43
Nearly 140 Puerto Ricans resettle in Valley
CAMPBELL
Since September, nearly 140 new Hispanic individuals have joined the Greater Youngstown community, and many are Puerto Ricans fleeing the devastation of this year’s hurricanes.
Over the course of three weeks in September, Hurricanes Irma and Maria tore through Puerto Rico on their way through the Caribbean and up the Florida peninsula. According to estimates from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, while cell service and potable water has been largely restored, more than 50 percent of the island is still without power. In a study released by the City University of New York Hunter Center for Puerto Rican Studies, an estimated 150,000 to 200,000 Puerto Ricans are expected to leave the island in the year after Hurricane Maria.
In Youngstown, institutions and affiliated care organizations are struggling to find enough bilingual speakers to properly engage with the growing population.
Duane Piccirilli, executive director of the Mahoning County Mental Health and Recovery Board, said there has been a noticeable increase in Spanish-speaking individuals seeking counseling, including those who fled Puerto Rico.
“What we’re finding is a lot of these people have post-traumatic stress disorder from the hurricanes. These are people who were uprooted from their homes and had to flee. Now that they’re here, they’re unable to contact their families and are experiencing a second dose of trauma,” Piccirilli said.
Sam Shorokey, the CEO of Alta Behavioral Healthcare, a non-profit organization providing early education services to students, said they have experienced an increase in Hispanic students and have encountered similar communication issues.
“We have translators who can assist us in counseling sessions, but that isn’t an ideal way to do counseling. You lose nuance and connection in the translation. We don’t have many Spanish-speaking counselors,” Piccirilli said.
In Campbell, the Hispanic population — which includes the Puerto Rican community — makes up 15 percent of the city’s population as of the 2010 census, and that number is likely to grow as more individuals displaced by the hurricanes move north.
Jeanette Morales, the owner of Papa’s Puerto Rican Cuisine and New York Pizza on 12th Street in Campbell, said she was aware of at least seven or eight families that have arrived in the area from the island since the storms.
“A lot of people fled to Florida when the hurricanes hit,” Morales said. “They went there because it was close and the climate was similar, but the cost of living is so high that many people have come up here because it’s much more affordable to live.”
She noted that many of the younger Puerto Ricans moving to the area not only speak English but are also college educated and perfectly capable of stepping into skilled jobs once they’ve found a home.
Morales has used her bar as a headquarters for accepting donations to send to Puerto Rico. During the hurricanes, she raised money and donated items, through an event at the bar, which she sent to Puerto Rico as well as Texas. Later this month, she will travel back to Puerto Rico to deliver toys for children as Christmas and Three Kings Day gifts.
Morales has immediate family — her mother, father and a brother — still living on the island. Her brother works at a clinic and is helping those recovering from the storms.
She said that for many people arriving from Puerto Rico, their first stop is one of the area’s churches.
At her church, Fountain of Grace Temple, senior pastor Angel Lopez and his congregation have been collecting baby food, formula, coats and clothes — especially those for surviving cold weather.
Though some new arrivals have family already living in the area, others are completely alone when they show up in the Valley.
“I had one very young couple show up who knew no one,” Lopez said. “They heard about our church and our donation drives for families in need and came by. Eventually we were able to help them find jobs and, thankfully, now they’re stable.”
Though Lopez wasn’t born in Puerto Rico — he lived in New York until he was 17 — he eventually left the city for the island, where he met his wife and eventually had children.
“It was terrible to see these places I knew, places where my children grew up, destroyed by the hurricanes,” Lopez said.
When he isn’t leading the church or tending to the spiritual needs of his congregants, Lopez spends time volunteering as a translator for the Campbell school district.
Since the hurricanes, 14 new students from eight families from Puerto Rico have been enrolled in Campbell Elementary School, and an additional four students have enrolled at Campbell Memorial High School.
The school district employs English as a second language teachers to work with students, and Superintendent Matthew Bowen said he was optimistic that incoming families will enjoy life in Campbell.
“Although the hurricane was tragic, we’re optimistic that our new families to the district will enjoy the Campbell community where diversity is celebrated. Our amazing students and community members care for and support one another,” Bowen said.
In Youngstown, the school district has seen an increase of more than 30 students from Puerto Rico since the hurricanes. To ensure the students are well served at the school, the district employs 23 educational assistants, all of whom are bilingual, as well as social workers, guidance counselors and parent coordinators, who can help direct families to resources that meet their needs.