Families of Immigrants Send Money to U.S. to Help During Financial Crisis

ABC’s Marc Frank reports from Havana: Hundreds of Cubans still line up at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana each week in hopes of obtaining a visa to visit relatives, or to do the paperwork after receiving one of the 20,000 permanent entry visas given out each year. Thousands more dream and scheme of entering the United States without a visa, where, unlike other illegal immigrants, they are granted temporary residence. But these days some Cubans are having second thoughts, others are returning home and still others are ending visits early as the financial crisis and soaring unemployment in Florida create an undertow of negative stories and doubt amongst would be immigrants. Six years ago Katrina and her two young children packed their bags in their Havana home and headed for Miami. Well educated, bilingual and exceedingly clever, Katrina had little problem obtaining a real estate liscense, a job, home and two cars. In short, the family began living the American dream. But that was before the financial crisis gutted the housing market leaving her without work. At 46 Katrina has yet to find another job. “They have cut off her phones, repossessed one of the cars and I just sent her $500 to make payments on the other, because over there no car means no job,” Rosa, Katrina’s mother, said. “I was thinking of visiting, but may wait as there is no money to go out and my daughter is planning to declare bankruptcy to save her house,” Rosa, who works for a foreign firm in Havana, said.