David Vela is president of the five-member Montebello Unified School District Board of Education and Norma Edith García represents Area 1 (El Monte) on the five-member Rio Hondo College Board of Trustees.
 

Transformational leadership, East Los Angeles, political will and the dynamics of Gloria Molina

 

By Albert C. Jones
America, The Diversity Place

EAST LOS ANGELES — The mission of Gloria Molina, former Los Angeles City Councilwoman, former California State Assemblywoman and long-time member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisor is likened to a series of adjectives.

She is a constant, continuing in her efforts to improve lives and bring services to her communities, enduring through obstacles until the job is completed, indissoluble, in that she is committed to the First District, lasting, persistent, persisting and steadfast.

“Gloria Molina believes if you keep at the vision, beautiful and wonderful things can happen if you are steadfast,” says David Vela, senior field deputy in the “City Hall,” which is Molina’s East Los Angeles Field Office.

So, in as much as any point of direction that a story may take, this one is about steadfast leadership, fighting the good fight and seeing continuity in those who follow. That’s the spur from the main line.

The next phalanx of Chicano/Chicana leadership is currently serving as understudies. They are operatively out in the community, serving on school boards, chairing community and professional associations, plying leadership skills, building close-knit networks and gaining in wisdom. Ahead of them are many possibilities, including local, county, state and national office.

In doing the research, speaking with two of Molina’s protégés, Vela and Norma Edith García, there is a must mention. Molina’s foundation, ahead of being an elected official, is rooted in the 1960s Chicano Movement, also known as El Movimiento, which is a continuum of the Mexican-American Civil Rights Movement of the 1940s.

Akin to continuity, there is another must mention.

Long before any infrastructure improvements or governmental services buildings, came to East Los Angeles — most recently the completion of the Metro Gold Line extension — there were the pro-longed legal battles to get Hispanic representation on the five-member Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

While that battle was being fought, the County Chicano Employees Association filed a lawsuit that challenged voter districting.

“Although Hispanics accounted for 27.6 percent of the county’s 7.5 million residents in 1980, none has been elected to the five-member Board of Supervisors or any countywide office,” the Washington Post reported in December 1988.

The U.S. Justice Department got into the fray when it brought a lawsuit against the county in violation of the Voting Rights Act. The lawsuits got the intended result. Molina became the first Latina ever elected to the Board of Supervisors. She took office on February 19, 1991.

According to the July 1, 2008 U.S. Census estimate, Latinos comprise 47.7 percent of Los Angeles County’s nearly 10 million population, meaning how future voting districts are redrawn remains an issue now linked to underrepresentation of Latinos on the Board of Supervisors.

At the center of what will be in the county is East Los Angeles, which is more than a just symbol. It is the yardstick by which how far movements of the 1960s have advanced and continue to press on.

Unincorporated East Los Angeles, third most densely populated area in the nation, exists without a council-strong mayor or council-city manager form of government. More than 141,000 people live within the 8.25 square miles of East Los Angles, Vela says, relying on U.S. Census data.

“East Los Angeles is not directly governed,” says García, who holds a Master’s degree in urban planning from UCLA. She formerly served as Molina’s Community and Environmental Deputy.

“Gloria Molina is responsible for governmental services in East Los Angeles, including health, sheriff, jail, mental health, parks and recreation, human and social services, family services,” García says. “One of her responsibilities is to act in a municipal function in the unincorporated areas of her district.”

Gloria Molina represents all those adjectives related to being steadfast

Major accomplishments have not come overnight — Molina has been 19 years on the Board of Supervisors — but have come through all those adjectives related to being steadfast. Support of the Mothers, who have been organized, informed and a lightning rod on environmental issues since the 1980s, has worked like a fulcrum.

“Supervisor Molina and a group of women, the Mothers, had a vision for creating a space in the community, a plaza, what we say in Spanish as ‘zocalo,’” García says.

Foremost, but not limited to, is bringing a “City Hall” to unincorporated East Los Angeles. It’s a development that mitigated turf once claimed by gangs and replaced it with government services that are common in other jurisdictions throughout the county but not unincorporated areas like East Los Angeles.

“Supervisor Molina used her leverage to create economic projects,” Vela says. “There were 60 capital projects going on at once — new library, new park, it was insane.”

The lagniappe, that something extra not measured in terms of appropriations or how big the slice of the budget, is that sense of pride in place. García was the liaison between Molina’s office for planning, construction and completion of the East Los Angeles Civic Center.

“This was one of my babies,” García says, sitting in a teleconference room in City Hall. “The paint on the walls still looks fresh. It’s a beautiful facility with beautiful artwork. It is a City Hall that gives its citizens access to government services.

“It’s a very symbolic place,” she says. “It’s typical of Supervisor Molina. It brings services to the people and to a community that has been underserved.”

What is here to be highlighted on this sprawling complex on Third Street and Mednik Avenue?
Need access to Parks and Recreation, Consumer Affairs, Public Works, Health, Fire and Regional Planning? Shuttle buses, known as El Sol East Los Angeles, will deliver you to City Hall and other points in East Los Angeles.

There is a childcare center. The old East Los Angeles Library was replaced in September 2004 by a new 26,000-square-foot facility, nearly doubling in size the old one. It maintains the Chicano Resource Center that was established in 1976.

The building references designs commonly found in Mayan architecture. Mayan influence is seen in murals on the outside of City Hall, on the outside of the library and in the lobby.

José Antonio Aguirre’s mural, Byzantine and Venetian glass with carved limestone, is high artistic expression. It is called “Our Legacy: Forever Presente . . .” So detailed and expansive is Aguirre’s lobby mural, you are required, not just for a moment, to study its images — icons more widely associated with Americana and not just East Los Angeles.

Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, pillars of the United Farm Workers movement, are depicted, so too are actors Anthony Quinn and Edward James Olmos (James A. Escalante in “Stand and Deliver,” 1988), Sister Karen Boccalero, founder of Self-Help Graphics, and Supervisor Molina, among others.

“It was a beautiful community event when the Civic Center was dedicated,” García recalls. “It is a created space that brings a sense of community. That was the objective of this project. This project brings a whole sense of pride and community. One of the oldest residents in the community, one of the Mothers, came to the event and she cried — so much pride and history.”

Lake among gathering places designed for community at the East Los Angeles Civic Center

The day before Christmas, sun-splashed and cloudless, fishermen, some standing, some sitting in lawn chairs, older men and younger men — one a picture of urban cool, black sunglasses and baseball cap turned backwards — cast their lines into Belvedere Park Lake.

The man-made lake is stocked with catfish and trout. Fishing derbies are held in June and September. There are two sculptures of oversized fish, one leaping out and the other headed back into the lake.

Summer concerts series, managed by Parks and Recreation, are staged at the amphitheater.

Children, being watched over by grandfathers and mothers, are at play on the pedestrian mall that surrounds the lake and on the grassy hillside of the 39.1-acre park. One lady is feeding eager-to-eat geese and ducks Doritos from an oversized bag and sprays chunks of bread upon the water. The gaggle of Ring-necked, Muscovy and Buff ducks never had it so good.

“Our parks are symbols that everything is going well,” Vela said. “It used to be that you couldn’t go into the parks because of the gangs. Supervisor Molina believes in the broken-window theory. If you don’t fix it right away, the rest will go down. “

Another measure of good and a major accomplishment under Molina’s leadership was launch of the Metro Gold Line in November 2009, connecting the light-rail system to the eastside of the county. It cost nearly $1 billion.

“Gloria Molina fought for years to bring the Gold Line to East Los Angeles,” García says. “Bringing the Gold Line to East Los Angeles was monumental. It was historical last month when it opened. It was monumental and ten-plus years in the making.”

With the six-mile extension, the Gold Line has eight new stations serving diverse Los Angeles neighborhoods, including East Los Angeles, the Arts District, Little Tokyo and Boyle Heights. These neighborhoods are connected to downtown, Pasadena, San Fernando Valley, South Bay, Long Beach and dozens of points in between.

The Metro Red Line, Metro Blue Line and Metro Green Lines make up a web of tracks 79 miles, going to points north, south and west where one-third of California’s nearly 37 million people reside. Metro Transit Authority also has 2000 buses running daily at peak hours.

“The Gold Line was icing on the cake,” Vela says “It connect everybody with East Los Angeles. It really shattered a lot of negative stereotypes people held about East Los Angeles.”

The eastbound approach of light-rail cars, up the Third Street corridor, on this sun-splashed afternoon, could be Main Street anywhere in urban America.

There is much more here to encapsulate among the 60 capital projects that were underway simultaneously in East Los Angeles, but it’s time to spur to the exaltation of ones who are in formulation to be next.

Garcia and Vela represent the mentored and next wave of Los Angeles County leadership

García is currently deputy director of the Planning and Development Agency in the county’s Parks and Recreation Department.

She oversees environmental and regulatory permitting, land acquisition and obligation, park and facility master planning, architecture and design, water and environmental planning for an inventory of 94 local and regional parks, 14 lakes and lagoons, 15 natural areas, four arboreta and botanic gardens and 65,528 of recreational acreage.

Vela is president of the five-member Montebello Unified School District Board of Education. He helps to oversee a district with more than 35,000in kindergarten through 12th -grade and more than 30,000 adult learners.

Montebello is one of the largest school districts in Los Angeles County.

García easily fits into the next phalanx of Chicano leadership. She is involved in the El Monte Coalition of Latino Professionals (emCLP), Latino Urban Forum and Hispanics Organized for Political Equality (HOPE).

She currently serves as the chair of the California Community Foundation’s “Community Building Initiative,” which is a 10-year effort to revitalize the community by engaging residents and developing their leadership, improving the physical environment and social services.

Vela has a long history of grassroots organizing and immigrant rights advocacy. He served as senior legislative assistant for labor, transportation and economic development to Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg. Vela was also a special consultant to the Employment Development Department during the Gray Davis administration.

Vela helped secure millions of dollars from the Workforce Investment Act to established and fledgling community-based organizations, including Chicana Service Action Center, Workplace Hollywood and West Angeles Community Development Corporation.

García formerly served as chair of the El Monte City Planning Commission and the Watershed Conservation Authority for the San Gabriel and Lower Los Angeles River Watersheds. El Monte is a city of 122,000 in the San Gabriel Valley.

In November 2009, she was elected to represent Area 1 (El Monte) on the five-member Rio Hondo College Board of Trustees. The two-year transfer college in Whittier enrolls 20,000 students.

“What I plan to do may sound simplistic, but it’s going to be hard to do,” García says. “People of color get stuck in the community college system. They get lost if you don’t have the proper services or resources. Some students don’t have support at home because in many cases they are the first generation in their families to attend college.

“Every student coming into a community college should have a road map,” she says “They need to know what it takes to transfer to a Cal State or UC system. My goal is to be a teacher. I will say, these are the four-year programs and these are the colleges that you go to.”

Environmental sciences have suddenly become a key academic pursuit connected to jobs of the future.

“I wish I knew about environmental sciences,” Garcia says. “I kind of stumbled into urban planning at UCLA. We need to push interest in environmental sciences and look at an environmental science degree aligned with transferring to get a four-year degree.”

García finds herself in alignment with President Obama, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa and leadership across the country at all levels of government. They see an evolving green economy and attach urgency to getting ready for the future proliferation rush of new job types.

“Los Angeles County is devastated by the economy,” she says. “Currently there is 15-plus percent unemployment. We will partner with the community to be a solution to the high unemployment. We will participate in retraining the workforce in green jobs. It will be our focus to prepare our workforce to access these quality jobs.

“This is about a community coming together and formulating a plan,” García says. “We will partner with schools to create a pipeline. Education is no longer K through 12. At a minimum, it’s K through 14. We need a shift in the paradigm. Community college is a minimum.”

What does the future entail for García?

“This is going to sound like a cliché,” she says. “I never intended to be an elected official. There was something about the election of Barack Obama that inspired me. I knew my life was going to be in community service. I ran with five other like-minded individuals. We all won. We all believe in change.

“Opportunities were afforded to me because I got an education. I want to inspire, mentor and motivate others on the importance of education,” Garcia says. “I want to do a good job there. If I do a good job, I can make contributions in another capacity.”

The Metro Gold Line was launched in November 2009, connecting East Los Angeles and the eastside of Los Angeles County to the light-rail system.