Prominent Maryland Hispanics say Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. must hire more Latinos to well-paying administration positions or risk losing support from an increasingly influential interest group when he seeks re-election.
The Maryland Hispanic Republican Caucus has scheduled a meeting with Ehrlich next week to discuss what its members see as a lack of diversity in appointments. The group is demanding that the governor conduct a national search for a Hispanic higher-education secretary and that he appoint a top adviser to handle Hispanic affairs.
Jorge Ribas, chairman of the recently formed caucus, said that no Hispanics have been appointed to what he calls the "top 125 government positions" in Maryland, which include Cabinet secretaries and their deputies, as well as the governor's staff.
"It is a new ball game in town. You better listen to us, because people are extremely dissatisfied. And you are not going to find loyalty with dissatisfied people," said Ribas, a pathologist and consultant from Montgomery County, in an interview yesterday. "People want to be players. People want to sit at the table. And if that doesn't happen, they'll be looking for another candidate."
Administration officials say that while they do not keep such a breakdown of high-level hires, they do not dispute Ribas' claim. However, they point to five Latino appointments, including the first Hispanic member of the unpaid State Board of Education. The other positions are midlevel jobs.
Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell said that the governor remains committed to diversity and has filled only a small portion of the positions under his direct control.
"There are a number of bright, talented individuals from the Hispanic community presently under active consideration for prominent positions in the Ehrlich-Steele administration," Fawell said.
The caucus' aggressive stance comes as Hispanics in Maryland and elsewhere are learning to wield a strength that comes with numbers. The U.S. Census recently reported that Hispanics have surpassed blacks nationally as the largest minority group in the United States.
In Maryland, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and Central and South Americans are a small but growing political subset that has never commanded much political attention. The 2000 census counted 227,916 Marylanders of Hispanic extraction, or 4.3 percent of the state's population. But Ribas said the figure does not include those fearful of reporting their status. He believes that the true population, including growth over the past three years, is closer to 400,000.
