Cooper/Howard Latino Group meeting
5 p.m. December 10, 2002
La Hacienda
 

Summary: We had nine people attend: Andy Melendez, Erin Egers of The Columbia Missourian, Vasyl Linde, Virgil Goodin of Harvest House, Sarah Gallagher of Boonville Daily News, Jamie Thompson and Art Schneider of University Extension, Christina Vasquez Case and Christi Angelo.

New attendees:
Vasyl Linde recently moved here and attended his first meeting In addition, Andy Melendez, minister, retired and part-time employee at Subway, attended. They will be added to our Hispanic translator list.

We look forward to both being with us in future meetings.

Report from Art Schneider:
Fuqua workforce of Latino workers is now nine. All still live in Marshall. (They have no Asian workers).

Isle of Capri now has seven Latino employees. They has 12 Asian employees).

Boonville School ethnicity enrollment shows 11 Hispanics and 15 Asians.

LaHacienda has 15 employees who live in Boonville.

Report from Police Chief:
Art Schneider read information provided by Chief Gholson, who was unable to attend.
He checked with Water & Light and there are three Latino families that have recently moved here. He will get addresses and/or phone numbers to invite them to the next meeting.

He also reported that there has been no need for police interaction with local Latinos.
Only one incident with Latinos is on record and that occurred with a traffic accident on Interstate 70, which was discussed at an earlier meeting.
His report noted some interaction with migrant workers, but it involved communications, not legal incidents.

The chief also provided a copy of questions that are with the ticket books police use. His list of 25 questions top be translated and brought to the meeting were:

What is your name?
What is your date of birth?
Where do you live?
What country are you from?
Do you have your Green Card?
What is your address where you live?
Where are you going?
Do you know why I stopped you?
Do you speak English?
Do you understand what I am telling you?
How old are you?
What happened?
Where did it happen at?
Are you the vehicle owner?
Do you have insurance?
You were exceeding the speed limit
You ran through a red traffic light.
You made an illegal turn.
Your headlights are not working.
I am issuing you a ticket.
You are in violation of he city's open container law.
Have you been drinking alcohol?
Have you been taking any drugs?
Step out of the car.
You are under arrest.

At the end of the meeting there was a question as to whether all the questions could be legally requested. Art will check with the UMC law faculty.

Report from Christine:
Art noted that the Missouri Alumnus magazine had an article on Christine and her research with Latinos in Central Missouri.
Christine reported that she had been in touch with John Sponaugle and that rather than a cooking class, a class on Latin American cultures would be offered through the Boonslick Vocational Technical Center.
She also brought a list of suggested items to be stocked in stores. She indicated that the list, at this time, might be a topic for future discussion and amplification before Danielle Blanck would take to local stores. The list had the following items:
Tripas
Pork Skin (Mexican)
Beef Tongue
Jarritos Soda
Cheese Oaxaca
Chorizo
(IF MY SPELLING IS INCORRECT, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.)
Our Lady of Guadalupe Day Dec. 12--Christine was to be interviewed by Karen at the Boonville Daily News. Karen turned the interview over to Sarah Gallagher. Sarah also interviewed several other people and the article ran on the front page Dec. 13. (Sarah, in talking with people, learned that the Dec. 12 celebration would instead be the weekend of Dec. 13 because of the work week hours.) I found it quite informative and appreciate the efforts Sarah went through to integrate several different voices from Central Missouri.

Report from Chris:
She prepared an extensive list of emergency and important contacts, addresses and phone numbers. She gave to Christina who arranged to have the paper reviewed for accents. At the meeting, some additional information was listed. In addition, Centro Latino office in Marshall will be added.

Next meeting will be in February.