And now, Latina teens celebrating their quinceañera can channel their inner princess with a new line of gowns by Disney that “combine classic styling with elements of fantasy and magic.”

Disney’s Royal Ball collection will feature 21 gowns, all designed to “bring an air of royal and fairy tale to young women celebrating their Quinceañera,” Disney announced Wednesday.  Young girls celebrating their coming of age can choose from gowns inspired by each of Disney’s princess characters, including Ariel (“cascading waves of organza ruffles and oceans of jewels”), Pocahontas (“these gown celebrate the beauty of the earth and the sky”) and Sleeping Beauty (“as alluring and beautiful as Aurora herself”).

The quinceañera party – celebrated throughout Latin America, Mexico and the Caribbean – is traditionally held on a girl’s fifteenth birthday to commemorate her entry into womanhood and typically, the gown is an integral part of the celebration. While the fiesta de quince can be as elaborate (think a formal church ceremony, court of attendants and ballroom party) or as simple as budget allows, the quinceañera is a custom maintained by many U.S. Latinos and is now a national industry which generates more than $400 million a year.

“The Latino community has a strong affinity for Disney, and the Disney Royal Ball Quinceañera Collection offers another avenue to make the Quinceañera celebration even more unique and meaningful for Latina teens and their families,” said Gilberto Martinez Kladt, vice president of licensing for Disney Princess of the collection. “Disney is thrilled to provide young Latinas with the opportunity to celebrate the elegance, grace and poise of their favorite Disney Princess characters on such a special and momentous day.”

But for some parents, like Cristy Clavijo-Kish, shopping for the big occasion may not automatically mean turning to Disney. As the mother of 11-year-old twin girls, the Miami-based lifestyle blogger says the decision to go Disney will ultimately rest with her children, who she says ultimately may not prefer such a formal style.

“These dresses are definitely very girly girl,” says Clavijo-Kish, whose Cuban parents threw her a fairly low-key event and rented her a simple dress. Her twins are likely to consider personal style over brand, she says, especially because “they are past the age of wanting to be a princess.”

Even so, Clavijo-Kish says she likes the dress line, citing its modest designs (“I hate it when quinces look inappropriate for their age,” she remarks) and range of “fun” colors and sizes (all gowns will be available in sizes 0-20).

Martha Bermudes, the owner of a bridal and quinceañera gown boutique in Sacramento, California, agrees that Disney’s main selling point for its new collection will be style – not its commercial branding.

“I don’t think girls coming in here would immediately want to look at a Disney gown,” says Bermudes, who typically sells gowns between $100 and $500 dollars; less than the Disney collection gowns priced from $530-$999. The predominantly Mexican-American clientele that come into her store want colorful gowns and what she calls “big, fluffy dresses.”

“If the Disney dresses can make girls feel like princesses, then that’s what they will go for,” explains Bermudes, who has been in the quince gown business for six years. “I don’t think I will stock the dresses right away in my store, but I would probably get a catalogue and special order them if clients are interested in buying them.”

And style might help Latinas and their parents overlook the fact that to date, Disney has not featured a Latinas as a princess in any of its films. There is an American Indian (Pochantas), Asian (Mulan) and African-American (Tiana) princess in Disney’s roster of classic films and parents like Clavijo-Kish are waiting for a bilingual princess to call their own.

“I think there should definitely be a Latina princess,” says Clavijo-Kish, who cites “princess” characteristics like loyalty, entrepreneurship and bravery as some of the values that Latino parents are most likely to appreciate about the current lineup of Disney princesses.

Until then, Latinas across the country can choose – if they have the budget – to embody the Disney princess look on their big birthday.

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Disney’s new line of quinceañera gowns will range in price from $530-$999 and will be sold at specialty and formal wear retailers in the US and Canada.

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Our overweight children are more at risk of developing serious health problems like heart disease and high blood pressure, and recent studies indicate that currently HALF of all Latino children born after 2000 will develop type 2 diabetes during their lifetime.

In addition to the health risks that it poses, high sugar consumption directly impacts academic performance since it often replaces foods rich in protein that are essential for helping students focus and learn. Sugary breakfasts and lunches cause a brief spike in energy that is not sustained throughout the school day. And as high-sugar diets suppress immune systems, more Latino students are forced to call in sick and miss class.

Obesity has become an epidemic for Latino kids across the country.

More and more organizations are taking action by starting programs or developing resources that focus on the problem of high sugar consumption among the Latino community. They are providing information or tools for Latino parents to use to fight back and help their children lose the pounds and maintain a healthy weight.

Last week, Arte Público Press, the nation’s largest and oldest publisher of U.S. Hispanic literature, launched A Day Without Sugar Challenge, or Un día sin azúcar. Their new initiative calls for children across the country to fight obesity and embrace healthy diets by limiting their sugar intake. For an entire day, families and especially children are encouraged to go without any sugary drinks, candies, cookies, or sweet baked goods and avoid foods with added sugars.  The American Heart Association recommends no more than 9 teaspoons of sugar per day, but children typically consume closer to 30 teaspoons.

When you visit the Day Without Sugar Campaign website you’ll find resources like a free downloadable coloring book, recipes and snack tips in English and Spanish, a fact sheet about the challenges Latino children face, and you can even sign up to receive your own classroom toolkit.

The campaign also has a bilingual children’s picture book to accompany it that was written by Diane de Anda and illustrated by Janet Montecalvo. A Day without Sugar/ Un día sin azúcar tells the story of five cousins who love spending time together as a family. One day, their Tia Sofía challenges them to go on a sugar hunt and find all the sugars that exist in their daily diet, including the hidden sugars. She’s concerned about young Tito, who is at risk of developing diabetes like his abuela and Tio Pedro. The kids are not very enthusiastic about going a whole day without sugar, but luckily, Tia Sofia has a plan and shows the children how to replace the added sugars with natural ingredients that sweeten their meals in a healthy way.

The new initiative is another example of the publisher’s commitment to fighting Latino childhood obesity. Just a few years ago, in 2009, Arte Público Press along with the support of the Kellogg Foundation, launched a project called ¡Salud, familia! that aims to educate Latino youth on a variety of health and nutrition topics with bilingual picture books distributed free of charge to families in low-income Latino communities through health workers.

How much sugar is in your child’s diet?

Monica Olivera Hazelton, NBC Latino contributor and the founder and publisher of MommyMaestra.com, a site for Latino families that homeschool, as well as families with children in a traditional school setting who want to take a more active role in their children’s education. She is the 2011 winner of the “Best Latina Education Blogger” award by LATISM.

The day itself was pleasant enough; my husband got me the obligatory ode to mothers greeting card, and my daughter did the obligatory signatory scribble at the bottom of said card (that she can’t even read yet). I also got the standard Mother’s Day gift and dinner and all the stuff you’d expect from people on Mother’s Day.

On my end, I did the obligatory call to my mother and got her the obligatory ode to mothers greeting card and the gift and we all went out to lunch and all the things she would expect from people on Mother’s Day.

But why? Why did I get a card and a gift? Why did I get one for my mom? Because I popped a human out of my vagina? Because my mom popped me out of hers? Because moms everywhere spend time and effort and love on popping out and raising their kids? No. My husband got me a card and a present and taught Adi to say “Happy Mothers Day” because he had to.

I’m not saying that my husband doesn’t love me. I know he does. And I’m not saying that Adi didn’t enjoy helping her father give me presents. I know she did. But I don’t want fake thoughtfulness. Sure I love my mom, but lets face it. I bought that card because a greeting card company told me to. We all went out to lunch because it was Mother’s Day and we had to go out to lunch. My husband does nice things for me all the time. Why did he also have to do something on Mother’s Day?

As much as we might love our moms and baby mamas the whole do something nice for your mom specifically today thing seems a bit forced. It’s not an act of love. It’s an act of peer pressure. Like Valentine’s Day.

Come on. Smoke this motherhood appreciation stuff. Everyone is doing it.

I’m not saying that mothers shouldn’t get gifts or appreciation. I like gifts. I like appreciation. I don’t even mind that much when my name is included in one of those massive “Let’s Tag All The Moms We Know In A Facebook Photo Of A Painting Of A Breastfeeding Woman Because Everyone Loves Mothers” posts. But if you really want to make your mom happy, call her today. Take her out to lunch next week. When you don’t “have” to. Getting flowers doesn’t feel as special when everyone else is getting flowers at the exact same time. It’s great to offer to change the poopy diaper on Mother’s Day, but offer it other days too.

Being a mom is hard. And it takes more than one token day a year to make us feel appreciated. Appreciate moms today. And tomorrow. And whenever you happen to find yourself in a store with gourmet chocolate. Because every day is Mother’s Day.

Rachel Figueroa-Levin is a soapmaker, cofounder and educator at Urban Babywearing, a hyperlocal Inwood blogger and organizer, a political/life/religion/parenting satirist, and all around trouble maker.  She is also the creator of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Spanish-speaking alter ego @elbloombito.  You can reach her via twitter @Jewyorican.

Did we want them to clumsily handle a deadly weapon — seduced by the excitement of seeing a real, live gun for the first time — or did we want them, as experienced shooters, to be able to step away from the situation with full knowledge of the danger involved? We opted for the latter and I sleep better for it.

That said, I can easily imagine either of my boys, now 11 and 14, innocently picking up a pint-size, colorful rifle and squeezing the trigger under the assumption that such an item couldn’t possibly be anything other than a toy.

In fact, as we discussed the terrible incident in which a 5-year-old boy shot his 2-year-old sister in the chest with a .22-caliber firearm marketed under the name “My First Rifle,” it came out that in teacher-led discussions at school about the incident, my sons’ peers still could not understand that the gun in question was not actually a toy.

During our firearms training, the most important thing our instructor drilled into us was our whole reason for being there: to ensure that our kids learned that “guns are not toys.”

How, exactly, do you teach that to a 5-year-old wielding a small, brightly-colored gun that looks exactly like a toy? It seems practically impossible.

In the case of the Kentucky 5-year-old, it would be very easy to be satisfied with thinking, as the local coroner told a reporter, that this incident was “just one of those crazy accidents.” But that’s just plain lazy.

You could blame the parents — according to news reports, the weapon was left loaded and sitting in a corner of their home. When the parents accepted this birthday present on behalf of their son, they appeared to not understand the respect it deserved.

Proper firearms training instills safety habits such as never keeping loaded weapons out in plain view, where the untrained might stumble upon them and harm themselves or others.

But in a country where even requiring a background check for the purchase of firearms sends some people into convulsions, it’s ridiculous to consider a day when certified training would be required for the purchase or ownership of guns. It’s easier to just call accidental firearm deaths — 851 in 2011, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — “crazy accidents.”

These “accidents” are preventable.

How in the world can it be that pellet-shooting replica guns — generally known as Airsoft or BB guns — are governed by federal regulations stating that they must be sold with clearly visible markings, but firearms merchants are not prohibited from selling real weapons that look like toys?

Do a Google image search. In addition to the rainbow, blue and fire-engine-red weapons from “My First Rifle,” you’ll find photos of real, hot-pink Glocks, Louis-Vuitton-inspired guns and blinged-out rifles. The Baltimore Police Department released a bulletin displaying pictures of real Rugers, AKs, KEL TECs and Colts that have been painted up in bright colors to look like toys.

Writing in The Wall Street Journal this past March, toy store owner and gun enthusiast Rhett Power lamented, “Let me get this straight: Children are not allowed to have toy guns that look like the real thing, but adults are allowed to have the real thing that looks like a toy? That has got to change. This isn’t about ‘gun control,’ it’s about something closer to simple decency.”

Obviously, criminals are going to customize their guns to evade law enforcement. But in terms of responsibility, is this that far removed from legitimately selling real firearms that look like toys to adults — or worse, are expressly designed for children’s little bodies?

Parents are within their rights to teach their children how to shoot and care for guns responsibly at any age they feel is appropriate. But not with toy-like weapons that violate the visual and tactile safety tenet that real guns are not playthings. Get these “first” weapons off the shelves.

Esther Cepeda is a syndicated columnist and an NBC Latino Contributor.

“I thought, ‘what does the world need?’” said Lopez on stage at the Mom+Social Global Summit, a United Nations Foundation event in New York City focusing on the role of technology and social media in improving maternal and children’s health. “I found that health care and education was very important to me; telemedicine was the answer.”

The Lopez Family Foundation – run by sisters and co-founders Jennifer and Lynda Lopez – operates telemedicine clinics in both Puerto Rico and Panama. These clinics act as hubs where technology is used to connect U.S. doctors to seriously ill patients in rural areas; by using telemedicine, these patients have access to medical diagnoses and quality treatment that would otherwise be unavailable for them.

Jennifer and Lynda Lopez discussed their passion for improving the lives of women and children around the world with Glamour magazine editor-in-chief Cindi Leive (r).

“We are working on it every day,” explained Lopez, who has opened three centers and hopes with Lynda, a radio personality, to open more. “You know, me big goals. But I realized that this was something doctors would love to have and I think one step at a time, we can make a big difference in the lives of babies.”

Joined at the Mom+Social Global Summit by fellow Latina Christy Turlington Burns, host Elizabeth Gore, Sheryl WuDunn and other socially-savvy moms, Lopez said that it was only when she became pregnant that she understood the impact of motherhood as a catalyst for change.

“We always talked about doing charity work together,” explained Lopez of working with Lynda, who coincidentally became pregnant just six months after Lopez did in 2008. “But when we became pregnant, that went into hyperdrive. Becoming a mom changes your life and your perspective on the world. It makes you want to have this great world for this little being that already exists in your mind.”

And Lopez credits her mother, Lupe – who was married at 20 and didn’t have a college education – for being “a great example.”

“My mom had three girls and her thing was to empower us, to make us feel that we could accomplish anything,” recalled Lopez, who grew up as the second of three sisters in the Bronx, New York. “No one had to take care of us – we could take care of ourselves. If we wanted to be president of the United States, we could do it. She was very intent on preparing us for the future …and now I think, wow, Lupe did an amazing job!”

It’s the type of mothering Lopez wants to children across the globe to have; and the key to doing so, she says is through health care.

“We need take the lives of children seriously and put that out in the atmosphere to make all women feel supported in this mission,” said Lopez.

“When we support each other, that support comes back to you and becomes a beautiful cycle of great energy and great things.”

There are many words I can use to describe myself – so many in fact, that I prefer to share my identity, my Mexicanness, through food and at the table: the one place where it all seems to make sense so beautifully.

My story begins in Mexico City, where I was born and raised in a middle class, Mexican-Jewish family. My three sisters and I were taught to work hard, study hard and above all, to appreciate good food, like the magic made when a touch of salt is sprinkled onto a warm and soft corn tortilla. At home, the conversation always revolved around food. From “Grandma made egg salad with mashed ripe avocado and gribenes!” to “Did you get to the school cafeteria on time to eat Doña Lupe’s sopes?” and “Papi will kill us if he finds out we stopped at El Galan for a spicy hot dog on our way home!” food was always on our minds.

I attribute my love of food partly to my grandparents, both sides of whom immigrated to Mexico from different parts of Europe and Eastern Europe. Our heritage and home was reflected on the plate, when we ate many traditional Jewish foods for the holidays – like gefilte fish – in a very Mexican way, a la Veracruzana, simmered in a spicy tomato sauce dressed with pickled chiles, olives and capers. Being Mexican and Jewish were one as I grew up eating pan de muerto, sucking on sweet sugar skulls during Day of the Dead and always enjoyed matzo ball soup on Fridays. Celebrating Passover and going to mass on Sundays with my nana was also a way I continuously tread between my two worlds.

Jinich with her sisters and parents always enjoyed quality time around the dinner table during a New Year’s Eve celebration. They’re pictured here during the ’80s in Mexico City.

Then everything changed when I moved to Texas. Overnight, I went from being undeniably Mexican to being someone who unexpectedly didn’t conform to people’s expectations of what it meant to look and sound Mexican. And so there I was, alone in Texas with a husband always on the road, writing my thesis on Mexican democratic institutions and missing everything that had made me feel at home: Mexican food. Though I had flirted on countless occasions with the idea of a culinary career, I tried to stay true to the policy analysis path in order to become an academic. “Snap out of it Pati!” I would say, reminding myself that I could indulge my love of cooking on vacations and Sundays. Years later, already in Washington, D.C. with undergraduate and graduate degrees under my arm and a job in a prestigious think tank, I switched careers and dove right into the culinary abyss. Since then, I’ve made sharing Mexican food my mission as a cooking show host and cookbook author in the United States because it was through food that I have been able to reconnect with my home country.

Cookbook author Pati Jinich with her three boys, who call themselves Mexican American.

Mexican, Mexican-Jewish, Mexican-American: Now, 15 years after moving to the U.S. and raising a family, I feel confident sharing what it means to be a Mexican. In a way, I hope I can break down myths about Mexican food (it’s not greasy and cheese, nor always laborious with hard-to-find ingredients, nor always spicy) but I also want to tear down walls surrounding Latino identity. I’ll never forget when I was a guest on the Paula Deen show a few years ago; when I was introduced as Mexican, the adorable Paula said bluntly ‘you don’t look Mexican at all! And what is that last name?’ So while my last name is European and I have blue eyes, I am Mexican and extremely proud of it.

Because there are so many words to say how I feel about my culture and identity – countless, really – I prefer to share fabulous food, heavy with the flavors, scents and colors of Mexico to share my story and what it means to be Latino and Mexican in this country. After all, when you stir, blend and season contradictions into one pot, they taste absolutely delicious.

He played bass guitar in salsa and merengue bands. He parked his school bus on the street. He gave neighborhood children rides on his motorcycle.

And when they gathered for a candlelight vigil to remember two girls who vanished years ago, Castro was there, too, comforting the mother of one of the missing, a neighbor said.

Neighbors and friends were stunned by the arrest of Castro and his two brothers after a 911 call led police to his house, where authorities say three women missing for about a decade were held captive.

A 6-year-old girl also was found in the home, and a neighbor said she was at a park a week earlier with Castro, who referred to her as his “girlfriend’s daughter.” Israel Lugo lives down the street from the house where the women were found Monday and said he was stunned to see one of them holding the girl, who was screaming and crying.

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Castro and his brothers, ages 50 to 54, were in custody Tuesday but had not been formally charged.

Castro was friends with the father of Gina DeJesus, one of the missing women, and helped search for her after she disappeared, said Khalid Samad, a friend of the family. He also performed music at a fundraiser held in her honor, Samad said.

“When we went out to look for Gina, he helped pass out fliers,” said Samad, a community activist who was at the hospital with DeJesus and her family Monday night. “You know, he was friends with the family.”

Tito DeJesus, one of Gina’s uncles, said he played in a few bands with Castro over the past 20 years. He remembered visiting Castro’s house after his niece disappeared, but he never noticed anything out of ordinary, saying it was very sparsely furnished and filled with musical instruments.

“That’s pretty much what it looked like,” DeJesus said. “I had no clue, no clue whatsoever that this happened.”

Castro’s son, Anthony Castro, said in an interview with London’s Daily Mail newspaper that he now speaks with his father just a few times a year and seldom visited his house. On his last visit two weeks ago, he said, his father would not let him inside.

“The house was always locked,” he told the newspaper. “There were places we could never go. There were locks on the basement. Locks on the attic. Locks on the garage.”

Juan Perez, who lives two doors down from the house, has known Castro for decades.

“He was always happy, nice, respectful,” Perez said. “He gained trust with the kids and with the parents. You can only do that if you’re nice.”

He said Castro had an ATV and a motorcycle and would take children on rides. Nothing seemed wrong with it then, he said, adding that he now thinks that was one way Castro tried to get close to the children. He also worked until recently as a school bus driver.

Castro’s personnel file with the Cleveland public school district, obtained by The Associated Press through a Freedom of Information request, shows he was hired in 1990 as a bus driver after saying on his application that he liked working with children.

The personnel file includes details on his dismissal, approved by the school board last fall after he left his bus unattended for four hours.

Police identified the other two suspects as the 52-year-old’s brothers, Pedro Castro, 54, and Onil Castro, 50.

A relative of the three brothers said their family was “as blindsided as anyone else.”

Juan Alicea said he hadn’t been to the home of his brother-in-law Ariel Castro since the early 1990s but had eaten dinner with him at a different brother’s house shortly before the arrests Monday.

Lucy Roman lives next to a house she said is shared by Pedro Castro and his mother. She said police arrested him Monday night.

“I feel sorry for her,” Roman said of the mother. “She’s a very nice lady.”

Several residents said they saw Ariel Castro at a candlelight vigil for the missing girls.

Antony Quiros said he was at the vigil about a year ago and saw Castro comforting Gina DeJesus’ mother.

One neighbor, Francisco Cruz, said he was with Castro the day investigators dug up a yard looking for the girls.

Castro told Cruz, “They’re not going to find anyone there,” Cruz recalled.

Castro’s Facebook page identifies him as a Cleveland resident and says he attended the city’s Lincoln-West High School. His interests include Virginia Beach, the Chinese crested dog breed and Cuban-born salsa singer Rey Ruiz.

On April 11, he wrote to congratulate “my Rosie Arlene” and wish her a fast recovery from giving birth to “a wonderful baby boy. That makes me Gramps for the fifth time. Luv you guys!”

—

Associated Press writers Mike Householder, Thomas J. Sheeran, Andrew Welsh-Huggins in Cleveland and Meghan Barr and Mark Scolforo in Harrisburg, Pa., contributed to this report.

It turns out I didn’t have complete control.

In my eternal quest to have Adi leave me alone long enough for me to cook dinner, I made a YouTube playlist of age-appropriate and very distracting videos. I hit play on the first one, go to the kitchen, and by the time the playlist is finished, I have dinner made. I don’t want to be the kind of parent that just sticks her kid in front of the television, but holy frijole it’s an effective babysitter.

Better living through technology.

Usually when Adi watches something on television, I’m sitting there with her and we talk about what’s going on the screen. When she’s on her YouTube playlist, I’m in the other room.

With many YouTube videos, especially the popular ones, an advertisement will play before the actual video. We don’t have a television (all of the media we consume is streamed over the Internet) so commercials are a bit of a novelty for Adi. They’re harmless typically, mostly for household cleaning supplies, cat food, or Tupperware. But then a couple of nights ago, I heard what I can only describe as noises of a sexual nature  over a dance beat. Worried that Adi had somehow left the playlist and stumbled on something horrifically inappropriate, I ran into the room.

Adi didn’t stumble on anything. One of the made-for-preschoolers videos had a music video commercial. A music video not made for preschoolers. It was not appropriate for someone Adi’s age. Heck, it wasn’t appropriate for someone my age. I know that the inappropriate parts of the video were beyond Adi’s scope of understanding but I would still prefer it if she didn’t see scantily-clad women grinding up on some man wearing tacky sunglasses and standing next to a wind machine.

I’m sure YouTube advertisements are based on some kind of algorithm I don’t understand based on title tags, meta descriptions, and other words my marketing technologist husband has said to me over the years. I suppose you could argue that I should stick to established and/or corporate channels that have complete control over advertising, but some of the best videos for children out there are independently produced and not affiliated with any large channel. If there is an age rating system for YouTube (aside from 18+) I haven’t found one.

If there’s a way to specify an age range for advertisements I encourage people who produce and upload videos to choose commercials that are age appropriate. Adi’s viewing habits have changed — at least the sources of her media consumption have. There are some really lovely videos that are ruined by terribly inappropriate advertisements. I can’t imagine that this sort of thing is done on purpose but it’s definitely something moms (who leave their kids alone watching videos to make dinner) should be aware of.

Rachel Figueroa-Levin is a soapmaker, cofounder and educator at Urban Babywearing, a hyperlocal Inwood blogger and organizer, a political/life/religion/parenting satirist, and all around trouble maker.  She is also the creator of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Spanish-speaking alter ego @elbloombito.  You can reach her via twitter @Jewyorican.

They say 46-year-old Ricardo Portillo of Salt Lake City died late Saturday night.

Unified police spokesman Justin Hoyal says Portillo passed away at the hospital, where he was being treated following an assault during a soccer game last weekend.

Police say a 17-year-old player in a recreational soccer league punched Portillo after the man called a foul on him and issued him a yellow card.

The teen has been booked into juvenile detention on suspicion of aggravated assault.

Hoyal says authorities will consider additional charges since Portillo has died.

This happened the day after federal immigration officials issued a new policy that would effectively expand that ruling, making government-paid legal representation available to people with mental disabilities in immigration courts in all states.

This is a common-sense move to provide protection to the most vulnerable of a class of people — immigrants facing deportation — who don’t have the right to a lawyer if they can’t afford one.

Now that such an important precedent has been set, it is imperative that the government move quickly to ensure that minors get similar protections.

As it stands now, children under 18 without a parent or guardian are forced to navigate the immigration detention process alone. Even children who are little more than toddlers are expected to appear before immigration judges to defend themselves in legal proceedings if they can’t secure a lawyer.

According to the Vera Institute of Justice, a New-York-based non-governmental criminal justice research and policy organization, from Oct. 1, 2008, through Sept. 30, 2010, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services, reported that 13,945 immigrant children were admitted into its Division of Unaccompanied Children’s Services. Sixteen percent of these kids were 12 and under.

“The recent litigation to protect individuals who cannot defend themselves in court set us up to connect the dots to children,” said Wendy Young, president of the Washington, D.C.-based legal advocacy organization Kids in Need of Defense (KIND).

“Extending these protections to children is the natural next step. These, too, are individuals unable to understand the proceedings they are involved in. We’ve represented children as young as 2 years old and it’s really a travesty of justice — the judges are almost as distressed as the children when they see young kids coming in to court without counsel.”

According to KIND, each year more than 8,000 unaccompanied children come to the U.S. alone, many of them escaping abuse or persecution, or as victims of trafficking, abandonment or severe deprivation. They’re expected to face the courts without counsel even though most children can’t understand the complex procedures or the options open to them. And there’s almost always a language barrier.

With the right legal representation, many of these children — about 40 percent in 2010, according to the Vega Institute — would qualify for some form of relief from removal.

KIND, like other organizations, such as the Immigrant Children’s Assistance Project of the American Bar Association, provides pro bono legal assistance to detained, unaccompanied children and trains lawyers to take up these complex cases.

As with any other proposal for immigration system relief, the first question raised by doubters is how much it would cost to provide such services.

“You have to remember that we’re talking about a very small slice of the 11 million undocumented immigrants on which most of our attention is focused,” Young told me. “Even though we’re seeing an increase in the numbers of children in this situation, the cost would be a fairly modest amount, to be perfectly honest. Because we’re talking about a private-public partnership, we’re only looking at a range of $15 million to $28 million per year, depending on the fluctuation in the numbers.”

To put that in context, though at the high end $28 million isn’t chump change, it’s also a relative pittance within the Department of Justice’s $27.1 billion budget request for fiscal year 2013. And the benefits would ripple far beyond cases involving minors.

“It would help the courts become more efficient,” said Young. “Rather than have kids coming in at multiple times, it would be much faster if they had counsel from the get-go so their cases could move ahead quicker.”

This is not a pie-in-the-sky dream. According to Young, the comprehensive immigration reform proposal being developed in the Senate includes a provision that would require the Department of Justice to appoint counsel in cases where such immigrant minors were unable to access pro bono services.

If there’s a shred of humanity in the legislators who negotiate the final compromise, this suggested protection will not end up on the cutting room floor.

Esther Cepeda is a syndicated columnist and an NBC Latino Contributor.