Locals in the Mexican-American community are working to preserve their history and their heritage.

On Monday, the Mexican American Development Association (MADA) and the City will hold a meeting to gauge interest on how that community should go about it.

The community meeting will take place at 6 p.m. Monday, June 3 at MADA, 17 N. 6th St. Free pizza will be included.

The main item on the agenda: whether the neighborhood locally referred to as Tortilla Flats should apply for and try to get designation as a historic district with the National Register.

City of Montrose graphic

Tortilla Flats is what local residents call the neighborhood that is encompassed in the area, roughly, from N. 9th Street to N. 1st Street. It also encompasses La Raza Park. The neighborhood has predominantly and historically  been occupied by Mexican-Americans and Chicanos.

A big part in organizing those efforts is Bethany Maher, the executive director for MADA.

“We haven’t really had an organization in the community dedicated to this type of work,” she said. “So we started getting MADA back to its original purpose. There really wasn’t an organization dedicated to this equity work and working with Mexican-Americans, Chicanos and Natives.”

The efforts to recognize Tortilla Flats really got started in 2021, when the City of Montrose applied for, and received, a $25,000 grant from History Colorado to conduct a historic context survey.

The survey was distributed and sought to gain insight into the history of the neighborhood, identify resources and plan for how best to recognize and designate the neighborhood.

Maher said she has seen nothing but positive feedback regarding a potential historic designation, but she also sees there may be concerns from residents in the neighborhood. Hence the meeting Monday.

“We want to highlight the benefits and explain what (a historic designation) is,” she said. “It is a cultural designation, not architectural, which is important because, it really doesn’t affect residents’ ability to modify their property and things like that.”

Anytime a community seeks a historic designation, she said, that is a major concern.

She said the meeting’s other purposes are to determine whether a historic designation is something the community wants and where the neighborhoods boundaries are.

“We want to determine that the community wants to apply for the nomination to be designated, and then, second, determine what the boundaries are,” Maher said.

Included in that is solidifying a name for the area. Maher said she believes the residents in the neighborhood would prefer to make official the unofficial title of Tortilla Flats, but the meeting will seek to confirm that. She also said they would discuss the name of La Raza Park, and whether it should officially keep its name.

With a historic designation, the community could be eligible for certain grant funding that could help purchase signage and other features to highlight the history of the area.

Including the Morada

Maybe the most important part of preserving the Hispanic heritage of Montrose is recognizing the Morada, a historic formal meeting place for Mexican-Americans built by Los Hermanos Penitentes, a religious and community serivice organization. The morada, now formally capitalized as “Morada,” was used up until the 1970s, when it was  essentially lost to history (Maher says there aren’t even photographs of the building anymore, but some residents remember going to the building as children).

All that is left is a foundation and a plaque by the Uncompahgre River, across Grand Avenue from Tortilla Flats.

A plaque near the Uncompahgre River at Colorado Outdoors details a “Morada” as an early meeting place for Montrose residents.
(Montrose Business Times file photo)

Maher said the intention is to include the Morada in a historic district, if the area were to receive its historic designation.

MADA was formed around the time the Morada stopped being used and was originally founded as a focal point of the Chicano civil rights movement. MADA’s building became a meeting place for the community when it was constructed in 1973, according to Maher.

The Morada is currently located on property owned by Colorado Outdoors, but MADA is working to purchase the property.

Maher said originally MADA sought to purchase a small portion of the property and work with the City, who could purchase another piece of it. The City set aside funds to do so, but within the past couple weeks, other developments have allowed MADA to shift its plans.

But now, Maher said, the hope is to buy the full parcel, which covers a little more than three acres.

“We’re very close to securing the property, and then from there, we want to decide what to do with the property,” she said. “Initial conversations include some kind of memorial site, like a bench or a structure. Maybe a path that goes to Grand Avenue or goes down to the water.”

She added that there’s also some potential to partner with other stakeholders for larger ideas.

“It would be important and significant to be able to secure that property and then do something over there,” Maher said. “It would be amazing, and then getting to be part of that new development (at Colorado Outdoors).”

Justin Tubbs is the Montrose Business Times editor. He can be reached by email at justin@montrosebusinesstimes.com or by phone at 970-765-0915 or mobile at 254-246-2260.