GreeninG Los AnGeLes

A Mdl Cas Stdy  Gr Rtrfts  Cty Bldgs

Yvonne Yen Liu

nmbr 2009

Appld Rsarch Ctr www.arc.rg/grjbs

applied research center

Racial Justice Through Media, Research and Activism

GreeninG Los AnGeLes

A Mdl Ca sdy  G rf  Cy Bldgnvmb 2009

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Yvonne Yen Liu

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Chrsta Ch ad Jatha C. Y

Cpy ed |

Kathry Dgga

A ad Dg Dc |

Hatty L

nw Mda Pdc |

Jrg Ras

sagc Pahp Dc |

Tammy Jhs

nw Dc |

Trry Klhr

Advy Cmm:

ela Fshay,

Research Associate, Apollo Alliance

Stacy H,

Policy Associate, Green or All

Rbé Lzard,

Associate Director, PolicyLink

Blly Parsh

Co-Founder, Energy Action Coalition and Ashoka Fellow

Raql Pdrhghs,

Proessor o Urban Studies and Planning, San Francisco State University

Chrs Rabb,

Visiting Researcher, the Woodrow Wilson School o Public and International Aairs, Princeton Universityand Demos Fellow

J Rckrt,

Director, AFL-CIO Green Jobs Center

Jh Thkral,

Director o Law and Advocacy, The Opportunity Agenda

Hashm Ymas-Brd,

Community Organizer, Miami Workers Center

Appld rach C www.ac.g900 Alc s., s 400oalad, CA 94607510.653.3415

3 • Applied Research Center | Greening Los Angeles 2009

Los AngeLes is A LeAder in the nAtion in terms of regionALmovements for green equity.

The region has a history o successullabor and community partnerships that birthed equity mechanisms suchas community benets agreements, living wage ordinances and local hirepolicies. In the spring o 2009, the city enacted an ordinance to retrotmunicipal buildings, largely because o the eorts o the Los Angeles Apollo Alliance and its convener Strategic Concepts in Organizing and Policy Education (SCOPE). This case study is the rst o a series o such studies thataccompany the Applied Research Center’s Green Equity Toolkit. The Toolkitadvances successul strategies to create race, gender and economic equity inthe green economy.Los Angeles, a city where all the tensions brought upon by unevendevelopment in the global economy came to a head, represents the uture ourban America.

The L.A. region is transorming how we think about living inurban areas, as well how we think about demanding equity in our cities andregions. Once, L.A. was ranked rst in the country in terms o manuacturing.Even Detroit and Chicago were eclipsed by industrial production in Los Angeles. The region developed polycentric suburbs, which are clusters odevelopment sprawling outwards rom the evacuated city center.

This wasthe L.A. dream: the working class, made middle by union membership, wasdrawn by manuacturing jobs and aordable housing in the suburbs.

Unortunately, domestic and global economic dynamics that aect many U.S. cities and regions plagued Los Angeles. Deindustrialization began in the1970s with actories closing, leaving thousands o people o color jobless andhopeless. Large corporations let town, leaving behind a ragmented businessclass that was unable to reignite the economy. Workers became reliant onservice sector jobs, which paid low wages and oered little to no security. Thecity watched as its economy atrophied, segregating pockets o the sprawlingcity into zones o poverty, with lack o opportunity and concentrations opeople o color.The 1992 uprising in Los Angeles—sparked by the acquittal o policeocers charged in the videotaped beating o Rodney King—was pivotal tothe ounders o SCOPE. Indeed, it helped to galvanize many community organizers to rethink how to bridge the disconnect between the angervisible in the streets and the strategic planning and building o a multiracialcoalition. Community residents gathered in meetings or weeks ater theuprisings, trying to make sense o the days o rebellion and the systemicinequities that dened daily lie in South Central L.A. Some observers claimthat the uprisings were the impetus or the reorganization and reraming oprogressive politics in the region.Four long-term trends inorm the movement or regional equity in L.A.and beyond:

• Racial ealt iie beteen Aneleno cities

: Los Angeles County is marked by vast disparities between cities with high concentrations opeople o color and cities with primarily white residents.

The City o Los Angeles’s population is majority people o color: 59 percent are Black,Latino and Asian, whereas 41 percent are white. One in ve residents

introDuCtion

“Progressive organizations realized that if the populationis pissed off enoughto burn their city down, but you’re not harnessing that anger,then you’re not doing your job,”

said ManuelPastor, Professor at theUniversity of SouthernCalifornia.

“The [civil unrest in 1992] humbled the left and forced us to think upnew strategies.”