CITY TIMES COVER STORY : Pacific Beat : Shoppers Find Bargains, Merchants Find Clientele and Latinos Find Comfort on Pacific Boulevard. The Vital District ‘Keeps This City Alive.’

Sam Joma, who owns a new electronic appliance shop on Pacific Boulevard, beamed as potential customers made their way along the crowded Huntington Park thoroughfare.

Across the way, an unlicensed street vendor nervously kicked her wooden crate filled with small fruit baskets out of sight until a police cruiser passed. A moment later she quickly sold two orders of watermelon and pineapple chunks for $1 each.

And a block or so down the boulevard, a teen-age boy hustled back and forth trying to peddle fake identification cards. “ Mica ? Mica ?” he asked hopefully.

It is all part of what is accepted, or at least expected, by the thousands of shoppers, merchants, retirees, teen-agers, criminals, panhandlers and others who spend time each day on thriving Pacific Boulevard.

To outsiders, Pacific Boulevard may be most familiar as the place that became unruly after thousands jammed the strip in June to celebrate Mexico’s advancement in the World Cup. But to local residents, the boulevard is a vital commercial district with about 400 businesses that account for at least one-third of the annual $3 million in sales tax revenue. It has emerged in recent years as a place that Latino newcomers throughout the region find both lively and comforting.

“That boulevard keeps this city alive,” said Mayor Richard V. Loya. “It really does bring in a lot of people.”

And it is a strip still in transition from the largely white, blue-collar area it had been for so many years after Huntington Park was incorporated in the early 1900s. As Latinos poured into the area in recent years looking for better lives, businesses began to tailor themselves to the new clientele.

The city, located just southeast of Downtown, has a population that officials say is easily 95% Latino. The 1990 U.S. Census counted more than 56,000 residents in Huntington Park, but local officials say that factoring in recent arrivals, illegal residents and others missed by the count raises the total estimated population to 75,000.

For many, the success of Pacific Boulevard registers in cash what many other largely Latino communities nationwide can calculate only as potential buying power. The boulevard is vibrant even as the community struggles with common urban ills such as low income and education levels and crime.

So, those along the boulevard say, the widespread attention generated when the World Cup soccer celebration became too rowdy and led to the temporary closing of the strip by city officials was misleading. Local boosters--while acknowledging some persistent problems with crime and trash--call the soccer trouble unrepresentative of daily activity along Pacific Boulevard.

For hundreds of merchants, both licensed and illegal, Pacific Boulevard is a virtual dreamland of pedestrian and car traffic. It is a nearly three-mile strip running north and south from near Leonis Boulevard to about Broadway.

Along the way, especially between Slauson and Florence avenues, the chatter of pedestrians is almost exclusively in Spanish. As people maneuver past each other, laughter mixes with an occasional angry voice or the familiar wail of an unhappy child. On every block, workers hand out leaflets promoting all kinds of special bargains.

Music coming from inside food shops and record stores inevitably is Latin.

Joma, whose shop, Super Expo Inc., opened in late August, is banking on appealing to the tastes of predominantly Latino customers. Risks exist for any business, but the boulevard seems as good as it gets for selling stereos, televisions and other electronic merchandise, he said.

“I came (to scout a location) on a weekend and it was really busy so I decided to take the place,” he said. “I know Latino people like to buy the kinds of appliances we have. Plus, this is the busiest street in the area.”

Donald L. Jeffers, the city’s chief administrative officer, agreed, adding that the most recent quarterly figures available showed that retail sales on the strip increased about 7% or 8% early this year compared to the same period in 1993.

“Obviously, it’s our main shopping district,” Jeffers said. “We do give the boulevard a lot of attention.”

It seems anything anyone would want is available on the boulevard.

The attractions include movie theaters, restaurants, bridal shops and dance halls. Florists, dentists and even fortunetellers are available.

Between Clarendon and Gage avenues, the China Bowl Express--where Asian workers take orders in Spanish without blinking an eye--is next to Tacos Mexico, which is next to California Sports Wear. A bit south, near Flower Street, is a pawnshop called Casa de Empeno, which is alongside Katty’s Bridal Shop, Associates-Financial Services and El Indio Amazonico, which besides offering goods and services for a price encourages passersby to find out their horoscopes for free.

Even those selling goods illegally are easy to spot. Many of them admit being illegal residents who aggressively seek out customers but are quick to scatter when law enforcement authorities appear.

One 18-year-old woman, who flavors the watermelon she sells with lemon juice or salt, said she works on the boulevard five days a week from about noon to 6 p.m. The daily earnings range from $20 to $30, she said.

“We don’t sell that much,” she said in Spanish, looking up the block toward her mother, who serves as a lookout. “We earn enough to pay rent and survive.”

Likewise, a slender teen-ager wearing a baggy T-shirt and a baseball cap pulled low on his forehead said he had no choice but to break the law by selling fake identifications with half a dozen friends.

“We can’t find other jobs. We’re illegal so no one will give us jobs,” the youth, who declined to be identified, said in Spanish. “We have to eat. We have to live.”

Authorities say about $100 will buy a fake driver’s license, a Social Security card and a resident alien card in a street sale.

Some consider the street vending a sticky problem. While many officials vehemently oppose the selling of illegal documents, they are less eager to condemn the unlicensed sale of legal goods such as fruit.

“These guys aren’t begging,” said Loya, the mayor. “We’ve got people pushing those stupid carts, but they’re hard-working.”

Jose de Jesus Legaspi, who works throughout the region as president of his own marketing and real estate company, said the Pacific Boulevard street vendors should be regulated, not eliminated. The vendors represent what helped make the boulevard successful during its transition from a predominantly white area years ago to a district where more businesses began catering to Latinos in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Legaspi said.

Street vending, he said, is a way for entrepreneurs to learn how to run a business. Some are bound to open licensed businesses some day and maintain commerce on the boulevard, he said.

“Activity brings activity,” Legaspi said. “They’re not really taking away from anybody.”

The boulevard, he said, was also helped by a series of conditions existing away from Huntington Park. Nearby cities including Maywood, South Gate and Bell Gardens do not have shopping centers that can challenge Pacific Boulevard, and busy South Broadway in Downtown is plagued by high rents, poor parking, crime and uncleanliness, he said. In addition, the 1992 riots exacerbated existing problems along South Broadway, while Pacific Boulevard survived with relatively minor damage, Legaspi and others said.

“I think it’s going through a little bit of growing pains but it’s very strong,” Legaspi said of the boulevard. “Anybody who is anybody who wants to sell to the Latino market is there.”

Those conditions allow even those who are adamant about wanting to clear the boulevard of illegal activities to be enthusiastic about the area.

“We have a great community,” said Rosario Marin, mayor pro tem. “When I see fake IDs offered, that really aggravates me. We’re working on it.”

Local police officials say they are pressing hard to discourage the sales of counterfeit identification cards with special surveillance and other efforts. About five to 10 arrests involving fake identification cards are made each day on the boulevard, officials said.

In addition, there are about two to four arrests a day for petty thefts of up to $400, and 16 to 20 arrests per week for attempted grand theft auto or attempted burglary of a motor vehicle, officials said.

Maggie Morales, 18, a saleswoman at Joma’s shop, said most of the people she sees on the boulevard are harmless, yet there are also those she considers “gangsters.”

“I’ve been living here all my life. To me it’s not dangerous,” said Morales, a senior at Huntington Park High School. “But you do have to look out for thugs. There’s a lot of gangsters. They look for trouble.”

Police Chief William F. Reed acknowledged that problems on the boulevard include car thefts, illegal street vending and congestion caused by young hotshots cruising the boulevard in late-model sports cars. Officers are expected to make arrests whenever necessary, but some activity is bound to go undetected, he said.

“It’s not an evil place. It’s a busy place,” said Reed, who became chief three months ago. “My concern is that I want people to feel comfortable going there to do business and to enjoy themselves.”

Raul R. Perez, a city councilman, said that problems are made more intense by the throngs on the boulevard.

“The success of the boulevard brought its own problems,” Perez said. “The good people spending money attract the crooks and the bad people who are out there.”

The situation has city officials and activists hustling to come up with projects, celebrations or other activities to bring about improvements.

Dante D’Eramo, 54, executive manager of the Greater Huntington Park Area Chamber of Commerce, said a major goal is to establish a business association that would collect dues and use the money to help ensure a safer and cleaner boulevard. The association could fight the chronic problem of garbage on the boulevard despite barrels labeled both basura and trash , he said.

“I have a personal interest in the community and I always have,” said D’Eramo, who first moved to Huntington Park with his family when he was 4 and has been running daily operations at the chamber for 17 years. “I feel there is more to be accomplished.”

Henry L. Gray, assistant director of community development/redevelopment, said one city project would reduce the number of public telephones along the strip. The project, which remains in the works but involves the city striking an exclusive deal with an undetermined phone service provider, would cut back on the phones available to shady figures, eliminate phone vendors offering poor services, and provide the city with a percentage of the revenue, he said.

Chamber of Commerce President Gilda Acosta-Gonzalez said another important project involves encouraging boulevard businesses to become involved in helping local educational institutions. A new satellite of East Los Angeles College, for example, sits near the boulevard so businesses and students could benefit from a strong relationship, she said.

And Marin is pushing to keep the boulevard bustling with new activities such as her proposed walk of fame, called “Latino Diamonds on Pacific.” The walk would involve sidewalk decorations shaped like diamonds featuring the names of well-known Latinos, she said.

Marin said the walk would only be one small way to encourage pride in the boulevard.

“We have a very young community and that’s what is so exciting,” Marin said. “I think my frustrations come from the failure of the existing systems to educate our people.”

Still, on the boulevard, away from the lofty ideals, the social analyses of what is right or wrong, and the careful planning for the future, people seem most concerned with making it through each day. It is clear, despite the constant movement, that there will always be those whose main interest in the boulevard will be to simply kick back and enjoy themselves.

“It’s good for sitting and resting,” Jose Rojas, 44, said in Spanish as he lounged on a stone bench between Zoe and Saturn avenues. “When I come it’s mainly to relax and pass the time.”