Wheaton's Challenge: A Revival That Keeps Its Ethnic Soul

It's a place where the air is often thick with the smell of chickens on the rotisserie at El Pollo Rico. Where Filippo Leo, who emigrated 31 years ago from Sicily, Italy, greets the customers at his Italian deli with a jovial buongiorno . Where the Indonesian buffet serves a tongue-searing beef dish marinated in 14 spices.

The Laos-born cashier at the Asian market speaks Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese and English in addition to her native language. Next door, the kosher supermarket offers eight kinds of knishes, and many of the labels are in Hebrew.

Wheaton is where Ramos opened her store so that instead of greeting cards wishing "Happy Wedding Anniversary," Hispanic immigrants could buy ones that read, " Feliz Aniversario de Boda. "

But these days, Wheaton is also a place of dread and uncertainty for some businesses. If the community goes upscale and rents increase, not all of the small shops will survive. Many of the store owners are wondering about their fate.

"I'm worried," Ramos said. "I feel they are pushing us out."

A University of Maryland study of Silver Spring's redevelopment found last year that with skyrocketing rents, many small businesses "are now suffering from the very revitalization they had hoped would give their operations a boost." In Wheaton, county officials say, they are taking steps to avoid a similar fate for owners such as Ramos.

The county sponsored a survey aimed at gauging the health and needs of Wheaton's business community. When it revealed that many stores were operating on leases of three years or less, officials brought in a real estate lawyer to lead a seminar on how to negotiate a lease.

A business consultant from Pepco Holdings recently gave a seminar on marketing, urging a dozen shop owners to aggressively promote themselves. Last week, another seminar focused on writing an effective business plan.

Meanwhile, the Latino Economic Development Corp., a D.C.-based nonprofit group that helps small businesses, plans to open an office in Wheaton this year, its first venture outside the District.

"The message is that redevelopment is coming," said Manuel Hidalgo, the corporation's executive director. "It's not a question of 'if.' . . . The developers are lining up."

He said his agency will help businesses get loans, develop strategy and train employees. The goal is to make sure "we don't lose the culture and what makes Wheaton Wheaton," he said. "It's the mom-and-pop, multiethnic environment that people come to."

He added: "It's to make sure that as Starbucks and Targets and Best Buys come into the neighborhood, we have a strong sense of responsibility to the mom-and-pops who have been servicing the community for decades. We want to make sure that they rise with the tide."