By Evelyn McDonnell, Contributor
Carson march for justice By Alex Witrago p. 4
Greed: It’s what’s for dinner By Leslie Belt p. 11
[See Rally, p. 2]
Remaking Justice By Paul Rosenberg, Senior Editor
The murder of George Floyd was a feature, not a bug, in the eyes of a growing number of critics, activists and ordinary Americans who’ve now watched police respond to peaceful protests with hundreds of instances of violent attacks, carried out with reckless abandon for all the world to see. The long-held belief that police are synonymous with public safety simply doesn’t jibe with what the whole world is watching daily on TV and social media. In a Monmouth poll, 78% of respondents said protesters were either fully (57%) or partially (21%) justified in their anger — an unheard of level of support for any protests in U.S. history. “What people in the streets have won is a permanent, generational change to the mainstream view of policing,” Minneapolis City Council Member Steve Fletcher tweeted on June 2. “We are going to dismantle the Minneapolis Police Department and replace [See Justice, p. 8]
June 11 - 24, 2020
By Greggory Moore p. 10
for a call to vote for change in November (agreed). Instead of singing Lean On Me, Alright, We Shall Overcome, or even, I don’t know, This Land is Your Land, a woman wailed (beautifully) The Star-Spangled Banner — as if we were at a political convention, or a football game.
Local farms feed the needy
O
n Saturday, June 6, San Pedro had its first large gathering in response to the protests that have swept the world since the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. There had been smaller protests, in front of the San Pedro police station and city hall, but that morning’s event was the first to draw several hundred people in a march from the police station to city hall, followed by speeches. It looked like a demonstration; there were “I Can’t Breathe” posters and chants of “No Justice! No Peace!” Some social media commentators called it a Black Lives Matter protest. But that activist organization was not involved in the event. Instead, it was organized by three unlikely bedfellows: The San Pedro chapter of the NAACP, the Los Angeles Police Department Harbor Division, and the office of Los Angeles 15th District City Council Member Joe Buscaino. Organizers hailed this as a breakthrough alliance. But skeptics — and I am one — feared that this was not a breakthrough coalition, but a cooptation. First, the march was channeled onto empty roads where there was no chance to engage onlookers or passersby or generally make an impact, which is pretty much the point of a march. One of the participants was controversial LAPD Chief Michel Moore, who led his officers into violent confrontations with protesters in Los Angeles earlier in the week and at one point blamed those protesters for Floyd’s death. [He later had to walk that comment back.] Buscaino, a former cop, is against the cuts to the police department already agreed to by Mayor Eric Garcetti, let alone the foremost demand of Black Lives Matter: Defund police. Indeed, no concrete changes were demanded or offered at the rally, except
Real News, Real People, Really Effective
Dr. Cheyenne Bryant, President of the San Pedro/Wilmington chapter of the NAACP, with Danielle Lumpkins who sang The Star Bangled Banner, top, community activist and president of the Muslim Democratic Club Najee Ali, right, City Councilman Joe Buscaino, left, LAPD Chief Michel Moore, far left, and march organizer Joseph Santiago, standing. Photo by Arturo GarciaAyala
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Community Announcements:
Harbor Area Ports Hold CAAP Meeting
The ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles will update the public on progress toward the goals of the San Pedro Bay Ports Clean Air Action Plan during a June 24 meeting. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the meeting will be held via WebEx, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. To participate in the meeting, click here to register https://tinyurl.com/CAAP-registration. This is the second meeting of 2020 and the ninth under the CAAP 2017 Update.
LB Councilwoman Calls for Meeting About Policing
Councilwoman Suzie Price, as Chair of the Public Safety Committee, has called for a meeting of the Long Beach City Council’s Public Safety Committee on June 23, via teleconference. The agenda will include a report on the events of May 31, related to protests and unrest. The agenda will also include a report on the Long Beach Police Department’s use of force policies and reporting processes as well as opportunities for additional training on topics of implicit bias, use of force and community policing practices. Time: 2:30 p.m. June 23 Details: https://longbeach.legistar.com Venue: Long Beach City Hall, 411 Ocean Blvd., Long Beach
Damaged Businesses Can Register Online for Disaster Aid
The Los Angeles County Office of Emergency Management is asking all business owners who suffered physical property damage or economic injury due to recent civil unrest to register online to be connected to future disaster aid, as it becomes available from state and federal sources. Kevin McGowan, Director of the Los Angeles County Office of Emergency Management said they have developed an online survey tool that gathers that information and will create a registry of business owners to facilitate direct communication with them as future disaster aid resources become available. The online survey is available at bit.ly/ SBApdpda. Business owners who do not have access to the internet, have limited computer proficiency or speak languages other than English may instead contact the County’s Disaster Help Center at 833-238-4450 Monday through Friday, from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. and on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Details: lacountyhelpcenter.org/for-businessowners.
June 11 - 24, 2020
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
Pandemic [P-EBT] Program
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Los Angeles County families have a new resource for food and groceries. Families who are normally able to receive free or reducedcost meals at school may now qualify for additional cash benefits (up to $365 per eligible child) through the Pandemic-EBT program. Families with children who are eligible for free and reduced-price meals, and who did not receive their P-EBT card in the mail by May 22, must apply online before June 30. Details: ca.p-ebt.org
LA County Libraries Start Sidewalk Service at Select Locations
In accordance with revised Public Health orders, Los Angeles County Libraries, beginning June 8, are offering sidewalk service pickup at select library locations. All bookdrops will also reopen for item returns that day. This is the first step of a phased reopening, with additional locations and hours to be added at a later date. Sidewalk service begins at 24 libraries, including Carson, and at LACountyLibrary.org/ express-service. Libraries remain closed to the public, but staff are answering phone lines during the hours of 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday.
LBCC Board Seeks Candidates for November Election
The Long Beach City College Faculty Association announced June 2, that they are welcoming candidates interested in the faculty [See Announcements, p. 3]
Committed to Independent Journalism in the Greater LA/LB Harbor Area for More Than 40 Years
Rally in SP [Rally, from p. 1]
The “Unity Rally” suffered from a serious existential crisis. Many of the participants were visibly and vocally disappointed by the speeches and the presence of Chief Moore and other cops; indeed, speeches by anyone with a badge were largely drowned out by protesters. “This is not a photo op,” they chanted at Buscaino. “This is a protest!” they shouted at the politicians. “This is not a pep rally!” they shouted — incredulously — when the NAACP’s Cheyenne Bryant ended the event by thanking folks for coming to, yes, “a pep rally.” Most people around me turned away in disgust at that point. One young man jumped up and started speaking to the crowd about his dismay with the speakers’ failure to address the real issues of systemic racism. Many stopped to listen to a voice that finally spoke to the real message of this movement. None of this dissent made the coverage of the “Unity Rally” in the Daily Breeze and the Los Angeles Times. Reading their accounts, I had to wonder if I was at a different event. As a journalist and a scholar of journalism, I can’t say I was shocked: Mainstream news outlets typically report the perspective of the powerful, not those speaking out against power structures. Sometimes the erasure is structural; reporters hang out by the stage, instead of in the crowd, and miss the true story. But at this event, you had to be pretty deaf and blind to miss the shouts of the protest against the rally. All this said, there was an incredibly moving moment that did bind everyone there — a
Protesters holding Black Lives Matter posters at the June 6 Unity March. Photo by Chris Villanueva
moment that lasted eight minutes and 46 seconds, the amount of time Derek Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck. Bryant asked everyone to take a knee, the gesture made famous by football player Colin Kaepernick (one of the pioneers of the protest against police violence for years now, whose work is finally being vindicated; the National Football League finally had to admit it was wrong to censure him and others). Cops, protesters, politicians, parents, kids, black people, white people, Native Americans,
It Wasn’t Supposed to Be a Pep Rally By Terelle Jerricks, Managing Editor
Joseph “Jojo” Santiago had a lot to get off his chest when Random Lengths News reached out to him following the unity march on June 6. The march was headlined by District 15 City Councilman Joe Buscaino, the Los Angeles Police Department, and the local chapter of the NAACP. Random Lengths News first learned of this march four days prior, which was billed as a unity protest march. The LAPD Harbor Division was supposed to be marching with them. A couple days later, the word “protest” was dropped altogether. Santiago is a Pedro boy, through and through. He attended Dodson Middle School and graduated from San Pedro High School. He is now attending Los Angeles Harbor College. He said he had no prior organizing experience before the George Floyd demonstrations. Up until a few weeks ago, Santiago had participated in several protests in other parts of Los Angeles, including a recent one in Palos Verdes, inspired by a Minneapolis man whose life seeped out of him as a police officer kneeled on the man’s neck. Floyd’s cry for his deceased mother before a very public death questioned whether black lives do matter. For Santiago, it was at this moment he sought to see his hometown stand up for justice. “I just wanted to do something in my own city to show that we are going to take a stand,” Santiago said. Santiago filmed a few videos of the demonstrations he had attended and sent them to
his mentor along with a text message explaining he wanted to do something in San Pedro. He explained that initially he only had a vague idea of what he wanted to do. Santiago explained that Dr. Cheyenne Bryant, the president of the San Pedro/Wilmington chapter of the NAACP, had a clearer idea of how to bring this vague idea into fruition. Santiago said it could have been as simple as a group of his compatriots standing in one place in protest of police brutality and advocating the defunding of the police departments. He said he would have been happy with that outcome. Instead, he got more than he bargained for. “She said she will see if she could get the NAACP to back us and that in the meantime for us to keep her in the loop,” Santiago said. “From then on, she just took charge and did a lot of things that I definitely would not have been able to do on my own.” As the march quickly started to look like it was going to become a reality, Santiago learned that the Harbor Division of the LAPD was going to join the march. Santiago recounted George Floyd demonstrations in which he participated elsewhere in the city — demonstrations in which protesters squared off with police officers clad in riot gear yelling and screaming at the officers to join their side, as if they could be persuaded to [See Unity Rally, p. 15]
Pacific Islanders, Latinx — everyone that I could see kneeled. And for almost nine minutes we were quiet — mostly. After several minutes that seemed like an eternity, in an act of spontaneous, improvisational street theater, voices rang out: “I can’t breathe!” “Get off my neck!” “Mama!” The final words of George Floyd exploded from the crowd. Staring at the ground, I began to sob. I could hear others crying around me. It was a powerful gesture that has been deployed at protests around the world. Eight minutes and 46 seconds is a long time. Long enough to take a man’s life, just because you can. As the crowd rose, they started another chant, again, one not led from the podium: “A silent cop is a bad cop.” I am not against dialogue. I understand that you sometimes have to sit down with your enemies if not to negotiate change, to make them change. For 8 minutes and 46 seconds everyone in that plaza — including many police officers — had to contemplate one man’s dying moments at the hands of another. Gestures can be powerful. But they can also be easily imitated. What America needs is not gestures, or even words, but action. Action like that the Minneapolis City Council said they would take on the night of June 7: To not merely cut the police budget, or defund the force, but to disband them. This is, of course, exactly what the LAPD fears, and why at this point, they need to listen to the people, more than the people need to listen to them.
Evelyn McDonnell is an associate professor in the English Department and Director of the Journalism Program at Loyola Marymount University. She has been the editorial director of http://www.MOLI. com, pop culture writer at The Miami Herald, senior editor at The Village Voice and associate editor at SF Weekly. Her writing on music, poetry, theater and culture has appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, including the Los Angeles Times, Ms., Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Spin, Travel & Leisure, Us, Billboard, Vibe, Interview, Black Book and Option. She lives in San Pedro. An earlier version of this article appeared on her blog, www. populismblog.wordpress.com.
Update on trip to Washington, D.C.—
Light Still Shines For SPHS Golden Pirate Regiment By Melina Paris, Editorial Assistant
Amid the strife we are collectively experiencing we can still find places where light shines. In what seems like a distant time now, in January, Random Lengths News covered a fundraiser for the San Pedro High School Golden Pirate Regiment to travel to Washington D.C. Nominated by Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragán (D-San Pedro), the regiment was to perform at the 2020 National Memorial Day Parade. With the coronavirus pandemic putting the stop on travel and the safety of the students in mind, curious, we checked in with regiment band director, Darnella Davidson, to discover what was going to be the outcome for the regiment and this special trip. Unfortunately, the regiment did not go to Washington, D.C. this past Memorial Day weekend. COVID-19 put a stop to that. “We have been invited and rescheduled to attend the National Memorial Day Parade in 2021!” Davidson said. The San Pedro High School Golden Pirate Regiment had worked hard for this honor. And Davidson was about to see a dream come true. In the original story she recalled, “I have always dreamed of taking a group out of state.” The dream came together when Rep. Barragán nominated the regiment to represent California in the District of Columbia parade. But the seed was first planted when drum major, Andrew Soto, senior and intern for Barragán, said that he knew his band was driven enough to participate at the National Memorial Day Parade.
Community Announcements:
Harbor Area [Announcements, from p. 2] association’s endorsement for this November’s Long Beach Community College District Board of Trustees election. Interested individuals may contact the organization and obtain information about the group’s formal endorsement process. The Long Beach Community College District Board of Trustees seats that will be on the ballot this November are Area 2 and Area 4. Candidate filling with the Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters for College Board opens July 13 and closes Aug. 7. Details: paclbccfa@gmail.com
LADWP, BREATHE LA Host Free At-Home Energy Efficiency Webinars
Rep. Nanette Barragán and San Pedro High School band leader Darnella Davidson with the Golden Pirate Regiment. File photo
Davidson reported that funds donated to the regiment will be transferred over for their 2021 trip and they will continue their fundraising efforts as soon as they deem possible. Booster Club president Kiok McCarthy reported they don’t know the total cost of the trip now. They may know in the fall when the regiment has a count of how many students will go. For now, there are no definite numbers
but they are trying to keep the cost as close as possible to the original $1,350 per student. “We have invited all of our regiment students to join us for the 2021 parade, including the current seniors,” Davidson said. “Plus, the opportunity to join the trip will be extended to incoming freshmen.” Details: https://www.facebook.com/ thesanpedrohsgoldenpirateregiment
This summer, BREATHE LA is joining LADWP to educate Los Angeles communities on energy efficiency tips, making homes in SoCal more sustainable. BREATHE LA Health Educators will be partnering with community center sites across the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s service areas. Local community members are invited to join the webinars, connecting LADWP incentivized programs, services and resources straight to your home. Times: 11 a.m. June 12 webinar link: energyefficiency-webinar-1 and 11 a.m. June 17 webinar link: energyefficiency-webinar-2
Stabbing Death Investigation in Carson
CARSON — Los Angeles County Sheriff’s homicide detectives are welcoming information about the stabbing death of a male adult on May 28, about 7:56 a.m. on the 880 block of E. Dominguez St. in Carson. The victim was pronounced dead at the scene. Anyone with information about this incident is encouraged to call (323) 890-5500.
Real News, Real People, Really Effective June 11 - 24, 2020
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SPNCs Respond to Proposed LAPD Budget Cuts By Hunter Chase, Reporter
In April, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s proposed budget for the 2020-2021 fiscal year included $1.86 billion in discretionary funds for the Los Angeles Police Department, an increase of more than $100 million from the previous year, while most other city departments faced budget cuts. On June 3, however, Garcetti announced alterations — further cuts to the budget of between $150 million and $250 million, including cutting any increase to LAPD’s budget. The change in budgeting priorities happened after there were protests in all 50 states against police violence. On June 3, Los Angeles City Council President Nury Martinez formally proposed cutting $100 million to $150 million from the LAPD’s budget.
Coastal San Pedro Neighborhood Council President Doug Epperhart said the suggested reduction was not worth getting excited about. He compared it to a drop in a bucket of the LAPD’s overall funding in a normal year. Epperhart characterized Martinez’s proposal as symbolic in light of the current protests against the police. He was not sure it was the best approach, as the LAPD has had decades of systematic racism and this is just cutting the LAPD’s budget by about 5 percent. Recently, the LAPD put out a press release that stated that the cuts were significant — big enough that they would force the department to perform a reassessment on everything including its most basic operations. The LAPD has already begun reviewing which services can be reduced.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the entire city will be in dire straits financially and Epperhart doesn’t see why the police should be any different. In April 2020, Los Angeles City Controller Ron Galperin projected a loss of city revenue from $194 million to $598 million for the 2020 to 2021 fiscal year. “Ron Galperin, the city controller, has put forth two or three different scenarios, in terms of revenue, for instance, and how it may or may not ultimately work out,” Epperhart said. The LAPD taking up a large portion of the city’s budget is not new. All three San Pedro neighborhood councils recently donated $5,000 each for the purpose of purchasing all terrain vehicles to be used by the LAPD’s Harbor Division. Coastal SPNC board
member Noel Gould said that this was akin to a reduction of about 15 percent of his council’s budget. Coastal SPNC was reluctant to finance the ATV’s, and the organization that was raising the money for the ATV’s came to multiple meetings to request them. Coastal SPNC Vice President Dean Pentcheff said that $5,000 would be a drop in the bucket compared to the LAPD’s transportation budget. “In my experience over the last 20 years, the way it works with the City of Los Angeles and its budget, there is the police department and there is everything else,” Epperhart said. The LAPD and the Los Angeles Fire Department combined make up about threefourths of the city’s budget. [See Budget, p. 13]
Carson Councilman Leads Peaceful Demonstration
June 11 - 24, 2020
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
By Alex Witrago, Editorial Intern
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In the midst of COVID-19, Carson marched in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and justice for George Floyd on June 6. “It is not just our community; it’s not just California but people around the world seeing everyone in the world stand next to us to fight for rights we deserve,” said Ryan Warn, a 39-yearCarson Councilman Juwane Hilton concluded his demonstraton by raising old man, who identified up his fist in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Photo by Alex himself as a black-Filipino. Witrago. “It’s beautiful.” Dr. Adaina Brown, the community of schools administrator, expressed her support for the movement. “I want to say I struggle for the past two weeks in finding the right words to express the right words on how I feel as a mother of four black sons and a wife and an educator,” Brown said. “I felt a marriott of emotions from anger, to fear, to hatred, to sadness, to rage, to helplessness, and then I was proud.” Councilman Juwane Hilton led the demonstration. “I want to get people together in a healthy environment to show their support towards the movement,” Hilton said. Hilton stood shoulder to shoulder with local law enforcement, elected city leaders and faith leaders to demand change for a safer African American community. “There are two silent plagues in our nation,” said councilman and former Mayor Jim Dear. “Coronavirus is invisible, but hatred and racism is more deadly because it destroys our spirit as a nation and you are here today because you care about America, you care about our children’s future and you are here because you believe you are doing God’s work.” Dear explained that the city council is working together with the leadership of Hilton to continue the change that is needed now. “We cannot wait for another brother or sister to die at the hands of people who wear a badge or a uniform and think they’re God,” Dear said. “It affects every one of us individually. The damage [See Carson, p. 15]
Solidarity on the Streets of San Pedro
Real News, Real People, Really Effective June 11 - 24, 2020
By Evelyn McDonnell, Contributor There were silver Priuses and white SUVs. socialist worker party folks hawking their wares A fire truck, two garbage trucks, Public Works (ironically). After all, Pedro is a union town, land trucks, an ice cream truck, a city bus and several of Harry Bridges and Joe Hill. Artists and activists semis honked their horns as they drove by. One handed out signs from the punk Pedro printers rig’s blast sounded like a train whistle, long and Calimucho: “Together we are stronger” over two loud — that got our adrenaline going. fists clenched together, designed by Ruth Mora. Lots of men in pickup trucks honked or raised It felt surreal and thrilling to be out with people their fists, even the one in a big white four-door again, after months of sheltering in place. Almost with an American flag flying from the tailgate and everyone wore masks, though social distancing a Donald Trump sticker in the window. was imperfectly practiced. We came in peace “He must be driving his dad’s car,” my friend and we left in peace, as curfew neared — and the Sue said. feet and knees of us old folks started to ache. The Even some police cars honked. A majority officers waved goodbye and we waved back. of the traffic passing the San Pedro police station The only scary moment of the whole afternoon Tuesday afternoon (June 2) between 3 and 5 p.m. was on the drive back down Pacific Avenue, past showed their solidarity with protesters waving “Black Lives Matter” and “End Systemic Racism” flags. They signaled support either with their horns or with their fists, thumbs, or fingers in peace signs. Many drivers admittedly were handicapped by their efforts to keep one hand on the wheel and one on their cell phones filming. There were only three voices of dissent, from a thumb down to a disturbing “Fuck [George] Floyd.” Boarded up storefronts on 7th Street in anticipation of violence that Some protesters misheard never materialized. Photo by Chris Villanueva. one shout as “Fuck you!” but in fact it was “Fuck yeah!” I could see the joy the Sixth Street business district. Stores were on the driver’s face. boarding up their buildings and a group of scary We were a small crowd — about 50 — but given musclemen in San Pedro Fight Club T-shirts that this was the first protest in often conservative looked menacing and out for trouble. San Pedro since the murder of George Floyd, our The idea that any of the peaceful protestors presence was significant. And with every passing at the cop shop or down the street at the city hall honk, shout and fist pump of support, we provoked building were going to bust some glass and steal, I a loud and clear message to the police standing don’t know — t-shirts, was laughable. outside watching us, or sitting at their desks inside Remember, violence in this country the station: People have had enough. historically and right now comes from the vested The horrific video of Floyd’s death has interests and the police who protect them. If galvanized a worldwide protest movement against nothing else, the protest forced locals to spray police brutality and white supremacy. President paint “BLM” on their makeshift window guards. Trump’s warning on Monday (June 1) that he Even if they were just trying to keep vandals away, would send the troops to clear the streets was the message was there this morning, on building the straw that broke the back for those of us still after building: “Black Lives Matter.” paralyzed by pandemic fear. He pushed folks like me off the fence/couch and out to the streets to show that these protests aren’t about violent extremism: They’re about making long overdue change in our country. The demonstration was peaceful. Police officers waved hello as my friends and I walked up to join the line of protesters and I flashed them a peace sign. There were people I knew there — all local San Pedrans — and mostly, people I didn’t. We were a notably diverse lot, trending young and female, but my friends and I are all in our 50s. Next to me was Paul, a retired longshoreman; Erin, a mother of children in San Pedro High and Dana Middle schools; and Catherine, a young woman with long purple braids. We were black, brown and white; first-nation, European, African, and Mexican — a “broad coalition,” as former President Barack Obama says. The only infiltrators I saw were not from the far right or left but a few Jesus freaks offering the typical crazy — but admittedly timely — apocalyptic rhetoric. There were the usual
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Race & Prejudice:
San Pedro History Project Just about every 27 years since the Watts Rebellion, LA has been burned by racial unrest By James Preston Allen, Publisher
The racism that Dr. King and his successors have fought against — institutional racism or systemic racism — is perpetrated by a system that works to ensure white supremacy in all matters of life. Just about every 27 years since the Watts
Rebellion, Los Angeles has been burned by racial unrest, the latest has been less severe than the previous two but still you can almost set your calendars by it happening. Will this time be different? However, the cause is still the same today as before: police abuse and endemic poverty. The history of racial prejudice here cannot be taken out of context of the greater history of race relations in Southern California nor the nation as a whole. It can, however, be seen as a microcosm of the greater history. Yet, it is specifically relevant to local organizers and the community at large to contextualize the contemporary situation by understanding the Harbor Area’s own special history. What is often missing from some of this history here in California is the genocide and enslavement of the indigenous peoples first by the Spanish and then the Americanos. Several years ago in an oil refinery in south Carson, workers digging a pipeline uncovered the remains of a mass grave that turned out to be from the preYankee era. Forensic archeologists noted that many of the skulls had what appeared to be bullet holes and that this was the scene of some violence. This may be the only historic evidence we have to date of the local crimes against people of color here, but there are even more documented cases all across California. In the historical era of Los Angeles it is known that some of the first settlers of this city were of African ancestry and that as the city grew it became more segregated to the point that up until the late 1960’s there were restrictive covenants in deeds and titles that excluded black, Mexicans and Jews from many parts of Los Angeles, including many parts of San Pedro, all of Palos Verdes, Torrance and many parts of Long Beach. Early in the 20th century in Southern California like elsewhere in America saw the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan, which enforced racial prejudice, often violently. Here in San Pedro like many towns we had our own chapter of the KKK and the building that was once their meeting hall still sits up on 10th Street. Recently, when a new developer proposed tearing down the old brick Calvary Chapel and putting up new condos I was the only voice to remind them of the forgotten origins of that edifice. They denied it, saying that they had Publisher/Executive Editor James Preston Allen james@randomlengthsnews.com
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
For most of my life racism was something people just didn’t talk about. It was treated as something different from religion or politics, which also were not to be discussed in polite conversation. That is the case except if you grew up in a home where all of the above was discussed, which I did. It is also why most white people are ignorant of racism, it’s simply something they have not experienced. In Los Angeles, it wasn’t really until the Watts Rebellion exploded in August of 1965 that racism came into the civic discourse and could no longer be ignored. We are reminded of this by civil rights lawyer Connie Rice who recently wrote: “It was only after this that the McCone Commission concluded that preventing future unrest required two things: ending police mistreatment and addressing ‘the spiral of despair’ caused by entrenched poverty.” Then in the late 1960s, the civil rights and the anti-war movements became intertwined when Martin Luther King, Jr., gave his famous speech at the Riverside Church on April 4, 1967, a year before his assassination. In this speech, Dr. King said : “Perhaps a more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. And so we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools.”
June 11 - 24, 2020
Assoc. Publisher/Production Coordinator Suzanne Matsumiya
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“A newspaper is not just for reporting the news as it is, but to make people mad enough to do something about it.” —Mark Twain Vol. XLI : No. 12
Published every two weeks for the Harbor Area communities of San Pedro, RPV, Lomita, Harbor City, Wilmington, Carson and Long Beach. Distributed at over 350 locations throughout the Harbor Area.
Managing Editor Terelle Jerricks editor@randomlengthsnews.com Senior Editor Paul Rosenberg paul.rosenberg@ randomlengthsnews.com
done a “complete historic survey and never came across that.” I was merely expressing the perspective that if we don’t preserve the historical truth of our past we are doing a disservice to the future. Perhaps there should be a plaque marking the spot? They later recanted and admitted that they were mistaken. I became aware of this hidden and forgotten history in San Pedro back when we published the first contemporary article on the union demonstration at Liberty Hill in 1923, which we published 70 years later. It was in that year that the Industrial Workers of the World, IWW or Wobblies as they were commonly known, held a waterfront strike. And because the IWW were considered “radicals” and allowed people of color to be members they were suppressed by the authorities, not the least of these being the Los Angeles Police Department and then-Mayor George E. Cryer, whose name is still inscribed on the San Pedro City Hall next to where the unity rally was held. The rally at Liberty Hill was made infamous world wide when the LAPD arrested Upton Sinclair, the noted author of The Jungle, while he was reading the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights — the part about freedom of assembly and free speech. He was incarcerated for many days and moved from jail to jail so his bail could not be posted but the hypocrisy was not lost on the public nor the media at the time. He was arrested and charged with “criminal syndicalism,” or agitating to overthrow the government. The California Criminal Syndicalism Act was found unconstitutional in 1968. And yet, one year later in 1924, the San Pedro KKK marched down 12th Street to the Wobbly union hall and ransacked the place, beat up and
injured the workers, their families and children. It is reported that members of the LAPD were members of the Klan. Now this can be dismissed as happening almost 100 years ago and that San Pedro as well as the entire nation has moved on, but the legacy of the IWW and the KKK are like two pieces of the same puzzle that remain like opposing Civil War monuments. The ghosts of systemic racism are still with us today. This is a piece of history rarely taught in schools about class struggle, workers rights and racism, even though this is a solidly working class community. This town struggles as most of the older Los Angeles areas do with their own identities, attempting to “reinvent” itself at least every 20 years if not daily. It is a kind of attempted amnesia that is constantly believing that the past is dead and that there is only a better future. Perhaps this is driven by our media attention to the silver screen and celebrity inventions. Or maybe we still hold on to some form of manifest destiny, but with no further place west to go, I’m not ever really sure. What I can tell you is that once about every 27 years we have to go back and relive, re-experience the racism of our past that keeps seeping into our present, exploding onto our streets, on the TV and the news. And people are shocked, shocked that this is happening here in the City of Glass that is so perfectly imperfect. A culture that is more enthralled by the lifestyles of the rich and famous than it is by the value of essential workers. The San Pedro Bay community is just one of the 30 satellite towns in the shadow of this great metropolis. We only get small uprisings here and very little broken glass. Yet, our civic leaders aspire to create the very inequalities that have produced this and previous uprisings, with the kind of gentrification that only exacerbates inequality.
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RANDOMLetters More Solutions, Less Complainin’
The following is meant to be one of the solutions to the problem of overzealousness on the part of police. In the 1970s, Miguel Garcia went before the California Supreme Court in Pitchess vs. California and set legal precedent for civil rights attorneys to use “discovery” to find earlier victims of a police “bad apples” so they could testify in a new case. This is routinely used today in similar cases all over the country. Unfortunately, police departments have taken to destroying their public files-deliberately hindering the efforts to weed out racists and other bad apples within the forces. The most important reform that could be made right now would be national laws forbidding the elimination of these files. Please initiate such legislation. William Weeks San Pedro
A Timely Letter
Before you start whining because you can’t go to the beach and lie in the sun, or drink at a bar, or go to a restaurant, think about those who have been devastated by the loss of family, friends and/ or their jobs so they can’t even afford to drive to the beach or go to a restaurant, and maybe not even have a roof over their heads anymore. Count your blessings. Mike McCollum, San Pedro
Nudging Over the Cliff
The budget cuts being contemplated by Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California Legislature are an assault on generations of seniors whose sacrifices have earned them more than red-pencil treatment on a spreadsheet. Already pushed to the brink by Medicare and MediCal reductions, hospital and insurance pressure, and COVID-19’s disproportional rate of illnesses and fatalities, this round of cuts will surely nudge them over the healthcare cliff.
History tells us that these seniors have lived up to their name: The Greatest Generation. They fought in distant and hostile lands to protect our freedoms. They spent their lives contributing to our prosperity and serving our needs as first responders, teachers, healthcare providers, public servants and business leaders. The $54 billion California deficit challenges us all to sacrifice. But for elder seniors, it is more like a whammy than a challenge. Programs allowing elder seniors to remain in their homes are being jeopardized. People who are not mobile, have disabilities, lack adequate transportation, or simply have difficulty seeing or hearing, could lose resources that get them through the day. Seniors are not asking for unfair advantage over others. They so appreciate being able to shop early at grocery stores; and get business-to-door services, wellness checks by phone, and food security. All they ask is an equitable opportunity to survive with dignity in their homes and not in substandard nursing homes or other facilities. Make no mistake, seniors
understand that many in California face challenging, life-altering consequences. But they also know that few are more vulnerable or face more life-threatening outcomes than those who have reached a time in their lives when
they need our help to go to battle. Seniors are accustomed to challenges and many have clawed back from the edges of conflict, shortages, and great recessions. They are soldiers, parents, and grandparents who have always had
the nation’s back. Now we need to have theirs. Gene Uzawa Dorio, M.D. Santa Clarita President, LA County Commission for Older Adults
Budget Cuts, Priorities By June Burlingame Smith
June 11 - 24, 2020
house changes family structure; each new business builds a new economic engine. Too much elimination of what makes San Pedro an essential current draw for the movie industry, for instance, will deprive that industry of one of its favorite sites and an income loss for us. We will always have the beach and the parks, at least I hope so, and we can probably depend on that continuing to draw movie revenues, but the rest of the town’s draw will diminish and eventually disappear forever. The proposed building along Pacific Avenue up to 22nd Street will further change the nature of San Pedro drastically; the whole west side of Pacific will be open to 45-foot buildings with inadequate parking for residents who occupy the buildings, diminished if not eliminated frontal local businesses and no parking for clients. Further, the proposed development and the inevitable build-out that will follow, will narrow and constrict a major emergency roadway, one of only two, that must be available for tsunami evacuation or earthquake access to Fort [MacArthur] housing and the Point. No additional park or open space will be provided for the many thousands of new residents, nor for the “old residents” either, and the effect will be container architecture boring, a parking nightmare and loss of any old San Pedro charm. Destroying the old character completely will not make the community more familyfriendly, nor enticing, nor will it attract new businesses because it isn’t providing the space, the transportation, the open space, or parking required for successful business and cheerful living. So, Joe, I am very concerned. How can I be a voice in the community to help you shore up and keep what is most valuable in our labor, immigrant and arts rich town?
Real News, Real People, Really Effective
Dear Joe [Buscaino]: What I didn’t say the other day, and should have, is that I was a Dodger fan when they were the Brooklyn Dodgers. We lived in Northern Jersey during World War II and I glued myself to the radio to listen to games. I loved those “bums.” But I’m writing on a more serious note, so please bear with me. We see, as a nation, that when we are all suffering together we turn to the arts for solace, expression and sanity. They offer us the creativity, emotional touch and release we seem to require to be stable human beings. So the arts are much more than just something “nice” in our lives; they are vital to our life and culture. Local businesses heavily depend on their health and vibrancy. As you well know, San Pedro is a mecca for all of the arts; look at what ballet and the success of Misty Copeland has done for us nationally. We are also the headquarters for the Watercolor Society and maintain the national reputation of our museums and aquarium. Without this creative and stimulating community, San Pedro would suffer financially and it would lose one of the mainsprings for tourism: nightlife and cultural attractiveness. To that end, I have a huge concern about upcoming budget cuts and what they will inevitably do to not only the arts communities individually but also to the collective economic and cultural life of San Pedro. Along with that loss, we are also changing the very “face” of San Pedro by new building and planning design. As we move into the mid 21st century, we have already seen the destruction of many of the older business buildings from the 19th and 20th century. As we tear out the old, we have to have a vision for the future that seeks to maintain one of the most important attractions to our town: families and family heritage. Each new building changes the character of the town’s presentation; each new apartment
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[Justice, from p. 1]
Justice
it with a transformative new model of public safety,” City Council President Lisa Bender tweeted two days later. Three days after that, a veto-proof council majority publicly committed to that promise, amounting to a drastic defunding of the department, if not its complete abolition, which remains a long-term goal of abolition activists. In case it sounds too risky or radical, Fletcher offered a safe, sane, sensible description of what it would look like in practice, in an op-ed for Time, under the headline, We Must Disband the Police — Here’s What Could Come Next: We can reimagine what public safety means, what skills we recruit for, and what tools we do and do not need. We can play a role in combating the systems of white supremacy in public safety that the death of black and brown lives has laid bare. We can invest in cultural competency and mental health training, de-escalation and conflict resolution. We can send a city response that is appropriate to each situation and makes it better. We can resolve confusion over a $20 grocery transaction without drawing a weapon or pulling out handcuffs.
June 11 - 24, 2020
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
Dramatic transformation is hardly a wildeyed fantasy. We could achieve it simply by becoming more like some of our closest allies. With just more than 4% of the world population, we have almost 20% of the world’s prisoners — an extreme outlier on the world stage. We imprison people at a rate almost 6 times that of Canada, the nation most culturally similar to
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us, and the rate at which our police kill civilians is similarly extreme. The comparison to Great Britain is even more stark: from 2010 to 2019 American police killed 140 civilians for every one killed by their British counterparts. But abolitionists seek more than merely catching up with what other countries take for granted. A June 5 Medium post from the Movement for Black Lives reaffirmed the ultimate goal: We believe we can build a world free of police, unapologetically. We know that will take all of us. We are not under any illusion that we can build that world overnight. Those who would suggest we believe that are gaslighting
you away from important solutions that work to keep our people safe NOW. … We need bold and visionary action, right now. The call to #DefundPolice gets us that action, right now. It is both a clear solution and an important measure of accountability.
Right now. In Los Angeles, Mayor Eric Garcetti had introduced a budget that increased spending on police by 7.1% at the same time other spending was being drastically cut — 8.9% cut from Economic and Workforce Development, and 9.4% cut from Housing and Community Investment, for example. This despite the fact that crime was down from the year before, even before COVID-19 hit. Garcetti’s budget devoted 54% of discretionary spending to the police. A coalition of groups organized by Black Lives Matter LA responded with a call for the People’s Budget, which was created based on a survey of 1,470 Angelenos, and with an online participatory budgeting process (via Zoom and Facebook Live) including 3,300 participants. That budget devoted 5.72% for “Law Enforcement and Policing,” 24.22% for “Reimagined Community Safety,” 44.25% for “Universal Aid and Crisis Management,” and 25.8% for “Built Environment.” All this happened before George Floyd’s murder, and the subsequent demonstrations, which led a group of city council members to introduce a motion on June 3, requesting up to $150 million in budget cuts for the LAPD. “The change required won’t happen with one piece of legislation and it won’t happen overnight, but this preliminary budget cut of at least $100m-150m is a step in the right direction,” Councilmember Herb Wesson tweeted. But activists saw things differently. “$150 million looks big, until you realize it still leaves the LAPD with 51% of the city’s unrestricted revenues. That’s not at all acceptable,” said Melina Abdullah, a leader of Black Lives Matter Los Angeles. “Our People’s Budget allocates just 5.7% of funds to traditional law enforcement. City Council and Mayor Garcetti need to know that we’re fighting for truly transformative change here and won’t be bought off with just this minimal amount of money.” That same day, Garcetti pledged to “identify $250 million for further investments in community programs, including cuts to LAPD’s budget,” and tweeted out a list of reforms that had already been introduced. Alex Vitale, author of The End of Policing
views reforms more broadly, as spelled out in a Guardian commentary headlined, The answer to police violence is not ‘reform.’ It’s defunding. Here’s why. Perhaps most importantly, Vitale’s book explains that the purpose of policing has always entailed violence for political ends, while also making it politically acceptable. “Crime control is a small part of policing and it always has been,” Vitale explains. “Felony arrests of any kind are a rarity for uniformed officers, with most making no more than one a year,” he notes. Even detectives “spend most of their time taking reports of crimes that they will never solve — and in many cases will never even investigate.” “The reality is that the police exist primarily as a system for managing and even producing inequality by suppressing social movements and tightly managing the behaviors of poor and nonwhite people: those on the losing end of economic and political arrangements,” writes Vitale, in contrast. This can be seen most clearly in the origins of modern policing, which were tied to three basic arrangements of inequality in the 18th century: slavery, colonialism and the control of a new industrial working class. In Britain, Sir Edmund Peel established the first urban police department, London’s Metropolitan Police, in 1829, modelled on his experience developing new methods of colonial control while managing the occupation of Ireland. Bloody massacres only increased resistance, so Peel employed more subtle methods — “identifying and neutralizing troublemakers and ringleaders through threats and arrests,” writes Vitale. That model was imported to Boston in 1838, and spread from there, most notably, to New York City in 1844, where biracial dockworker strikes, starting in 1802, and wider strike waves, beginning in 1809, “culminated in the formation of the Workingman’s Party in 1829, which demanded a ten-hour day, and led to the founding of the General Trade Union in 1833,” writes Vitale. A second point of origin was Southern slave patrols, adapted to controlling slaves in Southern cities, where they regularly were tasked with work outside the direct control of their master. These were professionalized long before the London Metropolitan Police. “The Charleston City Guard and Watch became professionalized as early as 1783,” Vitale notes, and had 100 city and 60 state guards on its payroll by 1831. There were other colonial origins as well, especially for state police. The Texas Rangers were originally “a loose band of irregulars... hired to protect the interests of newly arriving white colonists.” Its purpose was straightforward: It was established after a private police force, the Coal and Iron Police, proved inadequate in suppressing strikes and union organizing. What’s more, Vitale notes, America then turned around and created colonial police forces in Central America and the Caribbean. They “were designed to be part of a Progressive Era program of modernization and nationbuilding, but were quickly turned into forces of brutal repression in the service of U.S.-backed regimes.” Thus, the widely noted militarization of American police over the last few decades is but the latest example of a process that’s at least 100 years old. Given how badly our past several decades of forever wars have turned out, this close relationship only serves to further undermine the notion that it’s a source of safety, [See Justice, p.13]
A Towering Task: The Story of the Peace Corps By Melina Paris, Arts and Culture Writer
T
10,000 gathered students, Kennedy asked: “How many of you who are going to be doctors are willing to spend your days in Ghana? Technicians or engineers: how many of you are willing to work in the Foreign Service and spend your lives traveling around the world? On your willingness to do that … to contribute part of your life to this country, I think will depend the answer whether a free society can compete … I think Americans are willing to contribute. But the effort must be far greater than we’ve ever made in the past.” Inspired to serve, graduate students Judy and Allen Guskin wrote a letter to the editor of the Michigan Daily pledging to work in countries where their help was needed. One month later, Kennedy won the election. To watch the footage ingrained in America’s consciousness as Kennedy delivers the challenge, “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country,” it’s difficult not to ponder how different America may have been if not for the young leader’s tragic death. Upon his arrival to the White House, Kennedy received 25,000 letters from people volunteering for the Peace Corps. Kennedy delegated the Peace Corps to his brother-in-law, diplomat, politician and activist Sargent Shriver, who devised and implemented a plan for the organization. Shriver travelled to countries discussing his plans and gauging people’s approval. He assembled a task force across many disciplines which was presented with a memorandum titled, A Towering Task, with the understanding that it had to be a massive effort or it wouldn’t make any impact. “The Peace Corps was a product of relentless energy,” Shriver’s son and founder of the Special Olympics, Timothy Shriver said. “It took a fight.” By weaving together personal volunteer experiences with the political machinations of the time, [See Peace Corps, p. 12]
Real News, Real People, Really Effective
he idea for the Peace Corps took hold of then-Sen. John F. Kennedy after reading The Ugly American, [1958, William Lederer, Eugene Burdick], during the Cold War era. Set in a fictional southeast Asian country, United States diplomats made no effort to integrate into the communities they served while their Soviet counterparts learned the language and customs, allowing them to easily spread communism throughout the region. The film A Towering Task: The Story of the Peace Corps depicted the bestselling book as a cautionary tale, providing accounts which occurred during the Ronald Reagan era to make the connection. [Just switch the word communism for capitalism — and power.] A Towering Task awakens viewers to what it means to be a global citizen. Directed by Alana DeJoseph and narrated by Annette Bening, the film was released in virtual theatrical runs across the nation, May 22. A Towering Task features interviews with current and returned Peace Corps volunteers. Notable members of the media and politicians appear like Sen. Chris Dodd, Rep. Joe Kennedy and current and former Peace Corps staff, scholars, journalists, community members and world leaders including former President Jimmy Carter and former Liberian president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy gave young Americans the opportunity to serve their country in a new way by forming the Peace Corps. Now, more than 200,000 volunteers have traveled to more than 140 countries to carry out the organization’s mission of international cooperation. Talk of proposals for a volunteer corps circulated in Kennedy’s presidential campaign. October 1960, after the third debate between Kennedy and Vice President Richard Nixon, Kennedy flew into Ann Arbor, Michigan. The senator connected well with young voters who, in trying to coax him, placed a mic outside the Michigan Union at the University of Michigan. In response to
June 11 - 24, 2020
President John F. Kennedy meeting Peace Corps Volunteers in the Rose Garden of the White House 1963. Photo courtesy Haskell Ward
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I
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
t’s a big world, so perhaps there’s an urban farmer or three out there who is in it solely for the money. Talk to enough urban farmers, though, and you come away feeling these are people who do it for the love of food — good food, fresh food, healthy food and real food. They love food but not the status quo of quantity over quality; of ridiculously complex, petroleumguzzling supply chains; of mass-produced, preservative-laced, nutritionally dubious foodstuff. They know there’s a better way and they do what they do to prove it, to be part of the solution, providing not only quality food directly to their communities but creating an example for others to follow. Yes, they’d like to make money — a necessary evil in this world — but that’s not what drives them. No surprise, then, that despite their own difficulties, urban farmers in our area have been volunteering time, labor and of course, food, to help those most in need during the COVID-19 crisis. A few Long Beach farms are targeting their aid to specific vulnerable populations. The Growing Experience, for example, didn’t have to look far to find a way to step up. A sevenacre farm and community garden located in the Carmelitos Public Housing Development in North Long Beach, Growing Experience staff have been providing bags of produce to seniors within Carmelitos — and doing so in the absence of any extra funding. “Initially the LA County Development Authority [which oversees Carmelitos] wanted to stop all operations completely,” said Program Manager Holly Carpenter. “However, our staff pushed to be open to give away [our produce]. … We have been operating on reduced staff hours so we had to cancel our CSA [Community Supported Agriculture] veggie box orders during this time, [but] we set up a quick pick-up right in front of the Carmelitos Senior Center, which allows residents with mobility issues to only have to come a short distance or have a neighbor pick up a bag for them.”
Local Farms Feed the Needy During Pandemic By Greggory Moore, Columnist
David Cundiff, left and Mark Smerkanich are volunteers with Long Beach Organic’s weekly food deliveries. Photo by Greggory Moore
The Growing Experience is able to give away 30 bags of produce per week, each containing six items that may include collard greens, green onions, swiss chard, beet greens, beets, turnips, oranges, lemons, limes, salad mix, artichokes, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, avocados and eggs. Carpenter looks forward to giving away even more. “We are hoping to resume full-time [operations] soon,” she said. “However, until [then] we are limited in our ability to grow and produce more bags to give away. … We don’t know how long we will be maintaining this — it depends on when our management decides we can resume our normal CSA and produce sales. But for the time being, I see us continuing through June.” In March, Farm Lot 59, a half-acre food oasis in Central Long Beach, launched a Farmto-Family Program for the Elizabeth Anne Seton Residence (better known as “Seton House”), which offers emergency shelter to families, pregnant women, disabled and elderly persons experiencing homeless. “With our restaurant partners shuttered, we designed a program to make the best use of
our harvest to meet the immediate needs of our community,” said Farm Lot 59 founder Sasha Kanno. “Together with Chef Eugene Santiago of Baryo, we … are providing 120 healthy, fresh, organic meals per week for residents and staff of Seton House. … We have secured funding to continue this program through June 8, and we are actively seeking additional donors to extend the program.” Meanwhile, Long Beach Organic, a nonprofit dedicated to “locat[ing] urban vacant lots from public and private owners and turn[ing] them into beautiful community gardens for local and sustainable food production,” is donating additional produce from its eight gardens to the food pantry operated by Cal State Long Beach. “In the midst of our own semi-shutdown, the Long Beach Organic board decided to dedicate more of our produce — about 100 pounds per week so far — to the food bank [as a replacement for] our usual round of spring/summer projects: community work days, cooking and gardening classes, kids’ program, fundraising dinners, etc., all of which are cancelled during the shutdown,” said Joe Corso, the nonprofit’s garden director. “We [gardeners] can still work with each other
Private Event Rental Community Meetings Art Classes/ Exhibitions
For information call 310-847-7704
June 11 - 24, 2020
Banning’s Landing is a Port of Los Angeles facility operated by Friends of Bannng’s Landing
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100 E. Water St. @ Avalon Blvd. Wilmington, CA 90744
with social distancing and benefit the community in a badly needed way.” Corso says the extra food is the result of those who can donate each week. The gardeners at their various gardens leave produce on Thursdays. “I drive around and take it to the Zaferia Junction Garden, where a few volunteers wash, sort and bag it. Mark [Smerkanich, an LBO volunteer] picks it up on Friday morning and drives it to the school,” Corso said. “We have managed to do all this with proper social distancing. As the program expands it will involve more volunteers and drivers.” Long Beach Organic has also expanded the number of charity plots at its gardens, converting formerly empty plots and community areas into designated plantings for the Beach Pantry, work it was able to effect in part due to a $1,500 grant from the Long Beach Community Foundation’s Coronavirus Relief Fund. “These new plantings will bear much more produce in the coming months, and our gardeners will also be able to share their summer bounty as the season progresses,” Corso says. In San Pedro, Feed & Be Fed is delivering about 10 pounds of produce a week from its 6th Street garden to those in need — particularly seniors and disabled persons — and to San Pedro Meals on Wheels. “As our spring harvest comes in, we anticipate being able to offer small bags of produce to our larger community,” said board member Christian Guzman, who adds that a second garden (currently being built in northwest San Pedro) will probably have a crop for harvest at the end of summer. On the other hand, Green Girl Farms has focused on fostering food self-sufficiency in San Pedro. “Out of concern for our volunteers and clientele, we closed the farm to the public when the shelter-in-place orders took effect,” said founder Lara Hughey. “At the beginning of the order, we were in the process of removing spent winter crops and replacing them with summer crops, so [we] did not have food to sell or donate. Instead we’ve been donating seedlings and seeds so that our community can be growing its own food.” Hughey says the giveaways, which are announced via Green Girl Farms email and social media, generally take place at least twice a month, with members of the public pre-ordering their seeds/seedlings of choice to ensure minimal contact during curbside pick-up. “So far we have given away over 700 seedlings and nearly 500 packets of seeds,” she reports. Food self-sufficiency is also the thrust of North Long Beach Victory Garden’s efforts — not only during the crisis, but going forward into better days. Over the last couple of months this offshoot of the University of California Master Gardener Victory Garden Program has given away over 2,000 seedlings it received from the Fullerton College horticulture program and Seeds of Hope. [See Farmers, p. 11]
[Farmers, from p. 10]
Greed:
Local Farmers
“The [giveaways] this spring were directly focused on fulfilling the increase in the numbers of people wanting to grow fruits and veggies as COVID-19 kept them at home,” said master gardener Jeff Rowe. “I set a goal of fostering the creation of 1,000 backyard farms in Long Beach.” In addition to growing food, in normal times the North Long Beach Victory Garden offers free vegetable and fruit-growing classes, which Rowe says are currently being brought into the virtual world for home consumption. “Several Master Gardeners from Los Angeles County are working feverishly to convert the Victory Garden curriculum to an online package so we can expand our ability to teach people how to become backyard farmers,” he said. “In a sense, everything we’ve been doing at the North Long Beach Victory Garden was a preparation for [COVID-19] —to get people to become more self-sufficient and to experience the taste thrill of eating freshly harvested food.” COVID-19 has created a new normal, one that in the short term is causing some among us to struggle with the most basic of needs: food. Our urban farms are not only addressing this struggle in the short term, but also attempting to make increased food self-sufficiency a part of
BIG NICK’S PIZZA
BUONO’S AUTHENTIC PIZZERIA
Family owned and operated since 1965, Buono’s is famous for exceptional award-winning brick oven baked pizza. Buono’s also offers classic Italian dishes and sauces based on tried-and-true family recipes and hand-selected ingredients that are prepared fresh. Takeout and delivery at all three locations. Hours: Sun.-Thurs. 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Fri. and Sat. 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Buono’s Pizzeria, 222 W. 6th St., San Pedro, 310-547-0655, www. buonospizza.com
Long Beach Organic 562-438-9000; info@longbeachorganic.org http://longbeachorganic.org North Long Beach Victory Garden 6509 Gundry Ave., Long Beach 90805 www.facebook.com/NLBVictoryGarden Feed & Be Fed 429 W. 6th St., San Pedro 90731 c.louis.guzman@gmail.com www.feedandbefed.org
Green Girl Farms 390 W. 14th St., San Pedro 90731 www.facebook.com/greengirlfarms
online for curbside pick up and delivery. Open Mon.-Sat. 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sun. noon to 8 p.m. Conrad’s Mexican Grill, 376. W. 6th St., San Pedro • 424-264-5452, www. conradsmexicangrill.com
COMPAGNON WINE BISTRO
Compagnon Wine Bistro (formerly La Buvette Wine Bistro) offers rustic French cuisine that pays tribute to classic French bistros in various regions of France. Call in your dinner and family meal orders for curbside pick-up, Wed. - Sun. 4 to 7 p.m. Compagnon Wine Bistro, 335 W. 7th St., San Pedro, 424-342-9840, www.CompagnonBistro. com
HAPPY DINER #1
The Happy Diner #1 in Downtown San Pedro isn’t your average diner. The selections range from Italianand Mexican-influenced entrées to American Continental. Happy Diner chefs are always creating something new—take your pick of grilled salmon over pasta or tilapia and vegetables prepared any way you like. Call for takeout breakfast, lunch and dinner. Hours: Mon. - Sat. 6 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., Sun. 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Happy Diner #1, 617 S. Centre St., San Pedro, 310-241-0917, www.happydinersp.com
HAPPY DINER #2
Built on the success of Happy Diner #1, Happy Diner #2 offers American favorites like omelets and burgers, fresh salads, plus pasta and Mexican dishes are served. Call in your order for curbside pickup. Hours: Mon. Sat. 6 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., Sun. 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Happy Diner #2, 1931 N. Gaffey St., San Pedro, 310-935-2933, www. happydinersp.com
While I cannot deny that I find these facts compelling, I must admit that there are few things in life that I savor more than the pork chop. OK, organ meats and fried chicken come close. But candidly speaking, it is my lifelong love affair with the “other white meat” that has enabled me to keep pace with my fellow Americans and consume on average more than 200 pounds of meat a year—that is, until now.
A
ccording to a Gallup poll released this past January, nearly one quarter of adults in the United States said that they had cut back on meat consumption. Among these, the greatest drop was reported by women, people of color, Democrats and those between the ages of 18 and 25. While health was cited as the number one reason for making this change, environmental and financial impact were not far behind. Little wonder, given that making the switch to a plant-based diet can significantly reduce:
Trump, Meat Plants and the Moral Imperative to Just Say No
• Body mass index, blood pressure and the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. (American Heart Association)
• Global warming. Worldwide, livestock accounts for as much as 18 percent of human-induced greenhouse gas emissions. That’s more than all the cars and trucks in the world combined. (United Nations) • Food costs. When compared to the U.S. government’s animal proteininclusive MyPlate meal plan, a plant based diet costs nearly $750 less per person per year.
HAPPY DELI
The Happy Deli is a small place with a big menu. Food is made-to-order using the freshest ingredients. Breakfast burritos and breakfast sandwiches include a small coffee. For lunch or dinner select from fresh salads, wraps, buffalo wings, cold and hot sandwiches, burgers and dogs. Delivery to your home or office available. Hours: Mon. - Sat. 6 am. to 8 p.m., Sun. 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Happy Deli, 530 S. Gaffey St., San Pedro, 424-364-0319, www.happydelisp.com
PAPPY’S SEAFOOD
Pappy’s Seafood is your destination for fresh, sustainably caught seafood, locally sourced farm-to-table produce, craft beer, fine wines and cocktails. Now offering curbside pick-up or delivery via Grubhub and Seamless. Hours: Wed.and Thurs. 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Fri. and Sat. 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Sun. 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Closed Mon. and Tues. Pappy’s Seafood, 301 w. 6th St., San Pedro, 424-224-5444, www.pappysseafood.com
SAN PEDRO BREWING COMPANY
A micro brewery and American grill, SPBC features handcrafted award-winning ales and lagers served with creative pastas, BBQ, sandwiches, salads and burgers. Order your growlers, house drafts and cocktails to go (with food purchase)! Open daily 12 to 8 p.m. for takeout and delivery through Grubhub, Postmates and Doordash. San Pedro Brewing Company, 331 W. 6th St., San Pedro, 310-831-5663, www.sanpedrobrewing.com
Like the majority of the proud omnivores I have known in my life, I have given little thought to how those adorable, roly-poly pigs turn into rows of meaty pork chops at Whole Foods. Like virgin birth, mass-market meat is the kind of miracle you’re better off not asking a lot of questions about. I’m not saying that I’m proud of this denial, just that I had gotten pretty good at it through the years. That is until this spring when a perfect storm of disease, death and Donald Trump destroyed my faith in the meat fairy forever more.
[See Greed, p. 12]
TAXCO MEXICAN RESTAURANT
We are proud to serve our community for almost four decades with generous plates of traditional Mexican Call in your order for pickup or order online for delivery at Doordash. com Open for orders 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Taxco Mexican Restaurant, 28152 S. Western Ave., San Pedro, 310-547-4554, www.taxcorestaurantpv.com
WEST COAST PHILLY’S
Welcome to West Coast Philly’s Cheesesteak and Hoagies where authentic Philly cheesesteaks meet the waterfront in San Pedro. Along with serving the classic cheesesteak, West Coast Philly’s puts its unique twist on its cheesesteaks and hoagies. Also on the menu are subs, burgers, wings and salads. Order online or call for pickup in the rear parking lot or delivery via Postmates, Doordash and Grubhub. Hours: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily. West Coast Philly’s, 1902 S. Pacific Ave., San Pedro, 424-264-5322, www. westcoastphillys.com
Skip the delivery apps and save money by ordering direct for pick-up. Call or order online from your favorite restaurant.
Support Independent Restaurants • Dining Guide online: www.randomlengthsnews.com/dining-guide
June 11 - 24, 2020
Conrad’s menu reflects the cuisine of his native Oaxaca with a fresh focus on local, seasonal ingredients for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It features classic dishes from Oaxaca and regional Mexico, such as mole sauces, ceviche, empanadas and sopecitos. Conrad’s also features an inventive vegetarian and vegan menu. Order
Farm Lot 59 2714 California Ave., Long Beach 90755 www.farmlot59.org
By Leslie Belt, Contributing Columnist
CONRAD’S MEXICAN GRILL
The Growing Experience 750 Via Carmelitos, Long Beach 90805 562-984-2917; holly.carpenter@lacda.org https://growingexperiencelb.lacda.org
It’s What’s for Dinner
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Tradition, variety and fast delivery or takeout—you get it all at Big Nick’s Pizza. The best selection of Italian specialties include hearty calzones, an array of pastas and our amazing selection of signature pizzas. Call for fast delivery. Hours: 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. Sun.-Thurs.; 10 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. Fri.-Sat. Big Nicks’ Pizza, 1110 N. Gaffey St., San Pedro, 310-732-5800, www.bignickspizza.com
our new normal, a shift that will stand us in good stead in good times and bad. If you are in need of food, desire more information, or want to volunteer or donate to one of the urban farms/gardens profiled in this article, contact:
11
[Greed, from p. 11]
Greed
By late April, more than 3,000 meat plant workers had tested positive for the coronavirus, and at least 17 had died. Yet, it was not until some 22 plants had been forced to close and the king of the Tyson chicken fairies had uttered the magic words “meat shortage” that the president leapt into action. With the childlike stroke of his Sharpie, Trump declared meat processing plants “critical infrastructure” and their employees “critical infrastructure workers.” Invoking the Defense Production Act, Trump declared that plant closures “threaten the continued functioning of the national meat and poultry supply chain (pearl clutch).” As a result, the White House in conjunction with
industry leaders determined that these critical workers could continue to work following a potential exposure to COVID-19 virus as long as they are asymptomatic and the plant makes a good faith effort to adhere to a set of weak and voluntary guidelines (read suggestions) issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. On May 24, Los Angeles County health officials announced that COVID-19 has struck five meatpacking plants located in the city of Vernon. The largest of these outbreaks occurred at the Smithfield Foods-owned Farmer John plant — Home of the Dodger Dog. Of the fewer than 2,000 men and women employed at the facility, 153 have tested positive for the virus between March and May. Coincidence? You decide.
VEGAN LENTIL BURGERS
For those who prefer not to eat the fear and desperation of forced labor READY IN: 1-hour-and-10-minutes YIELD: 8 to 10 burgers INGREDIENTS 1 cup dry lentils, well rinsed 2 1⁄2 cups water 1⁄2 teaspoon salt 1 tablespoon olive oil 1⁄2 medium onion, diced 1 carrot, diced 1 teaspoon pepper 1 tablespoon soy sauce 3⁄4 cup rolled oats, finely ground 3⁄4 cup breadcrumbs DIRECTIONS: Boil lentils in the water with the salt for around 45 minutes. Lentils will be soft and most of the water will be gone.
Fry the onions and carrot in the oil until soft, about 5 minutes. In a bowl mix the cooked ingredients with the pepper, soy sauce, oats and bread crumbs. While still warm form the mixture into patties. It will make 8 to 10 burgers. Burgers can then be shallow fried for 1 to 2 minutes on each side or baked at 350 degrees F for 15 minutes. Adapted from a recipe by Bunny Erica posted at www.food.com/recipe/vegan-lentil-burgers.
Buy a Book, Save a Store By Lyn Jensen, Columnist
Looking for books to read during the COVID-19 safer-at-home orders? Bookstores have been especially hard-hit during the economic crisis and some are keeping their doors open (mostly for curbside service), while others emphasize online shopping. Here are some ways to shop locally for reading material, whether you’re looking for a specific title or just browsing.
Page Against the Machine Store owner Chris Giaco says he has never completely closed for the pandemic, half-joking that he considers a bookstore an essential business for the dissemination of information. He’s stocked up on science and medicine books, especially on the flu pandemic of 1918. “I didn’t have an online store before this started,” Giaco said. So the shutdown has given him time to sit down and create a working website. Having a website has enabled him to take special orders, although he doesn’t have a search service for rare books. Giaco says he’s had a steady trickle of orders during the COVID-19 lock down. He noticed, for example, an immediate bump in demand for racial-related books after a Minneapolis police officer killed George Floyd on May 26. Another of Giaco’s specializations is local authors. “It’s part of the socially conscious mission of the store,” he explained. “Any kind of poetry and writing is, almost by nature, subversive.” Details: 562-588-7075; www.patmbooks.com Venue: 2714 E. 4th St., Long Beach Book Off Book Off is a chain but the Gardena location has an advantage over other local branches
during the COVID-19 shutdown, because it’s in a storefront instead of an enclosed shopping mall. Different from many competitors, Book Off specializes in Japanese products, new and used. Here’s a place for Japanese manga, anime and literature, whether in Japanese or English translation. You’ll also find a vast variety of entertainment media, new and used — DVDs, CDs, gaming and collectibles. Details: 310-532-5010; www.bookoffusa.com/ bookoff-gardena-store Venue: 1610 Redondo Beach Blvd., Suite E-8, Gardena
Skylight Books General manager Mary Williams says the store isn’t open to browse “for the foreseeable future” but there are online sales and curbside service since May 20. She describes the store as “general interest” but specializations include literary fiction, children’s books and graphic novels. Whether you’re shopping for e-books, audio books, or old-fashioned books, you can browse the store’s website. Let’s say you’re looking for two critiques of mass media, one classic, one current. The store’s website lists several editions of Upton Sinclair’s The Brass Check, but none in stock. If you’re interested in the 2002 edition, for example, you’re directed to phone the store. Ordering a recent best-seller such as Ronan Farrow’s Catch and Kill is much simpler and more successful. Your biggest hurdle here may be choosing your shipping option. Store members ($25 per year) get free shipping. Details: 323-660-1175; www.skylightbooks. com; Twitter: @skylightbooks Venue: 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles
[Peace Corps, from p. 9]
June 11 - 24, 2020
Real News, Real People, Totally Relevant
Peace Corps
12
viewers gain a solid understanding of the Peace Corps — both its successes and mistakes. In many ways they jumped into the fire. The implementation of the agency was put on a fast track, causing uncertainty and questions from volunteers that couldn’t always be answered. Through improvising and problem-solving they experienced successes in areas including farming practices and teaching English. Peace Corps volunteers and those they served shared allegiance and affection in kind and people’s desire for the volunteers to stay remained constant. Archival materials of Vietnam, protest demonstrations and the strife happening around the world through the first decade and a half of the agency’s life provides a backdrop utterly relatable to today. Footage by cinematographer Vanessa Carr from around the globe brings to life an agency that represents to the world the American ideal. However, rapid growth and a disillusioned public during the Vietnam War soon had the agency fighting to exist. The Peace Corps found an unlikely champion in President Ronald Reagan — only after public thanks from a representative of a country which was helped by Peace Corps volunteers. With an unexpected revival, Reagan appointed Loret Miller Ruppe [U.S. Ambassador to Norway] as agency director — who advocated, undercover, for it to become an independent agency. Upon the Peace Corps’ 60th anniversary,
Director and producer Alana DeJoseph. Photo by Jason DeWitt
more than 200,000 volunteers have served in more than 140 countries. At the start of 2020, more than 7,300 Americans of all ages were serving their country and seeking to understand their place in the global community. In response to COVID-19, and for the first time ever, the Peace Corps has evacuated all volunteers. The future of the agency is in question. Volunteers work at the forefront of some of the most pressing issues facing the global community. Yet, the agency has struggled to remain relevant amid sociopolitical change. Between COVID-19, a rise in nationalism and deep cuts to governmental-agency budgets, the Peace Corps is again confronting a crisis of identity. As the world travails these challenges and reevaluates how to cooperate together, A Towering Task serves as a reminder of Kennedy’s call to action and the evidential need for its recommencement today.
[Budget, from p. 4]
Budget
“The other 30 plus departments get whatever’s left,” Epperhart said. “We are running other departments on shoestrings.” The reason for the disparity in spending is that decades ago, the city committed to having 10,000 police officers in Los Angeles and has retained that stance since. “They became wedded to this 10,000 number,” Epperhart said. Epperhart said the city has a strange culture that has been influenced by Hollywood’s portrayal of the LAPD, including shows like Dragnet and Bosch. “We somehow have turned LAPD into this … legendary organization,” Epperhart said. “My personal experience is that the police in LA are kind of like the police everywhere.” The LAPD’s prominence in the budget is helped by having the strongest city employee union in Los Angeles, Epperhart said. When Epperhart spoke before Garcetti and Martinez proposed the cuts, Epperhart said the proposed budget was preliminary. “At this point nobody has any clue about what’s going to happen or how things are going to pan out,” Epperhart said. “They’ll be lucky if it’s 70% correct.” Carrie Scoville, president of the Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council, said it is too soon to comment on the budget, but that there is still time to change it. Epperhart said he would have done a more conservative budget. “It’s always good to be a little more drastic about these things and then be able to say, ‘Hey, it’s not as bad as we thought,’” Epperhart said. “But that’s not how the city operates, it’s always
a matter of ‘Oh my god, it’s every bit as bad and worse.’” Both Coastal San Pedro Neighborhood Council and Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council passed motions recommending a 20% cut in funding for the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment, the governing body of the neighborhood councils. “They want to cut neighborhood council budget[s],” said Lou Caravella, secretary of the Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council. “The thought here was that the Department of [Justice, from p. 8]
Remake Justice
stability and lawful order. The call to defund the police and invest in communities can be framed in multiple ways, one of which is simply to highlight how much funding has shifted to policing and prisons over the past four decades, with so little good to show for it and so much community need left unaddressed. Making sense of this shift of spending is a primary concern of Dr. Julilly KohlerHausmann, in her book, Getting Tough, as she describes in her introduction: In 1980, the United States spent three times more money on food stamps and welfare grants than on corrections. By 1996, the balance had reversed, with the nation devoting billions more to corrections than the two principal programs for the poor. Policymakers paired diminishing levels of support with policies constraining beneficiaries’ privacy and freedom. Notably, black women — typified by the “welfare queen” trope — were both
Neighborhood Empowerment budget could be cut instead of our own budget, as they have not been serving our city well lately.” Central SPNC board member Linda Alexander said that she was unsure the motion was necessary, as DONE’s budget is going to be cut anyway. “This coronavirus has really caused a lot of havoc,” Alexander said. “I don’t know that we need to be real picky about hanging onto our $42,000 [neighborhood council budget]. But in the meantime, I certainly have no love for
DONE, and if it were going to be cut 10%, and we can encourage it to be 20, I can support that.” Gould said that it makes sense that his council had to do its part in regard to losing funding, but that this is money that goes directly to the community. “It would be great if they could reduce the amount that they’re cutting the budget because we are community organizations that are here specifically to serve the needs and hear the concerns of our community,” Gould said.
functionally and symbolically excluded from this political process of redefining ‘good citizenship.’ So there’s a historical logic to why they’ve played such a crucial role in the abolitionist movement that’s now so sharply challenging it — from Angela Davis, co-founder of Critical Resistance, to Michelle Alexander, author of The New Jim Crow, to Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi, co-founders of Black Lives Matter. The tough policies that emerged from the 1970s reversed the direction of thinking that preceded them, such as “[Richard] Nixon’s guaranteed minimum income proposal that would have added roughly ten million people to the public assistance rolls,” Kohler-Hausmann notes. “Before politicians enacted a frenzy of harsh sentencing laws in the 1970s and 1980s, there was broad agreement, especially among elites, that long prison terms were programmatically ineffective at controlling crime,” and federal mandatory minimums for drug violations were abandoned in a 1970 law. “[The new tougher] policies did not reflect the inevitable failure of the state or the congenital degeneracy of poor communities of color. Instead, they actually helped entrench these assertions in the political vernacular … ‘Getting
tough’ was often the path with less political resistance from powerful interests in society,” she explained. “Proponents exalted punitive strategies of containment and civic degradation by linking them to masculinist visions of ‘tough’ state power and disparaging alternative strategies as effeminate and ‘soft.’” The “get tough” narrative implies a reliance on hard facts that simply doesn’t exist. If it actually were the case, then America’s sky-high incarceration rates would make it the safest country on Earth — which it clearly is not. In fact, Japan, which has a murder rate less than onetwenty-fifth of ours has less than one-fifteenth of our prison population per capita. In short, for all the passion that’s driving the demonstrations and the calls for fundamental reforms, there is no rational argument against them. There is only force. “We must completely transform the world so we can start something new,” Cullors wrote recently in Vogue. “The abolition of the police can be an investment in care for people, leaning into the imaginative efforts of the collective to hold people accountable. Abolition inspires us to redefine safety as a collective action.”
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DBA FILINGS Fictitious Business Name Statement File No. 2020081506 The following person(s) is (are) doing business as: BLUE ENGRAVERS, 1375 CASPIAN AVE., Long Beach, CA 90813 County of LOS ANGELES. Articles of Incorporation or Organization Number: LLC/AI No 1334248. Registered owner(s): MIDONNA INC., 1375 CASPIAN AVE, LONG BEACH, CA 90813; State of Incorporation: CA This business is conducted by a Corporation. The registrant(s) started doing business on 04/2015. I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. (A registrant who declares as true any material matter pursuant to Section 17913 of the Business and Professions code that the registrant knows to be false is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000)). MIDONNA INC. S/ MICHAEL ROBERT LEONARD, CEO. This statement was filed with the County Clerk of Los Angeles County on 05/14/2020. NOTICE-In accordance with Subdivision (a) of Section 17920, a Fictitious Name Statement generally expires at the end of five years from the date on which it was filed in the office of the County Clerk, except, as provided in Subdivision (b) of Section 17920, where it expires 40 days after any change in the facts set forth in the statement pursuant to Section 17913 other
© 2020 MATT JONES, Jonesin’ Crosswords
than a change in the residence address of a registered owner. A new fictitious business name statement must be filed before the expiration. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see section 1411 ET SEQ., Business and Professions code). Original filing: 05/28/2020, 06/11/2020, 06/25/2020, 07/09/2020
FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME STATEMENT File No. 2020084943 The following person(s) is (are) doing business as: FRED ALLEN & ASSOCIATES DBA MISTER MARLEY, 880 W. 18TH ST, SAN PEDRO, CA 90731 County of LOS ANGELES Registered owner(s): FRED C. ALLEN, 880 W. 18TH ST, SAN PEDRO, CA 90731. This business is conducted by an Individual. The registrant(s) started doing business on 09/2014. I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. (A registrant who declares as true any material matter pursuant to Section 17913 of the Business and Professions code that the registrant knows to be false is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000)). S/FRED C. ALLEN, Owner This statement was filed with the County Clerk of Los
ACROSS
1 NATO Phonetic Alphabet vowel 5 Socially distance from 10 Kind of D.A. 14 Hawaiian party 15 Cape ___ (westernmost African point) 16 Tea-based drink 17 ___ Blanc (highest peak in the Alps) 18 About 1% of the Earth’s atmosphere 19 Prefix for “medicine” seen more often recently 20 Heart charts, briefly 21 Is a huge fan of, slangily 22 Garden gastropod 23 Nigiri sushi option 24 Come back inside 26 Army outposts (abbr.) 27 Squeeze bunt stat (or so I’m told... it’s sports) 29 Pen name? 30 “Meatspace,” for short 32 Like some sprays 34 Wu-Tang Clan member born Robert Diggs 35 Balance 38 Got high 39 ___ Arann (former airline) 40 Charge to a sponsor 41 “Hurts 2B Human” singer
Angeles County on 05/19/2020. NOTICE-In accordance with Subdivision (a) of Section 17920, a Fictitious Name Statement generally expires at the end of five years from the date on which it was filed in the office of the County Clerk, except, as provided in Subdivision (b) of Section 17920, where it expires 40 days after any change in the facts set forth in the statement pursuant to Section 17913 other than a change in the residence address of a registered owner. A new Fictitious Business Name Statement must be filed before the expiration. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another
42 Rosie of “Birds of Prey” 44 Gasket, e.g. 45 Flub 47 Fluffy grazer 49 With 53-Across, what a 7-Down helps keep 53 See 49-Across 57 “First Blood” protagonist 58 France on the new “Queer Eye” 60 “A Fish Called Wanda” Oscar winner Kevin 61 Sicilian mountain 62 Madcap 64 Americana lithographer 65 Punxsutawney notable 66 Multiple-choice choice, sometimes 67 Infamous fiddling emperor 68 Blue-green shade 69 Showtime series set in Agrestic Township 70 Spring up
DOWN
1 Fudd who bugs Bugs 2 Actress Kaley of “The Big Bang Theory” 3 *Sycophants 4 Escape clauses 5 “Three Sunflowers in ___” (1888 Van Gogh painting) 6 Spine components 7 *It helps out in the closet (as demonstrated by the other starred answers) under federal, state, or common law (see section 1411 ET SEQ., Business and Professions code). Original filing: 06/11/2020, 06/25/2020,
07/09/2020, 07/23/2020
FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME STATEMENT File No. 2020088140 The following person(s) is (are) doing business as: L.A. URBAN BALLET SCHOOL, 1231 S. PACIFIC AVE, SAN PEDRO, CA 90731 County of LOS ANGELES Registered owner(s): L.A. URBAN BALLET SCHOOL PARTNERSHIP, 1231 S. PACIFIC AVE, SAN PEDRO, CA 90731. This business is conducted by a General Partnership. T he registrant(s) started doing busi-
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PLEASE HELP! The animals at the Harbor Animal Shelter have ongoing need for used blankets, comforters, pet beds.* Drop off at Harbor Animal Shelter 957 N. Gaffey St.,San Pedro • 888-452-7381, x 143 PLEASE SPAY/NEUTER YOUR PET! *In any condition. We will wash and mend.
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8 “Meh, whatever” 9 Packed 10 Does something 11 *Product’s freshness period 12 “Cheers!” in France 13 ‘70s supermodel Cheryl 24 Really irk 25 “Live With Kelly and Ryan” cohost 28 *Steph Curry’s sport 31 *”The Twilight Zone” creator 32 Forty winks 33 “Dutch” actress Meyers 36 The briny 37 “Jellied” British fish 42 Lead-in to lude 43 “Your Moment of ___” (“The Daily Show” feature) 46 17th letter of the Greek alphabet 48 Panda Express vessel 49 Crawled cautiously 50 Wood shop equipment 51 “___ vincit amor” 52 Texas, for one 53 Did some comic book work 54 Coral reef visitor 55 Start of el a±o nuevo 56 Implant again 59 Dull pain 62 “That’s great” 63 ‘19 and ‘20, e.g.
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ness on N/A. I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. (A registrant who declares as true any material matter pursuant to Section 17913 of the Business and Professions code that the registrant knows to be false is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000)). S/PATRICK BRADLEY, Partner. This statement was filed with the County Clerk of Los Angeles County on 05/26/2020. NOTICE-In accordance with Subdivision (a) of Section 17920, a Fictitious Name Statement generally expires at the end of five years from the date on which it was filed in the office of the County Clerk, except, as provided in Subdivision (b) of Section 17920, where it expires 40 days after any change in the facts set forth in the statement pursuant to Section 17913 other than a change in the residence address of a registered owner. A new Fictitious Business Name Statement must be filed before the expiration. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see section 1411 ET SEQ.,
[Carson, from p. 4]
Carson
DBA FILINGS Business and Professions code). Original filing: 06/11/2020, 06/25/2020, 07/09/2020, 07/23/2020
June 11 - 24, 2020
FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME STATEMENT File No. 2020084095 The following person(s) is (are) doing business as: DOT COM LOU, 555 CALIFORNIA AVE, NEEDLES, CA 92363, County of LOS ANGELES, Mailing Address: P.O. BOX 857, Needles, CA 92363. Registered owner(s): LOUIE BLANCHARD, P.O. BOX 857, Needles, CA 92363. This business is conducted by an individual. The registrant(s) started doing business on 01/2004. I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. (A registrant who declares as true any material matter pursuant to Section 17913 of the Business and Professions code that the registrant knows to be false is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine not to exceed one thousand dollars ($1,000)). S/ LOUIE BLANCHARD, Owner. This statement was filed with the County Clerk of Los Angeles County on 05/18/2020. NOTICE-In accordance with Subdivision (a) of Section 17920, a Fictitious Name Statement generally expires at the end of five years from the date on which it was filed in the office of the County Clerk, except, as provided in Subdivision (b) of Section 17920, where it expires 40 days after any change in the facts set forth in the statement pursuant to Section 17913 other than a change in the residence address of a registered owner. A new Fictitious Business Name Statement must be filed before the expiration. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see section 1411 ET SEQ., Business and Professions code). Original filing: 06/11/2020, 06/25/2020, 07/09/2020,
Unity Rally
do something other than what they were sworn to do. Santiago’s comment was reminiscent of a scene recounted by Daily Breeze reporter Donna Littlejohn of the aftermath of an incident in which a march organizer asked (or perhaps demanded) that a police officer who was walking and taking a video during the nearly nine-minute moment of silence in Floyd’s memory to take a knee with the rest of the marchers. “The officer replied, ‘Thank you for the invitation’ and walked on, continuing to video the event,” Littlejohn wrote. Santiago admitted that his peers, ahead of the march, questioned the wisdom of including the LAPD in this unity march. “I stuck to my guns and went forward with it thinking that this march can be a guinea pig to see if the LAPD would pick a side,” Santiago said. The 22-year-old was not aware Chief Michel Moore would be participating in the march. He also was not aware that Moore had controversially relayed his honest feelings that looters were equally responsible for George Floyd’s death When the day of the march finally came, Santiago said things didn’t feel right. “It didn’t feel genuine,” Santiago said. “The shirts that were put out there, it had nothing to
“It was an absolute success; amazing, heartfelt and peaceful,” Bryant said. “To see the entire community, law enforcement, elected officials and community organizations come together to protest the same cause, share the same pain and march is the epitome of love and unity.” When she was asked how she thinks the police should reform, she said that the police need to involve black organizations when creating and deciding for the community. “The NAACP knows the needs of our community and should be directly involved in structuring and allocating resources, style of policing and the implementation of San Pedro/Wilmington NAACP president, Dr. Bryant, speaking culturally-competent and anti-racial through the police cruiser’s megaphone. Photo by Arturo Garcia- training,” she said. Ayala. Critical voices of the current do with what I was out there for. The front of the shirt policing paradigm are advocating a reimagining of policing so that communities are less reliant on read NAACP and the back of it read LAPD.” “There was nothing about Black Lives Matter or public servants with guns in exchange for public George Floyd,” Santiago said. “I told them no, why servants with expertise. These people would have expertise in assisting the homeless, expertise in would I want one?” For Bryant, the unity march was “mission mental health, expertise in dealing with domestic accomplished.” That is, of course, if the mission violence and addressing drug addiction. These was to demonstrate unity and agreement in San critical voices are demanding that we reimagine Pedro that Floyd’s death was wrong and a few policing so that we all can breathe. Joseph Baroud contributed to this story. policing changes needed to be made.
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to George Floyd was a damage to us and the damage to him was a damage to America.” Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Capt. Jason Skeen stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the community to show his support on behalf of the Carson law enforcement. Hilton expressed that police aren’t bad people and that the community has to change the narrative. “The deputies of this station support your right to do what you are doing and we are here to protect you,” Skeen said. “We get it. We understand that this is about a lot of other insignificant changes not just about police. On a local level we recognize that we can do our job better and we strive for that. This community has come a long way in the last three decades and I’ve been proud to watch where it’s at now.” Hilton invited City Clerk Donesia GauseAldana. She walked up with her son Mason to express her concern for her son’s future and her plan to change the community. “Growing up as a little girl all I ever wanted was a son, but now I have my son and I am teaching him lessons on how to behave when he is in public now, because I’m nervous for his life,” Gause-Aldana said. “We can’t keep moving like this people, but do you know what we got to do? We have to hold our legislators accountable. How do we do that? Election day.” Gause-Aldana’s plan is to improve the access to voting in Carson. She wants everyone who is registered to vote to vote on Nov. 3, so that they can elect legislators that can help implement the change the community needs. Part of the change that the city council wants to make is the city schools. Hilton explained that the schools in Carson are not educating the youth correctly and the city council calls to reform the schools. Brown supported Hilton and wanted to let people who were gathered in front of the city hall to know that change is coming, and nothing would be able to stop it. Brown expresses the importance of educating the youth. “These conversations have to happen not to evoke hatred, but to create power,” Brown said. “Knowledge is power to know, to stay woke.”
[Unity Rally, from p. 2]
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