Upset by Cartoon, Group to Picket Speech : Pomona: Activists will protest at the mayor’s State of the City address. They are unhappy with a sponsor’s use of material they consider racist.

Local activists say they will picket Mayor Donna Smith’s annual State of the City Address today because they are offended by a cartoon--depicting a sombrero-wearing man--that was reprinted in the membership bulletin of one of the speech’s sponsors, Pomona Valley Republican Women Federated.

The cartoon shows a man in a sombrero, a pregnant woman and nine children in line for U.S. medical benefits at a window with the sign: “Free Benefits for Aliens.”

Georgia Grove, president of Pomona Valley Republican Women Federated, said the cartoon, reprinted from Border Watch, a publication of the American Immigration Control Foundation, based in Virginia, is not racist.

“Heavens no, it’s not a racist cartoon,” she said. Grove said the cartoon and accompanying stories on the amnesty program and the cost of providing services to illegal immigrants in Los Angeles County were part of the group’s educational effort. She said concern about the cost of providing welfare and medical services to non-citizens has nothing to do with race. The more tax money that is spent on illegal immigrants, she said, the less money is available for services to citizens of all races.

But Abe Tapia, who ran against Smith in the March 5 primary and is supporting Councilman Tomas Ursua against Smith in Tuesday’s runoff, called the bulletin “blatant racist propaganda” that demeans Latinos.

Tapia, organizer of the protest, said an informational picket line will be established at the Pomona Valley Mining Co., where the address is scheduled at 11:30 a.m. today under sponsorship of the Republican club and the Pomona Jaycees.

Tapia said he is also contacting businesses that advertised in the bulletin asking them to disavow it.

Ursua, who is Latino, said he does not plan to join the picket line but was offended by the cartoon. Ursua said there have been many studies showing that illegal immigrants pay more in taxes than they receive in benefits. He said Smith’s supporters are using “racial scare tactics” by putting this issue in a club bulletin that also urges support for Smith and attendance at her State of the City Address.

Smith was in Sacramento on Wednesday and could not be reached. Grove said Smith, a member of the GOP club, had nothing to do with preparation of the bulletin.