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Slowly and carefully, Betina, who came from Haiti to Ohio in 2021, navigates a Toyota SUV between five traffic cones in a parking lot north-west of Springfield.
Betina, who works for a produce processing company, has never driven before. But now, four years into life in Springfield, she has grasped the challenge of learning to drive.
“I live close to my job, so driving is not that big a deal,” she says.
“But I’m taking these classes because when I want to go to Columbus or Dayton, I can drive myself there.”
Sitting in the passenger seat is driving instructor Josue Pierre, who came to Springfield two years ago, calmly delivering guidance in Haitian Creole.
“Many Haitians had been complaining that when they took the driving test and failed, they were then sent to take the abbreviated adult driver training online, but most of them don’t speak English,” Pierre says later.
“By doing the in-person course with the help of a Creole speaker, that helped them a lot.”
For years, longtime Springfield residents have shown up at city council meetings to complain to authorities about how Haitian drivers were allegedly driving dangerously around the town. Stories emerged of people, allegedly Haitians, accidentally driving into church buildings. Others were blamed for accidents causing deaths and at one point last year, as many as 2,300 Haitians were thought to be driving without licenses in Springfield’s Clark county.
The tragic death of an 11-year-old student whose school bus was hit by a Haitian man driving without a valid license in August 2023, played a major role in Haitians becoming a target for a national debate on immigration during last year’s presidential election campaign.
But recent months have seen significant efforts underway to solve an issue that has been used to shape the Trump administration’s drastic immigration policies.
“The motivation came from getting a lot of calls from Haitian folks asking if we offered our classes in languages they understand,” says John Whitacre, the owner of Champion City Drivers Ed, the company that employs Pierre.
“Once we started looking into this, we found that there was nowhere in Ohio doing this. Almost 100% of the Haitian people [who have taken the driving lessons] come back and show us appreciation.”
The Ohio state highway patrol’s crash dashboard shows that crashes in Springfield so far this year are set to fall compared to 2024. In the first four months of 2024, 598 crashes were reported. Over the same period this year, the number fell to 542.
Ten driving simulators were made available in six locations across Springfield, including at two churches that members of the Haitian community attend, with the goal of helping Haitians and others improve their driving skills.
“Last year, we added a Haitian Creole translation of the Ohio Driver Manual Digest of Motor Vehicle Laws. An interactive Haitian Creole version is available on our website and is provided in a printable PDF format,” says Bret Crow, a spokesperson for the Ohio department of public safety.
“The Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) also provided newly translated Haitian Creole versions of several of the most common BMV forms to deputy registrar offices.”
With a population of just 60,000 people and an abundance of manufacturing and other labor-intensive jobs coming out of the pandemic, Springfield found itself a desirable location for immigrants such as Haitians. But with an estimated 15,000 people arriving in the city over the past seven years, strain on already limited social services was heightened.
Communities such as Springfield have been losing residents – a vital source of tax dollars that pay for essential public resources – for decades. Springfield leaders have welcomed the revitalization and tax dollars Haitian immigrants have fueled.
But sharing the road has presented challenges.
Many of the Haitians who have come to Springfield are from rural Haiti, says Pierre, a part of the country where driving and car ownership isn’t a common practice.
“Now, when they come here and have a car, they don’t have a background in driving so that makes it challenging,” says Pierre, who became involved and qualified with driver training certifications after encountering Whitacre through a local church.
Since the in-person Haitian Creole classes started in December, more than 100 Haitian clients have signed up, securing a success rate of over 90%, say the company owners.
The eight-hour course includes four hours of class instruction and four hours behind the wheel. “We do an hour of maneuverability, driving in a commercial zone, a residential zone and on the highway,” says Pierre, who also gives classes in English and Spanish.
“Things are getting better in driving; there are less accidents, crashes and injuries.”
Last year, Springfield police received a $50,000 grant to promote traffic safety enforcement.
But just as many Haitians in Springfield are securing tools such as driving skills to better integrate in the Springfield community, the Trump administration is ending legal visa programs for Haitians such as humanitarian parole and temporary protected status. Those on the latter program now find themselves being forced to leave the US by 3 August.
The Guardian previously reported that many Haitians began leaving Springfield within days of Trump’s election win in November.
Crow of the Ohio department of public safety says there are up to five trainers who speak English and Haitian Creole available to help during driver simulation sessions.
Although the new driver training opportunities are welcomed, challenges remain.
When the Guardian visited recently, driving simulators located at the Clark county department of job and family services in Springfield weren’t easily accessible to the public.
“[Driving] simulators are a tool – they don’t replace the real thing. The challenge with the simulators [located around the city] is that sometimes they are not staffed by someone who speaks the language the user understands,” says Whitacre.
“And the simulator systems are not available in Haitian Creole, so people who don’t speak English are not going to be able to navigate them. That’s the biggest challenge with that.”
