Community News

By: Stephanie Mejia, EMPA, Community Advocate I moved to Buffalo from Long Island when I was twenty-two years old, still fresh out of college and looking for the next step in my career. I moved knowing that a new area would be an adjustment, as all new areas are, but quickly noticed that Buffalo was different. It’s a medium sized city with a small-town feel, which I really grew to love since it reminded me of my hometown just a stone’s throw from NYC. So, when I recognized this familiar feeling, I was excited and did everything I could to make new friends and try new experiences. However, I quickly started to notice a big difference between the community at home and here. I grew up in a diverse area much like Buffalo, but the Latino community was tight knit where everyone was aware of each other’s needs. More specifically, we knew who in our community was an immigrant, documented or undocumented. From that connection, we all learned of each other and our household needs and provided support for each other. You may see it as being all up in each other’s business (which is true, who doesn’t love chismosiando?), but most of the time it was to help each other. You need a new apartment because your landlord is illegally evicting you? Call Rosa, she’s renting out a room. Need more work as a house cleaner? Call Marta, she needs an extra hand with some houses. Jose is new to the area from El Salvador, he needs work? OK, no worries, they’re looking for workers to help with shoveling for the upcoming snowstorm, so call Alex. There was a network ready to go all the time, and that network grew as the Latino community grew their families and their kids started to go to school. My childhood friends became my network, and their family and elders were included in that. I have fond memories of planning my quinceñera and having a strong network of Latin moms directing me to the dress maker, the venue, and the tamalera for food. When I was twelve years old, ICE came to our doorstep looking for my stepdad, and things became difficult after that. Our community, however, was there ready to assist. My mom knew who to call for information on a good immigration attorney, someone to watch my brother and I while she figured things out, someone to give us a ride to after school activities while my mom processed the grief of her partner leaving. In the community, mutual aid was abundant, which is why, as I sit here and write this, I have hope that Buffalo can one day have that network. Right now, we are facing unprecedented times in our nation and community where there is instability in all areas – finances, housing, health, human rights, and more. We are witnessing in real time the kidnapping of our undocumented and documented neighbors – empty cars found with driver doors left open in the early morning because ICE took someone on their way to work, kids coming home from school to no parents, businesses struggling or being forced to shut down because their staff were taken by ICE. Community support is needed now more than ever, and the building of it can be done if we understand the root issue of our disconnection with each other, which is segregation. I believe that our community is unaware of how our city has been purposefully made into the disconnected and isolated communities we see now. If you drive down Niagara Street or Main Street, you can see the vast difference in poverty and community make-up – the difference in how our roads is maintained, number of homeowners, vacant buildings, and green space. You can also see how some areas are dense with a specific race/ethnic group or economic class. Elmwood has a predominantly higher income of residents who are White, they also have an active strip of small businesses that are held up by continued financial support by not only its residents but also the leaders representing those areas. In contrast the West Side has seen an inconsistent trend in growth in small businesses, homeowners, and infrastructure that has been tirelessly held together by the low-to-middle class residents who still live in the area. So, what are the reasons for this inconsistent distribution of resources and growth? And how does that impact the ability of the Latino community in strengthening itself? The City of Buffalo has a significant inequity issue, which is why our communities are fragmented to the point where the makeup of our neighborhoods is impacted. The City of Buffalo is so segregated that we now have data to support which zip codes have a higher rate for negative health outcomes. Did you know that premature death percentages are higher for Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) when compared to the White population; Black (60.3%), Hispanic (70%), Asian (52%), and White (30%) (The Harder We Run, Taylor et al 2021)? For our West Side community (14201, 14213, 14207, & 14222) where a predominant number of Latino/Hispanic households reside, COVID-19 infection cases were higher compared to zip codes like 14222, the Elmwood Village area, which has a higher rate of White households. Why are we talking about COVID-19 rates in specific zip codes? Well, it’s a good place to start when talking about how living in certain zip codes impacts our quality of life, from health, housing, to community building. We can see how certain areas were more impacted by the negative effects from COVID-19 compared to others (see maps below). If our community experienced higher rates of COVID-19, imagine how that impacted our small businesses, employment rates, and household stability. Sick and underserved communities cannot thrive as much as those who are not. Image Source: Partnership for the Public Good The areas mentioned above are referred to as “historically excluded areas” because that’s exactly what they are – an area that has been historically ignored and prevented from easily accessing opportunities to grow. More specifically, historically excluded means the systemic marginalization of certain groups using laws and policies to limit things such as economic opportunity or societal power. The West Side, an area predominantly composed of BIPOC residents, is a strong example of the effects of historical exclusion as it was impacted during COVID-19/by COVID-19 at a higher rate compared to areas that are not historically excluded. An example of early historical exclusion is redlining, which was a tactic used beginning in the 1930’s and continued to the 2010’s in Buffalo to segregate areas by social and racial class to maintain their value. This was a popular tactic used in the City of Buffalo to disenfranchise certain ethnic groups. The Federal Housing Association developed a system to categorize different neighborhoods