, the youngest of them just 9 months old, live at the orphanage. About 200 attend the orphanage school.

Maria and Theresa Cajou are among the oldest residents, and they

to complete their education because they can’t prove their Dominican citizenship.

appear to have absorbed the lessons Rosario has taught them.

“School,” said Theresa through a translator, “is the future for children.”

■

http://cronkite.asu.edu/ buffett/dr/education.

52

The People of Batey Esperanza Photos by Brandon Quester

i

Street Kids of Santo Domingo Photos by Brandon Quester

ii

Life in Barrio San Jose La Mina Photos by Brandon Quester

iii

Life in Barrio San Jose La Mina Photos by Brandon Quester

iv

Niños Del Camino Children’s Shelter Photos by Brandon Quester

v

Niùos Del Camino Children’s Shelter Photos by Brandon Quester

vi

Dominican Republic Schools Photos by Carie Gladding

vii

Dominican Republic Schools Photos by Carie Gladding

viii

Along the Haitian-Dominican Border Photos by Lauren Gilger

ix

Along the Haitian-Dominican Border Photos by Lauren Gilger

x

Life in Bateye San Isidro Photos by Lauren Gilger

xi

Life in Bateye San Isidro Photos by Lauren Gilger

xii

Los Mina Hospital, Santo Domingo Photo by Lauren Gilger

2.

3.

1.

4.

6. xiii

5.

1: Dr. Leonard Zuir of Centro Materno Infantil San Lorenzo de Los Mina 2-4: RaĂşl H. Yzaguirre, U.S. ambassador to the Dominican Republic 5: Adolfo Mecedes, head of Customs, Comendador, Dominican Republic 6: Atalio Herrera, founder of AGROESSA coffee cooperative

Public Faces Photos by Michel Duarte

xiv

Streets of Santo Domingo Photos by Michel Duarte

xv

Streets of Santo Domingo Photos by Michel Duarte

xvi

Life in Batey Nine Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

xvii

Life in Batey Nine Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

xviii

Churches of Santo Domingo Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

xix

Churches of Santo Domingo Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

xx

The Catedral Primada de America is one of many Catholic churches in Santo Domingo.

Photo by Lindsay Erin Lough 53

By Nick Newman Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Religious Weigh God’s Law Against Country’s Law

“Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these thy brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

gious organizations working with poor, displaced Haitians in the Dominican Republic – people who find themselves without the ability to travel abroad, legally find work, access adequate health care or enroll their children in high school or college.

The Jesuits loudly advocate for the rights of the refugees, often finding themselves at odds with

­– Matthew 25:40

government institutions.

Some government “institutions are acting against

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – It’s

the law of the country,” said Mario Serrano, national

a call to serve the poor. And for many of Christian

director of the Jesuit Refugee Service in the

faith, Matthew 25:40 is a mandate to do as Jesus

Dominican Republic. “You cannot deny (Haitians)

would do.

the right to documentation, education or getting a

But in the Dominican Republic – where birthright

job. These are young people whose only fault is

citizenship has been outlawed and left thousands

being born to a migrant who gave his whole life to

of Dominican-born residents of Haitian descent

cutting sugar cane.”

without a country to call their own – doing so has

The Jesuits work with the poor, running shelters

fueled a conflict between this country’s law and

and providing food and clothing, but they don’t

what some see as God’s law.

think that’s enough. “We need to help change the

At the center of the tension is the Jesuit Refugee Service, which has 51 offices worldwide, including

political structures of society and denounce when rights have been denied,” Serrano said.

four in the Dominican Republic – in the border towns

The Dominican government, in turn, accuses the

of Dajabón and Jimaní, the city of Santiago and a

Jesuit Refugee Service of being part of an interna-

home base in the capital city of Santo Domingo.

tional conspiracy to unify the island of Hispaniola,

The Jesuits, a Catholic order that embraces social

which consists of the Dominican Republic and

justice, advocacy and human rights work as prime

Haiti. Some also have accused Jesuit priests of

tenets, are among the most high-profile of the reli-

harboring Haitians in churches at the border and of 54

Opposite

page:

Students

provide dental services to low income people, regardless of nationality. The small clinic is hosted at the Jesuit Refugee Service office in Santiago.

Davide

Sala

is

advocacy

director for the Jesuit Refugee Service in Santiago, Dominican Republic. Photos by Brandon Quester disregarding federal law.

In 2006, Dominican Foreign Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso talked openly about such a conspiracy and the Jesuits’ part in it. That same year, Troncoso called members of the Jesuit Refugee Service “leeches.”

As recently as this year, Ramon Antonio Veras, a lawyer and political personality in Santiago, and nationalist presidential candidate Pelegrín Castillo have accused the U.S., among other countries, of a conspiracy to try to unite the island.

Davide Sala, advocacy director for the Jesuits’ Santiago office, said the conspiracy allegations ignore the real problem.

“Attacking us is just another way to not talk about the problem with immigration,” Sala said.

Serrano added, “We are a target. We are not the only ones working Attorney Yojaira Bonilla works

with the Haitians, (but) we might be the only ones in the public sphere

on birthright citizenship cases

saying things aren’t right.”

in coordination with the Jesuit Refugee Service. Photo by Brandon Quester.

Sometimes the disagreements between the two sides erupt into violence.

Jesuits in the Santiago office say several staff members were assaulted while they attempted to document a mass deportation of some 650 Haitian refugees and Dominicans of Haitian descent in that city in mid-April.

A number of impoverished children who beg for subsistence on the streets were deported, and the repatriations were done so swiftly – some in less than an hour – that the Haitians had no time to call attorneys or inform family members, the Jesuits said.

“We have seen authorities not only arrest people but also humiliate them, dragging them half-dressed from their houses, stripping them

55

of their property and carting them off to Dajabón and Jimaní,” Yaira Portes, a worker at the Santiago Jesuit office, wrote on a Jesuit website. “What is happening is heart-rending.”

History of Advocacy The Jesuits have a history of standing with the poor, even if it means coming into direct conflict with governments and even the hierarchy of their own church.

“You’re born in the country and I cannot live a normal life like any other citizen.

I just stay at home thinking of what I can’t do.” ­– Ramón Tibo, Dominican Republic resident

Pope Benedict XVI, while still a Cardinal, strongly criticized portions of the Jesuit Liberation Theology, which emphasizes the rights of the poor and disenfranchised.

Jesuit activism has sometimes led to direct conflicts with governments and death for its most outspoken members.

don’t expect that kind of violence in the Dominican Republic. But they said they are prepared to take risks – and to flout the law if necessary.

“Those migrants are among the weakest of the

For example, in El Salvador, Jesuits denounced

weak,” Serrano said. “And the law tries to be as just

what they considered a dictatorial regime that

as possible. But justice sometimes must go beyond

ignored the plight of the poor. In 1977, a Jesuit

the law. On the seal of our country it says, ‘God,

priest and a lay deacon were killed along the side

Country, Liberty.’ Notice that God comes first.”

of a road. Three years later, the archbishop of the

The Rev. Regino Martinez, director of the Dajabón

country, Oscar Romero, was assassinated while

office in the northern part of the country and among

celebrating Mass. Four nuns were killed in 1980,

the most outspoken advocates for immigrants, put

and in 1989, six Jesuit priests and two lay women

it more simply yet: “Migrants have rights, even if

who worked at a university were assassinated.

they are undocumented,” he said.

Several Jesuits who were interviewed said they

On two separate occasions in 2009, Martinez 56

57

Ramon Tibo, 21, who is of Haitian descent, displays his all-important birth certificate.

Photo by Brandon Quester 58

Jean-Louis

Raymond

says

changes in Dominican law,

was accused of hiding as many as 600 Haitians in a church to keep them from being deported.

combined with racism against

At one point, National Border Council President Radhamés Batista

those of Haitian descent, have

called for Martinez’s removal as a priest, saying he shouldn’t be allowed

made it impossible for him to

to serve while violating Dominican immigration laws.

support his 10 children.

“We believe no one is above the law,” Batista told a local newspaper, Dominican Today.

Fanie Bogelin, the mother of Jean-Louis

Raymond’s

chil-

Seeking Justice in the Courts

dren, says it is difficult to protect

The Jesuits have taken their battle for human rights to the Dominican

and nurture children who are

courts, winning four citizenship cases so far for Haitians threatened with

seen as illegal immigrants.

deportation.

Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

A fifth case, still in process, involves Ramón Tibo, a man of Haitian descent from the northern city of Santiago.

A young man in his 20s, Tibo was born in the Dominican Republic and has a birth certificate to prove it. But in the Dominican Republic, that’s not enough. Identification papers for those of Haitian descent must be obtained anew for most of life’s important steps – applying for college, buying a house or getting married, for example.

For a year, Tibo has been trying to get his cédula – a national identification card – only to be refused. He said he produced his birth certificate but was told that he’s too dark, looks like a Haitian and has a French-sounding family name. Authorities tried to detain him for identity fraud, he said, but lawyers from the JRS helped get him released.

The next day, Tibo, on the advice of Sala and others, went back to Santo Domingo to get his paperwork. This time, his birth certificate was given back to him. But the next day, authorities in Santo Domingo

59

Ramon Tibo, 21, was born in the Dominican Republic but does not have a birth certificate to prove it. He is being helped by the Jesuit Refugee Service.

Photo by Brandon Quester

wanted to detain him yet again. That’s when Tibo

Saints doesn’t have a mission to specifically help

turned to the Jesuits in Santiago for legal help.

the stateless, the international humanitarian arm of

While he is uncertain what the court’s decision

the Mormon Church, which has a regional head-

will be, Tibo said he hopes his actions will propel

quarters in Santo Domingo, also works with the

others to speak out about what is happening.

poor in the Dominican Republic, as do a variety of

“The government wants to destroy the aspirations

other denominations.

of many young people like me who have dreams of

But with more displaced Haitians pouring into the

becoming professionals,” Tibo said. “We must fight

country after last year’s devastating earthquake, it’s

for our future.”

impossible to get help to everyone who needs it,

Tibo wants to study to be a lawyer so he can help

religious leaders said.

others like him. But for now, he can do little but wait.

“For the moment, we’re not helping much,” said

He walks the streets in fear of being deported to

the Rev. Abrahán Apolinario, pastor of Santa

Haiti, a country he’s never laid eyes on.

Cura de Ars, the local parish in La Zurza. “We are

“The true reality is this,” Tibo said. “You’re born in

welcoming them into our church. We are just barely

the country and I cannot live a normal life like any

starting. But I think in the future, things are going to

other citizen. I just stay at home thinking of what I

happen.”

can’t do.”

Agathe Champagne, a Catholic nun from Haiti, said she fled to the Dominican Republic after the

Overwhelming Need

hurricane and now assists at Apolinario’s parish

While the Jesuits are the most vocal, they’re not

along with other nuns.

the only religious organization coming to the aid of Haitian immigrants in the Dominican Republic.

“Home is chaos,” Champagne said. “So we live everywhere.”

American Jewish World Service and Christian Aid

Jean-Louis Raymond and his family demonstrate

UK have their own operations on the island. Caritas,

both the extent of the need for help in Haiti and the

an international Catholic charity organization, teams

limits of what religious organizations have been

up with the Jesuit Refugee Service on occasion.

able to do so far.

And while The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day

The family – with 10 children ranging in age from 60

Students in the Santo Domingo

4 to 24 – lives in La Zurza, a predominately Haitian barrio and one of the

barrio of La Zurza attend a

most violent in the capital city.

school run by nuns from a

“This barrio used to be safe when I was a kid, with only knives and

nearby Catholic parish. Photos

machetes,” said a taxi driver by the name of Hipolito. “Now they use

by Lindsay Erin Lough

machine guns.”

Raymond and his family have no permanent home.

“We stay with one person for a week, then a different person the next week, and even then, sometimes, we can get kicked out. It’s scary, because you never know how long you can stay,” Raymond said during an interview at that week’s home, no more than an open enclosure, with concrete and dirt floors and a tin roof on a side of a hill. The smell was of rotting vegetables and fecal matter – no better than a county dump.

Men and boys strolled the neighborhood carrying guns and machetes.

Raymond said his family has never received any sustained help from religious organizations, other than a Catholic nun named Rosa Maria Marmolejos, who oversees a school in the barrio and has helped the family find housing.

“What is help? Is it getting a house? Where we get food? Where we sleep?” Raymond said. “Sometimes they’ll (religious organizations) come in and give us food for a day or two, but then they won’t show up for three or four months. So does helping for one day help?”

Still, Raymond said he has faith in God. His greatest hope is that he can get his children off the island so they can have a better life.

“There are … Dominicans that have a good heart, (that) see a Haitian as a person,” Raymond said. “There are many Dominicans … that see a Haitian as an animal. Here we only have the protection of God, and it is better than Haiti. But I would rather be anywhere than here.” ■

61

Domingo Fan Fan, son Osiris and wife Ulda Luis

By Nick Newman Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

want to become Mormons but can’t legally marry without the proper documentation. Photo by Cristina Rayas

Marriage, Church Membership Blocked for Couple

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic –

that’s almost impossible to prove.

Gazcue is a middle-class neighborhood by

Fan Fan has the correct papers, so he is consid-

Dominican Republic standards. With its tree-lined

ered a citizen of the country. But Luis said her

streets and apartment buildings, it looks as if it

mother did not obtain the correct documentation

could fit comfortably into almost any American

for her when she was born, so she is now living

city.

illegally in her native country.

But follow a laundry line that disappears down a dirt alley and you’ll find Domingo Fan Fan and Ulda Luis.

And without her citizenship papers, the couple cannot legally marry.

That became an even bigger problem for the

The two live here with their son, Osiris, 4, in what

two after they decided to convert to the Mormon

can only be described as a shack nearly hidden

faith. Early in 2011, the two began talking to

between tall apartment buildings.

missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of

How Fan Fan and Luis met is your typical boy-

Latter-day Saints, and after many discussions and

meets-girl-next-door story. Their parents lived in a

visits to the local church in Gazcue, Fan Fan and

village in a rural part of the Dominican Republic

Luis asked to be baptized.

and the two grew up together. When Fan Fan moved to the city to find work 16 years ago, Luis followed and they have lived together ever since.

The two would like to get married and make their son legitimate, but new laws in the Dominican Republic have made that virtually impossible.

But in order to become a Mormon, the two can’t live together as an unmarried couple.

“To get to the kingdom of God we have to be married,” Luis said.

Church elders Jordan Hunter, of Peoria, Ariz., and Daniel Marte, a native Dominican, said they

Over the past seven years, a series of new laws

have discussed ways to resolve the problem. But

have been enacted that eliminate birthright citizen-

for a struggling couple living in bad conditions in

ship. Now, anyone born in the country must have at

an unlikely part of town, the choices are not good.

least one documented Dominican parent in order

Luis’s parents, who were born in Haiti, are both

to be considered a citizen, and for many people of

dead and cannot testify as to where she was born.

Haitian descent who lack the correct paperwork,

She could go to her hometown about 60 miles 62

Daniel Marte, left, a Dominican Mormon

missionary,

and

Jordan Hunter, of Peoria, Ariz., are on a mission in Santo Domingo for The Church of Jesus

Christ

of

Latter-day

Saints. Photo by Nick Newman

away and get two family members to testify that

The members of the Gazcue LDS Ward assist

she was, in fact, born to her mother and born in

hundreds of residents, many of them of Haitian

this country, but the trip would be expensive and

descent, with food, clothing, money and some-

there’s no guarantee that they would be believed.

times shelter, said Bishop Cristian Olivero, the

“My last name … is Haitian-sounding and my skin is black,” Luis said. “It’d be easier if I had a Dominican name.”

leader of the local Mormon congregation.

“We have to take care of those who are poor and in need,” said Olivero, a convert of 27 years

She could try to find a Dominican citizen willing

who works for the U.S. consulate. “But at the same

to pretend to be her parents. Or she could find

time, we teach people to be self-sufficient. There’s

someone who has died, but hasn’t been declared

nothing that can bring more joy and happiness to

dead, and use that identity to obtain a cedula, a

our lives (than) when we can provide for ourselves

national identification card.

and our families, spiritually and temporally.”

The easiest and cheapest option would be to

Fan Fan and Luis are doing their best to achieve

have someone pretend to be her parents. But in a

that goal. Luis works at a clothing store for a little

church that values its standing with foreign govern-

more than $150 a month. Fan Fan parks cars, in a

ments and preaches “honesty to all your fellow

good month earning about $40.

men, it’s not an attractive option, Hunter said.

“The least of all evils would be for her to go to her hometown, and that’s the most honest option,” Hunter said. “But economically and logistically, it’s impossible.”

Hunter, 20, who is scheduled to complete his mission and return to the U.S. this summer, said the couple’s situation is not unique.

“It happens a lot. In my 18 months here, I’ve had to help four,” Hunter said. “And I’m one person among 200 missionaries in my mission.”

63

The two work, save as much as they can and raise their child, hoping all the time that they can find a way to marry and officially join the church.

“You first have to have faith in God. Without faith, you are nothing,” he said. “Our dream is to get married, buy ourselves a little house somewhere.

With faith in God, we can do that.” ■

Signs written in Creole and Spanish are posted outside the barrio San Jose La Mina. They ask Haitian migrants to leave the Dominican Republic and state that they are not welcome. Photo by Brandon Quester 64

Atalio Herrera grows organic coffee in the hills around Los Cacaos, Dominican Republic.

Photo by Michel Duarte 65

By Cristina Rayas Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Michel Duarte

Coffee and Clothing: Two Ways to Diversify an Economy

VILLA ALTAGRACIA, Dominican Republic – An

when an American student pulls his logo-embla-

American clothing company is transforming lives

zoned school sweatshirt over his head, he’ll care

and worker-employer relations here with a simple

about the workers who sewed the sleeves onto his

concept: paying a living wage.

favorite hoodie.

And 13 miles to the west as the crow flies (but

The company, which manufactures collegiate

57 miles in actual driving distance), family farmers

apparel, and its Dominican factory in Villa Altagracia,

in the steep, lush mountains near Los Cacaos are

are competing for their place in college bookstores

working together to produce pesticide-free, organic

across the U.S. by asking students to shell out a

coffee, taking advantage of a growing niche market

few extra dollars to buy a sweatshirt that helped

for coffee.

eliminate a sweatshop and gave workers rights they

In a country where the controversial sugar

have never enjoyed before.

industry has long been king, the two companies are

Knights Apparel has allowed its workers at the

examples of the Dominican Republic’s attempts to

factory in Alta Gracia to advocate collectively – a

diversify its economy.

rarity in a country where fewer than 10 percent of

More than half of the nation’s Gross Domestic

workers are unionized.

Product – the value of goods and services –comes

“One of the strategies that influences the lack of

from the service industry, including tourism, trade,

workers’ unions is the fact that a lot of times compa-

communications, real estate and other indus-

nies go to places that are very remote where people

tries, according to the U.S. Department of State.

are not educated,” said Mariza Vargas, the secre-

Manufacturing accounts for 21.4 percent of the GDP

tary of the workers’ union, Sitralpro, as she sewed

and agriculture 7.7 percent.

sleeves onto T-shirts. “And they take advantage of

The Dominican Republic is working hard to change those numbers by attracting foreign investors, like

the fact that they are not educated enough to know their rights.”

Knights Apparel, a privately owned company based

But just the opposite happened at Alta Gracia.

in Spartanburg, S.C., and retraining and redirecting

After taking over the manufacturing plant in 2007

family farmers into new crops and new markets.

from BJ&B, a South Korean-based company that

In Villa Altagracia, Knights Apparel is betting that

sewed baseball caps for brands like Nike and 66

Workers at La Esperanza

Reebok, Knights Apparel raised workers wages ten-fold. The company

plantation tie coffee bags shut

pays its workers at Alta Gracia 4,432 pesos a week – about $120. That

in preparation for shipment.

compares to the $12 a week paid to employees at BJ&B.

Photo by Michel Duarte

Moreover, workers had a strong say in what they would be paid.

Vargas teamed up with the Worker Rights Consortium, an independent

Below: Coffee beans are

labor rights watchdog organization, to help determine a baseline living

dried at the plantation

wage. They calculated the cost of food and water, housing and energy,

near Los Cacaos. Photo

clothing and health care, plus a modest savings, and determined that a

by Stephanie Snyder

living wage is 222,042 Dominican pesos a year, more than three times the local minimum wage. Knights Apparel agreed to pay the living wage.

Kayla Elisa Mena, 36, who used to work for BJ&B, said working for Knights Apparel –and earning the new, higher wage –has “changed my life 360 (degrees).” Before earning a living wage, she couldn’t keep up with her bills and shared a small house with many people, she said.

Today she is paying off her debt and living in a more comfortable home.

Organic farming Just a few miles away from the clothing plant in the mountains near Los Cacaos, family farmers who are members of the AGROESSA coffee cooperative also are inching their way toward economic stability.

To get to the La Esperanza Agroindustrial plantation, a rusty mini-bus, called a gua-gua (pronounced wah-wah) – makes an hour-long ascent, leaving the bustling streets of Los Cacaos behind. The endless greenery of trees is broken only to reveal the few tiny, derelict shacks that pepper the knolls. The idea of cell-phone reception is laughable as travelers take themselves off the grid, putting their lives in the hands of the gua-gua driver.

67

“If you are Haitian with papers, you are hired.

If you are Haitian without documents, you are not.” ­– Kayla Elisa Mena, factory worker, Knights Apparel, Villa Altagracia

The coffee plantation is a relic of Dominican

Today, the major organic exports in the Dominican

history but one with goals firmly fixed on the future:

Republic are bananas, cocoa, coffee and mangos,

Organic, free-trade farming has reached these

accounting for a small but growing .13 percent of the

secluded peaks.

GDP. Interestingly, the former king of cash crops,

La Esperanza is a family-business; in fact, 961

sugar, has not become a major organic export.

families work the land and 200 of them contribute pesticide-free, certified organic coffee to the

Haitian workers

cooperative, said Juan Arias, the co-op president,

Sugar, still an important crop, is intertwined with

who says he’s never heard of Starbucks, another

Dominican history. Christopher Columbus trans-

reminder of just how far off the grid you are.

ported sugar cane to what is now the Dominican

“We haven’t been able to expand (the number

Republic in 1493. The industry flourished through

of certified organic farmers) much beyond that yet

the centuries, dependent on the labor of slaves and,

since it’s a costly process to get more farmers certi-

later, on migrant Haitian sugar cane cutters.

fied,” Arias said.

The industry came under international scrutiny and

Over the past 25 years, agriculture has been

condemnation in 1990 when international humani-

reshaped in Latin America, fueled by new export

tarian groups charged that Haitian workers were

opportunities for products like organic foods aimed

being held in near slavery. The criticism prompted

at wealthy customers, particularly in the European

mass deportations of Haitian cane cutters in 1991.

Union.

Bernardo Vega, a former Dominican ambassador

From its small start in the 1980s, organic crops

to the United States and a prominent economist

are now grown on more than 177,915 acres in the

and historian, said sugar mill owners long were

Dominican Republic. That represented 8.3 percent

the primary beneficiaries of Haitian labor. He said

of the country’s agricultural acreage in 2009,

U.S. Marines occupying Haiti and the Dominican

according to the Switzerland-based Research

Republic in 1916 first promoted the idea of using

Institute of Organic Agriculture, and it’s among the

Haitian workers.

highest percentage of agricultural land devoted to

“That was in the past,” Vega said. “Now the

organic farming in Latin America and the Caribbean.

people who benefit from Haitian migrants are not 68

The

AGROESSA

coopera-

tive uses cloth bags to ship its coffee to the U.S. and elsewhere. Photo by Stephanie Snyder

only sugar producers. Only about 20 percent of Haitian migrants work in sugar.”

fields.

Using seasonal Haitian workers presents other

He said producers of coffee, bananas, cocoa and

challenges, Arias said. Many don’t understand

the construction sector are all dependent on Haitian

sustainable farming and have to be trained. And

labor, much of it undocumented, even though the

because the workforce is so transient, there are

country’s labor laws require that 80 percent of those

always new workers who must be taught.

jobs go to Dominicans.

No one has ever been taken to court for violating the laws, Vega said, and he doesn’t expect that to change. There are “so many vested interests which

“It’s a workforce that comes with a lot of deficiencies,” Arias said.

The temporary workers tend to live apart from the more permanent community, he said.

now make a lot of money on cheap Haitian labor,” he

“The community does not see them in social activ-

said. “And the labor unions who should be logical

ities or social events,” he said. “They don’t integrate

protestors have been politically weak.”

and that brings problems; because the cultures are

Arias estimated that only 10 of the 961 families in

so different, they clash.”

the co-op are of Haitian descent. But he acknowledged a seasonal dependence on Haitian workers

People and money

and said immigration officials have come to his

At the Knights Apparel plant in Villa Altagracia,

lands and chased Haitian workers down to deport

such problems have been avoided because the

them.

factory hires only people with cedulas, national

“Some come back and some don’t,” he said.

identification cards, said Mena, the employee who

While giving a tour of the coffee fields, co-op

credits the plant with turning around her life.

member and farmer Italio Herrera also admitted that

“If you are Haitian with papers, you are hired. If

Haitians provide much of the labor at harvest time.

you are Haitian without documents, you are not,”

Many live in bateyes, ramshackle company towns

she said.

close to the fields – places frequently raided by

Mena said there are many undocumented Haitians

immigration officials, who catch and deport illegal

living in her village who are limited to working as

workers as they return from a day of work in the

street vendors or for cash under the table. She

69

Santa

Alvarita

Hernandes

separates coffee beans at the AGROESSA cooperative. Photo

by Michel Duarte

wishes they could have dignified jobs, “but we have laws in this country,” she said.

Rudy Rijo, an administrative manager at the Knights Apparel plant, said there is no shortage of people seeking work at his plant, which currently employs 133.

“With labor, we have a lot of people available, a lot of qualified people.

A lot of them need jobs, like these kinds of jobs,” Rijo said.

In fact, “excellent human resources” is one of the pitches that President Leonel Fernandez employs to attract foreign investment to the Dominican Republic.

Another is “attractive government incentives” – and indeed they are available. During his first stint in office in 1996, Fernandez signed a law giving foreign investors huge tax advantages for bringing their businesses to the island. The law created “free trade zones” for textiles and

Organic

wearing apparel, for example, allowing manufacturers to import materials

grown at the plantation in Los

duty free to assemble. Other incentives keep taxes on foreign compa-

Cacaos, Dominican Republic.

nies low. Alta Gracia is in one of these free trade zones.

Photos by Michel Duarte and

The incentives have worked, increasing foreign investment in the

coffee

beans

are

Stephanie Snyder

country from $932 million in 2000 to a peak of nearly $3 billion in 2008, according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean of the United Nations.

Still, the plant at Altagracia and the plantation in Los Cacaos have faced formidable challenges in their quests to compete in the global market.

Next

page:

AGROESSA

workers scoop coffee beans Challenges for Coffee

into bags for shipment. Photo

Los Cacaos has been trying to integrate eco-tourism into its business

by Stephanie Snyder 70

model, hoping that tourists will come to see where

label “Café La Esperanza.”

their coffee comes from.

“The more tourists we have, the more they try our tasty product, and you know, that increases the outlet to get our product out,” Arias said.

The co-op was starting to build tourist housing

New Clothing Market At the Knights Apparel plant, things are even more uncertain. The market is not as well established and no one knows if the new plant is sustainable.

and plan small-scale attractions, but progress was

Business is down this year, said Rijo and admin-

halted with the flooding that followed Hurricane

istrative manager Adriana Tavernas, because a

Thomas in 2010. The community had to turn its

number of American university bookstores have not

attention to rebuilding homes and schools before

renewed their contracts.

starting on tourism ventures.

Natural disasters can create work shortages as well, Arias said. In 2007, a tropical storm devastated Los Cacaos, and instead of rebuilding, some families and workers moved to the cities to seek work.

“I think when we started everyone was really attracted to the idea of helping this community, but now they are not,” Tavernas said.

The company and its union are working hard to promote its clothing through online videos and

“That’s hard because if they cannot make money

conferences with students. The message, said union

here, they have to go and find a way to make money.

leader Vargas is that “we have the best customers:

But that means things are left here unattended,” he

university students who respect and understand

said.

workers’ rights and understand how important

Even in good times, organic farmers struggle with

freedom of association is.”

a difficult and expensive certification process for

Workers and managers alike hope the message

organic goods and detailed record-keeping require-

will resonate with the socially conscious, who will

ments, he added.

then pay a small premium to support a new way of

AGROESSA has been helped by organizations such as the Peace Corps and a global fair trade movement. Today, Arias’ coffee is distributed to the United States and throughout Europe under the 71

business for Dominicans.

“It’s a long way from where we need to be,” Tavernas said. “But it has to start somewhere.” ■

By Bastien Inzaurralde and Brandon Quester Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Brandon Quester

Children Struggle to Survive on Santo Domingo Streets

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic — Tono

are Dominican and some Haitian. Many are both.

Chelestine slumps onto a wooden bench, a small,

Most, like Tono, were born here, but few know how to

white plastic bag containing everything he owns

legally prove their citizenship.

dangling from his hand.

While the rest of Dominican society debates the

He says nothing as two counselors at a shelter for

rights of immigrants, something more matters to

street children talk to him, gently telling him it’s time

these kids than where their parents were born or

to leave.

whether they have a birth certificate. Their struggle

“Now everyone leaves, and you, Tono, I don’t know what you’re going to do,” said Natividad “Ana” Sosa, one of the counselors. “What are you going to do?”

The shelter, Niños Del Camino, an aging yellow

is surviving the day at hand.

They live lives largely ignored by Dominican society, on the margins, with no real homes and little access to education or other government services.

house surrounded by an iron fence, closes at 2 p.m.

“The population sees them as delinquents. They

It is now nearing 3, and all the other children have

only see it as a kids’ problem,” Sosa said. “They

left, threatening to beat Tono with a broomstick on

don’t see it as a state problem.”

their way out.

“If you choose to live in the streets, you also have to choose to be able to defend yourself, unfortunately,” Sosa tells the boy.

The Palomos The streets are a violent place. The street children encounter beatings, robberies, drugs and sexual

Tono, who is 14, doesn’t want to leave. He is

abuse. They earn what money they can, washing

frightened by what faces him beyond the iron fence.

car windshields in the middle of busy streets, shining

The shelter is in Ensanche Luperón – one of the

shoes, begging.

most dangerous areas of the Dominican Republic’s capital.

Tono has lived on the streets for only a couple of weeks. He has much to learn.

Informally, they are called “palomos,” a Spanish word derived from “dove.” On the streets, it means rascals. Others simply call them “niños de la calle,” or children of the street.

He is one of hundreds of children who roam the

Palomos have no legal recognition. Public authori-

streets of Santo Domingo, a city of 2.1 million. Some

ties don’t attempt to count them, and there are few 72

Natividad “Ana” Sosa, a social worker with Niños Del Camino, says that while it can be difficult working with street children, she need only look them in the face to remember why she does the work.

• More than a quarter – 27.6

public services available to them, although the government did create

percent – of families lives

the National Council for Children and Adolescents, or CONANI, in 2003.

in poverty Santo Domingo,

The council’s top official is Kirsys Fernández de Valenzuela, the sister of

according

the Dominican Republic’s president, Leonel Fernández.

to

government

statistics.

The council operates 58 centers nationwide, providing assistance to more than 18,000 children up to the age of 6, according to an email

•

The

Council

Dominican for

National

Children

from Lourdes Rodriguez, CONANI’s director of communications.

and

The council also offers some financial and other support to five non-

Adolescents runs 58 centers

profits that help the nation’s street kids, said CONANI Public Policies

and provides assistance to

Manager Alberto Padilla.

18,800 children nationwide.

But those programs “have lots of financial weaknesses” and don’t coordinate very well, Padilla said in a phone interview.

• More than 13 percent of all

“A kid sleeps at a shelter and eats at another,” he said.

Dominican children ages 10

Tono stayed at such a shelter after his father kicked him out of the

to14 works to help support their

house after Tono was caught breaking into a barbershop with a group

families, according to a 2006

of other teens. Tono said he was forced to participate in the break-in.

government report.

When Tono’s father came to the police station, he told Tono that he was no longer welcome at home.

• All of the children served by

“People at the CONANI were talking to my Dad on my behalf to see

the Niños Del Camino shelter

whether he would give me another chance, so that he would forgive

in Santa Domingo come from

me,” Tono said in Spanish. “He didn’t want to.”

impoverished families and 77 percent

have

At the shelter, Tono got into trouble again. He was asked to leave after

experienced

getting into a fistfight with another child. So he now lives on the streets,

domestic violence, according

going to Niños Del Camino three days a week from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. He’s

to 2009 data from the shelter.

careful to be on time: No one is admitted after 9 a.m.

Breakfast is at 10 a.m. and lunch is served at 1.

73

A Different Set of Rules

Manuel Antonio Santos, 16,

In addition to feeding the children, the shelter, supported largely by

(left) Eduard Arias, 13, and

donations, teaches basic literacy, offers drug counseling and tries to

Andres Castillo, 12, frequently

introduce the palomos to a set of social rules far different from those

visit the Niños Del Camino

that govern the streets.

shelter. Street children in the

While at the shelter, the children are expected to show respect for

Dominican Republic are known

adults and each other. They are asked to check their belongings –

as “palomos,” Dominican slang

and their attitudes – at the door. In exchange, they get a safe place to

for “rascals.”

regroup and escape the streets, if just for a while.

Abel Ortega, a Spanish teacher in Madrid who took a year off to work for the shelter, described his job this way: “Be tough if you have to be tough; get nervous if you have to get nervous; yell if you have to yell at one of them. But at the same time give them a lot of affection because a lot of times it’s part of what they need.”

Despite the counselor’s best efforts, fights sometimes break out, as occurred on a day in mid-March when Tono took exception to something another boy said to him and made a threatening gesture. The other boy picked up a five-gallon plastic water bucket and threw it at Tono, barely missing his head.

“The truth is that (getting) them to understand the norms, it is a bit complex,” Ortega said. “It’s obviously very difficult because these are children whose aggressiveness is skin deep.”

Nineteen-year-old Yeison Baís has lived in the streets since he was 5 and comes to the shelter every week. Baís said he spent two years in prison after a shootout with police following a robbery, and he prides himself on being tough. But even he needs a break.

The shelter is a place where he can “think a little, analyze, chill for 74

Pedro ‘Fifito’ Manuel Galbán, 6, spends his days on the streets of Santo Domingo as part of a group of children who wash car windows for cash. The operation is supervised by Fifito’s mother, 27-year-old Maribel Galbán. Photo by Brandon Quester 75

76

Cesar Julio, 14, (right) sits next

a while,” he said. “Because you can never chill in the street. There’s

to Tono Chelestine, also 14,

always someone that shows up to mess around with you.”

during a morning discussion at Niños Del Camino.

Street School Poverty is what drives most children to the streets.

More than a quarter – 27.6 percent – of Santo Domingo families lives in poverty, according to a 2009 Dominican National Office of Statistics report.

A report issued by Niños Del Camino that same year said that all of the children who came to the shelter were from a “very low socioeconomic level” and 77 percent had experienced some form of domestic violence before leaving their homes.

“The majority (of street kids) come from families where their most

Agustin Mora, (left) director of the shelter, tells a group of children about one of their friends who was attacked with a machete.

basic needs are not covered,” the report states.

Some children turn to the streets to help support their families, returning home at night. Others never go back.

Sixteen-year-old Manuel Antonio Santos has lived on the streets since he was 7. He occasionally visits his family in Los Guandules, a neighborhood that he describes as an “aggressive place.”

“I have my family at my house,” Manuel said in Spanish. “They give me everything so that I don’t stay in the street, but I leave because I don’t like it there.”

He has formed a new family on the streets – 13-year-old Eduard Arias and 18-year-old Jonathan Encarnación.

“I live in the street with my ‘brother’ Eduard, the small one,” Manuel said. “He’s my brother. In the street I have to protect him and get money, see?”

77

Tono Chelestine, 14, is new to the street and doesn’t mix much with other street children.

He often finds himself in fights.

Agustin Mora, the director of Niños Del Camino, said that kind of solidarity is very important for street kids. “They see themselves as a family,” he said.

Tono has yet to find a street family. At the shelter and on the streets, he keeps mostly to himself, and he’s often taunted and abused by other children, most of whom have lived on the streets of Santo Domingo for years.

To survive, he will need to make alliances and learn the street code from more experienced children.

“It’s like a school,” Mora said.

But this school can be a violent one. Tono said a man attempted to rape him a few days after he turned to the streets.

“I was in the street, a guy wanted to rape me. He took my money,” Tono said, imitating a knife held to his throat. “So he was telling me, ‘Look, do

Cesar Julio, 14, visits the shelter

you know what I have here? I have a knife. And do you know what you

along with many other street

are going to do now? What you’re going to do now is lay face down and

children to eat, bathe and wash

take your pants off. Got it?’”

their clothes.

Tono said he convinced the man to let him beg for money so he could pay for a prostitute instead.

Drugs and Violence As time passes, palomos often switch from becoming victims of crime to perpetrators. They say they do it to survive. And the longer they stay in the street, the more likely they are to use drugs.

Marijuana is the narcotic palomos use most, according to the 2009 Niños Del Camino annual report. They also consume cigarettes, crack and cocaine.

78

Yeison Baís, 19, has been homeless since he was a young child. He finds refuge from the violence of the streets at Niños Del Camino shelter.

Nearly all the children who visit the shelter use drugs, Ortega said.

“A lot of times they come (to the shelter) under the influence of drugs,” making social workers’ work more difficult, he said.

“They come when you’re looking for money. They give you crap,” Baís said. “They say that you can’t clean windshields here. They kick you out of your spot.”

The Dominican National Police Office declined

Niños Del Camino staff coined the word “streetiza-

repeated attempts for comment, but Mora said the

tion” – callejerización in Spanish – to describe the

claims are true. “They beat them, they send them

process by which violence and drugs become an

to jail with no justification,” he said. “It’s a way of

accepted routine.

creating fear.”

Some children eventually become leaders of small

Julio Cesar De la Rosa Tiburcio, director of

gangs of street kids, who band together at a stage

the Dominican Alliance against Corruption and

of what the staff calls “high exposition” to street life.

professor of law at the Autonomous University

That is what happened to Baís, the 19-year-old

of Santo Domingo, said his organization has

who visits Niños Del Camino to chill each week.

Baís is the leader of a group of about half-a-dozen youngsters who have claimed the intersection of 27

complained several times about police brutality.

Street kids are frequently robbed by police and sent to jail, De la Rosa said in a phone interview.

de Febrero and Lincoln Avenue, a high-crime area

“They do what they call raids, and they send

in the Dominican capital. They earn money by stop-

them to jail,” he added. “They put minors in jail with

ping cars and cleaning windshields.

adults.”

“I have been in the street for 14 years, but I have never been afraid of anything,” Baís said. “You have

Seasoned street kids like Baís say they aren’t afraid of the police.

to defend yourself,” he said. “If one wants to beat

“The cop who punches me, I hit him back right

you, you have to respond. Yes or no? You have to

away,” Baís said. “I sustain myself, but I don’t accept

respond. Those are the things of my life.”

being punched by anyone.”

Street violence sometimes extends beyond physical exchanges between palomos; the children also

Preparing to Close

complain of being abused by police.

If help doesn’t come soon, the Niños del Camino

79

Andres Castillo, 12, washes clothes at the Ni単os Del Camino shelter.

80

shelter may close. The primarily source of funding, which came from a

Pedro ‘Fifito’ Manuel Galbán,

regional government and a city in Spain, ended in May, Sosa said.

6, clean windshields with a

The Dominican government used to provide $10,000 pesos or about

squeegee and sponge on a

$270 a month for the shelter, but Sosa said the money stopped coming

street corner in Santo Domingo.

a year ago.

Another Niños del Camino shelter in northern Santo Domingo already has closed. It was a place where street kids could stay for extended periods of time, Sosa said.

The children who come to the shelter don’t know that it may shut down, she said. Part of the counselor’s work now is to prepare them to live without Niños del Camino’s assistance.

“We work with a view to teach them to move on,” Sosa said. “So that if the organization is not here anymore, they will know that they have to move on. And it’s hard, but you have to do it.”

One morning in mid-March shortly after the children arrived at the shelter, the counselors gathered them in a circle and asked them to each answer two questions: How do you feel and how did you wake up?

“Every one of them is an individual. Every one of them seeks a different kind of affection. And I think that affection starts with a smile as soon as they arrive here,” Sosa said. “They know that someone who will ask them, ‘How did you wake up?’ ‘How was last night?’”

As the children took their places in the circle, sitting on slab of concrete in the shelter’s back yard, Tono was the first to speak up.

“I didn’t sleep well,” he said.

“Why didn’t you sleep well?” Sosa asked.

“Because I slept in the street,” he replied. ■ 81

By Brandon Quester and Bastien Inzaurralde Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Abel Ortega, a social worker with Niños Del Camino, talks with Tono Chelestine, 14.

Street Kids Present Challenges

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – Little Pedro “Fifito” Manuel Galbán walks barefoot into

Camino, one of a handful of shelters in the city, takes their services to the streets.

oncoming traffic at the intersection of San Vincente

Social workers and volunteers introduce them-

de Paul St. and Mella highways in the Dominican

selves to the children and invite those without

capital.

homes to visit the shelter, which is open during the

A passenger bus stops, and the 6-year-

day-time, offering food, counseling and training in

old quickly climbs the grill guard, clutching a

life skills, said Natividad “Ana” Sosa, who works at

squeegee and water-soaked sponge in one hand.

the shelter.

As he starts swabbing, the bus driver swats at the

“From there, you build empathy … little by little,”

window with a folded newspaper and yells at Fifito

she said. “We adapt our street work to their rules.

to stop.

We are in their space. We are in the street, as they

A dozen or so street children watch the scene

say.”

and laugh. Although Fifito’s head barely reaches a

The work can be dangerous.

car door handle, he often earns more pesos than

Abel Ortega, a teacher from Spain who took

any other member of the group.

Fifito is one of nearly two-dozen street kids who survive by washing the windows of vehicles that clog the busy streets of the city’s Megacentro Zone.

They take their orders from Fifito’s mother, 27-year-old Maribel Galbán, who manages the

a year off to work with street children at Niños Del Camino, recently was assaulted and had his camera stolen while working on the streets.

“Challenges? There are a lot of them,” Ortega said, with a rueful laugh. “Really, every one of those children can be a challenge at any given time.”

children during the day and walks the sidewalks

But while the children – some as young as 6 –

as a prostitute at night. They all live together in a

are hardened by their street existence, Ortega

home Fifito’s mother rents.

said a little affection can go a long way.

The street kids are known as palomos, or rascals in Dominican slang.

Sometimes, he said, all they need is someone to listen. ■

To help these children, the staff of Niños Del 82

By Serena Del Mundo Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Lindsey Erin Lough

Island of Hispaniola Struggles to Control HIV

SAN PEDRO DE MACORIS, Dominican Republic

Ironically, the country may be too rich. Even

– Rammon ran into the makeshift hovel, kicked off

though more than 40 percent of its 10 million people

his dusty shoes and jumped into the arms of his

live in poverty and the average per capita income is

waiting brothers and sisters.

just $8,300 a year, the Global Fund categorizes the

The 5-year-old’s forehead was smeared with

Dominican Republic as “lower-middle income.”

green paint – evidence of a school day filled with art

Compounding the problem is the fact that the

and activity. Victoria Guzman, his stand-in mother,

Global Fund’s overall support for HIV treatment

picked him up and planted a slobbery kiss on one

is down. At an October meeting with its donors in

plump cheek.

New York, the fund’s managers outlined what could

The only difference between Rammon and his

be achieved with various funding levels ranging

brothers and sisters, said Guzman, is the “vitamin”

from $12 billion to $21 billion. Donors subsequently

he takes every morning. That “vitamin” is Zidovudine

pledged $11.7 billion.

– an antiretroviral that keeps Rammon’s HIV load low and his infection-fighting CD4 cells high.

Funding took another hit after The Associated Press reported in January on corruption in the

Rammon contracted HIV from his biological mother,

administration of grants supported by the Global

who left him in Guzman’s care when he was just 25

Fund. The AP cited the fund’s own investigative

days old. The drugs he takes would normally cost

report into grant recipients suspected of forging

almost $2,000 a year, but he gets them free, thanks

documents and pocketing money.

to international health agencies that fund much of the HIV treatment in the Dominican Republic.

Global Fund officials attacked the article for “serious misrepresentations and factual inaccura-

Now that funding is in jeopardy.

cies.” A follow-up AP story cited fund officials and

The Global Fund, the world’s leading financer

outside experts who said the Global Fund has less

of programs to fight AIDS, TB and malaria, gave

corruption and fights it more aggressively than most

the Dominican Republic almost $82 million over a

aid organizations, but the damage had been done.

seven-year period for HIV prevention and treatment

“Some donors have suspended their contributions

efforts. But that funding is expected to drop dramati-

to the Global Fund,” spokeswoman Marcela Rojo

cally in coming years.

said.

83

Rammon Hernandez, 5, cuddles with his father, who is visiting the foster home where Rammon has lived since his mother died.

84

Rammon has lived with Victoria

We are at a critical crossroads,” said Sharonann Lynch, HIV/AIDS policy

Guzman since he was an

adviser for Doctors Without Borders during an open webcast. “You have

infant. He has HIV, which he

a situation that the funds available for treating HIV, for scaling up preven-

contracted at birth from his

tion is shrinking right at the moment we can get ahead of new infections.”

mother.

HIV Help An art class at school has left

The island of Hispaniola, which the Dominican Republic shares with

Rammon with a smear of paint

Haiti, has the highest HIV rates in the world outside of sub-Saharan

on his forehead.

Africa, according to the United Nations.

In three of the largest cities, including the capital of Santo Domingo, HIV rates range from 1 percent to 9.9 percent. The U.S. rate of HIV infection, by comparison, is about 0.2 percent of the general population.

Far fewer people die of AIDS than once was the case. AIDS-related deaths have dropped worldwide by 40 percent since antiretroviral drugs have become widely available, according to the United Nations.

Expensive antiretrovirals were largely unavailable to poor people in developing countries like the Dominican Republic until the late 1990s and the early 2000s when international humanitarian agencies and world leaders made it a priority. Among the agencies that have been working on the problem are the Global Fund, former President George

Opposite page: Leona Adolfo

W. Bush’s President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief, the U.S. Agency

of MOSCTHA, a nonprofit that

for International Development and the Clinton Foundation, founded by

aids Haitians in the Dominican

former President Bill Clinton.

Republic, counsels residents

Not only do the drugs save the lives of those being treated, they save

of a batey near Santo Domingo

the lives of those closest to them. Patients on these medications have a

about safe sex practices. Photo

decreased viral load, making it less likely for HIV to spread from mother

by Michel Duarte

to child or from husband to wife. There is less maternal mortality, less

85

infant mortality, less tuberculosis – the benefits go and on, Lynch said.

For children like Rammon, the medications mean the chance to live a reasonably normal life.

imbalanced and unequal.”

There are two main branches of the Dominican health system – public and private. Eddy PerezThen, director of the country’s National Research

“When Rammon entered our clinic, he was a bag

Center for Maternal and Child Health, said the

of bones,” said his physician, Michael Dohn. His

private branch is largely available only to wealthier

transformation is nothing short of a miracle, Dohn

Dominicans. The public branch provides access for

said.

about 75 percent of the population, but there is no

But that miracle depends in large part on interna-

guarantee to access or quality of services.

tional aid, said Bethania Betances, program officer

If the government has to pay the costs of expen-

in Santo Domingo for UNAIDS, the United Nations

sive drugs, procedures and prevention for HIV

program to combat and prevent the disease.

patients, some fear that at-risk groups could be

“The HIV response in the country is being moved by international funds,” she said.

pushed out of the system based on their immigration and economic status.

Betances worries that the Dominican government

“What we’re hoping for the Global Fund to see

will have to fill in the treatment gaps as funding

is that even though we are a middle-class country,

dries up, which would strain an already overloaded

there is a lot of inequity,” said UNAIDS Monitoring

public-health system.

and Evaluation Adviser Yordana Dolores.

Health care is available to all Dominican residents.

And that would leave people like Pablo, a Haitian

Anyone can go to their local hospital, get tested

man without papers, living with HIV in San Pedro de

for HIV and, if they test positive, get the necessary

Macoris, unable to get treatment.

medications. However, that doesn’t mean health care is equal for everyone.

One Man’s Treatment

“The Dominican Republic claims universal access

When Pablo, who did not want to give his last

to health care, but that’s not the case even for

name, comes into the local clinic’s office, he creates

poor Dominicans,” said international public health

a buzz. He is tall and handsome and has an infec-

specialist Judith Kaine. “The roll-out of services is

tious smile that remains even as he recounts his 86

Daysi

Payano

works

with

HIV patients at the Clinica Esperanza y Caridad

in San

Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic.

personal struggle.

“When I found out I had HIV, I wanted to die,” he says matter-of-factly.

Pablo becomes animated as he tells his story of

with HIV. “I know firsthand . . . how to live with it, because it’s in my blood, so I want to help people who have it” Payano said.

living as a gay man with HIV in a country in which 95

Payano is a force at the clinic. People seek her

percent of the population is Catholic and gay people

out constantly, interrupting meetings and thrusting

often encounter strong disapproval.

messages in her face. She glides through the clinic

When he was diagnosed with HIV, Pablo assumed

and calmly handles all demands.

he was going to die, just like his partner before him.

She says she is a consultant at the clinic, but she

“The people in his barrio, his mom and dad, think

is much more: She is an advocate for people living

he died of lung cancer,” Pablo said of his partner. “I know he died of HIV.”

with HIV, like Pablo.

With his family now gone, Pablo said he consider

Soon after his partner’s death, Haiti was hit by

Payano and the people at the clinic his family. He

the 7.0 magnitude earthquake that killed more than

celebrates holidays with the clinic staff and members

300,000 people and left 1 million homeless.

of his therapy group for people living with HIV.

“All of my family died in the earthquake,” Pablo said. “And the pain was killing me.”

“They don’t discriminate, and they don’t care if I’m gay,” he said.

What saved him, Pablo said, was support from

And every day, Pablo takes his medication —

Clínica Esperanza y Caridad and the encourage-

antiretrovirals that physician Luisa Reyes said are

ment of clinic staff members like Daysi Payano.

provided by the Global Fund.

Clínica Esperanza y Caridad, like many other health clinics, was started with funds from the Clinton Foundation. It continues to operate with public and private funding.

Payano heard about Pablo’s case and went to his

“I have a cell phone that I set for 9 a.m. and 9 p.m., and I take one pill each time,” Pablo said.

These pills allow Pablo to leave his house and embrace life again. And they make it possible for Rammon to run home from school covered with

house. She told him again and again that he was not

green paint.

going to die. She told him that she, too, was living

For now. ■

87

By Serena Del Mundo Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photo by Lindsey Erin Lough

Sex Trade Flourishes in Dominican Republic

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – As a

tion grows, so does its sex tourism, according to the

“Almost always a sex worker starts because of a friend or because she was a child who has been sexually abused or she has a very bad husband. To me, all three of these happened.”

U.S. Agency for International Development’s profile

– Jacqueline Montero,

worker in the Dominican Republic’s burgeoning sex trade, Odalis, a 34-year-old mother of three, has been gang raped, robbed and harassed.

But she keeps selling her body, mostly on weekends, she said, so she can feed her children.

There is no law that explicitly prohibits or legalizes prostitution in the Dominican Republic, a country that has developed lavish resorts along its beautiful beaches.

But as the country’s popularity as a tourist destina-

president of MODEMU

on HIV/AIDS in the Dominican Republic.

The

Center

for

Integral

Orientation

and

Investigation, a non-governmental organization for

the Dominican Republic’s sex trade.

sexual and reproductive health in the Dominican

“I remember a time when a man took me for a

Republic, estimates there are almost 100,000 sex

long distance way up in the mountains and started

workers in this country of 10 million.

to beat me,” she said.

While sex work is most prevalent in large cities

Her voice was calm, her face expressionless, as

and tourist areas, according to researchers at Johns

she recounted how the man proceeded to attack

Hopkins and COIN, many sex workers like Odalis

her physically and sexually, again and again.

have local clients.

“I was just looking up saying, ‘Don’t kill me.’”

Odalis has a youthful face and a girlish physique.

While Odalis continues in the sex trade, she has

One day in late spring, she was dressed casually in

found an advocate in Jacqueline Montero, the presi-

leggings and a fitted T-shirt. She quietly described

dent of MODEMU, Movimiento de Mujeres Unidas

her experiences working for more than 14 years in

or Movement of United Women. Montero, a former 88

sex worker, now spends her days fighting for the

Republic,” spent years researching the sex trade in

rights of sex workers in the Dominican Republic.

those countries.

MODEMU was established in 1996 after the first

“MODEMU has been very successful in educating

congress of sex workers in the Dominican Republic.

women (in the sex trade) of their rights, letting them

It is made up of current sex workers, like Odalis, and

know they have labor rights, human rights and giving

former ones, like Montero.

them language and tools to defend themselves,”

The organization, which is dedicated to promoting the human rights of commercial sex workers,

Cabezas said. MODEMU “raises their self-esteem and their knowledge of sex practices.”

educates prostitutes on how to limit their exposure

She and Montero said a major problem facing sex

to AIDS and offers support for those hoping to tran-

worker advocacy organizations such as MODEMU is

sition out of the sex trade.

lack of resources. A religious organization that once

“Almost always a sex worker starts because of a

helped fund Montero’s group recently decreased its

friend or because she was a child who has been

contributions, which will make it difficult for women

sexually abused or she has a very bad husband,”

to develop literacy skills and support systems to

Montero said. “To me, all three of these happened.”

leave the sex trade for other jobs, Cabezas said.

Montero has turned her life around. She was

Meanwhile, Odalis continues to meet her three

elected to Santo Domingo’s city council and plans

johns on the weekends. When she leaves for work,

to run for Congress in 2016 in order to “promulgate

she locks her 13-year-old son in his room until her

a law that will respect the rights of my compatriots,”

return. He knows what she does and wishes she

she said.

wouldn’t “go out” anymore.

She also has been asked to speak at conferences and meetings in the U.S. University of California, Riverside, Women Studies Professor of Amalia Cabezas hosted a fundraiser at

“He hears things and he worries,” Odalis said.

Odalis’ dreams for her four children are the dreams of most parents – a respectable job, a good education, health.

her home for Montero’s presentation to her class.

But Odalis adds one more wish: that her four chil-

Cabezas, who wrote the book “Economies of

dren will never be drawn into the industry that has

Desire: Sex and Tourism in Cuba and the Dominican

sustained them. ■

89

By Bastien Inzaurralde Cronkite Borderlands Initiative Photos by Lindsay Erin Lough

Dirty and Dangerous Water Threatens Country’s Health

BATEY NINE, Dominican Republic – Christin Morin has to stop and think about the last time he drank water that was really clean.

Independencia,

the

poverty-stricken

province

where Batey 9 is located, near the border with Haiti.

Julis said the recent arrival of so many Haitian

It’s been a couple of months since the 54-year-

immigrants in these villages — the three bateyes

old agricultural worker and his wife had a few spare

have a total population of 5,000 – have made

pesos to buy chlorine or potable water, so they rely

already poor sanitary conditions and the lack of

on water from the Batey 9 village tank. The water is

access to drinkable water even worse.

free and accessible but also dirty and dangerous.

“Health issues started to become more acute, as

Birds sometimes get trapped in a tiny hole in the

families with boys and girls arrived in not so good

tank and die inside. When villagers turn on faucets in their homes, they may get a sickening mixture of water, feathers and dirt.

Running water and drinkable water are not synonymous here.

condition,” he said.

In addition, an outbreak of cholera Haiti in late 2010 that killed nearly 5,000 people prompted widespread concern that the disease would spread to the Dominican Republic. This year,

“The water doesn’t receive the treatment that is

there have been 1,681 confirmed cases of cholera

needed to make it suitable for human consump-

and 56 deaths in the Dominican Republic as of

tion,” said David Perez Julis, mayor of the munic-

June 18, according to the General Directorate of

ipal district that oversees bateyes 7, 8 and 9, where

Epidemiology of the Dominican Ministry of Public

nearly 700 Haitians have settled since the 2010

Health.

earthquake in their country.

“At times, some women have come to me and told me, ‘I turned the faucet on in my house to drink water and I saw small birds and water insects,’” Julis said.

Those fears are most acute in border provinces such as Independencia, according to the Ministry of Public Health.

While cholera raises alarms, however, diarrhea is a much more common health problem.

Waterborne diseases – often the result of poor

A nuisance in the U.S., diarrhea causes half the

sanitation and lack of treated, drinkable water

deaths of children under age 1 in the Dominican

– that are a rarity elsewhere are common in

Republic, according to the Pan American Health 90

Jorge Garcia Feliz, 8 months old, is sick with diarrhea as a result of drinking Batey 9’s water, according to his parents, Betti Feliz and Evanson Florestae, who say they can’t afford to buy purified water or medicine for him. Photo

by Lindsay Erin Lough 91

92

Organization.

And in places like Independencia, the problems are even worse. A little more than 21 percent of

“It’s not purified or they don’t boil it. They don’t chlorinate it and the children get sick. It causes them diarrhea,” she said.

children in the province contracted diarrhea over

Ramirez Aquino’s clinic, called a Unit of Primary

a two-week period, compared to 14.7 percent of

Care, is a small, under-stocked building of the

children in the rest of the country, according to

Dominican Ministry of Public Health that is reach-

the 2007 Demographics and Health Report by the

able only by dirt roads. The clinic has one doctor

Dominican Center for Social and Demographical

and five nurses to serve nearly 5,000 area resi-

Studies. The mortality rate in the province was

dents. A dermatologist comes every Tuesday, as

44 deaths per 1,000 children under 5 in 2007,

contaminated water also causes skin problems.

compared to a national rate of 36 percent,

Patients needing treatment that can’t be provided

according to The Dominican National Office of

by the clinic are either sent to the hospital in nearby

Statistics.

Tamayo or to a bigger health center in the neigh-

Low levels of vaccination for common diarrheal

boring province of Barahona.

diseases are part of the problem. Fewer than half

Rosa-Helena Feliz, a teacher who also works

the children in Independencia get a full series of

as a health promoter in Batey 9, said that in addi-

vaccinations, according to the National Office of

tion to bringing children to the clinic, parents often

Statistics, and 7 percent get no vaccines at all.

bring sick children to her home, where she gives

The most recent child death was last year in

them a serum made of three spoons of sugar, a

Batey 8, when a mother settled in the community

pinch of salt and a liter of clean water. She doesn’t

with a child who was already weak and later died of

prescribe medicine because she doesn’t have any.

complications from diarrhea, said Beneco Enecia,

When Feliz’s nephew, 6-month-old Diego Antonio

former mayor of the three bateyes and head of the

Perez Feliz, came down with a severe case of diar-

non-profit Center for Sustainable Development.

rhea, his mother took him to the hospital in Tamayo.

Alexandra Ramirez Aquino, a nurse in Batey 8’s

The mother, Virginia Feliz Santana, said that even

clinic, said impure water is responsible for most of

though she buys drinkable water for the baby, he

the diarrhea in the community.

vomited and had diarrhea for five days.

93

Opposite page: Lucien Sanchez Feliz scoops water off a dirt street in Batey 9, a poor area near the border of the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

Miguel Gomez waits to buy water from a truck that brings purified water to villagers in Batey 9.

“The fever increased after three days. He was really sick; he had hard stomach ache,” Feliz Santana said. “With all this happening, I felt the pressure increasing in me.”

Doctors could not tell her precisely what sickened her baby, just that “it was a virus that was around,” she said.

Not every batey resident will go to the hospital, even if they are desperately ill. Some fear being caught by immigration authorities at military checkpoints – there are two between the bateyes and the hospital in Tamayo, said Tomas Leyba, the head of the Red Cross in Independencia.

Most batey residents are Haitian or of Haitian descent and considered undocumented under a Dominican law that has overturned birthright citizenship. Nearly half of the population in bateyes 7, 8 and 9 is undocumented, Enecia said.

Lucien Sanchez Feliz has the important job of keeping the village water tank in working order. The cistern provides water for most of the village, but it often contains dirt and debris.

The Dominican Republic has a universal health care system that provides basic medical treatment free to all, but there are still some expenses – including medications – that some residents can’t afford.

“I was buying all the drugs. I was buying everything,” said Feliz Santana of her baby’s hospital stay.

But Enecia, whose center provides health assistance to poor resi-

On the web: Drinking con-

dents of the bateyes, said the real issue is how to prevent illness in the

taminated water can cause

first place.

widespread illness and even

“You not only get sick because you drink the (non-purified) water directly. A lot of times, it’s because it is misused after it comes out of the

death. But many Dominicans have no other option.

faucet,” said Enecia, who said water is often stored in dirty containers.

A lack of sanitary restrooms plays a part in the spread of waterborne

http://cronkite.asu.edu/

diseases. Only one in five Independencia homes had a bathroom in

buffett/dr/unsafe_water.

94

Yonei Feliz Cuevas fills

2007, according to the statistics office. Most families – 55.20 percent

bottles of purified water

– had access to latrines, but 23.75 percent did not have access to any

for Batey 9 resident Naica

kind of toilet.

Feliz. A gallon of water costs about three cents.

“A lot of people don’t have bathrooms or latrines . . . and they defecate outside,” Julis said. “It’s something that we’ve been trying to eradicate for several years.”

Marubell Feliz Santana consid-

Other realities, like the presence of animals and children wandering

ers a cup of water that is con-

naked in the village, increase chances of diarrheal diseases as people

taminated with bird feces and

are more likely to be in contact with excrement. The lack of plumbing

dirt. She gets most of her water

in the bateyes promotes the spread of cholera, diarrhea and dengue,

from the village’s water cistern.

a mosquito-spread disease, said Miguel Carvajal, an engineer for the National Institute of Potable Water in Independencia.

Community efforts to improve the situation face numerous challenges — money being one of the biggest.

“The majority cannot buy bottled water, so we explain to them how to put drops of chlorine in a gallon of water – five drops of chlorine for a gallon of water – or how to boil it before they give it to the children,” said Ramirez Aquino, the clinic nurse.

But Batey residents often don’t follow recommendation to chlorinate water, said Carvajal. Some are plain resistant.

Dieula Blanc, a Haitian woman who moved to Batey 9 after the earthquake, refuses to chlorinate her water and simply drinks it as it comes out of the tap. Blanc is afraid that if she gets used to filtered water, she will get sick when she returns to Haiti, where she drinks from the river.

Morin, the agricultural worker, said he is used to drinking water from the batey’s tank but his wife, Jean, frequently feels sick. She has had dizzy spells, intense headaches and stomach aches for nearly

95

Osmila Torres, 2, drinks Coca-Cola from a cup held by her mother. The soft drink costs 15 pesos, or about 40 cents, while five gallons of purified water from the batey’s grocery store costs 35 pesos, or about 90 cents.

five years. But they have little choice. The Morins live in a dark and decayed hut. There is no sink in their kitchen. They store water in a plastic bucket and cook with charcoal. They say they can’t buy water on his income of about 200 pesos a day – about $5.20.

“A lot of times, people don’t have the 30 pesos (about 80 cents) once every two or three days to buy water,” said William Decena, pastor for a local church. That’s the price charged by the water-selling truck that comes from Barahona on Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays; a gallon at Batey 9’s grocery costs several times that much.

A new water-purifying system has been built behind the church with help from G.O. Ministries, an American nonprofit. A gallon of the church’s water is less than 3 cents, and 5 gallons cost 5 pesos – about 14 cents.

Yonei Feliz Cuevas, who purifies and sells the water, said a hut-byhut educational campaign was launched to inform residents of the new system and some are taking to it. Up to 40 families a day now buy water from the new system – and Cuevas said he has had to stay at the church at night to keep water thieves away.

But not everyone is convinced. And change comes slowly here – even for the man in charge of the new water system.

On the same day that water began to be sold behind his own church,

Maria Lita worries about her son William Lita Feliz (left), who has lost a lot of weight because of severe diarrhea, a common consequence of drinking untreated water.

A woman washes clothes with the free but untreated water from a village tank.

Decena bought two gallons outside Batey 9. He had forgotten that cheap, pure water was now available in his own village. ■

96

Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Cronkite Student Reporters

Joshua Armstrong: Armstrong is a graduate

media journalism and was a fellow in the national

student at the Cronkite School and a former

News21 program last summer. Her internships

reporter and copy editor at the Fairbanks (Alaska)

include

Daily News-Miner. A native of Bradenton, Fla., he

CNN. She is a Carnegie Fellow with ABC News’

earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism at the

Investigative Unit in New York this summer.

CBSNews.com,

ABCNews.com

and

University of Florida before entering ASU in fall 2010.

Carie Gladding: Gladding moved to Arizona from Santa Cruz, Calif., last year to enter Cronkite’s

Serena Del Mundo: Originally from the tiny island

graduate program. She earned her undergraduate

of Guam, Del Mundo is one of the first participants of

degree from Ohio University with a major in broad-

a joint program that brings students from the Mayo

cast journalism and a minor in film. She has profes-

Medical School in Rochester, Minn., to Cronkite for

sional experience working in both television and

a condensed one-year master’s program in jour-

film.

nalism. She has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a minor in marketing from San Jose State

Joanne Ingram: A Cronkite graduate student,

University. She hopes to use her training at the

Ingram holds a bachelor’s degree in communi-

Cronkite School to report on international human

cation from the University of New Mexico. She

rights issues.

is interested in print journalism, and her articles have been published in a number of newspapers,

Michel Duarte: Born and raised in Brazil, Duarte

including the East Valley Tribune and the Tucson

has lived and worked in countries such as Wales,

Sentinel. She is reporting on food safety issues this

Turkey and Morocco. He is currently a photo intern

summer as a Carnegie-Knight News21 fellow.

at The Arizona Republic and plans to graduate from the Cronkite School in December 2012 with

Bastien Inzaurralde: Inzaurralde is a Fulbright

a degree in journalism. His specialties are visual

Scholar in the Cronkite School’s graduate program.

media and multimedia production.

A native of France, he earned a master’s in journalism with a broadcast focus in Grenoble, France,

Lauren Gilger: A graduate of Fordham University,

and interned for several print and broadcast orga-

Gilger completed the Cronkite master’s program

nizations in Paris. His reporting interests include

earlier this year. She studied broadcast and multi-

international, immigration and social issues.

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Lindsay Erin Lough: Lough is a Mayo Medical

“ABC World News” and “World News Now,” and

Student studying for her master’s degree at

he co-produced a live election town hall with ABC

Cronkite. She graduated from Princeton University

News and Facebook in 2010. He has interned at the

in 2007 with a major in ecology and evolutionary

NBC affiliate in Phoenix and attended the Institute

biology and two minors in Hellenic studies and

on Political Journalism at Georgetown University

environmental studies. She volunteered on the

while interning at a digital media company in

Los Amigos Research Station in the Amazon Rain

Washington.

Forest of Peru and is an avid photographer and photojournalist.

Whitney Phillips: Phillips received a bachelor’s degree in mass communication from Dixie State

Tarryn Mento: An aspiring multimedia journalist,

College of Utah before entering the Cronkite

Mento holds a degree in journalism from the

School’s graduate program last year. She worked

University at Albany in New York. She was a staff

as a section editor and staff writer for her college

writer for the student newspaper and an edito-

newspaper. She is reporting on food safety this

rial intern for the Times Union newspaper. She is

summer as a News 21 Carnegie-Knight fellow.

reporting on food safety this summer as a CarnegieKnight News21 fellow.

Brandon Quester: After earning his undergraduate degree from the Cronkite School, Quester worked

Nick Newman: A native of Utah, Newman holds

for five years as a photographer and reporter,

a degree in print journalism from Brigham Young

a backcountry wilderness guide, wild land fire-

University. He interned for the Deseret News in Salt

fighter and volunteer backcountry ranger with the

Lake City in sports and online and social media and

National Park Service and Student Conservation

worked for the paper as a religion reporter. He is

Association. He returned to Cronkite last year to

reporting this summer in Washington, D.C., for the

pursue a master’s degree and study multimedia

new Cronkite News Service Washington bureau.

journalism.

Nathan O’Neal: O’Neal is pursuing a combined

Cristina Rayas: Rayas is pursuing a dual bach-

bachelor’s and master’s degree in journalism. At

elor’s and master’s program at Cronkite. She also

Cronkite, he was bureau chief for the ABC News

completed a minor in urban and metropolitan

on Campus bureau. His work has appeared on

studies at the ASU College of Public Programs. She 98

Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

was a News21 fellow last summer, reporting on the

Dustin Volz: Volz is pursuing both a master’s and

relationship between violent crime and immigra-

bachelor’s degree in journalism while also studying

tion and was co-director, producer and writer for

American history. He has interned for The Arizona

the 2009 student documentary “Voices Behind the

Republic as a copy editor and online-content

Veils.” She has interned at KCNC-TV in Denver —

coordinator, covered the state legislature for the

her hometown.

Arizona Capitol Times and written a column for ASU’s student newspaper. He is a managing editor

Lisa Ruhl: Ruhl completed her undergraduate

of the Downtown Devil, a student-run online news

degree in communications at Westfield State

site. He is reporting on food safety this summer as

before coming to the Cronkite School to study

a Carnegie-Knight News21 fellow.

broadcast and multimedia journalism. While at Cronkite, she worked as a Carnegie-Knight News21 fellow reporting on immigration issues along the U.S.-Mexico border. She also served as director, reporter, and anchor for Cronkite NewsWatch, the school’s award-winning student-produced newscast. She earned her master’s degree in May 2011.

Lisa Ruhl also created web pages and gave multimedia support for this project.

Stephanie Snyder: Snyder is pursuing a dual master’s and bachelor’s degree at Cronkite as well as a minor in Spanish. She was a breaking news intern for The Arizona Republic and covered the state legislature for the Arizona Capital Times. She also is a managing editor of the Downtown Devil, an independent, student-run online news publication that she co-founded. She is reporting on food safety this summer as a Carnegie-Knight News21 fellow.

99

Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Cronkite Student Reporters

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Student Reporters Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

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Leadership Team Cronkite Borderlands Initiative

Leadership Team

Rick

Rodriguez:

Cronkite

Orleans. She conducts training at newspapers and

School’s Carnegie Professor of Journalism. The

for newspaper associations nationally and interna-

former executive editor of The Sacramento (Calif.)

tionally.

Rodriguez

is

the

Bee, Rodriguez was the first Latino president of the American Society of News Editors. He came to the

Steve Crane: Crane is director of the Cronkite

Cronkite School in 2008 to develop a new cross-

News Service bureau in Washington, D.C., directing

disciplinary specialization in the coverage of issues

Cronkite students as they cover the nation’s capital.

related to Latinos and the U.S.-Mexico border.

Crane was a political reporter and editor for The

Rodriguez is known nationally as a champion of

Washington Times before directing the D.C. bureau

watchdog journalism and newsroom diversity.

of the University of Maryland’s Capital News Service, where his students won numerous awards

Jason Manning: Manning is director of student

for their reporting. For five years before joining the

media at ASU, serving as adviser and publisher

Cronkite School, he was assistant dean at University

to the university’s student-run news outlets. He

of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism.

teaches at the Cronkite School and served as the managing editor for ASU’s News21 project — part

Nic Lindh: Lindh is the Cronkite School Web master

of a 12-university consortium that provides profes-

and instructional technology analyst. He built the

sional-level journalism experience for students. He

school’s website and the site for Cronkite News and

previously was politics editor for washingtonpost.

helps faculty and students use technology. He also

com, where he led the website’s coverage of the

has taught graphic design at the school. Prior to

federal government and national campaign politics.

coming to ASU, he worked as a writer, programmer and system administrator.

Kristin Gilger: Gilger is associate dean in charge of professional programs at the Cronkite School.

She came to the university in 2002 as director of student media. Previously she served as deputy managing editor for news at The Arizona Republic, as managing editor of The Statesman Journal newspaper in Salem, Ore., and in various editing positions at the Times-Picayune newspaper in New 108

Cronkite student Bastien Inzaurralde reviews his notes after an interview in the Dominican Republic.

Photo by Michel Duarte 109

110

The Cronkite School has been covering immigration and border issues since 2006 with the generous support of the

Howard G. Buffett Foundation

Members of the Cronkite reporting team have breakfast with RaĂşl H. Yzaguirre, U.S. ambassador to the Dominican Republic.

Photo by Michel Duarte

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