“This is a different world,” I thought to myself as I strolled down Whittier Boulevard, the main shopping drag in East Los Angeles.
The storefronts are splashy and loud, brightly painted with advertisements announcing their wares and services, mostly in Spanish.
La Raza 97.9, a popular Spanish-language radio station, blasted the latest hits as I waited in a lunchtime line at a juice bar for a mango licuado ““ a sort of Mexican smoothie ““ all but unheard of in Westwood.
The most conspicuous difference, however, was that I was the only white person around.
“Our clientele is only Latinos, a few African Americans, but no Americans, like you,” Alcira Orellana, the owner of the 97 Discount Store told me in Spanish, implying that, to her, only those with white faces count as Americans.
“They don’t call us Americans. They call us Mexicans,” Orellana said.
Ironically, she immigrated from a different Central American country.
Despite the social isolation of this barrio just east of downtown, however, a political movement is underway to attain something at the heart of American values: The right to self-government.
I think it’s time to help them get what they’re fighting for.
East Los Angeles, a heavily Hispanic area with a population of over 130,000, is currently an unincorporated part of Los Angeles county, which puts it in administrative limbo, without a city council or mayor.
While the surrounding cities are allowed to hire their own police force, control their tax revenues and elect their own officials, East L.A. is administered by the county, which means that the quality of public services ““ which are notoriously lacking ““ is left largely to the whims of county bureaucrats.
Folks are fed up. State Senator Gloria Romero, a leading advocate for East L.A’s independence, has been organizing meetings and rallies in support of self-determination.
“People are excited,” Gustavo Camacho, Romero’s top aide on the issue, told me. Her office hopes to put a referendum to ballot later this year.
This fight is not a new one. During the ’60s and early ’70s, when the area served as the heart of the Chicano activist movement, three separate attempts at incorporation ““ the act of becoming a city ““ were unsuccessful.
As they are today, residents were tired of inadequate health and education services, and hoped that incorporation would help rectify the problem.
Reynaldo F. MacÃas, a UCLA Chicana/o studies professor recently named acting dean of social sciences, wrote at the time that incorporation would bring “a visible, governmental structure that reflects a favorable Chicano identity” and provide an important “psychological” benefit for Chicano people.
Whether or not the Chicano support was separatist in nature, it still reflected an American ideal that each group should get full and equal representation.
These early attempts at incorporation, unfortunately, were quashed largely by business owners fearful of the increased taxes that would most likely be necessary to sustain an independent city.
Today, skepticism from fearful absentee landlords and business owners in the area is likely to resurface.
In addition, the area has a fairly low median income ““ and thus a low tax base ““ so there’s a risk that after incorporation, services could become worse due to budget problems.
“There is a short-term risk that services would be tight,” said Leobardo Estrada, a UCLA professor of urban planning who is familiar with the area.
It has a big gang problem, he said, and a police force powerful enough to deal with it will be expensive.
“They’re just on the margin,” he told me, “but I think they can make it. It’s like a start-up business: The overhead may be high, but the future payoff is worth it.”
Estrada is right. While budget problems are a concern, self-determination is a right that should be afforded everyone living in this country.
The area’s business owners, landlords, county officials and social justice activists here on campus should give East L.A. the support it needs to become its own city.
Maybe then, with a local government, folks like Orellana will get to see a little more of what America is all about.
Want to start your own city? Let Reed know at treed@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu