Mexico President Due in Santa Ana Today to Fulfill a Campaign Pledge

Vicente Fox, the first Mexican president to visit Santa Ana, comes to town today amid much fanfare as he fulfills an inauguration promise to open a Mexican trade center in the United States within 100 days of taking office.

Santa Ana police, who expect thousands of Mexican immigrants to throng the busy downtown area for a look at the popular new president, say they will close some streets in the vicinity of the International Business Center on Broadway near 10th Street as early as 8:30 a.m.

The public ceremony doesn’t start until after his helicopter touches down at Eddie West Field about 6 p.m., but crowds are expected to begin assembling earlier.

Gov. Gray Davis, Santa Ana Mayor Miguel A. Pulido, Mexican immigrant organizations, local businessmen and state representatives are expected to join Fox for the grand opening and VIP reception to follow. The city of Santa Ana has committed $200,000 in rent for 7,000 square feet of office space for the center.

Mexican officials say Fox, inaugurated Dec. 2, kept his promise, albeit 10 days late, in part because of Pulido.

Mexican trade centers had been proposed in Los Angeles, Chicago and San Antonio, but Santa Ana cut to the front of the line because Pulido for years had wanted to better connect his hometown to his native Mexico.

“They needed something hoy [today],” Pulido said, but “it hurts to move that fast. It forced us to do a redevelopment project.”

Pulido, born in Mexico City and raised in Southern California, said he has dreamed about this day for more than three years. During that time, he has led groups of mayors and businessmen to his native land.

By the time he spoke with representatives of former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo in 1999, it was too late in the latter’s term for a trade center. So when Pulido went to Fox’s inauguration and heard his promise to open a trade center within 100 days, “immediately a light bulb went off. I said, ‘Gosh, we can be that center.’ ”

The center is similar to state trade offices Fox opened as governor of the Mexican state of Guanajuato. Those offices are in Dallas, New York City, Costa Rica, Chile and in Los Angeles’ World Trade Center. They are credited by Mexican officials with generating millions of dollars in business for small Mexican companies.

“This is a scheme that worked when he was governor, and it’s a scheme that we would like to see duplicated because it serves everyone on both sides of the border,” said Jose Natera, general director of international projects for the Mexican federal government’s Office of Mexicans Abroad.

In his first year in office, Fox has said he plans to open a trade center similar to Santa Ana’s in Dallas, and news media in that city have similarly billed that center as the first of its kind. Mexican officials say the two centers are “both first.”

Dallas also has offered free rent to Mexico, Natera said, adding that what his government mainly wants are “partnerships.”

Pulido said the city will recoup the rental costs with new tax revenue from businesses that will open because of the center.

Bill Clements, director of sales at Ajax Boiler, which manufactures boilers for industrial use, hopes to pick up new customers at the center.

“Doing Mexico is not as easy as Canada. The center would help us develop contacts with people in the various Mexican states. We could establish contacts like the ones we have in Canada,” he said.

Pulido said many other high-profile governmental and educational tenants are considering opening offices in the same building, which will bring additional business to the downtown area.

‘What Are We Getting Out of It?’

Some community activists say they worry that nothing will come of those promises.

“I just want to know, what are we getting out of it?” longtime resident Ruben Alvarez said. “There is a natural ripple effect, but I haven’t seen anything other than ‘this is what we are going to.’ ”

But Pulido expressed confidence that the city and region will benefit. “This is a network we are creating,” he said.

The Mexican consul in Santa Ana also is beaming these days as his telephones ring incessantly with inquiries about the event.

“This is a big honor for all Mexicans who live in Orange County,” said Consul Miguel Angel Isidro. “We are all very excited.”

Santa Ana Police Sgt. Raul Luna said a stage will be constructed in front of the center that will take up half of Broadway. There will be 300 to 500 seats for invited guests and behind it standing room for the general public.

Broadway will be closed from Civic Center Drive West to West 17th Street beginning at 8:30 a.m. After 3 p.m., several side streets also will be closed, including Ross and Sycamore streets.

Fox and Davis will ride by motorcade from the stadium to the center. Police would not give a route for security reasons.

After the opening ceremony, Fox will sign an agreement with Mexican immigrants from the state of Zacatecas. About 800,000 Mexicans from the state live in Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Under the agreement, for every dollar raised by the immigrants and sent to Mexico for public works projects, the federal, state and local governments will add $3. The new program is expected to bring $20 million into the Mexican state this year alone, said governor Ricardo Monreal Avila.

“This is a program that is generating a lot of goodwill between people in Zacatecas and people from Zacatecas in the United States,” Monreal Avila said. “This is just one state. If every state does this, imagine the possibilities.”

Guadalupe Gomez, president of the Zacatecas Civic Front in Santa Ana, expects to see Mexicans waiting to see Fox because the new president has made immigrants a priority. Gomez was invited to the inauguration and to a subsequent meeting at the president’s ranch in Guanajuato.

“I’m sure there are a lot of people who would like to see our president. There is a lot of work to be done, and he has the willingness to do it,” Gomez said. “He has taken us into consideration.”