Over a decade has passed since I published my first-ever viral essay.

I was struggling to make ends meet while pursuing my journalism degree at Long Beach City College when a friend said something that sounded crazy: have a baby.

The more I thought about what she said—about how the government would assist me (and this theoretical child) not just with my education, but also with subsidized housing, food, and other necessary resources—the more I started to question why the system was set up to support single mothers but not low-income college students.

I was 22 years old, living at home with my very supportive grandmother; my only income was the $5,000 Pell Grant I received annually. I traveled two hours on the bus to get to school and then two hours back because I didn’t have a car. I struggled (if I could put that in red writing, I would). But what kept me going—and helped inspire me to write that essay—was that I wasn’t alone in what I lacked.

Society feeds young adults the message that we should have our lives together in our 20s. But I could not name 10 young adults in my friend group or my beloved community of Watts who had gotten their college degrees by 22.

Ten years ago, I asked: Shouldn’t students from neighborhoods like mine have access to necessary resources to help us succeed in higher education?

Today, I am still asking that question.

Soon after the story published in 2014, I lost my Pell Grant and could no longer afford to attend college full-time. So I made the only decision I could: I temporarily switched my focus to finding work.

This, I told myself, would allow me to finance my education, support my family, and start to save for a dream that had started to take shape when I wrote that article: to open my own higher education resource center in Watts. I knew I wanted to be part of the change in my neighborhood and make it easier for future college students to succeed.

By 2016, I was exhausted, but still trying to do it all: working full time at LAX cleaning planes on the graveyard shift and taking classes during the day. My resource center was still at the front of my mind, and that year I even located a venue in Watts that agreed to house it. But I could not afford to launch it; I was working so many hours that I could not concentrate on my own schoolwork, let alone assist others.

Finally, I made the hard decision to stop taking classes, table the idea of a resource center, and focus on work—for now.

In 2018, I got a full-time job with the City of Los Angeles at a 24-hour call center that came with a good salary and paid benefits, including school tuition assistance. I was 28 years old and so happy; I felt more equipped to excel in school than ever. But this job came with new hurdles. I could not enroll in school until I’d completed an 18-month training and probation process. I told myself this was just one last temporary setback, and I tried to make the most out of my hard-fought financial stability—the new salary allowed me to move out of my grandma’s house to a nice apartment, and even travel and see some of the world. But the job itself was not something that felt rewarding. My commute took hours (one month, I did the math and realized I had spent over 50 hours in traffic). The schedule was constantly changing, too—10 times in an 18-month span.

Then, my grandmother got sick. She spent most of 2019 in the hospital, and by early 2020, she was gone.

That was my lowest point.

Losing my grandmother, my biggest champion, was impossible. What made it even worse was that after her death, I didn’t feel like I could really grieve my loss. All those years in survival mode did not equip me to take care of my own mental health when faced with mourning someone I’d loved my whole life.

I knew that my grandmother would not have wanted this level of unhappiness for me. Eventually, I started going to therapy, which assisted with improving my mental health and provided me with insight into ways I can be more focused, disciplined, and consistent, regardless of the circumstances.

Months after my grandmother’s death, with my probation period finally over, I could officially resume my studies—this time, in her memory. I started school remotely amid the pandemic, with a newfound interest in working in the mental health field.

The idea of trying out a new career path, now in my 30s, scares me, but I know that I owe it to myself to try. After all of this struggle, I want a career that pays well, that serves others, and that I will enjoy.

This fall, I enrolled in the last three classes I need to transfer to a university. I have big plans for the degree I’m working toward.

In the last decade, I’ve been asked time and again to pick between my educational dreams and my survival needs. But I have never given up on my goals, despite the obstacles in my path. Instead, I’ve continued to find ways to fulfill the ambitions I have set for myself.

Looking back, I am so proud of what I’ve been able to accomplish. I’ve continued writing and publishing articles. I’ve played a role in raising my younger siblings. I’ve helped out in Watts by delivering food for seniors, painting houses, and hosting several community empowerment events, which I view as practice for the resource center that I still plan to open one day.

I wish that I and so many others weren’t put in the position I’ve so often found myself in, making choices that feel more like hitting limits. But despite the lack of support and resources out there, I refuse to see the pursuit of higher education as an impossible task.

My grandmother used to tell me each morning, “You can do anything that you put your mind to.” I still take that affirmation with me, knowing that ultimately, regardless of the circumstances, I will prosper.

The post Does My Neighborhood Want Me to Drop Out of College? appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

When I was a child, my grandmother often expressed the importance of communicating with everyone. She backed that up with her own behavior. When she walked down the street, she spoke to everyone. It did not matter if you were elderly or a child, or if you spoke English or Spanish. She had a smile and a conversation for you.

My grandmother knew people mattered, so she invested her time and energy in people. However, as she aged, she observed that her approach was becoming rare. She talked about how, in the age of technology, most people believe they do not have time for communications longer than a 160-character text message—much less time to develop genuine friendships that last for decades. In fact, people were barely speaking to one another.

As much as I hated to admit it, I had noticed it too.

My grandmother’s wisdom opened my mind to having a pen pal. This hobby—exchanging regular letters with someone on the other side of the world that you may never meet in person—used to be popular in the 20th century. But many people consider the practice outdated in the digital age of Facebook and Zoom. Today, when I reveal that among my longtime friendships is a relationship with a pen pal, with whom I communicate solely through long emails, people find it odd.

It isn’t odd—it’s wonderful. My relationship with my pen pal is one of the most valuable friendships I have ever had, even though I have never met her in person, or even heard her voice.

It all started in 2013. I was on my way to USC to meet with Kerstin Zilm, a German radio personality who wanted to interview me about being a struggling student at Long Beach City College. I did not know much about German culture or the German audience who would listen to the show, but I agreed to do the interview for two reasons. The first was that Kerstin was a journalist who I trusted—she had mentored me when I was part of a program called Reporter Corps. Second, I had internalized my grandmother’s advice. I felt that telling my story to whomever was interested was better than keeping it to myself. You never know who could learn from, or be intrigued by, my life experiences.

After the story aired, a woman named Renate reached out to Kerstin, inquiring how she could find me and help me financially with college. I thought it was great that Renate, who resides in Germany, wanted to assist with my education. My pride did not allow me to accept money—I was looking for a job to make ends meet—but I didn’t let the opening drop. Encouraged by Kerstin, I emailed Renate back thanking her for inquiring about my status in school. This would be the beginning of a beautiful transcontinental friendship.

At first, Renate and I emailed each other twice a month. She wanted to know a lot more about my life growing up in Watts, my attempts to further my education, and whether there were ways beyond finances that she could help. I did not have a specific answer for her last question, but her moral support was important. Just having someone rooting for me and my education gave me a boost.

Her support kept coming, in various forms. She would email me articles, send books, and began a tradition of having a birthday cake delivered to me every December on my birthday. I emailed back more frequently. It got to a point where, when I had a good day, I couldn’t wait to tell Renate. And when I had a bad day, I couldn’t wait to tell her as well because I knew she would make me feel better. After one rough day at work, she reminded me how strong she thought I was.

“You really have the heart of a fighter,” she would say in her email, “But fortunately you also got soul, smarts and compassion. In this way you are a rich person.”

Whenever I needed encouragement, she always delivered. After a couple of years of pen pal friendship, we were emailing at least once a week. I even downloaded WhatsApp so I could talk to her more frequently.

The more I spoke to Renate, the more I learned about her family life, her culture, and a world I couldn’t have imagined prior to connecting with her. I learned that, like many Germans, she celebrates Christmas on December 24. I learned that she has three daughters (her youngest, now 28, is just a few months younger than I am) and a couple of pets. And I learned that, while she is a doctor who has an obstetrics and gynecology practice with a friend, she also has ambitions to hold a political position in Hamburg.

Mostly, across the distance, I glimpsed her kindness and thoughtfulness. She gives away bouquets of flowers weekly to her patients. I also experienced her warmth firsthand. “Sending Virtual Hugs,” she ended all of our emails.

We continued emailing often, and even made plans to meet each other in person, in Europe, in spring 2020. Renate advised that, to make the most of the experience, I should consider taking a month off from work so I could do more than visit her in Hamburg. I should get to London, Amsterdam, and other nearby cities. I had never taken a month off work or been out of the country before, so I was beyond excited to meet my pen pal and plan a trip of this magnitude.

But as I prepared for what I thought would be the trip to remember, I received the worst news I’d ever gotten. In December 2019, I learned that my grandmother, who had been struggling since suffering a stroke earlier in the year, had also been diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer and only had a few months to live. I was devastated and depressed at the thought of losing the woman who raised me.

I quickly advised Renate that I was in no state to travel anywhere. She, of course, understood—and let me know that she was there for me as I dealt with this devastating loss.

And she was as good as her word. We communicated as much as ever before. She sent handwritten notes, emails, encouraging articles, and small gifts to bring me peace. She soon became a better friend to me than some of the friends I had known personally and longer.

In March 2020, my grandmother passed away. I wasn’t quite prepared emotionally to travel just then, but I promised myself that I would definitely meet Renate one day. Just as I started to figure out how and when to reschedule the visit, the coronavirus arrived and changed life as we knew it. Travel to Europe was banned. It still is.

The loss of my grandmother and the arrival of the pandemic were twin blows that deeply saddened me. Fortunately, Renate, who had only recently become a grandmother herself, never stopped offering words of encouragement. The prayers kept coming. She advised me to think back on positive memories of my grandmother. In one email, Renate wrote, “Keep the attitude your Grandma taught you. See things as she did. Deep down in your character and soul, it will be your spiritual gold nugget. Also, remember all the good times you spent with your grandmother. She contributed a lot to who you are—a very precious person. She will send you more such gifts from heaven.”

When I read it, I smiled for the first time in months. It was good advice. It also reminded me of how my grandmother had taught the importance of communicating, of establishing bonds with others. It seemed fitting that my bond with Renate was helping me handle the loss of my grandmother.

My friendship with Renate has become so important to me that I can no longer envision a life where I was not her friend. She has become a friend forever.

I write this now, in February 2021, shortly after receiving an email from her, about how it’s 12 degrees and snowing in Hamburg. She advised me that she wanted nothing more for me than to “Be successful!” this year. She added, “Occasional flops are allowed as long as you get up after stumbling, fix your crown and continue walking [with] confidence.”

Reading the email, I thought of two things. The first is that, having grown up and lived my whole life in Southern California, I’ve never seen snow before. The second is how important it is to me that I meet Renate in person—that the emails, pictures and WhatsApp text exchanges, while so important, are not enough.

My pen pal for nearly a decade has sent me virtual hugs at the moments in life when I need them most. I am more determined than ever that, as soon as the pandemic and life make it possible, I will get on a plane, and turn all the virtual hugs into real ones.

The post To My Pen Pal in Hamburg, Germany, With Love From Watts, California appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

With the holidays approaching I thought that I couldn’t be any happier. Over the past four years everything has been going great. My family and friends are happy and healthy. I made supervisor at my job. I bought a car. I’m more involved in my community. Most importantly I grew to become a better person. With everything going well, I anticipated things would be great this holiday season for the fourth time in a row, but an unexpected turn crushed my hopes.

Over the past couple of years, my community has changed a lot. Most people would say things changed for the better, being that much-needed resources were added to the community over the past four years. For example, a new Work Source Center and The College Track, a resource center for aspiring college students in the community, were opened recently. Alta Med and Children’s Institute contributed new locations in Watts. Also, Martin Luther King., Jr Community Hospital was modernized, and a newly designed community garden even brought a smile to my face. Beyond this, the introduction of the “community based improvement initiative” Watts Re-imagined, the goal of which was to add opportunities and resources that benefitted the community, gave me even more to be thankful for just in time for Thanksgiving.

In addition to the changes, the apartment complex that I lived in was renovated. Some of the renovations included new paint jobs, hardwood floors, a new dishwasher, and new windows, which was great because they provided a cozy new look for residents. Just as everyone was elated over all the new resources, some of my neighbors were unfortunately given letters asking if they would consider moving in exchange for a small amount of money, or face eviction.

I didn’t agree with the idea of paying tenants to leave homes that they’d lived in for years. Rightfully angry, my neighbors rallied, arguing that this is an injustice, and that this is exactly what is wrong when gentrification infiltrates communities. Some of them even pointed out that they felt it was unfair that they weren’t going to be able to enjoy all these new resources, which they once had been thankful for. If the new upgrades meant that they would be left homeless, or forced to break social ties, they would rather do without.

I was equally upset and fearful that the some of the inevitable negative effects of gentrification would further encourage involuntary displacement. To me it felt like watching a child open up a desired Christmas gift, then having it snatched from them after it was unwrapped. I know from personal experience how hard financially the holidays can be on some families—and the additional stress and financial burden of moving from a beloved community to a new home had to be worse.

Although the holidays have been going well for me for the past couple of years, I couldn’t feel well inside knowing that although my community was progressing as a whole, some members were being left behind. It was a bittersweet feeling: to be thankful for all the resources given to my community, but knowing that some people were being asked to leave, unable to enjoy the holidays in the community they’ve lived in for years. I’m not sure how I could enjoy my holiday knowing that all wasn’t well—but it’s definitely on my Christmas list to help in any way that I can.

The post I’m Counting My Family’s Thanksgiving Blessings. My Neighbors Aren’t All So Fortunate appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

I grew up in Watts, and for as long as I can remember I have been hearing negative stories about the community from family, friends, and the people I knew. At a very early age I learned that the crime rate was high, that the neighborhood was drug-infested, that the schools were hopeless, and that Watts was home to many ills.

I heard so much about its dangers that I planned my life around avoiding them. The safest way to live, I figured, was to focus on my education to protect myself—with the expectation that I might one day leave. I spent most of my youth indoors reading and writing, instead of playing outside with the other children.

I must admit that, while I never challenged Watts’ reputation as a kid, I was curious about where it came from. Watts had its problems, but it never felt half as bad in the experiencing as in the telling. And I never felt fearful in the way that people expected me to be.

As I got older, it bothered me that when people who didn’t live in Watts talked about the community, they always seemed to talk about the 1965 Watts Riots. The fact that this is still true more than 50 years later, in 2016, seems bizarre, given how neighborhoods change and how few of the people who were there are still here.

As I studied journalism and learned to write, I decided I had the power to change how people thought about Watts. Three years ago, having entered my mid-20s, I started to publish essays about Watts. I didn’t shrink from Watts’ problems, but I also wrote about my life and family and the joys of it.

One essay I wrote for Zócalo Public Square in 2014 became a sensation. In it, I praised Watts for offering a lot of institutions to help young parents and kids, but I wondered why it didn’t offer what I needed as a young, childless college student who was also working. I couldn’t print out an essay or get college-related advice anywhere in Watts. I closed the piece by suggesting that Watts needed a local neighborhood center with computers and guidance counselors that can get help people trying to get ahead.

The essay was also published in Time magazine and became so popular that reporters started calling to interview me. Of course, many of them were preparing pieces in advance of the 50th anniversary of the Watts Riots. NBC included me in their special on the anniversary. I used every opportunity to talk about the virtues of the community, the ways it had changed, and the need to improve some of the statistics around poverty that fuel our reputation.

I was proud of my work and glad for the attention, but for some reason, it didn’t feel right. I took a hiatus from writing articles to continue my schooling and work while I thought about why I felt unsettled. Was I approaching the story of changing Watts’ reputation wrongly? Had I not done enough?

I was especially frustrated because, with every passing day, the distance grew between Watts’ bad reputation and its improving reality. Schools were getting better, crime and violence were even less common, and there were all kinds of fairs and programs in the community that seemed to lead to people getting jobs and health care.

I didn’t have to go far to see this. Two impressive developments had launched within walking distance of my home. Last year, a College Track program opened in Watts, helping high school students enter college and also working with them so they can successfully complete their degrees. The second development—this January, chefs Roy Choi and Daniel Patterson opened a much-needed restaurant down the street from me and it quickly became a favorite among people in the neighborhood.

Things were looking up for Watts, and for me. I even received a letter in the mail giving me permission to use an old community recreational room to jumpstart my own resource center—exactly like the one I envisioned in my Zócalo article.

Pedestrian bridge over Blue Line tracks, Watts.

But I was less than thrilled—Watts’ reputation still wasn’t moving as fast as Watts.

Then one day, I had a conversation with my neighbor for an article I was planning to write to end my self-imposed sabbatical. He had lived in Watts for as long as I could remember and was very popular in the neighborhood. I asked him what he thought of all the improvements in Watts, and his reply really hit me: “To be real with you, I just lay my head there. I’m like most people, I don’t really pay attention to that stuff.”

I thought this was funny at first. But then I thought about it some more, and some more after that, and it hit me. He was deeply right.

I’m glad for the changes, but they didn’t really mean that much to me, or my own experience of Watts. Because Watts was never to me anything like the place people think it was. And if it didn’t really matter to him or matter to me—we had built lives here—why was I worrying so much about its reputation?

My problem was mine, not Watts’. Why was I making myself unhappy worrying about a reputational problem that wasn’t in my power to fix?

Watts is a fine place, with problems and virtues like other places; I’m proud to live here and I value it for what it’s given me. After all, hadn’t I learned the value of education here in Watts, sometimes from the same people who taught me about Watts’ ills? I have more positive to say about this place than negative (and I’m very grateful to see more and more positive things blooming here). And now that I’ve allowed myself to be happy about Watts, my goals feel even clearer. I won’t stay in my house, and I’m going to go outside and get my resource center up and running.

You can think what you want about Watts. I’m too busy enjoying my neighborhood to care.

The post Why I Don’t Care About My Neighborhood’s Bad Reputation appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

Later this summer — if things go according to schedule— bulldozers and demolition crews will rumble down South Los Angeles’ Alameda Street corridor, turn into Jordan Downs, and begin demolishing some of the 700-plus cinderblock houses lined up like dominoes ready to fall for the $1 billion-plus redevelopment project. Roughly 1,410 mixed-income housing units, new businesses, green spaces, a new restaurant, and a supermarket are expected to emerge from the rubble.

The redevelopment has already been 10 years in the making, and could take another decade to complete. And when the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently gave a thumbs-up to the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles (HACLA) and the master developer team of The Michaels Organization and BRIDGE Housing to begin work, the reaction by many was a mixed-bag—relief that the project will finally start tempered by troubling questions that remain unanswered.

Circumspection may be appropriate, given how similar efforts to transform other housing projects around the country have been marred by unexpected costs, delays, and disputes. The federal government’s rising ambitions—to transform older housing projects mired in poverty into sustainable and mixed-use neighborhoods where the haves and have-nots live shoulder-to-shoulder—make big housing projects even more complicated. And in reshaping public housing from previous generations, like Jordan Downs, you’re not only replacing people’s homes, you’re replacing history.

Jordan Downs was built in the 1940s as a temporary base to house workers who moved to Los Angeles during World War II. It was appropriated for public housing in the 1950s. But the difficulties in kick-starting its redevelopment can’t be explained by a lack of community interest in the project, or in improving Watts, where needs for a better quality of life are obvious.

The Health Atlas for the City of Los Angeles shows that residents in the wider Watts area live on average 12 years less than those in the affluent community of Bel-Air, and have the highest rates of asthma, mortality from stroke, and low-birth weight babies in the city. Of the roughly 2,714 Jordan Downs residents, 24 percent of adults are unemployed. The state’s unemployment average is 6.3 percent. Eighty-eight percent of people residing at Jordan Downs live below twice the federal poverty level.

In recent years, the area around Jordan Downs has been the focus of notable business, governmental, and philanthropic investments. School facilities have been improved. The Watts Gang Task Force, which brought together police and the policed, has made huge strides in improving safety in and around Jordan Downs. All kinds of grassroots initiatives, from work-training programs to Project Fatherhood, which forges closer bonds between the fathers and sons of Jordan Downs, have shown success.

Nor have elected officials dragged their feet. Mayors, council members, and congressional figures have taken turns championing Jordan Downs over the years, with many seeking to expedite the redevelopment. And residents have largely echoed their “what’s taking so long” sentiments. The Housing Authority’s agreement with the developer requires that 30 percent of people hired on the project are from Jordan Downs. Some residents have already begun training for work on the demolition and subsequent construction.

So, why has the project taken so long to launch, and why have many people expressed reservations about the redevelopment as a whole?

Bureaucratic blunders and the Housing Authority’s inability to secure valuable grant funding provide some of the answers. Twice Jordan Downs has been turned down for a HUD Choice Neighborhood Initiative (CNI) grant, which would funnel a possible $30 million towards the redevelopment. Last year, the application was submitted with errors and missing documents. This year’s CNI application has just been drafted.

But a bigger issue has involved the discovery of a toxic footprint in and around Jordan Downs.

News of contamination at Jordan Downs first drew my interest there as a journalist back in 2014. I’ve followed cleanup efforts since, watching as the redevelopment lifted a veil on the sheer scale of the environmental problems. Toxic hotspots include an Exxon pipeline breach at the northeast tip of Jordan Downs, and multiple lead and arsenic cleanups in recent years at Jordan High, on the southeast corner of the housing project.

Though steps have been taken to mitigate known contaminated sites, questions hang over the past and the future: whether residents were adequately protected from toxic exposure, whether enough is being done to protect residents as the redevelopment rumbles forward, and whether environmental racism has swayed key decisions.

Recent contamination concerns have focused on the “factory” site—a now empty plot of land nestled in the very heart of Jordan Downs, immediately abutting homes. A steel mill operated there up until 2000; the site has also been used for trucking operations and waste storage. These activities leached a toxic inventory including engine oil and engine waste, diesel and gasoline, paint thinners, solvents, and chemicals found in electric transformers into the soil and groundwater. Lead was detected there at levels as high as 22,000 parts per million (ppm). The safe threshold for residential soil lead levels in California is 80 ppm.

The water crisis in Flint, Michigan, has focused attention to the seriousness of lead exposure, especially for young children. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention finds no safe blood lead level in children, nor can the effects of exposure to lead, a neurotoxin, be reversed. More than half of those who live in Jordan Downs are children under the age of 18. Recent studies have suggested that lead contamination extends well beyond the factory perimeter, and residents fear that they may have been exposed to lead-entrenched soils from their gardens, community areas, and playgrounds for years.

A 2009 Housing Authority interoffice memo stated that the residential portions of Jordan Downs could suffer from environmental contamination and “might require remediation.” But it wasn’t until a full five years later that California’s Department of Toxic Substance Control conducted soil tests around the perimeter wall of the factory site, to gauge whether lead had migrated into residential areas.

Though the tests returned elevated lead levels in roughly half of the samples, the DTSC made a No Further Action (NFA) determination not to test further out into the community—a decision questioned by local residents and their advocates, who conducted their own tests earlier this year. A coalition of environmental justice groups hired an X-ray fluorescence analyzer to take more than 100 soil samples in and around the homes. Fifty-one of the samples screened above the 80 ppm 
threshold for lead. Thirty-three of those 51 samples had lead levels ranging between 105.25 ppm and 346.04 
ppm.

Uncertainty about contamination has been fueled by the fact that the DTSC scientist who determined that no further testing was needed was recently embroiled in a racism scandal, where he and another senior department scientist shared emails containing racial epithets such as “injun badge,” “crackho hooker,” and “Chop-chop Hop Sing.” The emails were exposed in response to a public records request I made as part of an ongoing investigation into institutionalized racism within the DTSC.

Confronted with the emails, the DTSC promised to review their decision to take no further action. When that review might be completed is unknown.

Lead isn’t the only concern at Jordan Downs. A plume of trichloroethylene (TCE), an industrial solvent that can be especially dangerous for pregnant women and developing fetuses, has been discovered in the groundwater beneath residential portions of Jordan Downs. The DTSC conducted soil, vapor intrusion, and groundwater tests last year, the results of which, they say, indicate that TCE vapor intrusion isn’t a threat to the existing housing. However, the full reach of the plume has never been fully delineated, nor has the source of the contamination been identified.

To get a clearer picture of how those who live at Jordan Downs are impacted by the myriad sources of contamination, Physicians for Social Responsibility—a nonprofit health and environmental advocacy group—is conducting an assessment of the community’s health in July and holding a health fair at Jordan High School, offering residents medical services and lead tests.

As the redevelopment nears its launch date, contamination fears are joined by different concerns: that today’s Jordan Downs tenants might not have a home at Jordan Downs when construction is over. Such skepticism is grounded in a long history of displacement and evictions in South L.A., and in redeveloped housing projects around the country.

Jordan Downs is supposed to be different. As currently envisioned, the redevelopment is designed to progress in piece-meal fashion, with new housing being built first on the empty factory lot, creating an over-flow for the initial batch of residents to move into while their homes are demolished, and so on. The Housing Authority recently distributed “Right to Retain Tenancy” certificates.

But the nonprofit L.A. Community Action Network alleges that low-income residents are already being removed to pave the way for wealthier ones, and is documenting evictions it says are tied to the redevelopment. The Housing Authority says otherwise. Figures the Housing Authority provided show evictions at Jordan Downs have fluctuated year-by-year, between 2011 and 2015, during which time 100 separate families have been evicted. Though the annual eviction rate per unit was slightly lower than that at two nearby housing developments.

Displacement fears are inevitable in a county with an estimated half-a-million fewer rental units than are needed. The people of Los Angeles simply cannot afford to lose what affordable housing remains, even for a short time. Which is why delays are better than getting Jordan Downs wrong. Here come the bulldozers.

The post What’s Holding Jordan Downs Back? appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

Zeke had migrated to the U.S. from Mexico with my father-in-law and the rest of the family and settled in Watts. Not all of my in-laws’ memories are idyllic. They remember family members being racially profiled and accosted by white police officers, and a community deeply affected by poverty, economic marginalization, structural racism, isolation, and disinvestment—the frictions that would soon erupt in the Watts Riots of 1965.

But Zeke and another uncle, Carlos, have always insisted that their childhood experience wasn’t defined only by these hostilities. They say they loved growing up in Watts and the sense of community that permeated their childhoods. From that sense, and that place, their family would rise.

Their home was seven miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles, but it was different from much of the rest of L.A. Watts was a place where minorities were intentionally segregated, but, where despite the weight of external hostilities bearing down, it was possible to own a home, to build a family across generations, to work toward a better life, and to be black or Latino and to find community. “We would play baseball with the African-American kids,” Zeke told me. “One kid even went to the majors, George Hendrick!” As Carlos put it: “Living in Watts, those were the best times of my life.”

Much attention has been given to South L.A.’s transition in recent decades from majority black to predominantly Latino, a transition Zeke and Carlos experienced firsthand. But the Latino presence in the area—Watts in particular—stretches back much further. The town was originally part of a Mexican land grant, El Rancho La Tajuata. After the Rancho was sold in the 1880s, some of the earliest residents were traqueros, the Mexican-origin workers who built the Southern Pacific Railroad, the tracks of which border Watts along Alameda Street. As Watts’ Mexican-origin community grew, it was sustained by San Miguel church, which opened its doors in 1928 in the center of the Mexican district.

My father-in-law, Manuel, and his six siblings were young children in the 1960s when they migrated from tiny Jalostotitlán in northeast Jalisco with their mom, Cele. Their father, Juan, had already been living in Watts’ Mexican district for nearly a decade, having ventured north to work alongside compadres who were already living in the town, his daughter, Rosa, told me.

They helped Juan find a job as a carpenter and upholsterer at a furniture store on Alameda Street, next to the railroad tracks built with the labor of their Mexican forebears. Eventually, his employer agreed to sponsor his legal residency. Such a simple act, but it was everything.

In an immediate sense, it meant Juan’s family could reunite—legal residency enabled him to secure visas for his family to migrate north. In the long term, what we now know—from a growing body of research, including my own on the Mexican-American middle and upper-classes—is that parental legal status is the one thing above all others that can pull families up out of poverty, helping elevate social status, income, education, you name it.

Over time the household expanded—four more children were born in the U.S.—and with 11 young mouths to feed, money was tight. Cele would make their clothes from furniture upholstery remnants from Juan’s job and flour sacks. “If the design on the sack was nice then it became a shirt,” Manuel remembered, laughing. “If it wasn’t, that was good for our calzones [underwear].”

In 1965, Juan sold the family home in Mexico and began looking for something suitable in Los Angeles. In August of that year, racial and economic tensions reached a breaking point and the Watt Riots erupted. Over six days, 34 people were killed and more than 1,000 injured. There were thousands of arrests and tens of millions of dollars in damage. Despite the riots, the family had found community in Watts, especially in the San Miguel parish.

Besides, they knew that there were few neighborhoods where minorities could buy homes. Lynwood, the city directly across the railroad tracks, was majority white at the time. It also had a legacy of racially restrictive covenants designed to reinforce segregation by barring minorities from owning property. Manuel, my father-in-law, recalled that in Lynwood, “they would say, ‘We don’t sell to blacks or Mexicans.’ We couldn’t even cross the tracks to go to the park.”

Watts was one of the few areas where minorities could buy real estate. And so that year Juan purchased a house on Weigand Avenue in Watts, a block from the railroad tracks dividing it from Lynwood. Also in that year, San Miguel Catholic School opened its doors and Juan and Cele enrolled their youngest children. In exchange for tuition, Cele, who was widely known as a community leader, made hearty breakfasts of menudo for the parishioners to enjoy after Sunday mass.

Despite the discrimination, and despite their lack of material wealth, Juan and his family were the beneficiaries of a community that helped them build a foundation for future generations to build on. He owned a home, had a stable job, enjoyed a sense of community with his neighbors that centered on the church, and his family had attained legal residency.

In the 1980s, Juan and Cele bought a house across the tracks, in Lynwood. In just a few decades, Lynwood underwent a major demographic transition from working-class white, to majority African American, to Latino. As Zeke explained, “When my parents moved from Watts it wasn’t because Watts was a bad place. My dad wanted a bigger house and for them it was moving up in class status.” For Carlos, it felt like, “You are progressing. We were moving up.”

Around that time Zeke and Manuel opened a Latino grocery store—the first in what would become a modest chain—also in Lynwood but on the border of South Central. The brothers had stable working-class jobs at the time, but they knew that, if successful, business ownership would increase their incomes, wealth, and class status. It also helped root them to the community.

During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, many retail businesses in the area burned to the ground, but Zeke and Manuel’s store remained untouched—a fact that they chalk up to the relationships they built with their multiethnic clientele and their community roots. “We served customers from around the neighborhood, Latinos and blacks. We had a little book and if you didn’t have money to buy milk or meat we would record your purchase and you could pay when you had money.”

Today, many of Juan’s grandchildren—the adult children of the 11 siblings, the second and third generations—have surpassed the class status of the generation before them and are middle class. They are entering and graduating college. Several have earned advanced degrees. They work as teachers, school principals, and in corporate management. Those who have not attained college degrees still have some level of higher education and have secured high-paying white-collar jobs.

The family remains rooted to the community. The house on Weigand is still in the family. And though she had moved out of Watts, Rosa would drive her children everyday to San Miguel Catholic School. Just a few weeks ago, Cele, the matriarch, passed away at 88 years old. At her funeral service, nine priests from South Los Angeles, including a few from San Miguel Parish in Watts, cleared their calendars to attend her mass.

That’s not nostalgia. It’s the result of a strong community foundation. Born alongside baseball and community institutions in Watts.

The post How Watts Provided the Foundation for a Family’s Rise in America appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

If I were to get pregnant, I would know just where to go for help: the local offices of Women, Infants, and Children, the federally funded food and nutrition program; Planned Parenthood; and the Family Resource Center. All three are places where I stood in line for hours with my siblings as a child growing up in Watts. But finding local resources to pursue higher education is harder. As one of the few community college students living in Watts, I can’t find a place to print out an essay or get college-related advice.

When I ran into a friend who grew up in the same low-income housing development as I did, she said there was an easier way than to struggle through college. “You should get pregnant,” she told me. “Girl, the government will take care of you, trust me.”

I didn’t think much of her idea. But she was right about one thing: In my community, there are many resources for young parents, and barely any for college students. Just on my own block, I recently counted a total of five programs for mothers my age or younger.

This makes some sense. One in five births in Watts are to teen mothers—the highest rate of teen pregnancy in Los Angeles County, according to Luis Rivera, a program officer at First 5 LA, an agency that promotes early childhood education.

Because my friend has children, she qualifies for subsidized rent for a two- or three-bedroom apartment in our complex. You have to have a low income—and you have to have dependents—to live where we do. My friend also qualifies for a Section 8 voucher, under which the government pays up to 70 percent of her rent. To me, that would be like hitting the lottery. I live with my grandmother, who is going through chemotherapy—and if she passes away, I will likely be kicked out of our complex because I don’t have children.

I know these resources are needed for the survival of single-parent families living in poverty. My own mother heavily relied on government assistance to care for my six siblings and me. And when my mother is absent or in trouble, we live with her mother. Unfortunately, my grandmother has arthritis and diabetes (causing her to become blind), so it was difficult for her to get a job that paid enough to support herself and the five of us grandkids who live with her. My whole life has involved income-based housing assistance, food stamps, and donated clothes.

The trouble with assistance programs, as I’ve seen it, is that they reinforce a cycle of poverty without offering a way out for young people like myself who want to pursue higher education and a career—at least without having to get pregnant.

My grandmother has always emphasized the importance of a college education and helped as much as she could with my college search and application process—even though she did not go to college herself. According to census data compiled by the Los Angeles Times, 2.9 percent of residents in Watts age 25 and older have a four-year degree. Growing up, the only person I knew with a college degree in my neighborhood was my auntie, Janice Burns. I wanted to be just like her. She went to the local high school initially but transferred to a school in Carson at the suggestion of a school counselor who told her she would have a better chance of going on to college if she left. After obtaining her master’s degree from UCLA, my aunt reinforced my grandmother’s push for me to attend college. They decided that I would be more likely to reach college if I went to school out of the area. So I enrolled in a small charter school, Frederick Douglass Academy High School, more than 10 miles from our home. Although it took two hours on the bus to get to and from school, I loved attending a school that provided assistance for college-bound students, including a $500 scholarship upon graduation—something I wished my own local school provided.

Getting into Long Beach City College, where I now study sociology, was difficult; staying enrolled in college has been much harder. As a college student today, you need a computer and Internet. I didn’t have a computer, printer, or smartphone for my first year of college, so I had to wake up at 5 a.m. and travel over an hour away by bus to the college computer center to get an assignment finished before class. My neighborhood library, which is a five-minute walk from my house, has free Wi-Fi, which is great if you have a computer, but most community members do not. (I only got my laptop last year.) At the library, there are two outdated computers available to adults, each with a 15-minute time limit—not a lot of time if a person has an essay to type up, or needs to complete her federal student financial aid form, or wants to use the Internet to find places that actually offer assistance to college students.

A few blocks from my apartment, Thomas Riley High School offers one-on-one college and career counseling, and a mentoring program in conjunction with the University of Southern California and Cal State Dominguez Hills. I would take advantage of these resources—but they are not for me. Thomas Riley is “a learning community for pregnant and teen moms.” How are those of us who don’t have children and don’t want to get pregnant supposed to find our way?

I recently talked with a Southwest Community College student, Shanese Diamond, who is one of the few other people my age I know of in Watts who is attending college. Our experiences are similar. She was born to a teenage mother who participated in many government assistance programs—and she too believes that path would be easier. “If I had kids, I would be a qualified applicant for Section 8 and other welfare programs that are beneficial,” Shanese told me.

As I struggle through college, I wonder why there aren’t more resources to help me succeed, especially in an area with such a low rate of college graduates. The problem is obvious: As the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has pointed out, low-income students are 28 percent less likely to finish college than those in higher income brackets.

The simplest approach would be to extend existing programs for young mothers to students like me. For example, why couldn’t we provide Section 8 housing vouchers to college students in neighborhoods like mine? Make it so we can rent a decent one-bedroom apartment without having to work 40 hours a week, like I do at my janitorial job for a contractor at Los Angeles International Airport.

I wouldn’t mind if such benefits were tied to my grade-point average or academic progress—I’m for anything that will help me focus on schoolwork rather than on survival. To the same end, why not create a local center in my neighborhood that has computers and guidance counselors and doesn’t require being pregnant or having a kid to enter?

It sends the wrong message for safety-net programs to reward acts that delay college (such as having a baby, dropping out of high school, even committing a crime), rather than providing incentives to promote college enrollment and graduation. I worry that this bias in offerings is one reason why there are so few college graduates in my community. Assistance with housing and support for college goals would create an incentive for kids growing up in poverty to try to do better. And it would help young people like me complete school once we get there.

The post Does My Neighborhood Want Me to Get Pregnant? appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

Leaving Watts means breaking a cycle. I’ve tried to break it, but I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Sometimes I feel trapped in a movie stuck on replay. Why do I keep making the same bad choices? How can I make it better? To make sense of it, I began to write down my story. It’s a story of three generations of women in Watts. It’s the story of how I became me, Lakesha Townsend, age 41.

My grandmother, Ruby Mae Wilson, gave birth to my mother, Gracie Marshel Wilson, in Los Angeles, California on November 1, 1952. Ruby was married, but she and her husband soon got separated. Ruby got together with other men, and she had eight more kids. Gracie Marshel took care of them all. Everyone called her “Michelle,” because of her middle name.

Ruby lived in a three-bedroom unit in the Imperial Courts project in Watts. By 1966, when Ruby had her nine kids, she was getting a hundred dollars a month from Aid to Families with Dependent Children. Even in 1966, that wasn’t much money. Ruby had to work, and she did. She had jobs in school cafeterias all over the city.

When the week was over, she liked to party. Every Friday night, Ruby would entertain a house full of friends. They’d pull out the records and dance and drink all weekend long, listening to songs like “Shotgun” by Jr. Walker & The All Stars. Ruby would get pissy drunk and pass out cold. But her male friends didn’t pass out. They would try to grope Ruby’s daughters. Michelle took the brunt of it, with men feeling her up and worse. When she finally got up the courage to tell Ruby that she had been molested, Ruby brushed it off.

One of my aunts told me a story about seeing Michelle, age 13, standing in the bathroom combing her hair in the mirror. A big, black, husky man with big hands was rubbing her chest. Michelle just continued doing her hair. “He was just groping on her little titties,” said my aunt. “Michelle never said one word.”

I can’t imagine what was going through Michelle’s head at those times. Not even her mother would do anything about it. I think Ruby was too ashamed to confront it, but I don’t know. The Ruby I knew loved her children and grandchildren. But Michelle never got over what happened to her.

Michelle took care of her younger sisters and brothers. She combed their hair, cooked, and cleaned. She made sure they went to school. To keep the kids in line when they were at home, Michelle would make up games. “We’d play talent show,” one of my aunts told me. “Because the one thing Michelle loved to do is sing.”

Michelle did love to sing. But the truth was she couldn’t hold a tune in a bucket. We could be riding on a city bus and Michelle might break out into song. Passengers would stare at her, and my sister and I would try to hide our faces. At home she’d make us listen to her sing, too. We’d laugh afterward, saying to each other, “She sounds terrible!” But we always told her she sounded good.

As a little girl, Michelle sang and danced around the house. Everything she touched became a song in her game. One song went, “If you don’t mind, please put that back in your room.” All of the kids would come up with their own songs.

They made a theme song for their momma, too:

Ruby, Ruby, Ruby, was king of the zoo.
She wore long Levis and some drawers too,
They took her to jail,
She got on her knees.
She said, “Lord have mercy,
I need some black-eyed peas!”
They gave her some peas,
The peas was rough,
But still big Ruby didn’t get enough.
They gave her enough,
She lost her cuff,
But still big Ruby didn’t get enough.

Michelle never told her father about the men who were molesting her. She was afraid he would kill them. So she adjusted. She wore sassy clothes and flounced around the men. They’d give her money. By this time, even Ruby could see there was a problem and tried to put a stop to it. But it was too late.

At age 14, Michelle became pregnant with her first child, my older sister, Renee. The father, William Knox, wasn’t someone who had plans to stick around. I don’t think Michelle expected anything different, either. When I was a kid, I’d see him when he’d come over to visit Michelle. We called him “Pops.” I liked him. He was a cool dude. He never had much money to give Michelle, but he was crazy about Renee.

After Renee was born, Michelle stayed in the house with her mother and all eight brothers and sisters. She kept taking care of the household. She also got involved in drugs. I don’t know it got started, but when Renee was a little kid Michelle started using “red devils,” which are similar to ecstasy. She’d head out into the streets, young and wild, hallucinating off the pills.

Michelle’s antics caught the eye of a neighborhood man named Edward Townsend. He was a truck driver and mechanic who also hustled a bit on the side. Michelle, still young, was thick and pretty, and Edward had an eye for the ladies. He had plenty of red devils, he told Michelle. She shouldn’t be out in the streets like that.

They started seeing more of each other. Despite his hustling, Edward, who was 11 years older than Michelle, was old-fashioned. He went to Michelle’s mother, Ruby, to ask for permission to date her daughter. Ruby, impressed by the show of respect, gave him her blessing.

Soon after, my mother became pregnant with her second child. On August 7, 1972, I was born: Lakesha Townsend. Edward and Michelle never had another child together. They were never married. I don’t think they ever discussed it. Everyone knew Edward had a wandering eye. He had another family in the Nickerson Gardens projects.

By the time I was two, Michelle managed to move out of Ruby’s house to a two-bedroom unit at the Imperial Courts housing project on 115th Street.

Michelle now had a chance to make a life of her own. But the years that followed didn’t see her break the cycle—or shield her children from it, either.

This is the first installment of a multipart series by Lakesha Townsend on her family history in Watts, Los Angeles, California. Zócalo will continue to run Townsend’s recollections every few weeks. 

The post Born Into the Cycle, Part One appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.

I believe the children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride …

I was a teenager growing up in the projects of Watts, and every word of the song seemed to be ministering to me. I felt the love of God through it. The singer was someone by the name of Whitney Houston. Who was she?

I saved every dime I had to buy a tape by this singer. Then my cousin and I stayed cooped up in a room listening to the tape all the time. I began to learn Whitney Houston’s other songs, and, before long, every day it was me and Whitney. I even managed to save up for a Walkman, just to make sure I could listen to a Whitney tape anytime I wanted.

I lived with my great-grandmother–I called her Grandmomma–and I hated it. I don’t think Grandmomma loved me much, and she would fuss at me about Whitney. She’d say, “All you do is sit up in that room and listen to ‘Do he love me, do he love me?’” Many people didn’t understand. They told me a black girl like me shouldn’t go crazy over Whitney. Only white people did that. But I knew this was a deep soul urge. I wasn’t deranged. I was never confused about who my God was. I just admired Whitney the person.

In those years, in Watts, a lot of people I knew were selling their bodies, taking hard drugs, robbing, stealing, etc. But I was writing to Whitney’s fan club. I wrote all kinds of letters, hoping and praying that she’d stumble across them. In one letter, I told her how my mother was on drugs and had left me alone, how I didn’t think my great-grandmother loved me. I set the letter on top of my dresser until I could get a stamp. When I returned later, Grandmomma had read my letter. “What you think Whitney Houston want to meet you for?” she asked. “You a po’ black girl, come from the projects, ain’t got money. Whitney Houston don’t wanna meet somebody like you.”

As I got older, I sometimes thought I should put this silly, childish Whitney infatuation aside. And I tried. But I wanted so badly to have Whitney in my life somehow, some way. Even in small ways, I felt connected to her. August 7th is my birthday, and August 9th is Whitney’s. We were both Leos.

Just before I graduated from Jordan High School, I was talking to a classmate named Sanola, who shared a fact about Whitney Houston. “My godmother’s brother, Rickey Minor, plays music for her,” Sanola told me. “He’s her music director.” As soon as I heard this, everything seemed to be happening in slow motion. I became real close to Sanola.

One thing led to another: Sanola contacted her godmother about Rickey, and Sanola’s godmother gave me the number for Rickey Minor’s mother. So I wound up calling Rickey Minor’s mother, who was known as Bert. I told Bert who I was and why I was calling, and Bert was very friendly and caring in response, telling me I could call her whenever I wanted to. But she also explained that she hadn’t spoken to her son, Rickey, for months.

After that, I started calling Bert from time to time. We eventually met, and she and I became really tight. I called her whenever I was in distress, or just worrying about something, and she was always a listening ear. One day, Bert asked me if I wanted her to be my godmother. I replied, “Yes!” I moved in with her, too.

While living with Bert, I saved up some money to see a Whitney Houston concert. I didn’t care if Bert hadn’t talked to Rickey in a while. I was going to this show-and I was taking Bert with me. I asked Bert if she would drive us to the show if I got us tickets, and she said yes. So, on August 22, 1993, we went to see Whitney Houston at the Hollywood Bowl. After the concert, I wriggled my way toward the stage, pulling Bert behind me, saying I was going to find Rickey to tell him that she was there. Bert seemed a bit nervous about this.

Now, normally, I do have enough sense to mind my own business. But finding Rickey that day and having him see his mother was my way to Whitney. This was my business! On the stage I saw Whitney’s musicians, all of whom I knew by name, just from seeing them on album credits. I called out to Ray Fuller, the guitarist, and explained that Rickey’s mom was with me. “Rickey’s mother?” he said, looking surprised. He left to pass on the message.

Rickey came out with a big happy face. Bert looked at him. Rickey looked at her. They hugged. I was ecstatic. And proud to have helped a mother and her son reconnect. They chatted for a minute, Rickey whispered something to Bert, and Bert grabbed my hand tight. Rickey pulled Bert along, and Bert pulled me along. That’s when I realized that we were going to meet Whitney Houston.

We walked down a long hallway, and I saw Whitney at the end of it. Bobby Brown was there, too. I got shaky and nervous, because the time had come. Bert whispered to me, “Don’t you even think about letting loose. They will throw us out of here.” She was right to whisper that. I wanted to scream so loud. But I kept my composure.

Soon, it was my turn to talk to Whitney Houston. There I was, standing in front of her. I grabbed her hands and said, “Thank you, Jesus!” My prayers had been answered.

I started trembling and shaking. “Oh, look at her, she’s just trembling,” Whitney said, and then she gave me a hug. I was speechless. I pulled out my fan club card to let her know I was a true fan. She signed it. Then she gave me tickets for a show the following week at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts.

We went to the next week’s show and got to meet Whitney backstage again. This time, I asked Whitney if she would be in a picture with me, because, I explained, “Last week nobody believed that I met you.”

“They don’t believe you?” she said. “Don’t worry about them. They don’t believe me, either.” So she came over and hugged me, and, snap, I got my picture.

Later, after years of having admired Whitney Houston, I discovered she was having problems with cocaine. My girl Whitney Houston had fallen prey to the same addiction as my family. Was I surprised? Yes. I can’t deny it. It hurt. The devil was trying to make a fool of love. But I knew in my soul I had to be an unconditional fan. I wanted to support her, to pick her up when she was down. The way I’d felt about my mother, struggling with her demons and pain, I now felt about Whitney. I hoped and prayed that she’d be delivered. If anyone asked me about what I thought about Whitney doing this or Whitney doing that, I would just say, “I think Whitney is the bomb!” That’s what I say, still.

I had my first baby girl on January 23, 2002. I’d picked out the name long ago, of course. Whitney was the prettiest golden brown baby. She had a clean, smooth, soft little patch of hair. She was all that I had dreamed of: my own daughter in my hands. I was 29, the same age as Whitney Houston when she had her first daughter.

Lakesha Townsend lives in Bakersfield, CA.

*Top photo courtesy of asterix611. Interior photo courtesy of the author.

The post The Greatest Love appeared first on Zócalo Public Square.