As debate rages overimmigrationenforcement, tightening the border and renegotiating trade agreements, Minnesota business leaderswarnthat a slowing of immigration will stifle the state's economy.

"Immigrants are a significant contributor to the development and growth of the state's economy," said Bill Blazar, president of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce.

"And that's true whether you're in Minneapolis or Mankato or Thief River Falls."

A recent University of Minnesota report (z.umn.edu/immigrantworkforce) said Minnesota will need to significantly step up efforts to bring in immigrants to meet labor demands.

"Minnesota will need to attract about 4.5 times the number of new residents it currently attracts to maintain a 5 percent average annual growth in labor force," the report said.

Blazar said the aging baby boomer workforce and looming retirements are creating a major worker shortage. "One thing growing businesses have the least tolerance for is the opportunity to grow and not being able to staff up for it. They will go elsewhere in a New York minute."

He said immigrants are especially key to saving rural communities from drying up. "The '80s farm recession took a toll population-wise on Greater Minnesota. A lot of people left. Many of those communities, Worthington, St. James, Faribault, Madelia, have come back thanks to the arrival of new Americans," he said.

"Immigrants are entrepreneurs, they start businesses. Nothing could be better for a small rural community than to have someone move to town and work for someone else and then start and run a business successfully. That's a big deal."

Blazar said the current immigration system is broken and the president and Congress need to fix it. He fears the focus on enforcement and polarization over immigration will divert attention from the need for reform.

"The administration is caught up in enforcement, which is unfortunate, so I don't see them coming up with legislation. So it's up to Congress. They've had a lot of time to think about it."

The Chamber said good immigration reform would contain four elements.

The administrative practices surrounding the immigration system, including the e-verify system employers use to see who's legal to work, needs updating.

Blazar said the quotas on the number of immigrants also needs to be changed from a static number to a dynamic system. "We've had the same quotas since 1986 when President Reagan and the Democratic Congress redid the immigration system. They're fixed quotas so they're not sensitive to changes in the economy."

The group's third goal may be the most politically sensitive. "We need to resolve the status of the 11 million people who are here without authorization," Blazar said.

"We ought to create a path to citizenship with whatever requirements the president and Congress see fit. To just leave them in limbo as we have since 1990 is just cruel and unjust."

Finally, he said, reform would address border issues. "For the business community, having border security fourth on the list is intentional because we believe if we do No. 1 and No. 2 and No. 3, we'd solve most of our border issues. We have so many crossing illegally because we have a broken immigration system."

As part of its push, the Chamber is promoting a report and map system created by the New American Economy and the Minnesota Business Immigration Coalition.

The new map (NewAmericanEconomy.org) provides data on immigrant populations in all 435 congressional districts and 50 metro areas in the country. It also includes tax contributions, spending power, home ownership, and voting power, of immigrants.

According to the mapping data, the First Congressional District, which stretches across southern Minnesota, has 37,166 immigrant residents, making up 5.6 percent of the population. That's a higher percentage than northwest and northeast Minnesota. The Twin Cities districts have between 4 and 15 percent immigrant populations.

Immigrants in the district have spending power of $771 million.

Follow Tim Krohn on Twitter @TimKrohn

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Businesses: State needs more immigrants - Mankato Free Press