<P> The Young Lords, later Young Lords Organization and, in New York (notably Spanish Harlem), Young Lords Party, was a Puerto Rican leftist group in several United States cities, notably New York City, and in Lincoln Park, Chicago, the Neighborhood where they were born . </P> <P> The Young Lords began in 1960 as a Puerto Rican turf gang in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of Chicago . Their president Jose Cha Cha Jimenez reorganized them on Grito de Lares, September 23, 1968 and became founder of the Young Lords as a national civil and human rights movement . This new community wide movement, then networked to nearly 30 cities including three branches in New York city . These groups were united into one by Chicago's national offices.It was an important base because then NYC was the port of entry for most immigrants, and for more than 90% of Puerto Ricans . </P> <P> During Mayor Daley's tenure, Puerto Ricans in Lincoln Park (the first hub of Puerto Ricans in Chicago) and several Mexican communities were evicted from prime real estate areas near the Loop, lakefront, Old Town, Lakeview and Lincoln Park . Chicago wanted to avoid paying for extra services and to increase property tax revenues . The Young Lords realized urban renewal was evicting Latino and poor families from their neighborhoods and witnessed police abuses . Some became involved in the Puerto Rican June 1966 Division Street Riots in Wicker Park and Humboldt Park . After the 1968 Democratic Convention protests which took place next to the Lincoln Park Neighborhood, is when the Young Lords joined with others and were reorganized by the founder Jose Cha Cha Jimenez into the more inclusively broader civil and human rights movement . Puerto Rican self - determination and the displacement of Puerto Ricans and poor residents became the primary organizing focus of the original movement . There were few Latino students or outspoken leadership at the time . Still the Young Lords were able to transform themselves, adding and training leadership, and organizing the broader Latino community . </P> <P> Multiple chapters sprouted nationwide following the example by the original chapter in Chicago with several loose branches forming in NYC, and along the East Coast . National headquarters in Chicago then asked a loose coalition of chapters in New York to form one regional branch . These all accepted neighborhood empowerment and Puerto Rican self - determination as the unifying mission . The national office headed by Jose Cha Cha Jimenez, gave approval because before the 1950's New York was the port of entry for immigrants and Puerto Ricans entering the continental U.S. </P>

The young lords legacy of puerto rican activist