There is little that irks us more than when people assume all Latinos — particularly Spanish-speaking ones — are all undocumented. Or even, all immigrants. Beyond flattening us to fit into a political argument (or media-reinforced stereotype) the assumption is just plain wrong.

In Philadelphia very specifically.

While nationally the largest Latino cultural group is Mexican, the largest Latino cultural group in our city is Puerto Rican. And despite people’s proclivity to lump Puerto Ricans in with immigrant and foreign-born Latinos, we are not. Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens from birth whether we are born in the English-speaking mainland or Spanish-speaking island — and Philadelphia county has the fifth largest concentration of Puerto Ricans in the nation: 121,643. 

It is a population that is growing at a clip. 

In fact, according to a Pew Research report released Aug. 11, more Puerto Ricans have come to live stateside in the past decade than in any decade since “the Great Migration” after World War II. Approximately 144,000 Puerto Ricans left the island for the mainland from 2010 to 2013 alone.

But, according to Pew, “the island born, however, are a smaller group than the faster-growing mainland-born Puerto Ricans.” The population of mainland-born Puerto Ricans has tripled in size since 1980, going from 1 million to 3.4 million in 2012 — and 21 percent of that growth took place from 2007 to 2012. 

While the report indicates that Puerto Ricans who come to the mainland are increasingly choosing to settle in the South (48 percent), the Northeast still draws 38 percent of those coming to the mainland for jobs and to join our families.

We see the growth in the Puerto Rican community reflected in the organizations that have long served us. 

The Council of Spanish Speaking Organizations (Concilio), which was founded in 1962, recently relocated its headquarters to a 30,000-square-foot building on Hunting Park Avenue as evidence of this growth. 

“It’s a great day for Concilio and the Latino community. Our community has grown and Concilio has outgrown their facilities, it is time to move to better serve our Latino community,” said State Representative Angel Cruz.

Meanwhile, Taller Puertorriqueño, which  has been the cultural heart of El Barrio for four decades, is in middle of a fundraising effort to build a massive new cultural center to accomodate its educational, exhibition and performance spaces. (AL DÍA reports on the progress of the fundraising regularly, on this page.)

The Asociación de Puertorriqueños en Marcha (APM) has gone even bigger in the past four years: it has expanded beyond a building to the development of a whole neighborhood. Ten-square blocks  — between 5th and 9th — with low-income rental units, homeownership units, supermarkets a credit union ... you name it. 

The youth of the Puerto Rican community, and the promise for ongoing and sustatined population expansion is evidenced by Congreso, the community services organization that has been an integral part of Latino Philadelphia since it was founded in 1977. The organization is expanding its educational offerings, and proposes to open a dual-language high-school to operate alongside its K-8 school (Pan American Academy Charter School) and Harcum College (which it also operates).

If political clout is the measure of the dynamism of a community within the larger community of the city, Puerto Ricans have it all over any other Latino cultural group.  

State representative Cruz is Puerto Rican, as is District 7 councilwoman María Quiñones-Sanchez. And if the exploratory committee set up in advance of a political run is any indication, Puerto Rican Philly may actually get a shot at a mayoral run. 

Nelson Díaz, former city solicitor and the first Puerto Rican to receive a J.D. from Temple University, hasn’t officially announced his run, but he has filed the papers  with the city (click here for an article about the possibility that both Diaz and Ken Trujillo, another Latino, will run for office).

The Puerto Rican community in our city is a lot like homegrown boxer Danny ‘Swift’ Garcia —  promising, scrappy  and tenacious. The recent growth in our community says one thing: Don’t ever count us out.