Deep Distrust Stalls Eastside Renewal Plan

Distrust is rooted deep beneath the bungalows that line the Eastside neighborhoods of Boyle Heights and El Sereno.

Freeways began slicing through the area more than 40 years ago. Then federal housing projects displaced homes in some areas. State authorities even tried in recent years to put another prison nearby. Many residents worry that the subway extension will bring more upheaval.

These neighborhoods, many residents feel, have been carelessly dissected without an eye to the future, sacrificed to more powerful interests.

Now the shadows of those earlier disruptive projects are stalling a $93-million redevelopment plan that boosters say is the best chance yet to create a vibrant Eastside economy.

A patchwork of land totaling three square miles in Boyle Heights and El Sereno from the Los Angeles River to Indiana Street has been tapped for the Adelante Eastside Project. The Community Redevelopment Agency says the project would rejuvenate the sagging industrial and commercial area by sprucing up streets, attracting new businesses and creating jobs for local residents.

If the project goes through, supporters say these old neighborhoods would be transformed: Repaved sidewalks would stretch down the hilly streets, leading to new retail stores that have sprung up next to the old mercados, drugstores and restaurants. Crumbling facades would be redone and freshly painted; abandoned buildings would be renovated and filled. The decaying area that houses old factories would be replaced by a new industrial park filled with new workers.

But critics see a very different future: local residents and small business uprooted from their decades-old homes. Pointing to the string of displacements caused by past projects, they argue that smaller businesses will lose out to bigger developers, and once again local residents will be sacrificed in the name of progress.

The dissent among wary Eastside neighbors who sit on a CRA citizens committee has delayed the project so long that some business leaders who support the plan fear it may never materialize.

“It’s a circus,” said Steve Barba, a Chamber of Commerce representative and supporter of the project since its inception. “It has been very frustrating on my part to attend these meetings, because there’s so much animosity among some members who are dragging their feet. I’m very concerned--are they really interested in seeing Boyle Heights and El Sereno improve?”

Critics of the plan say they’re fighting for control of their community--that not only have they been burned by past public projects, but they’re skeptical of the CRA’s ability to succeed in their neighborhood.

“We’re there because we care about our community and we want to protect it,” said Nadine Diaz, a committee member critical of the CRA. “The community needs to be revitalized, but I think they want to move out the poor and clean up the area for the middle class.”

The 30-member project area committee has been mired in arguments for the last 1 1/2 years. Hostility clouds the discussions. Months have been spent arguing about technicalities, rewriting bylaws and adding new members, as the December 1996 deadline for completion of a redevelopment plan slipped away.

City Councilman Richard Alatorre, who broached the redevelopment idea more than five years ago, has been dissatisfied by the group’s lack of progress.

“It’s frustrating,” he said. “This is a golden opportunity to produce some industrial redesign of the area. I’m very sensitive to [skeptics’ concerns], but they’re fixated on issues that are not there, spending needless hours on issues that have no value.”

Alatorre has instructed the group to have the plan completed by November. Otherwise, he said, he will consider presenting it to the City Council as is.

Despite Alatorre’s frustration, some veteran Eastside observers herald the drawn-out debate as a new era of citizen involvement--an unprecedented level of participation that challenges Alatorre’s political base.

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“What’s wrong, in the view of Alatorre supporters, is that somebody else is paying attention in terms of land use, and local residents are having a strong input into the future of their community,” said David Diaz, an environmental planner who closely watches Eastside politics.

Few residents would debate that the neighborhoods need a boost. Aging structures dominate the business areas, with almost three-quarters of the commercial buildings needing rehabilitation, according to a 1995 CRA study. Defunct and trash-strewn railroad tracks have become magnets for illegal dumping and crime, the study said. Property values have remained stagnant, and new construction has leveled off. Many vacant businesses and abandoned lots pocket commercial strips.

If the project fails, one committee member said, Boyle Heights and El Sereno “will continue down the road to decay and stagnation.”

People like Michael Kennedy say they’re counting on redevelopment to succeed. A project committee member whose Boyle Heights firm makes golf caps, he has stuck with the contentious group because he believes the project could save the area. “We need money; it’s that simple,” he said.

Runoff water flows down the middle of the road in front of his 11th Street factory. Ragged power lines cause outages. Redevelopment, he hopes, will bring in more companies with a desire to improve the area.

Many hope redevelopment will attract more retail businesses and keep local customers in the area. Currently, about $473 million of local disposable income leaks out to the nearby cities of Montebello, Alhambra and Huntington Park, CRA officials said.

But for residents whose suspicions remain, one of the biggest concerns is the potential use of the government’s power of eminent domain. In the 1960s, when freeways plowed through the area, eminent domain forced many people to sell their property and move.

Alatorre and CRA officials have said eminent domain won’t be used in residential areas, but many fear that smaller mom-and-pop businesses and those who live along the commercial strips will lose.

“The thing I think about is Chavez Ravine, when they went into that Hispanic community and literally took them out of their homes,” said Don Lippman, a CRA critic newly elected to the project committee.

Some committee members said there’s good reason for them to approach this project with caution.

“It sounds like a good idea on paper,” said Martin Flores, a member who represents a youth group in Boyle Heights. “But in reality, although we’ve been told it will benefit the community, the developer gets the money and the developer gets control. Those parts of East L.A. will get fixed, and the rest of the community will be ignored.”

CRA project officials acknowledge that the community’s suspicion has bogged down the process but say they are optimistic that the plan will move forward.

“There obviously is a high level of distrust, and given the history of things that have happened in that community, it’s not unreasonable,” said Don Spivack, CRA deputy administrator. “What we’re trying to do is get a discussion going and have a plan before the council by the end of the year.”

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The level of anxiety about the project threatens to sabotage redevelopment efforts and the future of the Eastside, the project’s supporters argue.

Even waiting on the plan, they say, further delays the infusion of redevelopment funds, while local retail money continues to flow out to other communities.

“It’s too bad, because it’s a good community with good people who want to help,” said one committee member, who asked to remain anonymous. “What they don’t realize is that they’ve protected themselves to death.”

Some committee members complain that the group has been subject to outside influence.

“I think [the outside groups] have their own agendas to slow it down,” said Hector Hernandez, who owns a mattress store on Olympic Boulevard. “Sometimes it looks like we’re going nowhere.”

Meanwhile, many residents are wrestling with the legacy of distrust, even as they hope the project will launch a new era on the Eastside.

“They always bring up the freeways, Dodger Stadium, Bunker Hill,” said longtime resident Art Herrera, referring to developments that disrupted other Latino neighborhoods. “But we’ve got to go forth in life. Sure, we didn’t speak up then, but now we have a better chance. We have a voice.”