In the wake of revelations through a lawsuit filed by Hispanic farmers, we now know that what we surmised years ago is true: The United States Department of Agriculture has systematically discriminated against Hispanics across the country.
In the lawsuit filed more than a decade ago, Hispanic farmers charged that the administrators of the USDA farm loan and disaster relief program have actively discouraged minorities from applying for government assistance, rejected their applications outright or put them through severe delays in receiving promised funds.
The program’s acknowledged history of discrimination against minority farmers has earned it the nickname as “the last plantation.”
After a settlement was reached, at last count the Hispanic and Women Farmers and Ranchers Claims Resolution Process, as of January 2016, the Claims Administrator had scheduled payments to more than 3,000 claimants.
For many years, Cameron County has been receiving colonia improvement funds either though the Texas Water Board or the state’s Community Development agencies. Some of these funds were earmarked for infrastructure such as water or sewer extensions to the colonias. Some are restricted to pay only for the mains and not for the connections to the individual homes.
To help colonia dwellers hook up to the sewer lines along the county right-of-way, planners decided to have them apply for low-interest long-term loans from the USDA’s Rural Development program operated out of San Benito. Under the Single-Family Housing Repair Loan program, very low-income families could receive up to $20,000 paid at one percent over 20 years for home improvements.
That office routinely gave local farmers loans and disaster relief for their crops. The rural development funds were issued to cover some of the farmers’ expenses from a variety of improvements, including drainage and erosion.
The average cost to extend the lines to the individual homes was about $2,500. USDA Rural Development loans would more than cover the cost of the hookups.
County administrators soon learned that it was going to be difficult getting the local USDA personnel to take the colonia dwellers’ applications. First they claimed that they did not have the necessary personnel to take the applications, much less to help the people fill in the required information, some of it quite technical in nature.
The county then bent over backwards to help the local USDA office and employed a clerk – at county expense – to help with the applications. After a time, planners and administrators went back to the clerk to inquire about how things were working out and to gauge the number of colonia dwellers that had been helped by the USDA.
To their surprise, and anger, they found out that not only had the clerk not filled out any applications of colonia dwellers, but that the staff there had put her to do some of their work.
They quickly set her right about her duties and functions and wrote the USDA administrators that she was there to help colonia.
After a few months, they finally gave up.
Not only had not one colonia dweller received any help from the USDA office, but there had been no response to their applications.
In the national lawsuit, attorneys for the plaintiffs said that the system the USDA had in place "gave full vent to regional and local prejudices. And even in largely Hispanic communities like the Rio Grande Valley, the local committee approving the loans were usually dominated by white males."
Even an internal USDA audit performed in 1994 found that the county-level committees charged with reviewing loan (and grant) applications were overwhelmingly dominated by Anglos. A full 94 percent had no female or minority representation.
In the Cameron County case, county officials closed the slot and sought funds elsewhere. Since then, the county hasn't approached the local USDA office for assistance. The masters at the plantation have kept the door firmly closed.
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