Does This Undocumented Mexican Family Deserve to Stay in Toronto? Nicholas Keung - Toronto Star
go to original July 14, 2013

They own two cars, a 3,000-sq-ft home by the lake and run a successful landscaping business that rings in hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in revenue.

By most accounts, they are the hardworking and well-established immigrants that Canada needs and wants.

Since their arrival from Mexico in 2007, however, the Dias family has lived a life of secrecy — off the population map and, by necessity, the radar of Canadian immigration officials.

Jose Dias, his wife Sofia, both in their 40s, their adult son Carlos and daughter Antonia are among tens of thousands of people in Greater Toronto who live and work here without legal status.

Known as “the undocumented,” they are failed refugee claimants dodging deportation or those who overstayed temporary work, student or visitor visas. Many are economic migrants, often from developing countries, seeking work or a better lifestyle.

With Toronto poised to become Canada’s first “sanctuary city,” which would open up municipally funded services to immigrants, legal or not, it raises the politically contentious question: Do these migrants deserve to stay?

Read the rest at Toronto Star

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