MIAMI. – Although there’re no official statistics, the Dominican presence in Florida seems to be increasing, as shown with a visit to any town in the state.

Everything seems to show that there’s a constant flow of Dominicans to this region from northeastern states, mainly New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts, attracted by the language (20 percent of Florida’s 18 million residents are Latino), the warm climate and the sparsely populated urban areas.

Manuel Almánzar, Dominican consul in Miami, said there are 160,000 Dominicans that are living throughout Florida. “Dominicans are living up and down the state. Obviously the places of highest concentration are Miami Dade county, that includes Miami and all adjacent cities; Broward county and its different cities, mainly Pembroke Pines, Miramar, Fort Lauderdale, Hollywood, etc, also the zone of Orlando, in Orange county; Kissimmee and Tampa also have a large Dominican population.”

The consul said “we’re in all the South, Central, and southwest Florida, where the cities of Fort Meyers Naples and Cape Coral are located. The old criterion that Dominicans only live in Miami Allapattah’s sector is a thing of the past, even though it’s fair to say that it was the place that welcomed the first Dominican immigrants mainly in the 1970s, where the first Dominican businesses were created and they are still a majority, in Miami’s 17th Avenue northwest.”