HORIZONTE’s One Year Anniversary Show

Sept. 16, 2004

Transcript:

>> José Cárdenas:
Good evening, I'm José Cárdenas. Welcome to our "Horizonte" anniversary show. Tonight, we celebrate the first year of "Horizonte." From in-depth discussions with national and local figures, to analysis of social and political issues, as well as covering the community, arts and culture all through a Hispanic lens. Join us as we look back on the first year of "Horizonte."

>> José Cárdenas:
For the past year, "Horizonte" has provided the forum for Hispanic perspectives on issues affecting the Latino community. Here is a look back at some highlights.

>> José Cárdenas|
Moving from politics to immigration, they are interrelated at least in this sense, there seems to be a rising tide of anti-immigrant sentiment. Do you agree with that and do you have that having any impact in the upcoming elections?

>> Henry Cisneros:
I think it's not a national rising tide against immigrants. I think -- in fact, there is a tremendous appreciation for what immigrants mean in this economy and what they've meant for our cities and so forth. I do think that it is in some places pretty sharp as in Arizona, where we've seen the vigilantes across the border and some of the statewide measures targeted against immigrants beginning to rear their head again.

>> José Cárdenas:
You have been quoted as saying that there is an immigrant wave. -- this was a promo to your speech about talking about how Latin immigrants are establishing a lasting and growing presence unlike other immigrant groups. What did you mean by that? Is it the constant refreshment in terms of the numbers of immigrants?

>> Ray Suarez:
That's exactly it. If you graph the arrival pattern of every other major immigrant wave of the last 150 years, there's a run-up, a spike, a subsidence and then an almost complete petering out, whether it's Germans, Irish, Italians, Eastern EUropean Jews. They all had a run-up, peak, subsidence and diminishment in the numbers.

>> José Cárdenas:
What are your duties as the head of I.C.E.?

>> Michael Garcia:
I'm not the head of I.C.E., but I run the different divisions one to make sure that we continue in our traditional missions. That our agents are out there investigating, but then to look at how do we make this work better because we are now one agency. Where do we see opportunities to address old problems in new ways and bring our new tools to the fight, alien smuggling is a good example of that, and how do we face new Homeland Security challenges. How do we look at border security, air security, in new ways, bringing these tools working together in new, more efficient and effective way to his protect Homeland Security.

>> José Cárdenas:
Let's talk about that before we go to your book. You are one of the anchors of one of the most watched news shows in the country. In Miami, Houston, Los Angeles it, out polls or outdraws all of the major network news shows. You've been described as one of the most powerful Hispanics in the country? What's your reaction?

>> Jorge Ramos:
I'm not sure if I am powerful enough. I wish I could give one immigrant a green card. I can't. But I can voice their concerns. So, as you know, before the interviews, we always have some time to talk with powerful people, and I've had the opportunity to talk to George Bush senior, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, with John Kerry, and before the interviews and after the interviews, we get to talk about pretty important things for Latinos, especially right now an amnesty, about the fact that 300,000 Latinos have lost their jobs in the last three years. About the fact that 40% of Latinos are poor. 6 out of 10 Latinos do not have health insurance. That's my job. I'm a bridge between those who sometimes don't have a voice and those who have a lot of power.

>> Raul Yzaguirre:
We have an umbrella organization for 300-some odd community organization, like Chicano por la Causa. Then the work serves 4.5 million people each year by serving -- I mean, they provide healthcare, educational services, through charter schools or a variety of educational apparatus, mechanisms. Housing, and employment and training programs. That's basically our work. We're better known for what we do in public policy. We try to understand what's happening in our community, that is to demographics, the income levels, the characteristics of our community, and then we try to do something about it.

>> José Cárdenas:
Do you see a departure of Hispanics from the church? If so, what it is being done to bring them back?

>> Thomas Olmsted:
Sadly I see a departure of not only Hispanics but others as well from the church. That's partly due to a culture that has less connectedness with the Jewish Christian tradition that we have. We also have a number of Hispanics moving into this region and when people move into a region, it takes time for them to get connected with a parish and to become involved with the church.

>> Reporter Mike Sauceda:
He met with local leaders and also held a meeting with several Mexican dignitaries and Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano. She later introduced him at a luncheon.

>> Governor Janet Napolitano:
The president of Mexico, Mr. Vicente Fox. [ APPLAUSE ]

>> President Vicente Fox:
Again, thank you very much for this invitation. Because this has been an important day for better relationship between Sonora, Mexico and Arizona and the United States. This is a great day for improving and enhancing this ancient tie and relationship we have. I'm really pleased to be here this day, to be here at this luncheon with the business community of Arizona.

>> José Cárdenas:
What do you consider to be your number one priority for the Arizona-Sonora relationship?

>> Governor Janet Napolitano:
I think where we should be focusing on is commerce and trade and what I would loosely call cultural and tourism exchange. There is always a temptation to focus on solely the immigration issues, but those are controlled primarily by the federal governments of our respective countries, so we need to focus on the areas where we can do the most good and have the most positive impact.

>> José Cárdenas:
You mentioned one of the benefits from a guest worker program is that it would enhance Homeland Security. How would it do that?

>> Jeff Flake:
You bet. Right now we focus so much attention simply trying to catch those who are coming here to work, and that's 99.5% of those who are coming across the border are simply coming for economic reasons and we're focusing all of our attention on them. If we have a program for them to go into, a legal program, then they can go through the legal ports of entry, and that will free up a lot of resources to actually target those who would actually come to do us harm, those who are coming for nefarious reasons.

>> José Cárdenas:
Is this going to affect --

>> Kathy McKee:
I don't think so. 80-85% of our 2000, 2200 supporters are still very, very loyal Protect Arizona Now and to the same ideals we started with. You had a small really vocal vicious minority try a hostile takeover with the outside group's bottomless pit of money and it didn't work.

>> José Cárdenas:
Would you put in perspective what we're seeing at the border?

>> Ruben Beltran:
We have seen these years a tremendous number of deaths taking place, particularly in the area pertaining to the Tohono O'odham reservation and also the corridor -- the Douglas corridor. This is the deadliest season ever and the amount of deaths are enormous.

>> José Cárdenas:
Humane borders, is placing water stations at the border to all of this?

>> Emilia Banuelos:
That's not the answer, any human being has to be moved by these deaths of young people, of old people, of men and women, humane borders -- it's not the solution to put water. We would have to put water every five feet. That's not the solution. But, something needs to be done.

>> José Cárdenas:
Why has the level of violence increased?

>> Angel Rascon:
Primarily, it's due to a number of factors, but the added increase along the border by the border patrol and other enforcement activities along the southwestern borders has increased the value of each person being smuggled across the borders and into Phoenix and this, of course, is the hub of the human trafficking organizations.

>> So we have one half to negative second. Cesar, what's my little shortcut?

>> Reporter Merry Lucero:
These Tolleson high school students toil away in what appears to be a typical math class, but it isn't. This is Roedel math. These students are packing two years of math course noose one. It's part of Roedel community scholars, a unique program that pairs honor students with schools that report high drop out rates.

>> Raul Cardenas:
The school has been interested in how do we impact our undergraduate business students to have a greater sense of civic leadership, civic understanding, and best way that we felt we could do that is to ground them in the skills they know.

>> José Cárdenas:
Senator this, bill has been here before. The first argument that's made against it is the same one you hear every time it comes up, and that is, aren't we rewarding people who are here illegally by doing this.

>> Pete Rios:
You know, and I look at it differently, Jose. What I see is that allowing immigrants that are here, whether they are here legally or undocumented, the fact is that allowing them to have driver's licenses is good public policy.

>> José Cárdenas:
Representative Barnes, those sound like good reasons to support such a measure, but you are opposed. What's wrong with this proposal?

>> Ray Barnes:
The problem that we have with driver's licenses, Jose, is the fact that it's tantamount to citizenship. It's been used as verification of the fact that you are a legal resident when you get on an airplane. If we start allowing illegals to use driver's licenses, then pretty soon it's the state department, Homeland Security will come in and say, okay, now we require that you have a passport as proof of citizenship before you can get onto an airplane to go from here to Boston.

>> Reporter Mike Sauceda:
A full house at the consulate general of Mexico in Phoenix on a hot summer day. A good portion of the people are in line for an item hotter than the summer weather, the metricula consular. The card has been getting a lot of attention recently, it's not new.

>> Alan Hubbard:
The metricula was created as a registry. If agencies, if banks decide to use it because it's useful for them, that's fine with us.

>> Suncerria Tillis:
The American Heart Association has decided on a national level to put together a cultural health initiative, and locally here in Arizona, we have a cultural health initiative's community that our committee targets specific demographic makeup of the community in the greater Phoenix area. So the work that we are doing is really to impact those least likely to receive healthcare information and those people tend to be disproportionately Hispanic-Latino populations.

>> José Cárdenas:
You've been an educator all of your life. How did you get into the writing world just nine years ago?

>> Stella Pope Duarte:
Yes, well, that was a magical way for me to get into the writing world. Actually, I had a dream, and I journal a lot, so in the dream, my dad, who had been deceased for 10 years in 1995, shows up in my dream with a huge spiral staircase to indicate to me that my destiny from thenceforth was to become a writer, that I was destined to write.

>> Soorean Lee:
Painter Teresa Villegas a gas has had a fascination with Mexican culture. This has led to the new faces of 100-year-old folk game La Lotria.

>> Teresa Villegas:
I've seen people playing it and I was curious about it because I've seen these little iconic images, graphic images. I was curious about where it came from. I thought I would like to do my own series of paintings, similar in that format of the Lotria. I wanted 54 images representing my experiences of Mexico through my eyes viewing Mexico and what it meant to me and gave back to me.

>> Reporter Paul Atkinson:
Being the highest rating broadcaster is nothing new to Univision Channel 33 television. Its newscasts have been number 1 the last nine months in the Phoenix market.

>> Marco Flores:
We all understand this is not new. We didn't just pop out of anywhere. We have been here. We are working hard and we're trying to do the best we can for our community.

>> Reporter Larry Lemmons:
Walking into the gallery, the photos all appear to be uniform, sharing a common theme. All are black and white photos neatly framed. Looking closer, however, you see the photos represent many different places and ideas. In order to keep up with the growth of Hispanic businesses, a group of Latino leaders are forming a bank to focus on the Hispanic bilingual market. According to federal deposit insurance corporation statistics, seven total Hispanic-owned banks opened between 2002 and 2003. Sonoran Bank will be the first new bank in Arizona to specialize in the needs of small and growing Hispanic businesses. It's estimated the bank will open in early 2005 and will focus on business loans.

>> Paul Atkinson:
In order to have a greater say in addressing education and other issues important to the Hispanic community, town hall participants noted the number of Latino civic leaders and elected officials must increase.

>> Carlos Garlindo-Elvira:
One of the things that came out in the Arizona Town Hall was a discussion about leadership. As our population grows, so does the need for leadership. There are organizations that have the institute, we need to promote a lot more leadership programs, support more leadership programs for this vastly growing community.

>> José Cárdenas:
Joining us is Anita Luera, Vice President of Corporate Relations for Valle Del Sol. Anita is also president of the Arizona Latino Media Association. Also here is Ricardo Torres, publisher and CEO of Latino Perspectives. I should add, he's the founder of the Sonoran Bank that was featured in one of the segments on the video package.

>> Richard Torres:
Well, one of 14. Thank you.

>> José Cárdenas:
Welcome to both of you. You are both media veterans. Give us your background in the industry. Anita, you first.

>> Anita Luera:
First I want to congratulate you on your first year anniversary. That's fantastic.

>> José Cárdenas:
Thank you.

>> Anita Luera:
Having been a veteran 27 years here of the broadcast TV market here in Phoenix, it's good to see a program like "Horizonte." I was born and raised hereby, to see a program that reflects us is really exciting for me to have you guys there. I've done everything from producing to being a news director in news management to community relations. I have a long history in Phoenix TV, not only in English, but also in Spanish.

>> José Cárdenas:
Thank you for joining us tonight. Ricardo when you are not banking, you are doing media stuff. You've been doing for a long time. Tell us about it.

>> Ricardo Torres:
I've been doing it for 20 years, Jose, both on the English and Spanish side, Spanish language radio, and publishing with the newspaper in 2000 and Latino perspectives magazine and very excited to be a part of it. Congratulations on your show.

>> José Cárdenas:
Thank you. Anita in addition to your 27 years in the business, you are a native Phoenician. Have you ever seen anything like "Horizonte" before?

>> Anita Luera
Well, in -- I call it commercial TV, yes, we've had consumer -- I'm sorry, community affairs types programs, but nothing like "Horizonte," which is patterned after "Horizon" where you've looked at an issue and invited experts to come on and talk about it at length. Usually in commercial TV, you might get maybe 30, 40 seconds on an issue, not the five or ten minutes that -- that still does not give an issue justice.

>> José Cárdenas:
Ricardo, what about you, have you seen anything like this before?

>> Ricardo Torres:
No, the closest thing just to add to what Anita was saying, you do have community affair programming on other stations. And some very good ones, absolutely, very good ones. Certainly the resource that is have been devoted to "Horizonte," you know, the Governor appearing and all of those important people that have been on the show before us, certainly nothing like that. But I think that "Horizonte" goes a step further. "Horizonte" treats the Latino community in the real sense as the Latino community truly is. For so long it was defined either on one side by the 10:00 newscasts that always featured Latinos in negative stereo types, negative roles or the Spanish language media treating it as an immigrant community who is Spanish dependent. "Horizonte," I think, breaks ground and very important ground in treating the community as intelligent, upwardly mobile, dealing with issues that are important and a very open context and way.

>> José Cárdenas:
You just launched Latino perspectives magazine. In the past when we've talked about it, you've said that Latinos perspective is targeted to the same demographics that you think "Horizonte" is targeted at. What did you mean by that?

>> Ricardo Torres:
When we started doing the magazine -- I want to go back to when you started doing the show. When you started doing this show, I was looking at some demographic information about the Latino market. The Latino market is a lot different than what people perceive it to be, and you actually had a very good show when Earl deberg was here and spoke about that, but what is one thing that people, and the market in general doesn't realize is that 66% of Arizona Latinos are U.S. born. By definition when you are U.S. born, you are educated in the United States. You are English dominant. It does not mean that you are not bilingual or that you cannot speak Spanish, you are English dominant and prefer to receive much of your information in the English language. That way I think your show has broken new ground and recognized this market. I'm just following your lead.

>> Anita Luera:
I want to add on that because you are bringing the Latino, the 66% and giving them a face that we are the experts. We are the people in decision-making positions, and it's not always reflected in general market TV, and I think that is truly is why "Horizonte" is a little bit different than most other broadcasts.

>> José Cárdenas:
Is it appropriate to have a program that focuses on one ethnic group or issues as we put it, from a particular group's perspective?

>> Anita Luera:
Yes.

>> José Cárdenas:
Why?

>> Anita Luera:
27 years in the Phoenix television market, it was a daily battle to bring that Latino voice, to bring a perspective of how it impacts the Latino community. I'm not saying I'm all the Latino community, but to give voice to that. You look in our news rooms. Diversity is not there. When you have a diverse community, when you talk about 66%, where are we? Or at least a quarter, you know of the residents of Maricopa County. Where are we on TV? We're not there. We're not in the sitcoms. We are not there.

>> José Cárdenas:
But you do have some very good community affairs program. You've got the program that this show is patterned after, "Horizon" talks about immigration issues, just as much if not more than we have. Isn't that enough? And do we trivialize Hispanic issues when we have a show that's devoted solely to it?

>> Anita Luera:
"Horizon" it on prime time. All of the other community affairs programs are buried at 5:00 in the morning when most people will not see them or have an opportunity to see them.

>> José Cárdenas:
Which is also when this program re-airs.

>> Ricardo Torres:
If I may add to this conversation here. I think that Ray Suarez in one of the clips put it best when he talked about the immigration patterns that the Latino community of the United States is following compared to other immigrants that have come to the United States. It's completely different. You know, by having a show that deals with Latino issues, it -- American Latino experience is different. How we got here, many of us never left. We were here since the time this was a Mexican territory. So it is a different experience. I think that shows like this highlight that.

>> José Cárdenas:
Anything that we have done particularly well to do that? And when I say "we," I'm talking about channel 8. It's not my show. It's something that was born here, the management at channel 8 decided they wanted to have greater outreach to the Hispanic community and came up with this. Is there something that this show has done particularly well in that regard?

>> Ricardo Torres:
I think that the variety and the diversity of people that you have had on this show, and we just saw a sample of that in the 15-minute clip that we saw, with presenting both sides of the issue.

>> José Cárdenas:
They were all on one show by the way, all of those people.

>> Anita Luera:
Today.

>> Ricardo Torres:
The diversity of people, the diversity of themes, of issues, and how they've been handled by you, makes this show different than anything else on television.

>> José Cárdenas:
Anita, same question.

>> Anita Luera:
I think what I appreciate and what you don't normally see is that Mexican president Vicente fox. He got maybe more time than all of the newscasts put together, you know, at 5:00, 6:00 and 10:00 on the general market stations. And he spoke English. How many people didn't realize he spoke beautiful English? You know, that opportunity. Bringing in Jorge Ramos who nobody else would carry because he was a network news anchor, nobody would even cover him. You brought him on. Those kind of faces are really crucial to -- that we can show case them.

>> José Cárdenas:
What did we do wrong or where did we fail?

>> Anita Luera:
I don't consider it a failure at all. I think -- I think -- yes, the fact that we have to have something dedicated to a Latino perspective, you know, commercial intended, but that is a -- the fact that we have to do that is not right, know, because this is America. We should be reflecting what's out there. But it's not happening. So the fact that you to do that is good.

>> José Cárdenas:
Was there too much of a focus on immigration for example?

>> Ricardo Torres:
No, I don't think so. I think that a lot certainly has been written about immigration, and these are important issues, and like the Governor said in the clip you just showed, immigration is a federal issue. When you look at what's going on right now with Proposition 200, and to me it's not an immigration issue.

>> José Cárdenas:
I think you said earlier you would like to see us devote every show from here to the election.

>> Ricardo Torres:
Yes, absolutely.

>> José Cárdenas:
Anita what do you think about that?

>> Anita Luera:
I would say that we do need immigration reform, proposition 200 isn't the answer, but I want to see the stories that affect my teenagers who face possibly going to war being drafted once this election is over. Who knows what will come down. You know, and we have a whole generation of young Latinos who are going to face that. I want to hear those people's stories. You know, we encourage them to go to college to get their education, but they could be facing being shipped overseas to fight a war.

>> José Cárdenas:
Ricardo you get the last word.

>> Ricardo Torres:
Real quick, you talked about immigration. Proposition 200 is not about immigration. It is a racist proposition because it pretends to single people out because of the color of their skin. That is why it's a wrong answer.

>> José Cárdenas:
Thank you very much for being on our anniversary show. If you would like to see transcripts or what's coming up on "Horizonte," go to our web site at WWW.azpbs.org click on "Horizonte" at the left of your screen and follow the links. I'm your host, Jose Cardenas. Have a good evening. .