First, a big layer of mayonnaise goes into a styrofoam cup, then a generous sprinkling of cheese and a scoop of juicy corn from a silver pot.
“¿Quiere limón y sal?” asked Letty Franco Espericueta.
Top it with lime, salt and chilli, and you’ve got a cup of Espericueta’s famous elote, which she serves in her shop, Antojitos Mi Pueblito, on the edge of downtown Rock Springs.
“Enjoy,” Espericueta, a 38-year-old mom of four daughters, said with a shy smile.
Elote is just one of the many snacks from her hometown in the coastal Mexican state of Nayarit. The menu at Antojitos Mi Pueblito includes everything from ceviche to ice cream.
Espericueta explained why she wanted to open the restaurant, “Me interesó porque yo le ayudaba a una vecina,” saying she once helped a neighbor with a similar business in Mexico.
“I guess it just reminds her a lot of her childhood,” her oldest daughter, Jocelyn Franco Campo, 17, summarized in English. “It was something that brought her closer to where she was from.”
This is one of several Latino-owned businesses clustered on this block on Pilot Butte Avenue, which the city recently rebranded the Las Americas Hispanic District.
From the sidewalk, pastel orange and yellow buildings can be seen lining the narrow street. There’s a Mexican restaurant, a market and money transfer business, and a jewelry, leather and piñata shop.
This district is also a place in transition, with boarded-up storefronts and a lively gentlemen's club across the street.
“So we identified this block as having the most challenges, the most potential, but a lot of assets,” said Chad Banks, who leads the city’s Urban Renewal Agency, “particularly the Latino entrepreneurs that were taking ownership of this block.”
Rock Springs, a boom-and-bust coal town, is trying to rebrand not just this block but all the sections of its city center. There’s also now a Parks District and a Railside Arts and Culture district.
That’s in part thanks to grant funding from the state business council and national organization Main Street America, which helps revitalize downtowns. The organization is partnered with almost 90 places in the Mountain West, eight of which are in Wyoming.
Banks, a former state representative, said downtowns are where history happens.
“That's where the heart of our community is,” Banks added. “That's where entertainment happens. This is where community gatherings happen. This is where parades happen.”
Pop into Casa Chavez, the Mexican restaurant down the street, on a Friday night, and regulars fill the booths.
“The city is, you know, doing something good,” said the owner, Inalvez Chavez.
He’s run the restaurant in Rock Springs for over two decades. Before that, he lived in California, which he said was a lot more expensive.
“Here, I got an opportunity, you know, much, much better to open a business with less money,” Chavez said, sitting in a booth underneath vibrant decorations. “That's why I moved here.”
Touring around the block, Banks said the city is trying to get more people of all backgrounds to open up shop. He pointed to new benches, murals and a newly paved parking lot, which used to house a Chinese market.
Banks said Rock Springs prides itself as the home of dozens of nationalities.
“When it was a coal mining town, there were 56 nationalities that sort of developed Rock Springs, that called it home,” he said.
Things are much different than in the late 1800s when there was a massacre involving Chinese miners, a history residents are reckoning with.
The name Las Americas Hispanic District tries to honor these diverse roots, while recognizing what the neighborhood is now. According to the 2023 U.S. Census, about 17% of the city’s residents are Hispanic, one of the largest communities in the state.
“Y en lo que va de este año, creo que me he despedido de más de 10 familias que decidieron dejar Rock Springs por todo lo que está pasando,” Letty Franco Espericueta said.
“We’ve had to say at least 10 goodbyes to 10 different families because they had to leave town,” said Jocelyn, interpreting for her mother.
Rock Springs is part of Sweetwater County, which is the only county in Wyoming that’s been closely working with ICE since 2020. This year, it signed two new agreements with the federal agency, a trend sweeping across the Mountain West.
Sitting on the porch outside her shop, Espericueta said the prospect of ICE activity has slowed business. And she believes putting a sign up saying “Hispanic district” could bring unwanted attention.
“It does put us at risk,” Jocelyn added. “It hasn’t yet…but it is a worry.”
Rock Springs resident Rosa Reyna-Pugh, who’s on the Urban Renewal Agency board, said it’s hard to make sense of all this.
“We are the first to be in a relationship with ICE [in Wyoming]. But yet we're also the first to do a project like this,” Reyna-Pugh said, referring to the Hispanic district, which was her brainchild. “It doesn't make sense, right?”
Still, she said, this is still home for many Latinos.
“We're gonna try to do the best that we can to keep our home and to make sure that we are thriving here,” Reyna-Pugh said.
Espericueta added that, as an immigrant, she feels safe and supported here, especially with the community’s investments in the block.
“Rock Springs, siempre lo he dicho, es una comunidad que siempre da la bienvenida a todos,” Espericueta said.
“Rock Springs, she always loved it,” Jocelyn summarized. “She’s loved Wyoming. Contrary to what anyone else said, she’s loved it because they’ve always welcomed her with open arms.”
And with snacks like elote and ceviche, Espericueta hopes to help others feel right at home, too.
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, KUNC in Northern Colorado, KANW in New Mexico, Colorado Public Radio, KJZZ in Arizona and NPR, with additional support from affiliate newsrooms across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Eric and Wendy Schmidt.
