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New home for Mexican consulate in LR set to open Monday, Apr 23, 2007 By Rob Moritz Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - A grand opening is planned for Arkansas' new Mexican Consulate this week amid fanfare by supporters pushing economic prospects and protest by an opponent who warns of a surge of illegal immigrants into the state. Mexican food and entertainment will highlight the grand opening Wednesday at the consulate office, housed in a former ice cream parlor across from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. About 300 state and local dignitaries are expected to attend the festivities, which also will include the signing of an official sister cities agreement between Little Rock and Pachuca in the Mexican state of Hidalgo, event coordinator Liliana Olea said. Meanwhile, immigration opponent Joe McCutchen of Fort Smith said he planned to air radio advertisements opposing the consulate, beginning today. Supporters say the consulate will help thousands of Mexican immigrants living in Arkansas who now must travel to Dallas, Kansas City and Atlanta for assistance. It is to house about a dozen employees. Gov. Mike Beebe also emphasized the business contacts the consulate could facilitate. "Any time you have a foreign government that chooses your city for a location, it's potentially an economic boost, it's certainly a cultural boost and it certainly allows interaction between people that have a kinship to whatever country that might be," Beebe said Friday. "Anytime you that time of international, cultural exchange it broadens your city." Beebe said he would be out of town Wednesday and unable to attend the opening ceremonies. Lt. Gov. Bill Halter is expected to attend. The Mexican consul for Arkansas, Andres Chao, who formerly worked in the consulate office in New York, did not return calls seeking comment. Supporters say the consulate will not only provide Arkansas businesses with access to Mexico and opportunities to expand their markets, but also will help to ensure that immigrants from Mexico are in the state legally. The idea of establishing a Mexican consulate in Arkansas was first discussed by former Gov. Mike Huckabee after a trip he took to Mexico City in 2003. Last year, Huckabee struck a deal with Mexican officials to house the consular office in a state agency office for $1 a year while the consulate facilities were being refurbished. At the time, some lawmakers complained the governor made the deal without notifying the Legislature. McCutchen, whose anti-immigration activism has landed him on a civil rights group's watch list, said Friday his radio ads opposing the consulate would run through Wednesday on several Arkansas radio stations in Little Rock and western Arkansas. He contended the consulate would lead to relaxed immigration laws and open the door to more illegal immigrants, an influx he said would hurt employment opportunities for middle-class Arkansans. Arkansas has one of the fasting-growing Hispanic populations in the country, and more than half of Hispanic immigrants live in the state illegally, according to a recent study commissioned by the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation. Another study, by the Pew Hispanic Center, estimated that as many as 50,000 immigrants lived in Arkansas in 2005. The Rockefeller study suggested cheap immigrant labor fuels the economic engine for the state's poultry and meat processing industry, and that production would slide and costs would rise significantly without it. McCutchen said last week that he did not know if anti-immigration protesters would demonstrate during the consulate grand opening, though several anti-immigration Web sites posted announcements that protesters would attend the event. McCutchen and his wife, Barbara, have in the past helped guard the U.S.-Mexican border as part of the Minuteman Project. Last year, the Southern Poverty Law Center in Atlanta labeled McCutchen a "nativist," or one who thinks immigrants cannot be Americans. A spokesman for the center recently characterized his views as "racist" and "anti-Semitic." McCutchen said Friday he is not affiliated with any groups and was mounting the radio advertising campaign on his own. |
