Giving Victims of Blight a Voice

Standing before a crime-ridden Silver Lake motel shut largely through the persistence of neighbors, City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo called for state legislation Monday that would allow judges to hear directly from community members whose quality of life suffers from prostitution, drug dealing and vandalism.

Delgadillo said the case of Sunset Pacific Motel, which was closed in March after a long campaign by neighbors and is now boarded up and fenced off, shows why new legislation is needed.

A bill advancing in Sacramento would allow those hurt by lesser crimes to tell judges how they’ve been victimized--as victims of homicide and other major crimes now can.

“The community must have a voice in everything that impacts our neighborhoods,” Delgadillo said.

Standing with him on Monday, Assemblyman Jerome Horton (D-Inglewood), the bill’s sponsor, said the proposed legislation would allay fears of community members who are afraid to speak out because of possible retaliation.

Horton said that under the measure, judges would receive statements in the form of a written report, videotape or audiotape from individuals or organized community groups.

“We would all prefer to have the judge go visit these communities

The bill, passed by the Assembly’s Public Safety Committee, is expected to go before the full Assembly next week.

For some 20 years, neighbors of Sunset Pacific Motel complained that shootings were commonplace, nearby homes were burglarized by motel employees, and condoms and syringes could be found strewn about sidewalks.

Los Angeles police officers responded to the motel often and considered it one of the most dangerous properties in the city.

In January, hundreds of residents attended a meeting calling on city leaders to shut the place down.

Its owner, Edward Eng, maintained that nothing out of the ordinary took place there. The City Council’s Building and Safety Committee voted to revoke Eng’s operating permit, a decision upheld by the full council in March.

Several community activists, integral in the battle against the motel, said they are skeptical that the bill would do much to rid their neighborhoods of nefarious activity.

“There’s already a lot of things in place, but it seems like nothing gets done anyway,” said Mary Rodriguez, a mother of two children who attend King Middle School a few blocks from the motel. She said efforts should be aimed at shutting down nuisance properties sooner.

Felipe Merino, executive director of Moneta Gardens Improvement in Hawthorne, said the bill would allow its residents to tell judges how, in that housing development, they live in fear of errant bullets and their children are being offered heroin and cocaine.

But Merino also questioned how much power the bill would provide to the community.

“What concerns me,” he said, “is whose input is it going to be: only the wealthy folks who have time on their hands to give a statement?”