Foundation aims to help L.A. immigrants

The fates of immigrants and their communities are connected. Help the immigrants learn English and job skills and succeed here and everyone benefits. DP

The California Community Foundation plans a campaign to help L.A. immigrants become more active citizens by helping them learn English, improve job skills and increase civic participation.

By Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times

A leading California foundation plans today to announce a broad campaign to help Los Angeles immigrants become more active citizens with a new $3.75-million, five-year program to help them learn English, improve job skills and increase civic participation.

The California Community Foundation in Los Angeles also is set to release a 75-page report that documents the essential and dynamic role immigrants play in the regional economy and suggests ways to help them become even more productive.

Immigrants make up nearly half the Los Angeles workforce and contribute nearly 40% of the county's gross regional product, with rates of entrepreneurship higher than their native-born counterparts, according to the report by Manuel Pastor and Rhonda Ortiz of the USC Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration. Despite lower-than-average wages, immigrants also account for more than one-third of the county's spending power.

But the report also found pressing needs for more English classes, job training and leadership development programs to help immigrants acquire the skills needed to keep the state economically competitive as baby boomers age and begin to retire.

About 28% of L.A. County residents are baby boomers who will eventually need to be replaced in the workforce -- many of them by immigrants who on average are less skilled and educated.

"The fates of Los Angeles County and immigrants are intertwined," said Antonia Hernandez, foundation president. "The programs that will most benefit this county are tied to our economic vibrancy, and that is tied to our immigrant workforce."
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