by Christopher Hinton
"'How are a Puerto Rican and a snail alike?'" asks Enrique "Ricky" Salgado, recalling a joke an English teacher once told his elementary school class. "The butt of the joke is: neither of them move, and neither of them work."
Salgado, who is Puerto Rican, is the executive director of the Division Street Business Development Association (DSBDA), a grass-roots organization dedicated to the economic development of the Latino community of Humboldt Park. As he recalls this memory, he shakes his head slightly, as do I, just at the idea of a teacher saying something so insulting to a classroom of children. "For a long time I believed it," continues Salgado, "I had the perception that Puerto Ricans don't work--even though everyone in my whole family worked. And that Humboldt Park was bad--even though I lived in it!"
Humboldt Park, on Chicago's west side, is an area traditionally known for Puerto Ricans, poverty, gang violence, and crime. Throughout the 70s and 80s it was considered an economic dead zone by city planners and developers. Despite the fact that there was a vital community of families, property owners, and businesses, many people from both the inside and out saw little opportunity.
"I graduated high school with a 1.9 GPA," says Salgado. "I barely graduated. I got into college through an assistance program, and I still barely got through that. And the reason I'm saying this is because I was born in Humboldt Park. I was raised here. For along time I didn't believe I could change anything. That I had no ownership of anything or that I was a part of anything."
Salgado first began working for the DSBDA in 1997 as a volunteer, while attending classes at the University of Illinois. He was interested in urban development, and worked closely with the executive director at the time.
By then things were just begging to change for Humboldt Park. Already, affluent professionals were buying up the cheap brownstones of Bucktown and Wicker Park, just east of Humboldt. They were renovating them and moving in. Long time residents either sold out and moved on, or were merely pushed out by the rising costs--a process well known today as gentrification.
For the Puerto Rican community, gentrification is nothing new. At one time the community stretched as far north as the Lakeview and Lincoln Park neighborhoods. But by the 1970s they had been pushed into Humboldt Park, and by the mid-90s, it looked as if they were about to be pushed out again.
In 1986, the Division Street Business Development Association was founded to help counter the displacement process of gentrification.
"Gentrification itself is not a bad thing," says Salgado, "and when you talk to people about gentrification you get many definitions depending on which side of the coin you're on. For people in my field, people in development, gentrification is a good thing because you're revitalizing the neighborhood, you're creating new housing, you're bringing more income into the community; those are all good things. But 99% of the time, they are never for the community that is there. Instead it's for a different community, the community moving in."
The DSBDA doesn't give out loans or financial assistance, but they do help locals become credit worthy. They help new business owners get through the red tape of city bureaucracy. They develop marketing, new business ventures, and tours for business leaders, and work closely with local politicians to get the city to repair damaged sidewalks, streets, and drainage systems. And most importantly, they help long-time businesses in the area stay vigorous.
"Our mission is to organize individuals who want to enhance their participation in the economic structure of the City of Chicago," says Salgado, "so that leaves us a lot of room to do a lot of things. The key difference is we're working with the community to develop the community for the community."
As in the 1970s, the Puerto Rican response seemed at first to be passive towards the new wave of gentrification. Parallel to Salgado's own personal experience, the Puerto Rican community had internalized the negativity projected upon it by others. The community believed the stories others told of itself. And if they were all lazy, at least now they could move. Many long-time community members began to leave.
One of the first things Salgado and other neighborhood organizations worked hard to build is a market center now known as Paseo Boricua. In 1995, the City of Chicago erected two great Puerto Rican flags over Division Street. Fifty-four feet tall and made of steel, they were painted with bright blue and red colors. In some circles the flags have been controversial. Critics say they look like barriers. But Salgado disagrees: "They are not meant to keep anybody out. There is no gate. Instead it is a gateway."
Between the flags, Paseo Boricua began to develop as the center of the Chicago Puerto Rican community. Puerto Rican restaurants, night life, salsa culture, and commerce began to develop with a little help. Beautification projects began: murals were painted, stone tables and benches were set-up, and 78 plant boxes, each painted with a different flag from one of Puerto Rico's 78 towns, were put on the curbs.
Over time, Paseo Boricua became a place where Puerto Ricans could go to learn about their heritage. A culture center was established, and the offices of local Puerto Rican politicians relocated their offices to Division Street. Recently, the City of Chicago has set aside money for Paseo Boricua property owners who want to restore their buildings' facades.
Salgado would eventually like to see the street resembling something closer to the old San Juan quarter of Puerto Rico, with decorative wrought iron and flower boxes hanging from the buildings' windows. But the real test was whether or not people from outside the community would want to visit, have a meal, shop in the stores, and maybe stay late for something more.
Salgado recalls people would say to him: "There is no way you're going to get people to Humboldt Park, to eat Puerto Rican food, and park their cars where they can't see them."
Slowly, people have come, but more importantly, locals are staying instead of opting out for top dollar on their property or business. Why?
Says Salgado, "Because there is now a vision within the community. And many of the people who have left are returning. Young Puerto Rican professionals are staying rather than moving to more traditionally well-off neighborhoods."
Another project Salgado is working on is the development of more affordable housing. This summer the DSBDA, with a lot of help from the Hispanic Housing Development Corp, is building a ten-story affordable housing project at the corner of Division and Campbell. Its facade will stick to the Paseo Boricua theme, and it will easily house over a hundred people. The building should be completed by the following summer.
Salgado believes this kind of community balance is important. A neighborhood is more than just a place to build a home or to just open a business; it's a place where everyone should have a role and feel connected to their surroundings.
"When I started with the DSBDA," says Salgado, "it was primarily because of the work the organization was doing with community economic development. And I stayed with it because I began to see myself as part of this community. I now have a daughter I want to raise here."
Salgado's community building therefore also involves activities for people to participate in, which fosters deeper ties between the neighborhood and its residents. Chicago is the "City of Neighborhoods," and as such, the expression of ethnic identity is key in the celebration of ethnic diversity. So the DSBDA also focuses on Puerto Rican oriented parades and festivals.
"As a little kid," says Salgado, "I remembered celebrating Three Kings Day, but for some reason it disappeared, and no one talked about it anymore."
Three Kings Day is celebrated with gifts and parades in Puerto Rico on January 6th. Though it hadn't really disappeared in Chicago, it was celebrated on a much smaller, more family-oriented level. The first year Salgado was volunteering for DSBDA, he discovered that the ward's alderman and a few other locals were carrying on the tradition of dressing as the Three Kings, moving through the neighborhood and singing carols. Salgado was excited to see the holiday celebrated as his grandparents in Puerto Rico used to do, and he felt as if he had been missing out on a part of his heritage.
With a little work, Three King's Day is now a full parade that marches through the neighborhood and ends at El Clemente High School. There a music program awaits, with local adults passing out toys to the neighborhood children. Over the course of a few years, Three Kings Day went from an isolated affair to a community-wide celebration. "Evidence," says Salgado, "of progression within the community."
History, and a community's connection to that history, is an important part of Salgado's activism. There's more to the development of a neighborhood than commerce and revenue. It also takes the development of the community spirit.
"When I started to learn about Puerto Rican history, my view of myself completely changed. I was no longer an object drifting along. All of a sudden I had a force. I had an identity. And that is extremely important."