When Connie Buschman moved to Auburn from Mexico and opened up Connie's Deli on State Street with her husband, Doug, she could barely converse with anyone in a city filled with white people.

But since then, almost 13 years later, Doug says the city is beginning to adapt to different cultures. Connie enjoys it when people come into the restaurant to try and converse in her native tongue.

Although the restaurant is Mexican themed, its menu would speak otherwise, providing a selection of both Tex-Mex foods and American dishes, including burgers and subs.

“We have to be realistic. We also focus on other foods,” Doug said. “The sheer lack of minorities does create an issue. There's not a lot of knowledge about the culture.”

The cultural challenge is one of many factors behind a lack of minority-owned businesses in Cayuga County. Numbers released last fall from the U.S. Census Bureau show the county has too few minority-owned businesses to report publicly, meaning there are fewer than 100 establishments owned by blacks, Hispanics, Asians and American Indians, respectively. That's out of 5,339 establishments countywide.

With a population that is 94.4 percent white, it's not surprising the numbers of minority-owned firms does not approach statewide levels, in which 7.6 percent of businesses are black-owned; 8.5 percent Asian-owned; 9.6 percent Hispanic-owned; and 0.7 percent American Indian-owned.

But business owners who are part of a minority population in Cayuga County said there are definite roadblocks locally to a more diverse business ownership profile.

Success of minority businesses stems from the possibility for inclusion, an idea Cayuga County has not yet grasped, said Sean McLeod, president and CEO of Auburn's New York Institute for Dance and Education.

McLeod, a black Auburn native, said he sees the lack of inclusion locally each day as more and more dancers taking NYIDE classes travel from outside the county to attend classes in Auburn.

“Diversity is about the inclusion of race, ideas and about multiple avenues of execution,” McLeod said. “If you want to celebrate diversity, have diversity, the principle is inclusion,” said McLeod, who's celebrating his company's 15th anniversary this year.

“We have diversity but it's not working,” McLeod said. “There is no local presence of diversity. We need to make diversity an integral part of business in the county.”

But differences also exist from place to place within the county.

While Kevin Zhang's Chinese food restaurant is embraced in the town of Moravia as one of the few diverse businesses in the southern end of the county, Connie Buschman said she has managed to keep her Mexican-themed restaurant in business by mixing American cuisine with the Mexican dishes she wants her restaurant to be known for.

Doug Buschman said that the deli's customers are a mix of people socially and economically and they try to cater to all.

“There just isn't enough demand for Mexican-only dishes to support this place,” Doug said.

When the restaurant opened, only a few types of Mexican dishes were served along with the common hamburgers, subs, soups and salads.

“Over time we slowly integrated the Mexican food,” Doug said. “We've created a niche, now people have gained a familiarity with the food.”

McLeod acknowledged that there are more minority-owned businesses in the county now than when he was younger, but, he said, there are still too few businesses when compared with the way minority populations have grown.

“Clearly there's more. But when you go from zero to one, it's not anything. The way you tell there is racial diversity is not how many businesses there are but by the support of that business by the white population,” McLeod said. “When I was growing up in Auburn it was only white and black, 99.9 percent white. Colors didn't show up. Now I see a lot more.”

Diversity thrives

On a Tuesday afternoon, six white men sat in the neatly kept Great Garden Chinese Restaurant in Moravia. Kevin Zhang stood behind the counter taking orders while his wife cooked in the kitchen.

Most of his customers are from the southern end of Cayuga County and a majority of them are white.

“It's a small town,” Zhang said.

Zhang said that he, his wife, Maple, and their two children are the only Chinese people living in Moravia and are one of the few Chinese families at the southern end of the county, but that the overwhelmingly population welcomed them to the area when they moved to Moravia from Auburn three years ago.

“I just do the best for my customers,” Zhang said.

He said he lived by that motto when he owned a Chinese restaurant in Auburn and when he opened his Chinese restaurant on Moravia's Main Street.

“We were really busy when we first opened, serving about one customer every 20 minutes,” Zhang said.

Aside from being one of the few Chinese families in the area, Zhang says his restaurant is the only Chinese food restaurant in the southern end of Cayuga County and that people have taken both an appreciation for the food and his family, he said.

“People told me when the store opened that they've been waiting for one to open. Before this they had to drive to Auburn, Cortland or Ithaca for Chinese food,” Zhang said.

He said he and his family don't mind being one of the only non-white families in Moravia. Zhang said he moved from Auburn to escape the crime and find a more quiet lifestyle.

Zhang moved from China 18 years ago and settled with his family in Clifton, N.J., where he learned the restaurant business. A friend of his suggested he move to Auburn to open his restaurant.

“People in Moravia are very nice. They always ask about my children and family,” Zhang said.

Diversity struggles

In Auburn, McLeod said, his Auburn dance studio doesn't get the same local support that non-black organizations in the county receive.

“I make my living on leaving Auburn,” McLeod said.

Roughly 95 percent of the organization's support comes from dancers who travel outside the county to participate in his studio. Although he says that local state officials do support him financially, the support is never publicized the way other official contributions are.

“Based on the evidence I'm forced to conclude that perhaps color has something to do with it,” McLeod said. “Cayuga County does not celebrate, promote or yet benefit from diversity.”

The inclusion some minorities have incorporated into their businesses is still not felt by others.

“To celebrate diversity, inclusion is the principle,” McLeod said.

That's a battle the Booker T. Washington Center fights, as well, said program assistant Merritt Fletcher. He would love to see more white people participating in center activities.

In 1927 the center opened as an agency providing services to assist the community in promoting civil rights, justice and equality without regard to race, creed or color.

Fletcher, who was born and raised in Auburn, said the center has developed new programming, including holiday celebrations, child and family services, after-school care and summer camps.

But he says there are still misconceptions.

“We're not always embraced. We do stuff that you can't beat for free, but people prefer to take their children to the YMCA,” Fletcher said. “We don't discriminate. We're open to everyone and a lot of our activities focus on diversity.”

He blames the misconceptions on old stereotypes about the center that have formed in the minds of people in the greater community.

“One is it's all black here and another misconception is we only play basketball,” Fletcher said. “Somehow it goes through their mind 'I can get hurt there.'”

Fletcher said if people embraced the idea of inclusion the tension felt when talking about different minorities would disappear.

“People would just feel better,” Fletcher said. “As long as there's not (inclusion), there's always tension to make if feel that way and you are going to have all sorts of opinions about how to do it.”

Staff writer Kristina Martino can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 238 or kristina.martino@lee.net