All Aboard the Bus of Hope : And a promising move for Vermont Avenue
As the economy of Southern California slowly improves, places like Leimert Park and the surrounding Crenshaw neighborhood ought to see an upsurge in commercial activity as merchants eye the stucco bungalows and small apartment houses with lush gardens out front, full of exactly the consumers they crave. But history would indicate otherwise.
These African-American areas’ pleasant streets have far more vacant commercial space than, say, the similar Larchmont Village. The will has been there, but too often in South Los Angeles will has not been matched by financing.
The sheer normalcy of this and other neighborhoods, both richer and poorer, in South Los Angeles, Inglewood and Compton was the message of the second annual bankers’ bus tour Wednesday, put together by Operation Hope. Four buses full of lenders, appraisers, community activists and journalists wound for three hours through an area roughly bounded by the Santa Monica Freeway, La Cienega Boulevard, the 91 freeway and the 710. They saw what tour leader John Bryant, founder of Operation Hope, was talking about: Homeownership creates pride. Pride creates secure neighborhoods. The best community “police” are additional homeowners. According to one study cited on the tour, about half of renters in South Los Angeles pay rent equal to a mortgage in their neighborhood. Since the federal Home Mortgage Disclosure Act requires lenders to strive to reflect the racial and ethnic makeup of communities in their loans, that makes South Los Angeles a good bet for regulatory as well as fiscal bottom lines.
A side benefit of homeownership is more small-business activity, since it’s far easier to borrow on homes than to obtain a business loan. But the magnet developments, like the sparkling new shopping centers at Compton Boulevard and Alameda Street or Baldwin Hills/ Crenshaw, still need big lenders and big dreams.
One of those dreams is the development of a block-long strip of Vermont Avenue a few miles north of the new Century Freeway. The surrounding residential areas are a homeowner heaven of spacious one-story houses: here a Cape Cod, there a touch of Moorish, over there a Spanish stucco. But the lack of nearby retail development is eerie.
First Interstate Bank has dived into a commitment to coordinate and finance a $10-million-to-$15-million commercial/residential project on the site. The project, backed by City Council member Mark Ridley Thomas, has drawn some fire for including affordable housing with the commercial element, but the bottom line is that it is housing that draws the tax incentives.
Three Los Angeles-based design/construction teams were announced Thursday as finalists and community comment has been invited. May the best dreamers win.
