The Hmong are a major ethnic group residing in Merced, California. As of 1997, Merced had a high concentration of Hmong residents relative to its population. The Hmong community settled in Merced after Dang Moua, a Hmong community leader, had promoted Merced to the Hmong communities scattered across the United States. As of 2010, there were 4,741 people of Hmong descent living in Merced, comprising 6% of Merced's population., U.S. Census
Culture
As of 1997 Merced has fourteen Hmong clans; they are the Cheng, Fang, Hang, Her, Kong, Kue, Lee, Lor, Moua, Thao, Vang, Vue, Xiong, and Yang. As a result, as of 1997 young people easily found exogamous marriage partners. Hmong often drive from city to city in the Central Valley. The Hmong who moved elsewhere go to Merced for subclan gatherings in a manner similar to how, in history, Hmong residents in Laos traveled to their home villages from satellite villages. Because of the manner of the Hmong using Merced as the location of the subclan gatherings, Anne Fadiman, author of The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, said, "Sometimes I felt that the other cities of the Central Valley—Fresno, Visalia, Porterville, Modesto, Stockton, Sacramento, Marysville, Yuba City—were mere suburbs of Merced." Because of the presence of a large Hmong community, it is easy for one to find a Hmong clan elder for dispute mediation, a txiv neeb, a Hmong herbalist, and a qeej player. Since, as of 1997, bamboo is not commonly found in Merced, qeejs are often constructed from PVC plumbing pipes.
Beginning of settlement The Hmong began to settle in Merced in the 1970s and the 1980s.Reiter, Carol. "." Merced Sun-Star at Suab Hmong Radio. January 29, 2008. Retrieved on September 20, 2010. The Hmong settled Merced and other areas in the Central Valley of California after the conclusion of the Laotian Civil War, when Communist forces won and began to oppress the Hmong, who had fought for the anti-Communist United States side. The Hmong fled to refugee camps in Thailand, then relocated to other parts of the world such as the United States, France, and Australia.
Members of the Hmong community settled in Merced because Dang Moua, a community leader and former clerk typist at the Embassy of the United States in Laos, promoted Merced. Fadiman said that from the Hmong point of view, Moua "bears the same relation to Merced that Daniel Boone bore to Kentucky or the Pied Piper bore to Koppelberg Hill." When Moua moved to the United States, he originally lived in Richmond, Virginia. While there he researched climates, crop yields, and soil conditions in other states. Moua's brother, a resident of Southern California, told him that the Central Valley had good weather and a variety of ethnic groups. Through the Hmong community social network, Moua learned that General Vang Pao planned to buy a fruit ranch near Merced. As a result, Moua left for Merced, arriving there mid-April 1977. While Vang's plan to buy the fruit ranch did not succeed, the Hmong community spread favorable reviews of Merced, and Hmong people from all over the United States traveled to Merced. Eric Crystal, an anthropologist, expressed surprise over the fact that the Hmong had converged upon Merced; he told a reporter for the Merced Sun-Star, "It was just wild! You'd see these Arkansas plates and stuff on the streets, I mean they were just pouring in from all over the place!" Because of the pre-existing Hmong settlement in Merced, Merced remained a favored destination for Hmong migrants.
In April 1982, Merced County had 1,800 Hmong people. On October 19, 1982 Merced County officials said that the county had 5,800 Hmongs, with most of them having arrived within six months of that day. Mike Conway of Merced Sun-Star said that the officials said that "they may be underestimating the total."Conway, Mike. "Refugees' impact on county is given study." Merced Sun-Star. Tuesday October 19, 1982. Volume 151 (CLI), No. 169. Retrieved from Google News (1 of 20) on March 11, 2012.
The Hmong believed that Merced was a farming community, but they discovered that the land was owned by other people, and they could not farm. Many Hmong who traveled to Merced became unemployed; they could not get high end agricultural jobs because they did not speak sufficient English, and Mexican migrants already held low end agricultural jobs. The Hmong arrived as Merced began to experience an economic recession in the early 1980s. In October 1982 the Hmong refugees present in Merced County had not stayed in the county long enough to become eligible to receive unemployment-derived benefits. They were not counted in the county unemployment rate of 13.5%, which represented 8,000 jobless people already present before the arrival of the refugees. In a meeting held by the Merced County Board of Supervisors, the members of the board were told that the addition of the Hmong in the labor pool increased racial tensions in Merced County.
Crystal told a reporter for the Merced Sun-Star, in the words of Anne Fadiman, author of The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, that it was "extraordinary" for the Hmong language to have a presence in Merced when, fifteen years prior to Crystal's statements, the language had an almost negligible presence in the entire Western world.
Maturation of the settlement As Hmong lived in Merced, they bought land and began to farm. In addition, as the Hmong presence continued, Hmong gangs appeared and began causing crime. When the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act was passed in 1996, some Hmong left Merced and settled in Minnesota, North Carolina, and Wisconsin. When Hmong women first came to the United States, they often married at 14 or 15 years of age. In 1990, the average Hmong woman in Merced had 8.5 children. By 2000 the average Hmong woman had 3 children. Women began to attend universities and complete their educations before marrying.
By 1997, Merced had about 61,000 residents. Of them, over 12,000 were Hmong, making the Hmong about 1/5 of the population of Merced. Because of the concentration of Hmong residents relative to Merced's population, Fadiman said that Merced was the "most intensely Hmong place in the United States." As of 1997 Fresno, California and the Minneapolis – Saint Paul area had larger Hmong populations than Merced, but Merced had a higher concentration of Hmong residents than those two places. Blia Yao Moua, a Hmong leader in the area, said that the concentration of Hmong in Merced "lets us keep more Hmong culture here than in Vientiane."
Around 2004 around 700 Hmong refugees were scheduled to arrive in the Merced area.Carlson, Cheri. "Students Try to Ease Hmong Transition." Merced Sun-Star. Thursday July 15, 2004. Local A01. They were originating from Wat Tham Krabok, where they had taken refuge in central Thailand.Carlson, Cherie. "Immigration: Lessons in learning lie ahead for Hmong" Merced Sun-Star. Tuesday June 8, 2004. A1. Retrieved on March 12, 2012. As of June 2004, of the population anticipated to arrive, most spoke little English and had little education. Over half of that population was of age to attend primary and secondary school.
According to a 2006 Anchorage Daily News article, of the metropolitan areas in the United States, the 2000 U.S. census stated that Greater Merced had the fifth largest Hmong population, with 6,148 people.O'Malley, Julia. "Hmong and Mormon." Anchorage Daily News. Sunday October 8, 2006. A1. Retrieved on March 13, 2012.
Because of unemployment, many Hmong left Merced between 2006 and 2008; some went to Alaska to work in industries, such as crabbing and fishing, that did not require a lot of English language knowledge. Dr. Long Thao, a Merced Hmong physician quoted in a 2008 Merced Sun-Star article, estimated that 8,000 Hmong lived in Merced, down by about half from the number in 1988 (15,000).
Economic activity In 1988, the Merced County Chamber of Commerce estimated that the Southeast Asian community in Merced County, which had over 10,000 people, spent $25 million each year. The Hmong community leader Dang Moua estimated that if each Southeast Asian refugee spent $1 per day, the figure spent by the Southeast Asian community on an annual basis would be $36.5 million. Moua said that because Merced-area companies are not aggressively courting the Southeast Asian refugee market sufficiently, millions of dollars left the Merced community each year."A marketing message." Merced Sun-Star. Tuesday July 5, 1988. Page 8 Opinions. Retrieved from Google News (159 of 169) on March 12, 2012.
As of 1997 the Merced Chamber of Commerce distributed a tourist brochure showcasing a Hmong woman holding vegetables.
Social services As of 2004 the Merced Lao Family Community Inc., a nonprofit organization that has been in operation since 1983, is the main support organization that provides social services to Hmong people.
Media The cable television channel Channel 11 broadcasts informative programming to the Hmong community twice per week. The radio station KBIF 900 AM, located in Fresno, California and serving Merced, airs programming oriented towards Hmong people. As of 2004 the station staff members state that 95% of the area Hmong community listens to the station.
Politics In 2014 Paul C. Lo received his appointment as a Merced County Superior Court Judge, making him the first ever Hmong American judge. Lo arrived to the U.S. as a refugee."Paul Lo, From Hmong Refugee To California Judge" (Archive). National Public Radio. January 16, 2004. Retrieved on July 6, 2014.
Health care
As of 2009, each day, Mercy Medical Center Merced in Merced has four new Hmong patients.Brown, Patricia Leigh. "A Doctor for Disease, a Shaman for the Soul." The New York Times. September 19, 2009. Retrieved on March 12, 2012.
Around 1989 the Hmong population of Merced had difficulty communicating with the medical establishment in Merced's primary hospital due to language and cultural barriers.Jennings, Ralph. "MERCED HOSPITAL FILLS CULTURAL PRESCRIPTION." The Modesto Bee. Sunday March 21, 1999. B3. Retrieved on March 12, 2012. Miriam E. Warner and Marilyn Mochel, the authors of "The Hmong and the Health Care Delivery System in Merced," stated in 1998 that "Provider and facility insensitivity to the linguistic needs of the Southeast Asian patients sends a loud negative message about accessing health care to the ethnic communities in Merced County." The two stated that health care providers in the county had a lack of awareness of the history of the Hmong patients in the Laotian Civil War and the experiences during that war. In addition they stated that the providers had a lack of awareness of the Hmong beliefs and that Hmong patients had a difficulty in expressing and sharing their belief systems.
The 1997 book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman chronicled the care of Lia Lee, a Hmong child in Merced's health system. The book discussed disparities that the Hmong in Merced encountered while accessing health care. Due to the book, several groups intending to improve the health care of the Hmong population formed.Reiter, Carol. "Addressing problems in Hmong health care." Merced Sun-Star. Friday May 14, 2010. Retrieved on March 11, 2012. The book also prompted the hospital (then Sutter Merced Medical Center) to increase efforts to reach out to the Hmong community. The hospital hired additional employees, including Hmong employees. It also received a $246,000 worth of grants for cross-cultural training.
The Merced Department of Public Health began the MATCH (Multidisciplinary Approach to Cross-Cultural Health) program, intending to co-opt Hmong patients into the health care system.