This article by Lizette Alvarez appeared inThe New York Times. <\/p>\n
When Manuel Hernandez, a teacher in Puerto Rico, looked at the reasons to stay home or to take a chance on joining the ever-growing Puerto Rican diaspora in Central Florida, it was not a hard call. <\/p>\n
I was fed up, Mr. Hernandez said of his life in San Juan, and my wife was fed up; frustrations were building. <\/p>\n
So last October, Mr. Hernandez got off a plane and arrived here, a place best known for hosting Mickey Mouse and rodeos, but also increasingly seen as a faraway suburb of Puerto Rico, a trend that has quickened with the islands deepening economic morass. <\/p>\n
Florida is now poised to elbow out New York as the state with the most Puerto Ricans close to one million, according to the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at the City University of New York. Nearly 400,000 Puerto Ricans have settled in the Orlando area, and by some estimates, thousands continue to arrive monthly, a marked increase from a decade ago. <\/p>\n
Not all the newcomers are from the island; a large number also hail from the Northeast and Chicago, spots they traded for the warm weather and more affordable lifestyle of Central Florida. <\/p>\n
The migration the third and largest wave here in four decades and one that began several years ago is transforming a corridor of Central Florida that is increasingly viewed as economically powerful, culturally diverse and politically pivotal. <\/p>\n
Puerto Rico has 78 municipalities, said Art Otero, a Kissimmee city commissioner who was born in San Juan and is running for mayor here, as he sat amid the bustle of the Melao Bakery, a popular pit stop formallorcas, the sugar-topped Puerto Rican sweet rolls. Now they say we will be the 79th. <\/p>\n
As United States citizens, Puerto Ricans from the island, who generally favor Democrats but are less party conscious than their mainland brethren, can easily register to vote. And in the past two presidential elections they have turned out in large numbers, helping hand President Obama his victories in Florida. But they also helped elect Charlie Crist as governor when he was a Republican. <\/p>\n
Their turnout and willingness to consider both parties make them a highly coveted group, a crucial swing vote in the nations largest swing state. <\/p>\n
There is a large number of independents and people who vote on a candidates appeal; party affiliations mean less to them, said Edwin Melndez, the director of the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, which analyzed the most recent census data on the latest migration. The Puerto Rican vote here is not just captured by one party. The candidates have to talk to us. <\/p>\n
Their growing numbers about 15 percent of the areas population in 2013 have also made it easier for them to organize and mobilize on issues that affect Puerto Rico, including a push for equity in Medicare and Medicaidon the island, and for changes that would provide for some debt relief through bankruptcy laws. <\/p>\n
And they are gradually gaining a political foothold of their own in local commissions and the State Legislature, where there are six lawmakers of Puerto Rican descent, half of them Republicans. One state senator, Darren Soto, is running for an open seat in Congress. <\/p>\n
The Puerto Rican stamp on the areas culture and work force is unmistakable. Typically bilingual to varying degrees, Puerto Ricans are often recruited for jobs, including those as doctors, teachers and engineers, but also to work at Disney World and in hotels. <\/p>\n
Just two years ago, the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration, seeing the growth in population, opened an office here to help Puerto Ricans resettle in the area. <\/p>\n
Restaurants dishing out mofongo are no longer hard to find in this once low-key city, where Disney World rose from the swamp. Puerto Rican universities and companies, including those specializing in food, aviation and language training, are also moving into the area to cater to the newest arrivals. <\/p>\n
But the surge of Puerto Ricans does not always make for an easy transition. Increasingly, it is also having an impact on schools and government service agencies, both of which are working to help absorb the latest arrivals, particularly those with children in schools. <\/p>\n
As a result, schools are scrambling to hire more bilingual teachers (some of them also from Puerto Rico) and expand dual-language programs that can best suit Puerto Ricans. In the last month alone, the Osceola County School District, which is home to Kissimmee, registered more than 1,000 new students, many of them Puerto Ricans, said Dalia Medina, the director of the multicultural department for the school district. <\/p>\n
We are a mini-Puerto Rico here, she said. We are now 58 percent Hispanic in the schools, and every year we have increased. <\/p>\n
But in their rush to move to the Orlando area, complications sometimes arise, particularly for those with no jobs waiting for them, no invitations from relatives and insufficient cash to see them through. Finding affordable housing in the area, where rents are higher than in Puerto Rico, and ponying up deposits can pose a problem for many. <\/p>\n
Some Puerto Ricans find themselves living week to week in run-down motels that line Kissimmees main artery because that is the only option, Mr. Otero said. <\/p>\n
And many realize that their English, while passable in Puerto Rico, needs refining here, making it tricky to find jobs, said Betsy Franceschini, the head of the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration office here. Her advice: Enroll in English classes. <\/p>\n
Reports of people packing up and moving back to Puerto Rico appear to be on the rise, she said. Those that plan have better success, she said. Its a shock to those who did not do the research ahead of time. <\/p>\n
Even when someone arrives with a good job and perfect English, the transition can be rocky. Mr. Hernandez, who was recruited from Puerto Rico, where he trained teachers to work for Osceola High School because of his specialty in teaching English language learners, wound up first sharing a mobile home with a stranger, then in two motels (including one with bedbugs) with his wife and child. He said other Puerto Ricans were also living in the motels. <\/p>\n
His Osceola job offer had arisen unexpectedly, and he had just returned from an expensive vacation with his family, leaving little cash for deposits. Ultimately, he got help through a program called Families in Transition. <\/p>\n
The living conditions were horrible in the motel, said Mr. Hernandez, who is originally from New York and has participated in a TEDx talk onteaching English as a second language. <\/p>\n
But returning to Puerto Rico, where his career seemed frozen, raises were nonexistent and taxes were escalating, seemed unthinkable. <\/p>\n
Now he is in a two-bedroom beautiful apartment across from the school, and the family is settling in nicely and his teaching career glimmers with promise. <\/p>\n
I really believe that I am in the right place in the right time, he said. <\/p>\n
For the original report go tohttp:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2015\/08\/25\/us\/central-florida-emerges-as-mainland-magnet-for-puerto-ricans.html?emc=edit_th_20150825&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=41473240 <\/p>\n
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