|
Boulevard of Dreams
Once an outlet for UM students, University Boulevard now serves immigrant community
By David Zenlea
Sitting in the CASA of Maryland's Wheaton workers' center on University Boulevard Monday, about a block away from where Ourisman Wheaton Chevrolet sells shiny new Impalas and Malibus, Nelson Lionel Lopez said through a translator he had come to this country for a better future, and in order to better support his disabled brother back in Honduras, who at 10 years old remains unable to speak.
| Photo: Eric Bond |  | | Recent immigrants looking for the American Dream in places like Langley Park are a common sight along University Boulevard. A rich cultural marketplace of international food, music, and other specialty shops has developed along the corridor. |
Translator Tona Cravioto, senior manager of employment for CASA, added, "Employers request him by name."
A few miles east down this same road, groups of youths loiter at all hours in Tic Toc Liquors' parking lot, a hot spot for violent crime in the Langley Park area, which is 63.5 percent Hispanic/Latino, according to 2000 Census Bureau data.
The conflicting images are clichés; they are realities; and they are University Boulevard, a corridor around which have formed some of Maryland's most diverse and densely populated communities. The area has become a regional focus in the national debate over immigration.
In the early 1980s, El Salvadorans fleeing civil war in their native country moved into the area, according to CASA site manager Silvia Navas. They were followed soon thereafter by those from other Central American countries and then from everywhere in the world.
CASA formed in 1985 as a non-profit organization oriented to the needs of the El Salvadorans, and then broadened its mission to serve the larger immigrant community, representing day laborers in order to negotiate better paying contracts and offering a variety of social, educational, and legal services.
Both Navas and Wheaton workers' center staff member Justin Schear said that CASA does not ask immigrants how they entered the country.
"We do not ask. Everybody needs help so we help," Navas said.
Stephen Schreiman, director of the Maryland chapter of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, said this is illegal.
"They are providing work for illegals, which is a violation of federal law," he said.
Schreiman criticized the Montgomery County council for its monetary support of CASA's work centers on University Boulevard, and for what he said is an overly lenient policy towards illegal immigrants in the county.
Councilwoman Valerie Ervin, who represents District 5 said the county's contributions were only a small portion of CASA's funding. But she added that Montgomery County does not "turn people away at its borders."
"If they work here and rent here and send their children to public schools here, they are members of our county," she said.
As the name suggests, University Boulevard once enjoyed a strong connection with the University of Maryland's campus.
Tommy Marcos Jr., whose family has owned and operated the original Ledo restaurant at 2420 University Blvd. in Adelphi since 1955, said, "A lot of students lived down on University, all the way up to Takoma Park."
Joe Mullineaux, an alumnus presently serving as assistant director of campus dining services, recalled nights spent on the road in the late 1970s.
"My dorm mates and I would place an order for at least five large Ledo pizzas around 10 p.m. and then drive down University Boulevard to Tic Toc Liquors for some cold beer," he said via-email.
Since then Route 1 has become a major source of student activity and increasing development.
Bill Hanna, an urban studies and planning professor at the university and an advocate for the Langley Park community, said students miss out on what University Boulevard has to offer within walking distance of campus.
"I think one of the great shames of the disconnect is that there are some wonderful restaurants within a mile of campus that are underused by students, even though they can be accessed by the shuttle or even by walking on a nice day," he said via-email.
Later, Hanna added that the crime that occurs on University Boulevard is concentrated in areas such as Tic Toc Liquors.
"The areas where students are more likely to go are not high crime areas," he said.
Ervin likewise said that crime from immigrant communities is not occurring "Where any of the people who are complaining would live," but rather in the immigrants' own neighborhoods, something Hanna attributed to the density of the population as well as a transience that impedes the development of a community mindset.
Schear said that CASA's work centers have drawn many people off University Boulevard's roadside and parking lots, and given them a chance to make better salaries with more job security.
CASA asks employees to pay $10 for basic laborers, $15 for skilled workers, and $16 for hazardous jobs such as roof work.
In exchange, Schear said, CASA offers higher quality workers.
"We have a lot more buying power," he said.
But Schreiman said the centers do not succeed in getting immigrants better jobs, or in raising their low wages.
"Economically they are a disaster--they don't work. They are pouring good money into a bad idea," Schreiman said.
About 35 workers sat in the Wheaton workers' center Monday morning. Across the street, dozens more workers waited in the parking lot of a paint store.
Cravioto said those workers are mainly contractors with their own tools and vehicles, and thus no need for CASA's services.
One of the workers, who asked not to be named, entered the staff office and complained of little work.
"I think I'm gonna start asking for money in the street like a homeless person," he said.
Schear later said that this worker in particular had a drinking problem, adding, "This is the exception."
The future of University Boulevard is uncertain.
Hanna said gentrification threatens to make property in the area too expensive for the low-income immigrant community, adding, "Already, some houses sell for $400,000 in the area."
"[Gentrification]'s good for some people, bad for others. For businesses, it means more money, for the people who live there it will end with pressure to move," he said.
The Purple Line would also have an impact, Hanna said, given that plans for it have light-rail on University Boulevard.
But Hanna added that such a line, if built, is "many years away."
Schreiman said he ultimately hopes to see change in the form of Federal government action.
"What's going to change the dynamic is Congress taking action," he said.
Schreiman said he hopes court rulings on immigration cases could also result in stricter immigration policy.
Ervin said that the immigrant community faces "many, many daunting issues," among them limited access to healthcare, difficulties with the English language, and lack of transportation options.
She added that these problems apply to the larger community.
At the workers' center, Lopez, who entered the country and found his way to Silver Spring almost a year ago, said he has been able to send $100 to $130 per month back to Honduras.
"Every time I go to work, I do well. They say 'good job,'" he said with Cravioto translating.
No comments have been posted to this article.
Want to post a comment to this article? Click here.
|
