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BETWEEN THE LINES: Save (LA's) Leimert Park . From Itself
(April 18, 2006)
Leimert Park continues to be a beacon of hope that Blacks in L.A. would have somewhere to go, and somewhere to call their own, in a city that is quickly changing-and when I say quickly, I mean in the time it takes the room to get dark when you hit the light switch. It also continues to be the political football that has been passed more times than bringing real NFL football back to the city. Now with at least two new plans to develop the area, political cooptation and economic opportunism is again at Leimert Park's front door. Some people want to save Leimert Park. Yeah, it needs to be saved-from itself.
Los Angeles of 2006, is not the L.A. of 1946, 1956, 1966 or 1976 as one might expect. But it's not even of the L.A. of 1986 or 1996. In ten years, this city has gone from English only to anything but English, from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, from export city to an import city, from a leading civil insurrection threat to the nation's leading terrorist threat, and from the last vestiges of a black-white paradigm to brown-yellow-white-black paradigm (to where you can barely see the "black").
Some things remain the same. LAPD is still the same (regardless of what they want to tell you). Education is still the same-highly unaccountable while churning out ignorance and incompetence with optimum efficiency. And the black community is still the same, being the last commercially developed, the last to get new housing-still untransit friendly (the only part of the city without a red, blue, green or gold line system even touching it, and one not due to come before 2010). Still, there was always one reason to come into the black community, Leimert Park-a two block square area that once had more electricity than all the rest of the community combined. The kind of energy that only black people can create, on a total positive-where the rest of society rushes down to "get a hit." The kind of energy that was once reminiscent of Central Avenue and the Dunbar Hotel, or the Birdland Club in Harlem.
Ever busy, ever bumpin', Leimert Park was a creation of artists, griots, poets, and small merchants that, by accident-mind you-in creating a space to "express themselves," created a space for a whole community to express itself. But with growth comes complications.that turn into problems when not addressed. First it was something as simple as parking, then it was saving its hub (the Vision Complex, which was subsequently lost), then it was rent control, now it's land control. Ultimately, Leimert Park lost control of what it was and what it was supposed to represent. That's not likely to change.
Leimert Park has two big problems-competing economic interests and dysfunctional politics. What to put in Leimert Park is always the question thrown up, and nothing ever lands. The problem stems from the fact that most of those who helped create the ambiance don't own anything (land or building), and those that do want to take advantage of the real estate boon and maximize both the market and location of their properties are considered "outsiders" to the village (known as absentee owners). Anything that is brought into Leimert Park will compete with existing businesses. Anywhere else, free market economics teaches us that competition is good for the economy. Anywhere except Leimert Park, where capitalists are the enemy. Then there are the landowners versus the renters, competing interests that have forced some merchants out of business, or out of "the village." For the last ten years, folk have tried to bring projects to the village, only to have them stonewalled by either the merchants or the politicians. Sometimes both. Because of these competing interests, one can very quickly get the sense that Leimert Park doesn't know what it wants. More movies and music videos are shot in Leimert Park than anywhere in the city. They (merchants) can't even agree on how to make the industry pay them right for shutting down their business. Some demand $500 a day (which what they should get) while others take $500, period (sometimes for five days). Some are sophisticated while others are not. Their competing economic interests fosters disunity that allows them to be exploited. And it's just starting.
Then there's the dysfunctional politics that allows them to be played (and to play each other), that again takes an obstructionist twist when it comes to advancing any real progress. Two years ago, a development was proposed that was a win-win for everybody. Tavis Smiley proposed a three story office building that would have not only brought his show taping to Leimert Park everyday (His show intro was going to be "Live from Leimert Park.), it would have brought retail, office space, a roof-top garden restaurant (with jazz and comedy)-and would have brought Eso Won Books to Leimert Park. It would have been totally black owned. For $3.5 million dollars, the funding was already in place, the Mayor's Office, CRA and CDD wanted to do the deal and most of the merchants had signed off on it. The deal was killed because the councilman didn't like "the team" bringing the deal (which was essentially the Mayor that had ended police career and the CDC started by his predecessor). He let the director of Cultural Affairs (who's made ten years of promises and has delivered no new buildings) talk him into coat-tailing the Vision Complex into Tavis' deal. Tavis said "I need a building, not a theatre." The councilman, being the autocrat that he is, said, "All or none?" Tavis said, "None." End of deal. Then he took the highest valued land in Leimert Park and put it to the lowest value use, a farmer's market (which the merchants never wanted). Then the Business Improvement District, started by the Leimert Park Village CDC, was highjacked, again by the autocrat who wanted to give it to another organization as a political payoff-not knowing that a city contract had already been signed. Property owners have been taxed for two years while the city tries to settle a impending lawsuit, but the BID has delivered no services. Every other BID in town is spurning developments. Now a commercial residential mix is on the table. Again, ten years ago, this was proposed and was overwhelming rejected by the merchants and community. Expect it to be rammed down the community's throat-and both the community and the councilman will end up choking on this one. So goes the politics of Leimert Park. It's just the last of a long series that won't end until folk get stuck off stupid, forms a REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust), buys the land and puts there what they want to do there. There are, at least, four millionaires in the village that can make that happen. That's how you save Leimert.
That bus called commercial development is coming to Leimert Park. Folk can either be driving the bus, or get hit by the bus. Twenty years of passing a community by is long enough. Doing nothing hurts the whole community. Enough of that. Save Leimert Park from itself.
Anthony Asadullah Samad is a national columnist, managing director of the Urban Issues Forum and author of 50 Years After Brown: The State of Black Equality In America (Kabili Press, 2005). He can be reached at www.AnthonySamad.com
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