Feeling all too foreign

Immigrants wary; officials deny bias

There are whispers in Revere about drivers who are stopped by police because they look foreign. In Everett, there are similar anxieties.

Newcomers also talk about local ordinances that seem to be enforced unfairly, with residents who don't speak English more likely to receive tickets for breaking curb-side trash rules and other health code violations. Those concerns are echoed in Malden, where some say City Hall seems more like an ivory tower.

Immigrant enclaves across the region say they are feeling a local backlash as federal authorities conduct large-scale raids nationwide, tracking down and deporting undocumented immigrants. Yet elected and appointed officials say immigrants are not being singled out, and that leaders have been working hard to bridge divides and ease fears.

On one point, all sides agree: Language barriers are a huge hurdle. Finding common ground has been complicated, and solutions even more elusive.

Consider the trash issue, where local rules tend to vary community by community.

"In a lot of cities, you cannot put all the garbage outside. And you have to get a sticker or you get a ticket," said Lucy Pineda, a 35-year-old Revere resident who moved to the United States 24 years ago from El Salvador.

Pineda is the director of LUMA, Latinos United in Massachusetts, an Everett-based nonprofit. She said that immigrants who do not understand local trash rules or have limited English skills will go to a city hall to find out why they received a trash ticket, and find there is no literature or employee who can speak their language to explain it.

So LUMA is planning to translate fliers that explain various local ordinances into several languages for a number of communities, she said.

Pineda also said that her group, which serves immigrants in many of the urban communities north of Boston, has been receiving complaints from immigrants who say they are being singled out by police for traffic stops, particularly in Revere and Everett.

"If police stop an American and then they stop Lucy, Lucy looks different, so they treat Lucy different," Pineda said.

Police officials dispute the allegation. They say immigrants are treated the same as all others who are stopped for violations.

But officials acknowledge that they often face substantial communication problems because their departments don't mirror the demographics of their changing communities.

"It's extremely frustrating communicating with someone who doesn't understand what you are asking them for," said Revere Police Chief Terrence Reardon. "Oftentimes we have to depend on other police departments. We'll call over to Chelsea and see if they have anyone who speaks Spanish."

Chelsea often receives high marks from immigrant groups, who say the city has made great strides in bridging cultural and language differences.

It is one of a handful of cities that has declared itself a sanctuary for immigrants, including those here illegally.

Everett, by comparison, approved a resolution last fall urging that federal homeland security dollars be stripped from self-declared "sanctuary cities" and instead be sent to Everett and other neighboring communities.

In Everett, the 99-member police department has just six officers who are bilingual, speaking a variety of languages. Yet a quarter of families with school-aged children in the city are Hispanic, according to state education data. The numbers are similar in Revere, where there are four Spanish-speaking officers in a force of roughly 92. Yet more than a third of families are Hispanic, state figures show.

Officials in both police departments said they are aggressively working to boost their bilingual numbers.

Revere's chief said his department has also received federal funding for more bilingual translators to help with domestic violence issues in the community's growing Asian and Hispanic neighborhoods.

Everett, which has a growing Brazilian population, has held Portuguese language classes for officers and is planning more this fall, said Everett Police Lieutenant Paul Landry.

"We understand, all too well, that perception is reality," he said. "We're here to help [immigrants]. We are not here to target them. But if they break the law, they will be arrested."

In Malden, where roughly 40 percent of families with school-aged children are Asian or Hispanic, the unease is more diffuse. Some immigrant groups say that the city, for years, has done little to make them feel welcome.

"You go into the City Hall, there is a bunch of white people. It's ivory tower politics," said Mohamed Brahimi, 39, founder of the Malden-based Moroccan American Civic and Cultural Association.

Brahimi said that about three years ago, when he was forming the association and looking for a place to hold free English classes, he received a chilly reception when he knocked on a lot of doors at City Hall asking for help finding space. Eventually, he said, a nonprofit agency stepped forward with a low-cost rental.

He also said that last summer, some immigrant groups lobbied, unsuccessfully, to have city pamphlets published in various languages.

While information handed out by city and school departments is only in English, for roughly the past five years there also has been a sentence in boldface type that says, "This is an important notice. Please have this translated."

That sentence is in five languages: Spanish, Portuguese, French, Chinese, and Vietnamese, said the mayor's spokeswoman, Deborah Burke.

"The city . . . has been most welcoming to new immigrant groups," said Burke, who noted that Malden has at least six employees throughout City Hall who are fluent in either Spanish, Mandarin, or Cantonese.

"We could always do more and better," Burke said. "But we have made progress."

Kay Lazar can be reached at klazar@globe.com.

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