Associated Press
06-19-06
Immigrants find home on Main Street
OPEN FOR BUSINESS: The downtown areas of several Midwest cities are being boosted by immigrant entrepreneurs.
BY GREGG AAMOT
ASSOCIATED PRESS
MARSHALL, Minn. Adolfo Avila senses history when he looks at the old brick buildings and dusty facades lining the Main Streets of Minnesota's rural cities. He also sees a future for immigrants in the Midwest.
Avila, a business consultant who runs a translation service in Marshall, Minn., is helping a new generation of immigrant entrepreneurs who are looking for the
American dream in the abandoned buildings of old downtowns.
While Congress spars over the country's immigration policies, newcomers in the
Midwest are helping breathe new life into rural Main Streets that have been in decline. In southwestern Minnesota alone, immigrants are running more than two dozen stores in the old downtowns of Willmar, Marshall and Worthington. It's a similar story in parts of Iowa and other states.
"They have all these old buildings that other people that already have money are not worried about. They don't want them," Avila said. "And then you got people that come along that don't have anything and are willing to put money in it and fix it up and make it a business."
He added: "It's a win-win situation."
City planners say downtown property is a good deal for immigrants just starting out because it's cheaper than that in newer commercial districts, more readily available, and usually nearer to low-income housing.
Many of the shops are grocery and clothing stores; others include music stores, translation services and Mexican restaurants.
"It's happening in a lot of places," said Cornelia Flora, director of the North
Central Regional Center for Rural Development at Iowa State University .
"Not unlike many immigrants before them, they are finding empty businesses, where retail or services are needed, and starting them."
Brad Chapulis, the community development director in Worthington, said the new shops "have helped provide interest in downtown again."

Worthington officials said the property value of businesses in the city increased from $85 million five years ago to $107 million in 2005, attributing at least some of that growth to immigrant entrepreneurs. A half-dozen immigrant stores are located downtown, with others elsewhere in the city.
Maria Parga has run a grocery store in town for more than a decade. About two years ago, she opened a clothing store in the downtown a few blocks from Lake
Okabena.
Parga sells wedding dresses, outfits for First Communion, soccer uniforms and other clothing primarily for Latinos in the city of 11,500. She grew up in Mexico and knows what the local market lacks. "I just saw a need for another place for people to find stuff," she said.
The shops offer the chance for connections in small towns adapting to population shifts, though many stores mostly serve immigrants or their children.
When an elderly white man stopped in and offered Parga and her sister, Luisa
Rodriguez, some fresh rhubarb, the women declined, telling him with a laugh,
"We don't know what to do with that!"
Thanking the man as he left, Parga added: "We have a different culture, and we are serving a niche. Sometimes there are white customers who come in like just now, but not very often."
Avila, a Texas native who served in Desert Storm and has a 5-foot-long
American flag on the wall in his office, moved to Minnesota 4 years ago with his wife and four children. About 1 years ago, he said, requests exploded for help in starting immigrant businesses.
"There was a real need for a Spanish-speaking consultant to help people navigate all of this," he said. "There was no trust."
Center Sports manager Mark Schwarz said his Worthington store has benefited from foot traffic generated by nearby Asian and Mexican restaurants. The Latino influence in town also has boosted sales of soccer and baseball equipment, he said.
"There are difficulties with population changes like the one we've had here, for sure," he said. "But it's been a great thing for us. We have open stores now and then, but usually something goes in them. Sometimes it's newcomers giving it a try."
In Marshall, Ahmed Omar ran the till and stocked the shelves at Hindi Quality
Cultural Products. Omar came to Minnesota in 1998, played basketball for

Marshall High School and graduated in 2001. The Somali native and his wife decided to make the city of 12,500 their permanent home and dreamed of starting a store.
With Omar's savings and a loan from his father, they opened the store in 2005 and also rent the apartment above it. Most of his customers are Somalis who come for the goat meat, African fish and other products that aren't available at other grocery stores in town. Some customers are Schwan Food Co. workers from India.
"It's a good location, but right now (business is) so-so," Omar said. "I can't say
I'm making good money, or that I'm losing money. But it takes time to get a store going."
About 75 miles northeast, more than a dozen immigrant shops line the streets of downtown Willmar, where a community development group has received tentative approval for a $99,000 federal grant that would jump-start a planned$2.5 million multicultural market with about 20 shops.
The old Lakeland Hotel houses a barbershop with Latino hairstylists and a
Mexican restaurant, Antonio's, where customers dine on red and white tablecloths, below a high, ornate ceiling that lets in natural light.
Though not the grand hotel of its heyday, it is once again drawing customers downtown.
"For lunch, I get doctors and chiropractors and the lawyers from down the street," said Yesenia Medellin, a waitress and bar tender at Antonio's. "They all like it."