Demographics change for Hispanics

When the economy was booming some years back, Hispanics began moving away from traditional locations like L.A. and towards fast-growing regions like the Inland Empire. But with the housing collapse and subsequent recession, that movement is largely over, according to a study by the Brookings Institution.

The "retrenchment" of Hispanics toward traditional gateway areas is most vivid within California. Hispanic gains in metropolitan Los Angeles quadrupled in 2007-2008 compared with just two years earlier, at the same time that they halved in metropolitan Riverside. Other traditional Hispanic areas, including Chicago, New York, Miami, San Francisco, and San Diego, saw increased gains in 2007-2008, at the same time that Hispanic growth declined significantly in places like Phoenix, Las Vegas, Orlando, and Atlanta. About half of the nation's 100 largest metro areas showed Hispanic growth slowdowns that year, mostly represented by non-traditional Hispanic areas.

Despite the economy, Hispanics remain a significant portion of the Inland Empire population, and it's creating a "cultural generation gap." Consider that two-thirds of seniors in the Inland Empire are white and 73 percent of the children are non-white. From the Riverside Press Enterprise:

Janice Phillips, 71, said she is "extremely frustrated" by the number of illegal immigrants and non-English-speakers in Perris, which has gone from 36 percent Hispanic in 1990 to 70 percent today. "We don't have a lot of work here in Perris and a lot of work here is held by Hispanics who are not American, illegal immigrants," she said. Phillips gets annoyed that many employees at a large Latino supermarket near her house speak only Spanish. "I can't ask for an item in English," she said. "The only ones who speak English are the clerks at the cash register."