Watershed Study Analyzes State of Milwaukee’s Latino Community

By Mitch Teich of WUWM Milwaukee Public Radio

It probably comes as no surprise to hear that the Latino population in the Milwaukee area is skyrocketing. As with many cities around the country, people of Latino descent represent a much larger proportion of the population at large than at any other time in the nation’s history.

But for that basic statistic, the issues facing the Latino community in particular have been under-studied. That’s all changed with the release of a watershed study. Latino Milwaukee: A Statistical Portrait was commissioned by the Greater Milwaukee Foundation and conducted by UWM’s Center for Economic Development.

“There’s data out there, obviously the census provides us a lot. But what we heard from every person that we went and talked with, every leader in the Latino community, was that there is no comprehensive study like we were envisioning,” says Marcus White, the foundation’s vice president for civic engagement. “And frankly, what Marc [Levine] and his colleagues produced is far more comprehensive than we were even expecting.”

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