Jim Newton: It is just a vacant piece of property at this point?

Maria Cabildo: No, it has a fully operating Sears store.

Evangeline Ordaz-Molina: It's not the distribution center anymore.

Robert Greene: It's a fully operating Sears?

Maria Cabildo: What's also interesting about that Sears is it's the only, it has the only bookstore in Boyle Heights.

Jim Newton: Is that right?

Maria Cabildo: In the basement there's a little place where they sell books.

Robert Greene: That's the only bookstore in Boyle Heights?

Maria Cabildo: Yeah, there's not a bookstore in Boyle Heights. You need to go, like to Montebello, or come downtown. There's not a place where — you know, I go to the thrift store that's really close, but there's no bookstore.

Robert Greene: Well next to the Starbucks next year we'll have a Borders or a Barnes & Noble...

Evangeline Ordaz-Molina: Well that's what they're talking about!

Maria Cabildo: Seriously. That's the MTA. The folks on the ground, that's their vision for Mariachi Plaza. To bring in like a Barnes & Noble or a Borders. Right there at First and Boyle.

Robert Greene: And, we talk about this a lot but I want you to sort of articulate it for me. What's wrong with that?

Evangeline Ordaz-Molina: It would be OK, if let's say, it doesn't interfere with the mariachis who hang out on Mariachi Plaza and wait for work.

Robert Greene: Because that's the distinctive character of the...

Evangeline Ordaz-Molina: Exactly. Because the worst thing that could happen would be a Mariachi Plaza with no Mariachis. Which would just be a repeat of what happened at Olvera Street. And so that's part of what prompted us to buy the Boyle Hotel, or the Mariachi Hotel as people call it in the neighborhood, is that: to try to preserve some affordable housing for those mariachis so that they stay on that plaza — which they made, they created. That was a traffic island with a donut shop. And they started hanging out there, and then that's when they brought in that kiosk, which now unfortunately doesn't serve much function except to look pretty to people driving by.

Maria Cabildo: And it has no acoustics.

Evangeline Ordaz-Molina: You can't play in there, yeah.

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