TheBakersfieldCalifornian.com

Trying to pinpoint the cause of Kern County's notoriously high teen birthrate isn't easy. Some blame high rates of poverty or low educational attainment, while others point to pop culture, risky behavior or parents who are unwilling to discuss the birds and the bees.

But one glaring statistic can't be ignored. While nationwide, three out of 10 teen girls will become pregnant, for Hispanic teens, the chances are a full 50 percent. More than half of Hispanic women have their first child before the age of 20. And in Kern County, Hispanics are the fastest growing segment of the population: Between 2000 and 2010, the local Hispanic population grew 63 percent, according to U.S. census figures.

That's not to blame our teen pregnancy problem solely on one ethnicity. Birthrates among Hispanic teens have come down in recent years -- though not as quickly as other population groups. And local teen birthrates for whites, blacks and other ethnicities are also higher than the statewide and national averages. But seriously addressing teen pregnancy in Kern County merits taking a closer look at the factors in play in the fastest-growing segment of our population.

We've all got a significant monetary incentive to do so. Between 2004 and 2005, a slight drop in the California teen birthrate meant that 1,419 fewer teens gave birth, saving California taxpayers more than $44 million. At the time of the study, Hispanics accounted for 72 percent of all teen births in California.

"I think our efforts are going to have to be more targeted to specific communities and populations," said Bill Phelps, chief of programs for Clinica Sierra Vista, which provides services to teen mothers and contracts with school districts to provide sex education courses. "The message we're giving is not being heard by everyone. If you're newly immigrated here and new to the language, and your cultural norm is to have a family in your teens, (our message) may be falling on deaf ears."

Recent research that has begun to focus more on Hispanics has found that one explanation for their stubbornly high teen birthrates may have to do with the failure of traditional prevention messages to connect with the community.

Standard prevention messages often characterize teen pregnancy as destructive behavior that can jeopardize future ambitions. But in many Latino cultures, motherhood is valued at any age, a deep-rooted standard that creates a conflicting message for Latina teens.

Consequently, "a lot of teen pregnancy messages have been seen in the Latino community as anti-family, anti-baby, anti-child messages," said Bill Albert, chief program officer for the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.

Messages directed at Hispanics should avoid portraying babies as life-destroyers, Albert said. Instead, they should emphasize that "it's not a question about loving babies, it's about timing and experiences," Albert said.

While cultural influences do impact Latina teen birthrates, teen childbearing is largely a socioeconomic problem, according to a UC San Francisco report, published in March, that broke down Hispanic childbearing factors in California.

The study noted that "lack of hope for educational and career opportunities" was common among the adolescent Hispanics interviewed. Foreign-born Hispanics in particular indicated that while they wanted to go to college, they perceived that their inability to obtain state and federal aid would make it virtually impossible.

Silvia Henriquez, executive director of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health, wrote in the Huffington Post in 2009 that socioeconomic obstacles are even more basic than that.

"For many Latinas, the top barriers to birth control usage are ... transportation, lack of health insurance or cash for health services, confusing and intimidating immigration regulations for households with a combination of citizens and non-citizens, and lack of guidance about available services. When teen pregnancy prevention programs and messages ignore these obstacles, Latinas become distanced from sex education efforts."

Kern County's rural nature likely compounds some of these challenges, said Phelps of Clinica Sierra Vista. While there may be a clinic that provides free birth control in Arvin, a teen may be worried about who will see her going there -- an aunt, a mom, a neighbor? A Bakersfield clinic might be an option, but that requires locating a ride or finding money for bus fare, and an hour on the bus each way.

In Los Angeles County, a Latina with similar circumstances could take a bus to another neighborhood 10 minutes away and visit a clinic there, Phelps said. That may explain why teen birthrates among Hispanics are lower in Los Angeles than in Kern, even though its Hispanic population is larger.

Over the next two years, Clinica Sierra Vista will retool some of its teen pregnancy prevention programs and will focus greater efforts in Arvin and Lamont, where the population is almost entirely Latino. Phelps hopes that will inform some better strategies for preventing teen pregnancy among Latinas.

But reaching parents is also key. Albert, of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, said his organization's research consistently shows that Hispanic teens cite parents as more influential in their decisions than peers, pop culture or partners. Yet other studies show that Hispanic parents are likely not to discuss sex with their children.

"I think the message ... to all parents, and Latino parents, too, is you really do have a role to play here," said Albert. "People are talking to your kids about sex, on TV, the Internet, at school. Are you going to be part of that conversation or not?"

If Kern County, consistently at the bottom of every teen-birth survey, is to ever make headway on this difficult and self-perpetuating problem, it's a conversation we'll have to resume with new urgency.

Stacey Shepard is The Californian's associate editorial page editor. Email her at sshepard@bakersfield.com.