Spanish speakers claim bias at eatery

AUBURN – Three Mexican migrant workers who say they were forbidden to speak Spanish in a Latin eatery are planning to file a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission and may sue the owner.

Victor Estrada, Omar Gonzalez, and Christo Gutierrez said the owner of Poncho’s Cantina chastised them for speaking Spanish.

“She slapped the bar with her hand and said, ‘If you’re going to be here, you have to speak in English because this is my place!” Estrada said in English. “She told us, ‘If you don’t like it, leave.”‘

All three men speak some English but feel more comfortable in Spanish.

The owner, Patricia Varnum, said the men misunderstood her and expressed shock that the incident has received attention.

“What I said to them is, ‘I don’t understand what you are saying. I don’t speak Spanish,”‘ Varnum said. “I told them, ‘You have to speak English to me to get served.”‘

Varnum said that they asked her if they could speak Spanish to each other and she told them they could.

Benjamin Guiliani, executive director of Maine Migrant Workers Inc., said he called Varnum on Sept. 22, several hours after the men left the restaurant. He said Varnum said she told them they could not speak Spanish.”

“She said, `I have the right to have people speak English here,”‘ Guiliani said.

Attorney Sally Morris said she plans to file a complaint with the Maine Human Rights Commission, a necessary step before a lawsuit can be filed. Morris said the men’s civil rights were violated because Spanish is an inherent part of their being, Morris said.

“By saying, ‘I don’t want you speaking Spanish here,’ she’s saying, `I don’t want you in here because you are Mexican,”‘ Morris said. “This is America, and in America you have a right to talk to your friends in whatever language you want.”

Regardless of whether there was a misunderstanding between the men and Varnum, word of the incident has spread among the growing migrant worker population. The numbers of workers from Mexico and Central America have swelled in recent decades as more have decided to stay in the area.

In 1980, there were fewer than 150 Latinos in the Lewiston-Auburn area. According to Census figures, there were 1,067 by 1999.

A state lawmaker from Auburn, Rep. Thomas F. Shields, unsuccessfully sponsored a bill last year that would have made English the official language of state government. Although the bill died, it stirred resentment among Latinos in the area.

Shields said some immigrants resist learning English because of a desire to hold on to their culture.

“We can’t let our country become a bunch of squabbling minority groups who can’t understand each other,” he said.