The riots that changed the way DC connected with the Latino community

On May 5, 1991, a Salvadoran man was shot and killed by a police officer in Washington, D.C., and this shooting sparked several days of unrest in the city. The response to the shooting was also the culmination of years of tension over language and cultural barriers between police and the Latino community.

Emi Reyes, executive director of the Latino Economic Development Center, said that in the 1980s, when El Salvador was experiencing civil war, many Salvadorans fled to the United States and many chose the District as a destination. Many settled in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood, which she said has a large Latino footprint.

“Suddenly it became an area with the second largest Salvadoran population in the entire country,” Reyes said.

At the time, there weren’t many resources for people who didn’t speak English, which created a divide between the city and the Latino community, Reyes said.

Things came to a head when news spread that a shooting had occurred in 1991. The man who was shot was injured, but rumors led some to believe he had died.

According to a 1991 Washington Post report, a man was shot and injured by an African-American officer after police said the man threatened them with a knife.

“So it led to a lot of misunderstanding and clearly the cutting of very fragile threads between what this immigrant population supported and what didn’t. “I think that was really the culmination that forced them to respond to the wants and needs of a growing population and brought attention to what had been so severely neglected by the city,” Reyes said.

Riots soon began and lasted for three days as shops, buses and more were damaged and curfews were imposed.

In the wake of the unrest, the city created a Latino Civil Rights Task Force. One of the recommendations was to create an organization that would better connect the Latino community to the city’s resources.

“The recommendation to create an institution that truly provides the financial tools and education in the language that people need, with the cultural competency to understand the experiences of immigrants and truly able to provide services where they need them need them as they need them,” Reyes said.

Since its founding, the LEDC has helped connect families with city services and brought together Latinos in the city to grow their small businesses.

“We provide microloans from as little as $1,000 to $250,000 to really help entrepreneurs start or grow their businesses across the city,” Reyes said.

In the immediate aftermath of the riots, the organization also helped the local government better connect with the Latino community, with the goal of preventing another 1991-like situation.

“We were really like an advocate supporting the creation of a police force, a Spanish-speaking force that could operate in Mount Pleasant and Columbia Heights and other parts of the city where we had these groups of immigrants whose native language was Spanish Reyes said.

Reyes said even if everyone doesn’t agree on issues, it’s still important for the community to work together to find solutions.

“It’s really critical that the community comes together and that we include the voices of long-time immigrants who have been here for over 30 years as well as those who arrived just a few months ago,” Reyes said.

She also said the city needs to continue investing in minority-owned businesses so they can grow in D.C. as costs rise.

“I think the commercial real estate space can learn a lot from the residential real estate space in terms of existing programs, whether it be rent stabilization or rental assistance programs or down payment assistance programs,” Reyes said.

Overall, Reyes believes we have seen positive changes in the last few decades.

“I think our organizations and our infrastructure are much more welcoming and supportive than they have been in the past,” she said.

As for what Mount Pleasant looks like today compared to what the neighborhood once was, Reyes said that while the landscape has changed, the neighborhood is working to maintain its cultural identity.

“Mount Pleasant has a very long history, and so I think it’s important that we actively work to preserve that,” she said.

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