LINCOLN — More than 60 Nebraska organizations converged Wednesday at the State Capitol to announce a unified resolve to help change state and federal policies that would swing the door open for more immigrants to work and settle in as Cornhuskers.

Among the representatives was Bryan Slone, president of the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce and Industry, who said he wouldn’t have thought two years ago that such broad support could be harnessed for immigration-related shifts.

Touring the state and visiting with people voicing perspectives ranging from rural to urban, and from health care to hospitality, changed that mindset, he said.

While differences in political and cultural viewpoints no doubt exist, Slone said that he found common ground in concerns about the state’s economic future, family and community instability and a workforce with up to 80,000 open jobs.

“We don’t see a solution to Nebraska’s workforce problem without immigration reform and without our communities being successful in welcoming these people into the community,” he said.

‘Stuck In Immigration Limbo’

The group that gathered atop the west steps of the building where Nebraska law is made grew out of a smaller coalition formed two years ago by leaders of the chamber and Omaha Together One Community, a religious-based network formed three decades ago to advocate for social justice issues.

Now under the newly announced name Nebraska Alliance for Thriving Communities, the coalition boasts backers including labor unions, hospitals, banks, cattlemen and pork producers.

Collectively, they seek an update of immigration policies, including those they said have kept longtime members of Nebraska cities “stuck in immigration limbo.”

Speakers pointed, for example, to the roughly 2,500 foreign-born “Dreamers” in Nebraska under Deferred Action For Childhood Arrivals status and an estimated 2,000 on temporary protected status due to civil wars, disasters or other extraordinary conditions in their country.

While DACA and TPS recipients often have temporary work permits that must be periodically renewed at a fee, they don’t have a direct path to permanent residency. The group wants to see a way forged for them to stay and contribute, without fear, to their professions and communities.

Nebraska Appleseed, which is part of the group, provided testimonials from people such as Cleofes Sarmiento of Wakefield, who attended preschool through high school in the small Nebraska town before going on to doctorate degree studies at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Sarmiento said he realized as a boy that he was not like all the other kids. Since age 2, he has been in the country under TPS status.

“I do have a constant fear that I will one day be asked to leave and go to a country that I do not recognize and that I do not consider home,” Sarmiento said in a video. He said he would love to be present in the U.S. to see the impact of his research.

Not Speaking: Elected Officials

Not part of the speaker lineup or visible among the group were members of Nebraska’s congressional delegation or state lawmakers with standing to push policy and legal changes.

Darcy Tromanhauser, Appleseed’s director of immigrant integration and civic participation, said the key at this point was to establish broad support among varied industries and political persuasions.

“That’s huge,” said Slone. “This now sets the table of what we can all advocate for together and individually.”

Tromanhauser and others said members of the alliance will start meeting with congressional representatives and state and other local elected officials to share goals and to press for action.

Most supporters represented Wednesday have national affiliates that can offer backing, said Slone.

Among other changes the group wants to see at the federal level:

• Increase the number of government-issued visas based on employment and U.S. family ties, particularly for high-demand fields such as agriculture, manufacturing and hospitality.
• Allow spouses and working-age children of temporary visa holders to hold U.S. jobs, too.
• Eliminate the seasonal requirement for farm workers under the H-2A program, making visas year-round. 
• Improve immigration “infrastructure” by, for example, upping funding for immigration court judges and case processing capabilities.

Currently, the Omaha immigration court that processes Nebraska and Iowa applications has the longest average wait in the nation, about 5.5 years, for asylum hearings, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, or TRAC, a nonpartisan, nonprofit center at Syracuse University that collects immigration data.

The Omaha court’s judges also have one of the highest asylum denial rates in the country. In fiscal years 2018 to 2023, TRAC shows that judges at the Omaha-based court denied asylum in 90% of cases, compared to the national average of 61%.

State Changes Sought

Among changes the group recommends at the state level:

• Ensure training for all Nebraska Department of Motor Vehicles workers to avoid barriers to foreign-born applicants due to “complex and varied immigration statuses.”
• Improve the transfer of professional licenses from foreign countries.
• Invest money for “New Nebraskan Centers.”
• Adopt a state law to allow access to unemployment insurance benefits for TPS and DACA recipients. Nebraska is the only state that bars such access.
• Reverse Nebraska’s position seeking to end expansion of health care access to DACA recipients. Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers last month joined 14 other states in a lawsuit to stop the Biden administration from allowing DACA recipients to participate in the Affordable Care Act’s insurance marketplace.

On an even more local level, the group favors ways to attract and make integration of immigrant families smoother.

Examples include cities adding affordable housing stock, in part by ensuring that the  tax-increment financing tool is used to increase dwellings for lower income tenants.

Also cities and local business chambers should help open more affordable child care options. And schools could add more English as a Second Language teachers, said Lina Traslaviña Stover of the statewide Heartland Workers Center.

‘Always Short Of People’

Denise Bowyer of OTOC said the alliance’s effort is built upon hundreds of conversations with people statewide — and the premise that nearly 40 years have passed since Congress “meaningfully” overhauled immigration laws with the Immigration Reform and Control Act.

That 1986 legislation, in part, required stronger employment verification, beefed up border enforcement and also granted an amnesty to an estimated 3 million undocumented immigrants who met certain eligibility provisions.

More recently, Bowyer and others said, baby boomers increasingly are retiring. Nebraska has among the five lowest unemployment rates nationally, and among the five highest labor participation rates.

“We’re always short of people — feed mills, trucks, maintenance crews. The biggest need is not going away,” said Al Juhnke, executive director of the Nebraska Pork Producers Association. “We need immigrants like the Dreamers and everyone else we can get. Our farmers do not understand why we are turning people away at the border. … Can’t we find a legal way to make this work?”

A leader of the Nebraska Cattlemen said the average age for cattlemen is about 57.

“Everything is tied together,” said Laura Field, executive vice president. “We need people not just for the industry work, but for the rest of community life.”

Zoe Olson, executive director of the Nebraska Hospitality Association, represents the largest collective employer in the state, the alliance said.

“Restaurants and grocery stores are closing and reducing hours, closing because they don’t have people to work,” Olson said. “This has a direct impact on town livability. Without restaurants and social spaces, that changes places.”

This story was published by Nebraska Examiner, an editorially independent newsroom providing a hard-hitting, daily flow of news. Read the original article: https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2024/09/18/more-than-60-ne-entities-show-un...