Every culture offers a unique perspective, even perhaps a practice that, if adopted by those in another culture, enriches everyone's lives. The cultures that immigrants to the United States bring with them come to life in the practices, traditions, rituals, and stories that are handed down from generation to generation, and sometimes adapted by friends and neighbors to everyone's benefit.

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John Phillip Santos
Writer/Producer

• There has been a presence, an Hispano, Latino, Mexicano presence here in Idaho, Nevada and Wyoming for at least 150 years and, in fact, considerably longer than that. Peoples have been wandering these continents of what we call North and South America now for 40,000 years.
       

Oralia Mercado
Executive Director, Mountain Plains Agricultural Service

• We bring workers from not just Latin American countries but from all over the world to do jobs that nobody else wants in agriculture and we do it legally. And ... this country is rich because of the Latinos.
       

Sam Byrd
Executive Director, Idaho Migrant Council

• The debate is not only about illegal immigration but it is also how we treat those that illegally immigrate to this country especially those that come from Latin American countries.
       

Jesse Gutierrez
Executive Director, Nevada Hispanic Services, Inc

• We didn’t cross the border, the border crossed us when the big expansion of the Madison government took over when they bought the amount of land that was originally Mexico into what is now called the United States.
       

Martin Torres
Head Consul, Salt Lake City Consulate of Mexico

• On one hand, these young kids that achieve, they have overcome all odds. These are the very best that we have and you are taking them and you are keeping them and we lose them.
       

Peter Padilla
Vice President/General Manager, Azteca America Television and KREN-TV, Reno

• Certainly, we have problems within our own culture but we contribute in many ways ...and we’ve contributed in many ways to make society better.
       

Mary Gutierrez
2nd grade teacher/Bilingual teacher

• Most of those children are in the classroom because their parents would like for them to be enriched by learning a second language.
       



• I am not, not teaching them English; I am teaching them English, but my primary job is to teach them those skills and it is a bonus for the children that are learning each other’s languages and not only learning each other’s languages but also sharing each other’s cultures.
       

John Phillip Santos
Writer/Producer

• I think that if we embrace superficial economic goals exclusively, we do that at the cost of really what makes us unique.
       

Curtis Mendenhall
Burley, ID City Council

• You are my friends, you are Americans, your blood flows the same, the difference is that we have a different heritage. We may have different lifestyles but in our community, we try to embrace everyone the same
       



• We are caught in between and we’ve been able to see what’s right and what’s wrong, it’s not so ingrained in us at this point that we can’t change.
       

Father José de Jesús Camacho
Priest and Director of Prison Ministry for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Idaho

• We have filled the mouths of Americans with salsa and salsa (dancing) so it’s not just money, it's not the only way to make people valuable, what about life?
       

Carmina Oaks
Executive Director, Latino Resource Center, Jackson, WY

• Sometimes the integration is not there, because for us, sometimes, we are far behind, people have maybe a 3rd-grade education so to come to these meetings, to really embrace that is very difficult.
       

John Phillip Santos
Writer/Producer

• We may see very different experiences of the immigrant life emerging that are much more fluid, much more bicamerel in the sense of going back and forth between homelands and the United States.
       

Sam Byrd
Executive Director, Idaho Migrant Council

• I would just like for us ... to imagine a day without Mexicans, and imagine the social costs and the richness that would be lost. Imagine the economic crisis that would occur. And imagine the human costs.
       

Peter Padilla
Vice President/General Manager, Azteca America Television and KREN-TV, Reno

• We’re all Americans. We’re all after the same objectives, the same goals. We all want a great life.
       

Josefina Estrada
Human Resources Administrator, KNPB-TV, Reno

• For Latin Americans, Mexicans especially because I know my culture, familia is very important.
       

Estella Zamora
President, Idaho Human Rights Commission

• I want you to see the color of my skin, I want you to look around you and notice the diversity, notice the richness of who we are as individuals.
       

Curtis Mendenhall
Burley, ID City Council

• I want to know about your cultures. As far as your color, whether you’re black, white, yellow, red, or green, it doesn’t make any difference to me. Your cultures do.
       

Jesse Gutierrez
Executive Director, Nevada Hispanic Services, Inc

• You improve one part of the community—you improve the entire community—and you bring it together.
       

Father José de Jesús Camacho
Priest and Director of Prison Ministry for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Idaho

• Something I’ve learned from this country, from the very beginning, was to be practical and realistic. So my question is, why can't we get along?