The Dream Team : Business Partners Cross Social Lines to Open New Playground

The MBA, the JD, the MD and the two “OGs”--Original Gangsters--stood on the sidelines of their bustling new basketball court Saturday and could hardly contain their pride.

Months before, when this unusual partnership first set out to open “The Playground,” a community center and retail store in South-Central Los Angeles, the businessman and the lawyer offered technical expertise. The doctor put up the capital. And the two ex-gang members provided what they all agreed were the most important ingredients: street sense and knowledge of the community.

The five partners invested their time and money in a place many people try to avoid: the inner city, just one mile west of where rioting erupted last spring. But when the result of their collaboration was unveiled near Florence and 6th avenues, they said the crowd of hundreds was proof that they had done the right thing.

“This is history here,” said Ronald (Ray Ray) Arnold, 25, an ex-Crip from Watts, who stood with one of his partners, Glenn Harvey, 32, a lawyer and bank vice president. “We’re from the bottom. They’re from the top. It’s a great mixture. It’s like Kool-Aid and sugar--it’s sweet.”

With a lot of sweat--and donated paint and cut-rate assistance from a contractor and an architect--Ray Ray, Harvey and their colleagues transformed a vacant plumbing supply store into a fanciful retail outlet. Decorated with a miniature Astroturf football field, a running track and a mock home plate, it is the only African-American-owned distributor of Nike and Reebok athletic shoes in Los Angeles.

Outside, on the sprawling new blacktop, Nike has painted a brightly colored basketball court with a red, black and green peace sign at half court. Nearby is the site of an outdoor educational center that Harvey said will provide tutoring programs and homework assistance. Soon, he said, a concession stand run by local youngsters will open.

“We’ll furnish the inventory and split the profits with them--75% for them, 25% for us,” Harvey said. “We want to teach them management skills.”

The project is an outgrowth of a venture undertaken in July, when a local sneaker company called Eurostar Inc. contracted with Amer-I-Can, a self-esteem course for gang members and ex-convicts founded by former NFL star Jim Brown. The shoe company hired Ray Ray and another former gang member, Gregory (High T) Hightower, 28, to help create and sell a new line of mid-priced footwear.

The men were given $20,000 worth of inventory, they say, which they sold from a tent at Figueroa Avenue and 88th Place. Harvey, who also has worked with the Amer-I-Can program, helped keep the books.

Sales were pretty good. But from the outset, the two ex-gang members say, the quality of the inventory was less than excellent.

“They said it was seconds. But half of it looked like fifths,” said Ray Ray, who remembers thinking: “If we’re selling this, we can sell anything.”

Carl Washington, an account representative for Reebok’s Southern California office, had been dropping by the tent, offering to teach the young men about the footwear business. With his encouragement, Ray Ray and High T began trying to devise a way to branch out into other brands.

To sell Nike or Reebok, they needed a storefront. Soon, Ray-Ray, High T, Harvey and Albert Sanford, a manager at a film post-production facility, were cruising South-Central for a location.

They wanted a site where youths could play as well as buy--a refuge where they could meet black professionals who could serve as role models. But to outfit a community center they needed money.

That is where Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) came in. She knew Ray Ray and High T from the days, six years ago, when they attended her job-training programs. When she heard their idea, she telephoned a wealthy friend.

Floyd Coard, a Marina del Rey physician and businessman, invested about $100,000, he said, because it is time that Angelenos of means--especially wealthy African-Americans--invest in the community.

“It’s time for people like me to put capital into the community because the community has everything else--manpower, brains, creativity and the willingness to work hard. We hope it’ll be a catalyst.”