How a former white enclave became an aspirational suburb for Latinos in Los Angeles.

By Erick Galino with photos by June Canedo @ NYTimes.com/Style, Dec. 5 

I was having dinner at some fancy beach-side eatery in early March when someone said they had just moved to Downey, a Southeast Los Angeles suburb 12 miles south of downtown. The other Latinos at the table oohed. “You finally made it,” someone said. “To the Mexican Beverly Hills.”

In many ways, that is what Downey represents. It’s hoity-toity, gilded and more conservative than surrounding neighborhoods — a status-marking place where the average household income, at $88,000, is significantly higher than in other areas in Los Angeles with a similar ethnic makeup. In East Los Angeles, which is also predominantly Latino, the average income is $56,000, according to census data [....]

In short, it’s a great example of a place that rebukes the idea of a singular Latino vote, or of any ideological uniformity among the nearly 61 million people of Latin American descent who live in the United States.

My immigrant parents scraped and earned and brought us to South Downey in 1995 to keep their five kids out of gangs. The schools in Downey were known for their prowess and the Downey Police for their severity [....]

As early as 1988, the city’s edges became a gateway for working class Latinos seeking to spend their hard-earned savings on a first home in a neighborhood with access to great public schools. The Downey Unified school district consistently ranks in the top 20 safest districts of L.A. County. For parents like mine, who had bought into education as the key to a life of American exceptionalism, Downey was a beacon [....]