Back to the Barrio : Tax Consultant Gives Up ‘Success’ to Return to East L.A.

Louis Barajas had it all: a loving family, nice suburban home and a job at a prestigious firm that paid him handsomely to help wealthy people with their investment portfolios. He worked out of a well-appointed Newport Beach office with a spectacular view of the ocean.

But Barajas, 30, was a kid from East Los Angeles who never quite got over a bad case of homesickness. “I missed the tortillas,” he said only half-jokingly.

So about six months ago, with his wife’s blessing, he chucked the job and returned to the neighborhood of his youth, a grimy barrio in Boyle Heights. His office, over a Mexican seafood restaurant, has an unobstructed view of an auto repair shop.

His working-class clients come for advice on their income taxes. Barajas has slashed his fees to about 10% of what they were in Orange County, and there have been times when he has received hefty servings of enchiladas as payment. On occasion, he charges nothing.

It might be the ultimate comedown for some alumni of the “Me Generation,” but Barajas, who holds a master’s degree in business administration from the Claremont Graduate School, says he is just about the happiest man in the world.

“I love this,” he said. “People look at what I did and tell me: ‘What are you doing in East L.A.? You’ll get shot.’ They say it like a joke but they aren’t really joking. But this is where I am from.”

The path back to the barrio is one that many educated Latinos have traveled, prompted largely by the urge to give something back to the community that nurtured them. Since the 1960s, Latino professional groups--lawyers, architects, doctors and others--have established scholarships to encourage aspiring young Latinos.

Many young professionals volunteer their time in the barrio while working at high-paying jobs elsewhere, but few take the risk that Barajas has, community leaders say.

“He is a rare breed,” said Diane Acevedo, a health-care advocate who oversees three Eastside nonprofit foundations for Latinos who want to be nurses. “He isn’t looking to get patted on the back. He’s just decided to come back to his community.”

The son of Mexican immigrants, Barajas spent his early years helping his father, keeping the books at his wrought-iron business. By 16, he was savvy enough about tax law to take on IRS officials auditing the elder Barajas. He argued that his father owed the government no additional money. The IRS concluded that the insistent young Barajas was right.

“I guess I got my MBA on the streets,” he said.

At UCLA, where he majored in sociology, Barajas volunteered for the university’s Partnership Program and returned to two neighborhood high schools to encourage the largely Chicano student bodies to consider going to college. The experience fueled his desire to help others on the Eastside.

“In college, he constantly talked about East L.A.,” said former roommate Robert Testa.

On a recent afternoon at his office, Barajas had plenty of opportunities to act on his idealism. As music blared from the restaurant below, Barajas gave financial advice to locals whose circumstances were typical of his clientele:

* A 21-year-old grocery clerk wanted a strategy for holding onto a modest home that he paid $235,000 for two years ago. On his salary of $20,000 a year, the clerk was in danger of defaulting on his mortgage payments.

* A middle-aged couple earning about $40,000 a year wanted to know how they could finance two children’s education in Catholic high schools. Over four years, costs could run about $17,000.

* A 26-year-old nurse told Barajas she had run up about $10,000 in credit-card debts and had no savings. The woman, who would like to be a deputy coroner one day, admitted that she was spending money foolishly.

His clients, who must search for a handwritten sign to find Barajas’ office, were grateful.

“He’s introduced me to stocks and mutual funds, things I never thought about,” said Loretta Pedroza. “It’s extraordinary that I can find help like this here.”

But Barajas has been frustrated to find that many Latinos have been victimized by fly-by-night operators who take advantage of unsuspecting people in dire straits. In many cases, the offenders are Latinos themselves, abusing the faith placed in them, Barajas said.

As the April 15 tax deadline nears, Barajas said he has encountered an alarming number of locals who have been taken in by notarios publicos, notaries public, who are not trained to prepare tax returns.

In Mexico, a notario is often an attorney. But here, a notary public is simply a witness for legal transactions. More than once, Barajas said, people who do not know the difference have had their returns done by preparers operating out of stereo stores.

“I get frustrated because many of the people I talk to will not listen to me but will listen to that notario down the street,” Barajas said with a tone of resignation. “Latinos do a lot of things on faith, on a handshake. ‘I trust you,’ they’ll say. It is frustrating.”

Although Barajas says he is not a crusading do-gooder, at least one neighborhood notario said he wished Barajas would just go away.

“That muchacho doesn’t know everything about money,” said the Whittier Boulevard notary public, who asked that his name not be used. “I’ve been in this community for a long time. I bet he goes back to wherever he was before.”

But Barajas has vowed to stay put.

“I’d like to have a business with a conscience,” he said. “I’d like stationery with stuff on the bottom that says: ‘Offices in New York, Tokyo and Beverly Hills.’ Then, it’ll say: ‘Headquarters in East L.A.’ ”