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San Pedro Intersection Named Misty Copeland Square p. 2 Activists Call for Return of Port Oversight p. 3 Star Fisheries Workers Strike Before Christmas p. 13
An Irregular, Not Quite Random, Retrospective
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By Paul Rosenberg, Senior Editor, and Erik Kongshaug, Former Editor
[See Retrospective, page 4]
By James Preston Allen, Publisher
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n every crucible where there are actors with competing interests, there is conflict. Without conflict there can be no resolution, let alone an end to a crisis. Random Lengths has played critical and important roles in most of the crucibles that have transformed the Los Angeles Harbor Area in the past 35 years. The first crucible, which proved momentous in this paper’s history before it was even founded, occurred on the night of Dec. 17, 1976. At the time, I had just moved into a new place I rented on 32nd Street, overlooking Cabrillo Beach and the West Channel, just a half mile from berth 46 at the Port of Los Angeles. My friend Patrick was setting up my stereo in time for my birthday party. As he tinkered with the sound system, a glimpse out a living room window facing the bay caused him to excitedly call me over. “Wow, James, you’ve got to come see this!” He said it with such intensity that I immediately ran to see what he was witnessing. Outside, across the channel was a ball of fire rising above a dark column of smoke, hundreds of feet into the sky as a Liberian oil tanker, called the S.S. Sansinena, exploded. [See Masthead, page 8]
stories—whether familiar, forgotten or even hidden—together in new ways. This is the reason for this retrospective.
Public-Interest Journalism Key to Saving a Diverse and Vibrant City
The Local Publication You Actually Read
hirty-five years is an eternity in the news business. When Random Lengths was launched, during Jimmy Carter’s presidency, there was no cable news, no Internet and no text messaging. People were distracted the old-fashioned way: Politicians lied to them and newspapers printed the lies as facts. This is where Random Lengths came in, taking aim at those lies, one at a time. The pace and volume of those lies have increased dramatically since then, requiring more thoughtful and diverse responses. Sometimes it’s shining light on a neglected or hidden story. Sometimes it’s setting the record straight about very public proceedings—from neighborhood councils and the Harbor Commission to the state legislature, the Congress, even United Nations conferences, like the recent climate change “Conference of Parties” in Paris. Sometimes it’s reporting from an unexpected perspective, showing things in a whole new light. Sometimes it’s taking a very familiar subject, story or point of view and discovering something more. Sometimes it’s being right up to the minute, as new developments cast old certainties into doubt. And, sometimes it’s recovering history, putting old
President of the San Pedro-Wilmington chapter of the NAACP, Dr. Cheyenne Bryant presents American Ballet Theater principal ballerina Misty Copeland with a lifetime membership to the NAACP. The pair are flanked by Councilman Joe Buscaino, Wolf Bradley of local band 20 Eyes and Copeland's former ballet instructor and director of San Pedro City Ballet, Cindy Bradley. Photo by Zamná Ávila.
December 24 - January 6, 2016
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