El Salvador eyes setting up consulate in Vegas

By Timothy Pratt (contact)

Tuesday, April 24, 2001 | 10:43 a.m.

The 58,000 Las Vegas residents from El Salvador would be well served by a consulate and a bank, local and Los Angeles representatives from the Central American country told a city councilman Monday.

Invited by the Salvadorian Foundation, eight Los Angeles area business and community leaders spoke in Las Vegas for the first time on behalf of their countrymen here. The gesture represents a coming of age in Las Vegas for the Salvadoran community, which has grown to 850,000 in Los Angeles, its largest population in the United States.City Councilman Gary Reese, in whose ward most of the local Salvadorans live, met with the Los Angeles and local representatives at City Hall.

"Our community has grown so much that we're ready to benefit from the experience of business and community leaders from Los Angeles," said Frank Canales, founding president of the foundation.

The meeting included Sonia Salgado, manager at Los Angeles' Banco Salvadoreno; Gina Levy, Consul Ad Honorem; and Juan Duran, president of the Comite Politico de Emigrantes y Empresarios Centroamericanos, a national group representing Central Americans. Reese's counterpart in Lynwood, Calif., Ricardo Sanchez, was also present. He is the first Salvadoran to be elected to local office in Southern California.

One goal expressed at the meeting was opening a local branch of the Banco Salvadoreno, El Salvador's oldest bank. It has three branches in Los Angeles and one in Houston. Reese said as much as 30 percent of businesses in his district may be Salvadoran-owned.

Another goal expressed was establishing a consulate from the Central American country in Las Vegas. El Salvador has consulates in many American cities, including Miami, New York and Houston.

The idea of opening a consulate was voiced as Mexico is poised to open one here in Las Vegas.

"The Mexican community is further along on this than we are," Canales said. "But I think the city understands that a consulate here would be good for our community and for Las Vegas, since Salvadorans would also come from surrounding areas to file papers and for tourism."

Levy, honorary consul in Los Angeles, said the Salvadoran Embassy in Washington would be studying the proposal.

Also present were reporters from El Salvador's Canal Dos, a television station. The meeting was a stop in a national tour for them "in search of people from El Salvador who are doing interesting things in the United States," said station producer Leopoldo Herrera.