-- by Gus West, Chairman of The Hispanic Institute, in The L.A. Daily News:

When he departed from the recent North American summit with the leaders of Canada and Mexico last month, President Obama reaffirmed his support for creating "a path to citizenship" for undocumented immigrants. But, for millions of Hispanic Americans who voted overwhelmingly to elect him, the president's words rang hollow.

Indeed, for all Americans who care about righting the wrong-headed immigration policies of the Bush administration, the Obama administration's approach has been disappointingly slow to change and vague about the direction and pace of any future transformation.

To be fair, the administration's attention is divided. It faces extraordinary financial, military, political and diplomatic crises at home and abroad. Yet, immigration policy remains just too important to wait until 2010, the point at which the president said in Guadalajara that there might be action on legislation for comprehensive immigration reform.

While we're waiting, however, too many more families on both sides of the border will be damaged, too many more American citizens will be improperly arrested and detained, and too many more taxpayers' dollars will be wasted on ill-conceived, poorly implemented enforcement programs. Additionally, waiting provides more time for opponents of immigration reform to obscure the issues by fanning the flames of bigotry and xenophobia.

Even the nation's police chiefs are clamoring for change. In July, more than 100 of them met in Phoenix to share their opinions with Homeland Security officials. Bad policies and inconsistent enforcement are "starting to tear my town apart, especially with the economy going south," Framingham, Mass., Police Chief Steven Carl told USA Today. "You see a hatred toward the immigrant population."

The administration must begin to dismantle destructive programs from the Bush era that simply do not work, notably the Internet-based e-verify system that allows employers to check Social Security numbers supplied by job applicants and employees against those in a federal database. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service has acknowledged that the system has a 3-to-1 error rate. What's more, the system is unable to detect cases of identity theft in which stolen (or borrowed) numbers are used illegally.

Incredibly, the Obama administration has announced that it will allow this faulty program to go forward. That leaves Hispanics and others concerned about reforming America's immigration policies to wonder if the administration is serious about the positions it has articulated.

More troubling is Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's support of the program that allows local authorities to arrest people suspected of being undocumented immigrants on minor, unrelated charges such as alleged traffic violations. The provision is insidious, and it promotes ethnic profiling.

Although President Obama continues to enjoy the support of many Hispanic voters, he must realize that patience is not an infinite resource and that action must replace promises. 

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