for seasonal work opportunities and then return to their country. Costa Rica and Nicaragua signed an agreement regulating seasonal migration in 1998; it allows Nicaraguans with work permits to enter Costa Rica at the western border at Peñas Blancas on the Pan-American Highway. In the northern part of Costa Rica there are 287,766 Nicaraguans and the Catholic Church in this area has an active program to protect the rights of migrant workers. Nicaraguans in the United States Abroad, the United States is home to the second largest number of Nicaraguans outside Nicaragua, particularly in the Miami area. The estimated number of Nicaraguan Americans in the United States was 281,167 in 2006, up from 177,684 in 2000. The earliest documents of immigration from Nicaragua to the United States was combined in total with those of other Central American countries. However, according to the U.S. Census Bureau some 7,500 Nicaraguans legally immigrated from 1967 to 1976. An estimated 28,620 Nicaraguans were living in the U.S. in 1970, 90% of which self-reported as "white" on the 1970 census. Most Nicaraguan immigrants during the late 1960s were women: there were only 60 male Nicaraguan immigrants for every 100 female immigrants during this period. In 1998 more than two million Nicaraguans were left homeless due to hurricane Mitch, as a result many Nicaraguans received permanent residence or temporary protected status (TPS) in the late 1990s. According to the 1990 U.S. Census 168,659 of the total 202,658 documented Nicaraguans in the U.S. were born in Nicaragua. In 1992 approximately 10–12% of the Nicaraguan population had emigrated. These emigrants tended to be disproportionately of working age, better educated, and more often white-collar workers than nonmigrants. In addition, emigrants were more likely to come from larger premigration households and higher income households. Areas of greatest concentration in the United States The largest concentration of Nicaraguan Americans in the United States, about 79,559, is in Miami, Florida, most notably around the areas of Sweetwater and "Little Managua". Sweetwater has the highest concentration of Nicaraguan American in the United States, in 2000 16.63% of Sweetwater residents identified as being of Nicaraguan heritage. This was the highest percentage of Nicaraguan Americans of any place in the country. As a result, Sweetwater is locally known as "Little Managua" after Managua, the Nicaraguan capital. However, the area of "Little Havana" in Miami is also colloquially called "Little Managua" even though Sweetwater has a