"NEW" LATINA/O MIGRATION: LATINA/OS MOVE TO SUBURBS

LATINA/OS AND HOUSING POLICIES

BY STUDENT

How does Latino/as housing conditions and policies in New York in the 20^th century relate to these same policies in the 21^st century? That is the grand question but unfortunately, the same kind of problems still arise. In this blog post, I will speak about the housing policies for Latinos in the 20^th and 21^st centuries respectively and how not much has changed. Up to this day, Latinos face housing discrimination and it seems to be a trend that is not changing anytime soon. Throughout the past decades, the housing situation for Latino has improved, but the problem is that it is not par to par with other ethnic groups such as Whites and their housing situations. When something is wrong in someone’s apartment let’s say for example, the correct thing to do is report. This is the opposite of what Latinos are doing. The face the fear of filing complaints when they have to, have language barriers when a disagreement occurs, and are unfamiliar with the culture which relates to not trusting the government or even their landlord. Latinos have feared to speak up about the awful housing conditions they reside in and for the reason for that is the lack of general knowledge on knowing fair housing rights and responsibilities. The Fair Housing Act of 1968 helped dramatically, with a house provider having been forced to meet with someone seeking to rent regardless of their ethnicity or race but problems still arise in the 21^st century.

The housing conditions around the 20th century were crowded and deficient with more than five people living in one single apartment built for two. Tiny, crammed full, musty and filthy buildings that migrants were forced to be in when they migrated to America. These were called tenements. As the book, How the Other Half Lives, by Jacob Riis states, in a specific tenement, a total of 89 children out of 180 people resided in the just two tenements. These places were not big to begin with in the first place. 150 lodgers were found sleeping on the tenement floors in just two apartment buildings and even worse, water did not rise up to the second floor in some locations. Overtime, these types of housing locations were exposed and change was made but not soon enough.

New York City has been a home to many foreigners, who have struggled trying to find a living on their own homeland. Puerto Ricans were a group of people that faced many inequalities regarding housing conditions where they would live in. Housing conditions for Puerto Ricans during the 20th century was nothing but dreadful to those who migrated to New York City. While those who thought coming to New York would change their lives, it made a huge impact on Latinos, for they have struggled to make their ends meet. The Puerto Ricans that migrated to New York City settled in the barrios of the Lower East Side, East Harlem and the Bronx during the mid-20th century. The housing in these places was horrible and also was severely crowded, as was stated in the Lower East Side Tenement Museum article. In fact, the 1990 census showed that the median family income for Puerto Ricans was close to half of the income of other New Yorkers and also stated that most Puerto Ricans still continue to live below the poverty line.

             

"NEW" LATINA/O MIGRATION: LATINA/OS MOVE TO SUBURBS

LATINOS AND HOUSING POLICIES

BY STUDENT

The United States has been seen as a country full of hope and opportunities for many. Immigrants from all over Latino America travel to this country to fulfill a better life or a more comfortable life. However, throughout history it has been difficult for many of them to be able to do so because of the housing policies that have been enforced. So, how can Latinos really live comfortably in the United States if these housing policies have made it nearly impossible to do so? In this blog post, I argue that housing policies, in New York City specifically, have been a huge obstacle for Latinos to live in homes securely.

It’s saddening to know that many Latinos and other people of color have only had access to the “slums” of New York. Since the 1930’s, the government has been segregating whites and people of color by giving whites more opportunities to housing with federally insured mortgages (Rothstein, 2012). This policy excluded people of color. By 1973, the projects had gained its bad reputation of being impoverished and socially dysfunctional. Housing policies and neighborhood conditions can serve as both outcomes and factors to social and economic mobility. Unfortunately though, the way in which these living conditions have been set up throughout the years, make it difficult for much improvement.

Gentrification and displacement have been some key obstacles as to why Latinos and other “minority” races have been unable to live in their homes securely. Industrial jobs in New York have been relocated to other parts of the world and the city has transformed from an industrial to a post-industrial city, according to Luis Aponte-Parés. This, in turn, displaced industrial workers and their families; a lot of them were Puerto Ricans and African Americans were not integrated into the new economy.  Latinos and other people of color have experienced massive urban dislocation, but these losses were not only of buildings and people, it was also their primary life spaces.

Citation

Parés, Luis Aponte. "What's Yellow and White and Has Land All Around It?: Appropriating Place in Puerto Rican Barrios." N.p., n.d. Web.

Rothstein, Richard. "Public Housing: Government-Sponsored Segregation."The American Prospect. N.p., 11 Oct. 2012. Web. 24 Nov. 2015.

"NEW" LATINA/O MIGRATION: LATINA/OS MOVE TO THE SUBURBS

PUBLIC PARDON THROUGH PUBLIC HOUSING
BY STUDENT

Take a moment to compare modern-day New York City Public Housing to tenement homes from the early 1900s. When comparing the two types of housing, it is evident that the two are extremely similar. Fortunately, present-day housing has received many improvements and upgrades when compared to its predecessor.  Tenements located in New York City were mostly the homes of immigrants in the early 1900^th century. Small, overcrowded and dirty, buildings would only have a limited number of bathrooms for all residents, many who would be living with about 5 – 7 others in a single room.  With the help of muckrakers such as Jacob Riis and his book, How The Other Half Lives, this atrocity was exposed to many, forcing the government to improve the slums of their city.

             

After the horrid conditions of tenements were exposed, many new housing policies were put into place to improve the housing where many immigrants, Latinos and blacks in New York City continue to reside. Such housing policies would require landlords to continuously renovate damages in their buildings for the tenant’s safety, such well as the creation of New York City Public Housing (NYCHA), also known as the “projects” and section 8. NYCHA provides affordable housing for tenants and Section 8 is subsided housing, where the government pays a portion of rent for the disabled or families earning below a certain amount of income.

           

This cheap housing is extremely beneficial to its tenants who are mostly minorities, such as Hispanics. Many Latinos remain and continue to move into public housing because it is one of the few affordable housing options available in New York City, as many of their former neighborhoods are becoming affected by gentrification. Personally, I see public housing as way for the government to receive pardon from minorities as they continue a hidden institutionalized segregation. Though many races tend to concentrated in the area populated with their race, public housing is seemingly a way to continue to marginalized a population that is already oppressed and divided.

Though in recent decades, public housing has made many major improvements, it continues to harbor the poor and oppressed, and is now becoming a home to those who have been displaced from their beloved, cultural filled neighborhoods. With this forced gentrification, a Latino’s lost becomes a white man’s gain.

Sources

http://www.tenantsunion.org/en/rights/section/subsidized-housing-section-8

https://blackboard.albany.edu/bbcswebdav/pid-1953130-dt-content-rid-8928949_1/courses/2159-ALCS-283-10080/NLR_right_tothe_city.pdf

http://www.archive.org/stream/howotherhalfliv00riisgoog#page/n8/mode/2up

"NEW" LATINA/O MIGRATIONS: LATINA/O MOVING TO SUBURBS

BY STUDENT

Latinos/as living in the United States often confront racial slurs and stereotypes. It might be heard by Latinos living in the United States, “Go back to your country! You’re just here to steal our jobs!” This is just one among the many accusations made about Latinos and are directed especially and specifically to Latino/a immigrants. Even if a Latino is not an immigrant they are made to face stereotypes. In addition to being accused of “stealing” jobs from U.S. citizens, Latinos are also made to face insults and stereotypes such as not knowing English, being accused of defacing America with their “immigrant status”, and bringing crime with them wherever they go. On the contrary, these are statements are ignorant and wrong and can be disproven through use of new Latino/a immigration statistics. Some of these statistics and facts can be derived from the Prince William County incident .  

Firstly, the accusation that Latino immigrants are taking jobs that more-deserving American citizens deserve is unjustified. The well-known argument against this is that Latino immigrants are taking the jobs that Americans don’t actually want to do. According to the Pew Research Center (PRC), “About half of Hispanic workers are employed in just four industries—construction; eating, drinking and lodging services; wholesale and retail trade; and professional and other business services” (Kochhar 2014). Most of these aren’t lucrative jobs. The fact that Latino immigrants are taking U.S. citizens’ jobs is quite untrue. In studies done by the PRC, Latinos have actually experienced an overall increase in wages. The reason for this is “Because Hispanic immigrants earn less than U.S.-born Hispanics, their retreat from the U.S. workforce raises the estimated earnings of Latinos overall” (Kochhar 2014). Basically, the jobs that Latino immigrants used to do are now actually being done by Latinos who are, in fact, U.S. citizens. With this being said, the argument that Latinos are defacing the U.S. with their immigrant status and populating the U.S. with tons of children can also be opposed. In 2011, the birthrate of the United States dropped to the lowest ever recorded “led by a plunge in births to immigrant women since the onset of the Great Recession” (Kochhar 2014). Also, there is no “defacing” being done with immigration status because there are more Latino citizens now than there are Latino immigrants. Often times, the argument is made that unauthorized immigrants, are the ones populating the U.S.’s immigrant population. However, according to the PRC, from 2009 to 2012, the unauthorized immigration population decreased in 14 states and only rose in seven (Cohn 2014). 

The last two stereotypes to be battled in this blog post are the accusation that Latinos don’t know English and therefore don’t belong here and also that they bring crime to the streets. These two problems can be cited from the Prince William County incident. Accusations that Latinos do not know English may be true in some cases, but that’s the case for a majority of immigrants and America is a melting pot of immigrants. English is not even the national language of the United States. Thus, to argue the point that Latino immigrants are not even assimilating to the American culture because they don’t know English is a fruitless argument. Studies by the PCR have also shown there has been a gain in English proficiency by Latinos born in the U.S. by 17% from 1980 to 2013 (Krogstad 2015). Finally, when Prince William County was questioned by the government about the rise of crime in their streets, it was shown that the county could not provide any factual evidence supporting their statement. Thus, crime is not something that should be blindly associated with the Latino population and therefore should not be an argument made against Latinos staying in the United States as are the other arguments and stereoypes.

References

Cohn, D., & Livingston, G. (2012, November 29). U.S. Birth Rate Falls to a Record Low;

Decline Is Greatest Among Immigrants. Retrieved November 17, 2015, from http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2012/11/29/u-s-birth-rate-falls-to-a-record-low-decline-is-greatest-among-immigrants/

Crogstad, J., Stepler, R., & Lopez, M. (2015, May 12). English Proficiency on the Rise Among

Latinos. Retrieved November 17, 2015, from http://www.pewhispanic.org/2015/05/12/english-proficiency-on-the-rise-among-latinos/

Kochhar, R. (2014, June 19). Latino Jobs Growth Driven by U.S. Born. Retrieved November 17,

2015, from http://www.pewhispanic.org/2014/06/19/latino-jobs-growth-driven-by-u-s-born/

Singer, A., Wilson, J., & Derenzis, B. (2009). Immigrants, Politics, and Local Response in

Suburban Washington. Survey Series for the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings. Retrieved November 11, 2015.

LATINA/OS TAKE CENTER STAGE: CENSUS 2000

BY J.G.

Throughout school and life in general we hear statistics about race, age, sex, etc. but never truly wonder where all these numbers come from. We owe this pool of information to the census. By definition the census is an official count or survey of a population, typically recording various details of individuals, which takes place every ten years. In 2000, 281.4 million citizens were counted in the United States and of those residents; 35.3 million or 13.2% were Latino. The amount of Latinos counted shows a Hispanic population increase of 57.9 percent from 22.4 million in 1990 (Guzman 2001). With this increase of Latinos shown in the 2000 census questions arise of how many of the undocumented population is getting counted and put toward these statistics. The government does their best in trying to estimate the number of undocumented immigrants in this country but the real question is: how accurate is the US census?

The census is important to us as residents of the United States because its results can effect our every day lives. The results of the census are used for planning, development and improvement of residents' quality of life (Central Bureau of Statistics n.d.).

As we previously saw in the film The Sixth Section, many undocumented immigrants enter our country every year for reasons such as finding work, sending home remittances, and even to play a role in their local government from their origin town (Rivera 2003). In 2000, 31.1 million “foreign-born” US residents were accounted for with over half of those being Latino and almost 60% of the “foreign-born” being undocumented (Census 2003). Many may wonder how undocumented immigrants are accounted for, being as most of them would prefer to lay low from the US Government fearing deportation, but the United States does a good job in reaching those who may be more seemingly off the grid than others. To assure undocumented immigrants that responding to the census won’t get them in trouble, the Census Bureau uses TV, radio, as well as the help of community organizations to get the word out. Also to make-up for a potential language barrio, census forms are provided in five different languages and have assistance guides available (Mather 2010).

With all the means of answering the census and the “protection” of undocumented immigrants the United States census should be very accurate although its statistics can never truly be proven. The US census does its best in encouraging the participation of the undocumented immigrants but we’ll never truly know for sure how many censuses go unanswered and how many residents go unaccounted for.  

Census. The Foreign-Born Population: 2000. 12 2003. https://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/c2kbr-34.pdf.

Central Bureau of Statistics. Population Census. http://www.cbs.gov.il/census/census/pnimi_sub_page_e.html?id_topic=1&id_subtopic=5.

Guzman, Betsy. The Hispanic Population: Census 2000 Brief. 05 2001. http://www.census.gov/prod/2001pubs/c2kbr01-3.pdf.

Mather, Mark, interview by Emily Howard. How Does the U.S. Census Count the Homeless and Undocumented Immigrants http://earthsky.org/human-world/how-does-u-s-census-count-the-homeless-and-undocumented-immigrants, (04 06, 2010).

The Sixth Section. Directed by Alex Rivera. Produced by PBS. 2003.

LATINA/O TAKE CENTER STAGE: CENSUS 2000

BY STUDENT

When you think of “new” Latino migration what do you think of? Do you think of the new wave of Latinos coming to a place like ‘Dyckman, NY’ or ‘Jackson Heights, Queens’? When I read the heading, “New” Latino migration, I immediately thought of a new wave coming into a already Latino populated area, like Jackson Heights, Queens. You think of suburban and urban areas of where multiple races live, however, when you think of Latinos you think of them living in Urban Areas not suburban. However, this is a textbook example of the stereotypical view of the suburban and urban areas. “More than half of all Americans now live in “suburbia” urban areas outside of what the U.S census defines ‘central cities’” (Jones-Correa 183). When I first read this I thought to myself well they must have fled because of the poor economic situation in the urban cities, and I’m sure most minority groups thought so too, however the reality is much different. Often most of those who move into the suburbs are faced with the same if not worse violence and poverty they were once experiencing in the urban cities. As I read more information I came to find out that although living in the suburbs ended up being the same if not worse than living in urban cities, for most minority groups it was not the same for Latinos. “For Hispanics, suburban life is the good life..It’s the American Dream. First you go where you’re comfortable, make a little money, get a little English and then head for the suburbs” (Sueiro). 

A specific area that I found was interesting was the “new wave” of Latinos in Washington D.C. “As a result of its great ethnic and racial diversity, suburban D.C politics has changed in four significant areas: growth, education, quality of life, and representation” (Jones-Correa 186). Over the span of 10 years the population growth in the Washington D.C Metropolitan area has increased by ‘16%’. A very important factor in the new wave of Latinos in the suburbs is that its not predominately one ethnic group; it’s made up of various Latino national groups that are slowly but surely taking over. While the “new wave” is said to be positive for Latinos, the process getting there was not easy and still isn’t. There were numerous problems with the new wave in the D.C metro area. For example, the schools in D.C were notorious for “their ability to attract and keep the allegiance of the upper-middle class” (Jones-Correa 196). However with the new migration of Latinos, that changed the demographics they were previously interested in. This lead to the racial separation in some schools, because upper class white students were now mixed with low-middle class minorities. Another problem was the social identity in Latinos, as well as other minority groups. The social identity of a student is crucial to their educational success, so when you place a minority student in a environment where only whites are said to prosper, you hinder the social identity of the student therefore causing them to believe they cannot achieve the same academic success as whites. 

The “new wave” of Latino migration is still a very controversial topic because there are still a lot of things that we don’t know are happening in these areas, such as the D.C metropolitan area. Although there are still hardships that many minorities are experiencing because of the changing demographics, keep in mind that the changes that are being made are in favor for minority groups. This “wave” has had a rippling effect in the sense that the areas that are stereotyped typed as majority white Americans, are now being somewhat forced into changing or molding their new neighbors (Latinos) in order to avoid racial tensions or protests among the community. After reading a little about the “new wave” what other important factors do you think would not only promote the new wave but also hinder the wave in terms of the quality of life for minorities?

Citations:

1.     Kruse, Kevin Michael, and Thomas J. Sugrue. "Reshaping the American Dream." In The New Suburban History, 183-196. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.

2.     Witt, Karen. "Suburban Expansion Fed By an Influx of Minorities." The New York Times. August 14, 1994. Accessed November 10, 2015.