NEW YORK–Caribbean Amer­i­can Con­gress­woman Yvette D Clarke has wel­comed a plan by New York City (NYC) to aid un­doc­u­ment­ed Caribbean im­mi­grants.NYC of­fi­cials say the city will spend US$18 mil­lion to help un­doc­u­ment­ed Caribbean and oth­er im­mi­grants find jobs.City coun­cil speak­er Chris­tine Quinn, a may­oral can­di­date, said the mon­ey will fund adult ed­u­ca­tion class­es and le­gal ser­vices that the US fed­er­al gov­ern­ment re­quires im­mi­grants to take to qual­i­fy for the De­ferred Ac­tion for Child­hood Ar­rivals pro­gramme.

The New York Im­mi­grant Fam­i­ly Uni­ty Project will pro­vide free le­gal ser­vices to im­mi­grants threat­ened with de­por­ta­tion who are un­able to rep­re­sent them­selves in pro­ceed­ings."New York has al­ways been a city of im­mi­grants with­in a na­tion of im­mi­grants," said Clarke, the daugh­ter of Ja­maican im­mi­grants, who rep­re­sents the 9th Con­gres­sion­al Dis­trict in Brook­lyn.

"Un­der this pro­gramme, thou­sands of im­mi­grants in Brook­lyn and oth­er parts of the city will fi­nal­ly have an op­por­tu­ni­ty to chal­lenge the de­por­ta­tion pro­ceed­ings that sep­a­rate fam­i­lies and weak­en com­mu­ni­ties," she said.

CMC