Money Talks

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Nowhere is that need for education more manifest than in computer literacy. As the economy becomes increasingly dependent on computer know-how and Internet acumen, those who fail to use these essential tools of the Information Age are at risk of falling farther behind.

“Technology is meant for information, and information is power,” says Margaret Iwanaga-Penrose, president and chief executive of the Union of Pan Asian Communities. “It’s critical for economic advancement.”

A recent study from the San Diego Regional Technology Alliance shows that local Latino and African-American households are twice as likely not to own a computer as white and Asian/Pacific Islander households. This so-called “digital divide” is particularly acute for Latinos, who make up a quarter of the local population but represent 42 percent of the nonwired population, the alliance reports.

Gateway’s Waitt Family Foundation, responding to the dearth of computer literacy in ethnic and disadvantaged communities, this year announced it was anteing $9.5 million and donating some 250 computers with Internet access to community centers throughout the county. Qualcomm and Microsoft also have donated to the cause of narrowing the local digital divide.

But these programs, for all their good intentions, don’t get computers inside homes, where most people, specifically students, spend most of their time. And even when computers are available for public use, there’s no guarantee people will use them. Villareal notes that the Hispanic Chamber has an agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration whereby members can use SBA resources, including Internet access. But few, if any, actually have taken advantage of the service.

All is not gloom and doom, however. The Hispanic Chamber boasts relatively new programs that plug the city of San Diego and the San Diego Unified School District into a database of Latino-owned businesses to contract for goods and services. Villareal hopes the program improves what he calls “an abysmal” record of minority contracting from these agencies, which collectively contracted for $100 million in goods and services in 1999—when only 4 percent of those contracts went to minority- and women-owned businesses.

Slacks and dress shirts move assembly-line fashion along overhead racks as UniMac washers churn and steam presses whoosh at USA Cleaners on College Avenue. Hung Huymh, the 29-year-old general manager, leads a tour of the business, hub of four dry-cleaning and laundry facilities that came to life four years ago. What started as empty square footage inside a defunct 99-cent store has grown into a thriving small business that handles 600 pieces of clothing a day and employs 12 workers. “We’re looking at franchising,” Huymh says.

When owner Dung Lee decided to launch this business, he didn’t march to City Hall and apply for a business license—he first turned to the Union of Pan Asian Communities (UPAC) for aid and comfort. It was there he met Joseph T. Dynh, one of more than a dozen business counselors on staff who speak the native tongues of Asian and Pacific Island immigrants and help would-be entrepreneurs navigate the regulatory minefields associated with starting a new business. Dynh walked Lee through the regulatory and site-selection process.

USA Cleaners is among 400 minority-owned businesses UPAC has helped launch since 1994, when it inaugurated its Multi-Cultural Economic Development Program. Of those 400, 388 are still up and running, employing more than 425 people. Not bad, considering eight of 10 small businesses fail in their first five years, according to the SBA. For the Asian and Pacific Islander communities, 80 percent fail within two years, because of lack of management knowledge as well as language and cultural obstacles, UPAC officials say.

“This is a mentorship program, in a sense,” says UPAC’s Iwanaga-Penrose. “The stereotype that the Asian and Pacific Islander community is healthy, wealthy and well-educated is one of the great myths.”

Iwanaga-Penrose says two-thirds of the Asian-Pacific Islander population here are immigrants, 40 percent of whom don’t speak fluent English. Beyond language barriers, her constituency faces interesting cultural obstacles. Three years ago, a particular cultural idiosyncrasy involving chickens came home to, um, roost.

Many Asian cultures require freshly killed chicken with feet and head intact as part of traditional ancestor worship or religious festivals, such as lunar New Year. For years, immigrants here have been butchering birds in bathtubs and backyards. “Obviously, that’s a health hazard,” says Iwanaga-Penrose. An alarmed San Diego City Council passed an emergency ordinance allowing certain poultry shops to slaughter chickens on-site. Those in Asian and Pacific Islander communities hailed the move as a step toward cultural tolerance, as well as a sign that immigrant businesses are welcome here.

Civic acceptance is only one component of the economic mosaic, however. Access to capital—money—for start-up businesses is a crucial stepping stone for many minority-owned companies. This was one reason Susan Lew, a pillar in the Asian–Pacific Islander community, left her longstanding post as a San Diego Port commissioner this year and helped found the First Pacific Community Bank of California. As e-mail prompts chime from her computer in her third-story office of S. Lew & Associates on Convoy Street, she talks about a lack of locally owned and operated financial institutions that cater to minorities.

“More than 96 percent of deposits here are in banks with headquarters outside of the San Diego community,” Lew says, looking up an address on her Palm V computer. “A local community bank can really understand the needs of the local minority community.”

The fledgling bank’s work dovetails with that of the Asian Business Association of San Diego, another organization helping its constituents achieve the same sort of success as their Caucasian counterparts. The bank, which opened in November, also is working with the Hispanic Chamber and is running Spanish-language ads for home loans. And in late February, the bank established a Small Business Administration department to help seed start-ups. “Call me back in a year and you’ll see that a lot of these initiatives will have reached fruition,” says Rob Hildt, First Pacific Community Bank president.

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