And is white gentrification threatening that community?
There is a Puerto Rican community in Humboldt Park, and Humboldt Park is home to a number of Puerto Rican cultural institutions, but is it accurate to call Humboldt Park “a Puerto Rican community.”
As of the 2000 Census the 11,777 Puerto Ricans in Humboldt Park constituted just 17.9 percent of its population. Puerto Ricans in Humboldt Park were outnumbered by Mexicans (16,248, 24.7 percent), and far outnumbered by African-Americans (31,960, 48.5 percent).
The Puerto Rican population of Humboldt Park declined by more than 23% from 1990 to 2000, and some would blame the forces of white gentrification for that decline. The nonHispanic white population of Humboldt Park, however, also declined during that period, by nearly 20%.
From 1990 to 2000, the Mexican population of Humboldt Park increased by more than 40%. For every 3 Puerto Ricans that left Humboldt Park, 4 Mexicans moved in and 2 whites also moved out. Mexicans were the only major ethnic or racial group that showed an increase in population in Humboldt Park from 1990 to 2000, a period when some gentrification was indisputably occurring. Should we conclude that Mexicans were “gentrifying” Puerto Ricans and whites out of Humboldt Park?
The Humboldt Park community is highly transient: more than two-thirds of its households in 2000 had moved there within the past 10 years. That transiency has been a feature of Humboldt Park for decades, undermining the argument that many long-term residents are being threatened by gentrification, although some doubtless are.
Humboldt Park, it ought to be noted, is not the largest Puerto Rican community in Chicago. It’s not even close to that. The Puerto Rican population of Logan Square was 18,601 in 2000, far outnumbering the Puerto Ricans of Humboldt Park. West Town (14,567) and Belmont Cragin (12,960) also had more Puerto Ricans than Humboldt Park