A FORUM FOR COMMUNITY ISSUES : In the Neighborhood : Pico-Union: Jobs Lost in the Riot, Not Regained

High unemployment and scarce low-income housing were huge problems for Pico-Union before April’s disturbances. Then the violence dealt this highly immigrant neighborhood a crushing blow-about $13 million worth of damage, according to city estimates.

Today, jobs are the most urgent issue in this densely packed one-half square mile, with its high percentage of recently arrived immigrants.

Pico-Union’s upper-class “suburban” past is visible in the 19th-Century Victorian and later Craftsman-style structures that stud the area. But in the early 1960s, freeway construction, absentee ownership and immigration began to transform the area. The 1980s brought an increasing number of Salvadorans.

Community workers and ordinary residents of goodwill struggle to solve Pico-Union’s problems. Can they succeed? Let’s hope so.

Ethnic Background, 1990

HISPANIC ANGLO BLACK ALL OTHERS Pico-Union 88.7% 4.2% 1.6% 5.5% Los Angeles 39.9% 37.3% 13% 9.8%

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Persons of Hispanic Origin

MEXICAN CENTRAL AMERICAN OTHER HISPANIC Pico-Union 51.6% 41.6% 6.8% Los Angeles 67.5% 22.6% 9.9%

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Population Pico-Union: 28,126 Los Angeles: 3,485,398

Pico-Union Los Angeles Foreign-born persons 72% 38% Workers who use 55% 26% public transportation or car-pool to get to work Persons age 0-17 51.2% 27.8% living below the poverty line Homes with no telephone 15.9% 4.1% Persons under 25 41.7% 37.4%

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Unemployment: The 1990 census gives the official unemployment rate in Pico-Union as 13.2%. However, this does not include additional job loss caused by the recession and by destruction during the riots, and does not take into account people who have given up looking for work.

Businessman

NICOLAS ORELLANA of Niky’s Sports.

(Job seekers) come more often than ever before and (we say,) “Sorry, we don’t have any openings. This is just a family business three.”

There are a lot of people who really work and need to work. We have mainly a Hispanic community, but we have a lot of black people too. If they have job opportunities, they will work-something different than the (present) situation. It’s a community like any other.

Labor Activist

JOSE DE PAZ, Executive director of the California Immigrant Workers Assn., a 7,000-member group involved in community and labor organizing.

One of the most widespread observations made during and after the riots was the lack of leadership. There is a reason why the black community and its leadership were able to respond, the Asian community was able to respond and the Latino community did not respond in an organized manner. The reason for it is that other communities have “their” institutions. The Latinos, unfortunately, don’t have any institutions in the sense that they have influence and control of those institutions. We have Latino politicians. But we don’t control them. They see themselves as politicians first. Like the Olympic Games-every four years-they come to the community for votes and contributions.

There has to be the investment of political will to change things. Politicians have to start taking risks in terms of their careers and say, “I’m going to do what is right.”

Pastor

CARLOS E. PAIVA, Senior pastor of Angelica Lutheran Church.

If we provide jobs to this area the gangs would disappear and the drug activity would disappear.

Housing would be another project. They can’t improve the housing here, because they don’t have jobs. We want to provide child care and give food to the population. We need a very good library and also a clinic.

Historian

CARSON ANDERSON, Free-lance consultant who does architecture history research.

I think the people who are employed are employed in the (low-paying) garment industry. It’s going to take jobs that pay at least minimum wage to have a positive effect. There’s a labor pool here of energetic, intelligent people who are hard working. I think the negatives of the neighborhood are often exaggerated. There’s a feeling of good-will in the neighborhood that can be tapped into.

We’re going to have to make it easier for them. We’re going to have to market (the area) for them. The (city) is not promoting the older neighborhoods.

There needs to be better security-the feeling of safety. That’s probably one of the things that negatively effect the neighborhood.

Community Worker

JULIO GOMEZ, Community specialist at the community-based recovery program, El Centro del Pueblo.

(Jobs) would cut down on crime a lot. They’re basically honest men, but they need to survive.

Any (jobs) will do right now. These guys will do anything. What they want to do is general labor: construction. I have carpenters here. I have a doctor here from Mexico. This guy will work for $5 an hour! Anywhere you go, you find guys with talent. (But) first you take care of their immediate needs-housing, food and a job.

Jobs are very different. If they get them, they get them in the garment industry and they pay them whatever. Sweatshops. They have to work overtime and they don’t get paid.

Community Organizer

OSCAR A. ANDRADE, Executive director of El Rescate, a multiservice community organization whose name means “rescue.”

We’re used to seeing signs, “No jobs available,” in English and Spanish. What this means to us that the companies come to develop an apartment complex, (but) don’t take applications from people who live in the area and need a job.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau