Census Vote Spurs Alarm in Santa Ana

Santa Ana officials expressed alarm Friday over the U.S. Senate’s vote to exclude illegal aliens from the 1990 census, saying that the action could undermine the validity of the population count and possibly rob city coffers of much-needed federal and state money.

“It will be devastating to the census process. The numbers will be artificially suppressed,” said City Councilman Miguel Pulido. Residents, both legal and illegal, in the city’s substantial ethnic communities could be needlessly intimidated by census takers’ inquiries into their status and not participate in the census, he said.

“I’m stunned,” said Pulido, who is co-chairman of the city’s “Complete Count Committee,” which will educate residents about the census. A higher census count will result in an additional share of tax money, which is allocated according to population and need. “My reaction is somewhere between shocked and disappointed. They’re saying we want to count everybody as long as they fall within a certain definition of ‘everybody.’ ”

Throughout California, public officials have condemned the Senate’s vote, contending that the action will shortchange California in Congress and possibly deprive the state of millions of dollars of federal aid for medical emergency services and other programs for poor people.

“I think it’s an outrageous piece of legislation and probably unconstitutional,” Assemblyman Peter Chacon said Friday. Chacon, a San Diego Democrat, is chairman of the Assembly’s Elections, Reapportionment and Constitutional Amendments Committee.

At the same time, the Senate’s action has created great confusion and stirred hopes, especially among urban Democrats, that it will be overturned by the House of Representatives.

Major Impact

If it were to become law, the Senate’s action could have a major impact on California and other states where the influx of illegal aliens significantly boosts the population and, thus, can affect the size of congressional delegations and the amount of federal aid that is doled out. With an estimated population of about 28 million people, California is thought to have at least 50% of the nation’s three million to eight million illegal aliens.

Authorities on reapportionment have widely predicted that California would gain five to seven congressional seats as a result of population gains made during the last decade. But if illegal aliens are not counted, the experts say that the state would not get one of the anticipated seats.

“It’s hard to tell exactly how many congressional seats California will lose. But we could have gotten six or seven additional seats and this could cost us one or two. It’s possible,” said state Sen. Milton Marks, a San Francisco Democrat who heads the Senate’s Elections and Reapportionment Committee.

Loss of Funds Feared

Jesse R. Huff, the state’s financial director, said that California could lose up to $300 million in federal aid that is allocated on the basis of population as determined by census counts.

Because of the confusion over which programs would be affected by the Senate bill, Orange County and Santa Ana officials said they could not estimate how much is at stake financially.

In 1985, before the federal immigration reform act, the number of illegal aliens in Orange County was estimated at 229,000, the second-largest population in California, a county official said. There are no current estimates, “but if it was 229,000 four years ago, you can imagine what it is now,” said Tom Doti, director of financial assistance with the Orange County Social Services Agency.

Santa Ana--home to 44.5% of the county’s Latinos, according to Councilman Pulido--would be hardest hit of the county’s cities by the elimination of illegal aliens from the census.

Santa Ana officials believe the city’s 1980 census, placing the population at about 215,000, was under-counted significantly, somewhere in the neighborhood of 50,000, Pulido said. The city’s current official population, according to state figures, is 231,460, and Pulido said that Santa Ana officials are certain the city has grown by more than 16,000 since 1980.

A city official said the estimated 50,000 uncounted residents translates into a loss of $2 million a year. To try to get an accurate count in 1990, the city originated the “Complete Count Committee” to educate residents about the census and encourage them to participate. The city is one of a handful selected in the nation to develop model census-education programs, according to Jill Arthur, a city management assistant.

Even if illegal aliens are counted for financial aid programs--but not for determining congressional seats--the validity of the census will be undermined by the questions that the census takers will have to ask about legal residence, Arthur said.

“I think it will promote fear and intimidation. That’s our main concern,” she said. For example, some may fear that the information will be turned over to the Internal Revenue Service or other governmental agencies, she said.

“We’re trying to tell people that the census is nothing to be afraid of. It is confidential. But we are hampered in that when they are saying they are going to pick and choose who they will count,” Arthur said.

Pulido added that many families are in various stages of legal residence. For example, a husband may have been granted amnesty while his wife’s application was turned down, and they have children who were born in the United States, making them citizens. They may fear that authorities will break up the family if the truth is learned by census takers, he added.

If census takers begin questioning residents about their legal status, “even the people here legally will be concerned. I think they will lose all confidence in what we’re trying to do here,” Pulido said.

Santa Ana “has a major stake in this financially, of course. It’s going to bear directly on the quality of life in the 1990s if we’re allowed to count everybody and get our fair share. If we’re not allowed to count some people, we may be hurt more than other cities” with smaller Latino populations, Pulido said.

Orange County officials likewise were unhappy with the Senate’s vote.

“They counted them in 1980, and now for them to say they won’t count them in 1990 is ludicrous,” said Doti of the Orange County Social Services Agency.

“The fact is they are here. They’re going to stay here. They pay taxes and are going to avail themselves of our services. We need to know the numbers. To not count them is to close our eyes,” Doti added.

Top officials with Orange County’s Republican and Democratic central committees could not be reached Friday for comment.

The measure passed by the Senate was part of a larger overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws that, if it becomes law, would place an annual cap of 630,000 immigrants for each of the next three years and make room for more residents of Western Europe.

The Senate bill is expected to face tough opposition in the House, where states such as California, New York and Illinois with large alien populations have many votes. Moreover, a federal court in Pittsburgh ruled earlier this year that excluding illegal aliens from the census would be unconstitutional.

But even if the Senate’s action were to become law, it is not clear how much impact it would have on federal aid.

“I think the effect is going to be minimal,” said Michael Myers, counsel to the House subcommittee on immigration and refugee affairs. Myers said the measure would prohibit aliens from receiving direct federal benefits, such as Social Security payments. But he maintained that such ineligibility is already written into a number of federal programs. Myers said that most of the assistance that states and cities now receive comes in the form of bloc grants that do not qualify as direct financial aid and, therefore, would not be affected.

Still, many local officials remain puzzled by the Senate’s action.

Tajima said he was not sure whether programs such as foster care for abused and neglected children or Supplemental Security Income for aged, blind or disabled people would be vulnerable. “They all involve direct payments by the county of federal money,” he said.

Times staff writer Jerry Gillam contributed to this article.