Lowriders: Car club enthusiasts say it's a family activity

YAKIMA, Wash. -- On a warm afternoon, Danny Gonzalez's fiancée and 4-year-old son play on the front lawn of their home as he works on his maroon 1986 Monte Carlo.

Gonzalez leans his body under the hood, peering into the nooks and crannies of the engine to get a better look. He quickly walks to the other side of the car to pick up a tool, replacing the upper A-arms for the hydraulics he plans on installing.

Next Saturday, he will enter his Monte Carlo at a custom auto show in Union Gap organized by the Lowcos Car Club.

"I'll probably buff it to make it shinier," Gonzalez says of the car, which he considers a work in progress.

He bought it for $2,000 a few years ago and has invested another $5,000, part of it for new maroon seats, new tires and hubcaps.

The 31-year-old tow truck driver is part of the lowriding community in the Yakima Valley. Though lowrider car enthusiasts have been around for decades, they recently found themselves at the center of controversy when the Lowcos Car Club tried to get a cruise night in Yakima to coincide with the Aug. 28 car show in Union Gap.

The Yakima City Council denied the permit due to time and budget restraints, but on Thursday the city of Union Gap gave permission for a cruise next Saturday night. It was an easier process, in part, because Union Gap doesn't have an ordinance that bans cruises like Yakima and doesn't require permits.

"I saw no reason to not allow it," Mayor Jim Lemon said. "Basically we don't anticipate any problems with it."

Yakima Mayor Micah Cawley indicated there were other, somewhat unspoken, reasons behind the city's reluctance about having lowriders driving down local streets. He told the Yakima Herald-Republic that they bring a "different element" than other car cruises.

"Look at pop culture and watch MTV and you see the cars in the videos," Cawley said. "I'm not saying that it's not a family event. Part of it is the stereotype and the labeling. There is a different feel, and you can ask the police and anyone."

Lowriders think the perception is misplaced.

"Nowadays young people are causing trouble and it takes one bad apple to ruin it for the rest," said Jaime Esquivel, 47, of Toppenish, who's been building cars and attending shows since the 1990s.

He feels cultural stereotypes contribute to misperceptions about the lowriding hobby.

"People misjudge you for the color of your skin," Esquivel said. "Most think you're doing something illegal when you're driving in something nice. They think you're a gangbanger or a drug dealer."

Esquivel says lowriders trace back to the days at the end of World War II, when "Pachucos" -- Mexican-Americans who slicked back their hair and wore polished shoes -- threw sandbags in the trunk to lower their cars so they would ride closer to the ground.

"It was a way to make their cars different and customize them," Esquivel said.

Lowrider magazine this year profiled the Lowcos Car Club, noting that while Southern California is widely viewed as "the mecca" of lowrider culture, the Pacific Northwest has seen a growth in lowrider activity.

Negative image dispelled

Gonzalez, who grew up in Granger, admits that until three years ago, he had a negative image come to mind when he thought about lowriders.

"I thought 'gangbangers,'" he said. "It's the first thing that came to mind like anyone else."

That changed, though, after he attended a lowriding show in Portland. He saw wives, children and car enthusiasts showing off their trophies.

Today, Gonzalez is vice president of the Royal Image Car Club, one of about a dozen in the Valley.

The Lowcos Car Club started about 20 years ago in Spokane and opened the Yakima chapter about four years ago. Together, the chapters have held at least 19 car shows throughout the Northwest.

In Yakima, "interests" usually go through a one-year probationary process of attending meetings, car shows and charity events before being allowed into the club, said Javier Gonzalez, president of the Lowcos Car Club.

Car enthusiasts describe the clubs and hobby as a family. Almost all say their passion for cars was inspired by an older brother, cousin, uncle or father.

Jose "Sporty" Cantu, 29, of Zillah says he's been going to lowrider car shows since he was a kid. He would go with his father to show support for his uncle, Esquivel, and his entries.

After his mother died in 2005, Cantu said, his father bought a rusty 1949 Ford pickup, in hopes of rebuilding it. But when he fell ill with cancer, he gave it to his son to finish the project.

"Now he's gone and I have to do this car in his memory and tribute," said Cantu, whose father died in May.

Cantu's uncle opened his own shop in the back of his house in Toppenish in the late 1990s. Car enthusiasts from all over Washington, Oregon and California would come to get their cars customized.

But Esquivel's work came to a halt about two weeks ago, when he was ordered by Yakima County to close the shop due to a nuisance complaint from 2005.

For now, he is preparing for the annual Lowrider Magazine Super Show in Las Vegas with a bright green 1937 Chevy pickup, named "The Wicked One," that is being turned into car royalty with sharp silver and gold chrome engravings on the engine and grill.

"It's all about the competition and the bragging rights," Esquivel said.

Fellow Lowcos member Kevin King, who worked in manufacturing until an injury more than two years ago, said car building kept him way from gangs.

"I didn't have time to be a thug," King said. "My money and time went into cars."

Every once in awhile people knock on his door, offering to buy one of his three cars in the driveway. He turns them all away because he is not ready to part with the cars that make up what he considers family.

"They're like my kids," said King, who often takes his wife and two sons to car shows.

His favorite is the 1965 Chevrolet Impala. The charcoal car has purple lining around its body and hood.

"The Impala is worth a lot of money," King said. "It's rare and old. The goal for anyone is to have an Impala."

It's not often that lowrider cars actually get driven. Car owners say they do take them out with their families on the weekends. But most of the time, the cars are being worked on and preserved, almost like museum pieces, in garages and driveways, almost always covered.

If a car show is more than a few miles away, the entries aren't driven but loaded onto trailers so they can be transported.

Javier Gonzalez, the Lowcos president, has a 1966 Impala that's been transformed from "rusty, old, and torn apart" into a silver classic with hydraulics. He figures he has spent an estimated $50,000.

Customizing a lowrider is an ongoing project and is never entirely finished, even after years of work, Gonzalez said.

"There are a lot of problems that can be presented," he said. "It breaks down, but like anything in life it's about getting right back on your feet. We know who drives a true lowrider when you're always fixing something."

* Viviana Buzo can be reached at 509-577-7675 or vbuzo@yakimaherald.com.