The small crowd huddled inside and around a tent pitched on a vacant lot on Good Latimer near Swiss. The weather hit below-freezing temperatures, and the TV news broadcasters stirred panic over a coming ice storm that never came. But the citizens and city employees who collected here had waited too long for the groundbreaking ceremony of the new Latino Cultural Arts Center--roughly 15 years, to be precise--to let the coldest day of the new winter keep them away. For those lucky enough to be seated inside or standing at the front of the unsheltered rows peering through the tent's opening, a host of luminaries took their turn to herald this still-to-be-built institution for the city's Latino population. One problem: Most of these crowing roosters--Mayor Ron Kirk, City Councilman John Loza, City Manager Ted Benavides, a priest who led a prayer to the Virgen de Guadalupe--had contributed little substance either to the Latino Arts Center specifically or Dallas' Latino... More >>>