They pay taxes and suffer the hard times, but there’s no stimulus money for them - Tampa Bay Times

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TAMPA — Patricia Chirinos is feeling the pain of the coronavirus pandemic.

In March, the 53-year-old Honduran woman lost her job cleaning and painting houses. In April, she lost the room where she lived near Raymond James Stadium. This month, she moved into her sister’s apartment so she wouldn’t have to sleep on the street.

“This virus has not yet claimed my health,” Chirinos said, “but I feel sick from so many bad things that have happened to me."

Hers is a grimly common story across Tampa Bay in the time of the coronavirus pandemic. But unlike many people, Chirinos cannot count on the one-time relief check — $1,200 for an individual, $2,400 for a couple — that Congress provided through the CARES Act.

She’s in a class of people specifically denied the benefit — undocumented immigrants and others who don’t have a Social Security card.

Since 1996, they’ve been able to pay taxes on their income and even qualify for income tax refunds by obtaining an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number through the Internal Revenue Service. But for now, there’s no coronavirus relief.

Ruth Martinez, center, lives in Ruskin with daughters Ashley, 17, left, Carla, 19, right, and mother Isidra Medina, 73. Martinez said she could use the help of a stimulus check. [JUAN CARLOS CHAVEZ | Times]

Ruth Martínez feels the pain, too.

Martinez immigrated from the Mexican state of Chiapas and lives with her two teenage daughters in Ruskin. She recently lost her job in agriculture.

“We were left with nothing because the company closed until further notice,” said Martinez, 48.

Damaris Álvarez Rodríguez, 34, said the relief check would also help her Tampa family.

Álvarez came from Honduras 17 years ago and works in construction. She was out of work for two months because of the coronavirus.

“We had hoped that they would give us a little more help, but we are still waiting,” Álvarez said. “I really need it. My bills have been accumulating.”

There’s a measure before the House of Representatives to provide another one-time payment of $1,200 and extend it to people who have a taxpayer identification number. Known as the HEROES Act, the measure also would also make payments under the CARES Act retroactive to this group.

The Republican-controlled Senate was not expected to consider the measure.

Congress is considering measures to extend stimulus payments to people who file income tax returns using a taxpayer identification number. These include undocumented immigrants. [ERIC GAY | AP]

The CARES Act payment goes to qualified single people who earn less than $75,000 and to married couples who earn less than $150,000. There is an extra $500 for each dependent child under 17.

In excluding undocumented immigrants from the payments, Congress also left out their spouses and children — many of whom are citizens born in the United States.

In 2015, the most recent data available, the IRS received 4.4 million income tax returns filed with taxpayer identification numbers. The payments amounted to $23.6 billion, the agency reported.

In Florida, passing the HEROES Act and extending the CARES Act retroactively would help an additional 277,240 people — those living in households where at least one member uses a taxpayer identification number, according to the Institute On Taxation and Economic Policy, a nonpartisan tax policy organization in Washington, D.C.

Patricia Chirinos is one of them.

She moved to Tampa in 2004 and ever since, she has been supporting seven siblings and her mother in her hometown of Puerto Cortés, Honduras. Eight years ago, she paid to build a small three-bedroom house for her mother.

She uses her taxpayer identification number to pay her income taxes, she said.

In March, she heard on the news that coronavirus relief checks would go to anyone who pays taxes. She was disappointed when that didn’t happen.

"It felt like a slap in the face because even though I don't claim or ask for free help, in this case it seems to me that I deserved that help," Chirinos said.

"It would give me a little more time to pay my bills. Because, in the end, everything is money.”

Now, she makes a trip each Saturday to Hillsborough Community College and collects a bag of donated food for the week — vegetables, pasta and canned goods.

“If it wasn’t for the help of these blessed places, I don’t know where we would be."

Ruth Martínez could really use a government check, she said. She has no savings and went weeks without a job, getting help from friends and family, before going to work with a lawn service company in Tampa.

Her two daughters were born in the United States — Carla, 19, who suffers from autism, and Ashley, 17.

Martínez is a legal U.S. resident but has no Social Security card, so she has been paying taxes with her taxpayer identification number for five years.

Last year, she received a $3,078 refund from the IRS. She used $1,830 to pay two months rent for her apartment in Ruskin. She spent the rest on food, utility bills and medicine for her mother, Isidra Medina, 73, who suffers from heart problems.

Damaris Álvarez Rodríguez came from Honduras as a teenager 17 years ago. She works in construction and lives in Tampa with her three children, Javier, 15; Elianai, 7; and Damian, 13, not pictured; as well as her mother Adelina, 62. [JUAN CARLOS CHAVEZ | Times]

Damaris Álvarez Rodríguez said she holds out hope she’ll get help.

Álvarez has been paying taxes for seven years using her taxpayer identification number. She said the government checks would have “oxygenated” life for her family — Javier, 15; Damian, 13; and Elianai, 7, all born in the United States; and her mother, Adelina, 62. They live together in a three-bedroom Tampa rental.

“We contribute and I think we have some rights. I don’t demand too much," she said.

After two months out of work, she was surprised to be called back in by her boss. This week, she worked three days in a row.

The family has survived on money Álvarez had saved. This month, she held back a few days on the rent and her landlord sent her text messages pressuring her to pay. It was the first time in 10 years she has been late, she said.

She has no regrets.

“It is not my fault,” she said, “and I’m not the only one going through a difficult time.”

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They pay taxes and suffer the hard times, but there’s no stimulus money for them - Tampa Bay Times
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