By RGJ.com

September 4, 2010

One of Congress' most outspoken voices on immigration reform said Saturday that providing the 12 million undocumented workers living in the United States a path to legalization is not only necessary but inevitable.

When the baby-boomer generation retires, one-third of the national work force will disappear, and the United States will have no choice but to find more laborers, said U.S. Rep. Luis Gutiérrez, D-Ill., the first Latino member of Congress from the Midwest.
"This is unprecedented in our economic history," he said of the demographic trend. "Who is going to care for them? Who is going to replace them?"

The U.S.-native population will not be able to meet this demand because the non-Hispanic birthrate is less than two, meaning the size of the work force is receding when it needs to be expanding, he said.

Gutiérrez was a speaker at a conference titled "The International Conference on Food Security and International Migration: A Perspective from the Americas," held at the Atlantis Casino Resort Spa and organized by the University of Nevada, Reno's Latino Research Center and the United Nations World Food Programme.

Attendance was capped at 120 people, many of whom were UNR students.
Gutiérrez, who spoke at the event’s keynote lunch, said U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., persuaded him to attend.

"He said that there was this important conference in Reno and that I need to go," said Gutiérrez, a third-generation Puerto Rican-American.
Gutiérrez described his vision of reform.

First, the federal government would encourage all undocumented residents to come forward and pay a fine for immigrating illegally.

Next, they would be granted a six- to seven-year work visa if they pass a criminal background check. And when their visa expires, they can pursue a path to citizenship, which would include learning English.

Nevada is one of the most important states for discussing immigration, said Alejandro Lopez-Chicheri, an information officer at the U.N.'s World Food Programme.
"Nevada is one of the states with one of the higher immigration rates," he said.

Sonia Folsom, a UNR graduate and Canadian immigrant, said many of the conference's events focused on the causes of both legal and illegal immigration.
"It's a spider web," she said. "You’ve got tackle it from all angles."

Agricultural policy in other countries, for instance, can cause people to emigrate from their homeland, Folsom said.
"If the citizens of Mexico and other countries were given the power to control their land, there would be less of a reason to leave," she said.