COSTA MESA : City Leaders Reach Out to Latinos

In the 14 years Victor Bonilla has lived in Costa Mesa, Sunday was the first time he had seen city leaders and police publicly extend a hand to Latino residents.

At the first Platicas en el Patio (Discussions on the Patio) at Wilson Elementary School, members of the city’s Latino community came to learn how to use government services, meet political and school leaders and find courses for self-improvement.

“I get emotional about it,” Bonilla said, looking toward the auditorium stage where Mayor Mary Hornbuckle, Newport-Mesa Unified School District Supt. John W. Nicoll, school board President Sherry Loofbourrow, and Police Lt. Jim Watson sat, answering questions from the audience.

“Before, we weren’t even acknowledged and we weren’t even wanted. It’s about time that we’re acknowledged as a part of the community,” said Bonilla, a local supermarket owner.

His wife, Cora Bonilla, added: “I think they (Latinos) are going to have a better sense of being a part of the community and not just as immigrants.”

Platicas was organized by members of Latinos Costa Mesa after the city’s Living Room Dialogues, which brought together people of different cultures in homes throughout the city. Although the dialogues were successful, organizers lamented the lack of Latino involvement.

Latinos Costa Mesa founder Roy Alvarado and group members responded with the Platicas neighborhood meetings that will target seven areas of the city’s west side where a large number of Latinos live.

“We hope to get together to come up with some positive ideas and get some things in place so we can move forward in the Latino community,” Alvarado said. “We need to assimilate in some ways but we also need to feel proud of our cultures.

“I think that in getting together with this group we will be able to establish a process that we can continue throughout the year. We hope to empower the community to be able to be self-sufficient in what they do.”

Parents asked about activities for their children and about the city’s curfew laws. Some teen-agers asked why people in the community view them as troublemakers when they wear certain kinds of clothing.

“They judge us in the wrong way,” said Jorge Rubio, 19, a student at Estancia High School. “We’re just a bunch of friends and they see us together and they say: ‘That’s a gang.’ ”

Rubio added that he and some of his friends, because they have been harassed by authorities, want to become police themselves.

Wilson Elementary School Principal Sandra Bundy said changes in the immigration laws and amnesty requirements in the past few years have brought an increased awareness among parents to become more involved in their community and schools.

“That is one of the biggest changes. They feel very comfortable coming to school,” Bundy said. The Wilson Parent Teacher Assn. Board, for example, is half Latino, and the school has offered parent programs on various topics, including discipline, child abuse and drugs.

Councilman Joe Erickson told the audience that he and other city leaders welcome contact from the community.

“One thing that the people in this community need to do is to trust the leaders. . . . From the Latinos, we don’t get many letters and we don’t get many calls. But we need to develop a level of trust,” he said. “We’re here to help you.”

The monthly meetings will resume in January.