Tribute to Immigrants : Firm Presents Bradley Check for Monument

Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley collected a $100,000 check to help pay for his proposed monument to immigrants on Monday--from a donor who said the cash represented a “small gift” of support for the city.

“I’ll take this kind of small gift any day of the week,” the mayor responded, chuckling.

The check was handed over by Shigeru Kobayashi, president of the Shuwa Corp. of Tokyo, Japan’s biggest condominium developer.

The firm’s domestic subsidiary, Shuwa Investments, owns two Century City office buildings and recently plunked down an estimated $650 million to buy downtown Los Angeles’ Arco Plaza twin towers.

Idea Followed Liberty Fete

Bradley proposed in mid-July, less than a week after the Statue of Liberty centennial, that a privately funded monument be built to welcome immigrants to the nation’s western shore.

“It’s not a duplication of the Statue of Liberty; it’s simply some form of visible expression of our welcome to our new immigrants who have come from various parts of the Pacific Rim,” Bradley said. “They have contributed to the vitality and wealth and diversity of our culture.”

Kobayashi, speaking through an interpreter, called the proposal a “very good, very important, wonderful” idea.

“When we come over from Tokyo after a 19-hour flight, if when we reach the city we could see a monument like the Statue of Liberty, people would be very happy to see that,” he said.

Answering questions from reporters, Bradley said he remains open to suggestions about the form of the monument, its location and its cost. He has received dozens of recommendations, which will be forwarded to a special task force being set up to review the idea, Bradley said. The mayor said it would be “premature” to disclose his preference.

First Donation Received

The $100,000 gift from Shuwa marks the first actual donation toward the monument. Bradley said other pledges had been received for the statue by Ken Kragen, the entertainment industry agent who helped mastermind the “We Are The World” campaign for African famine relief.

But Kragen said Monday that he was not involved in fund raising for the Los Angeles statue. He said he suggested to Bradley that a proposed “We Are The World” statue might fit the bill for the city monument, but their conversation ended without an agreement.

“I never heard anything more,” Kragen said. “We assumed they would go in his direction and we would go in ours.”