GUEST WORDS--Luxury condominiums compete with foreign banks on the new skyline of Koreatown. On a Saturday night, 20-somethings crowd the sidewalks, huddling around food trucks, circling in and out of karaoke bars, biryani places, barbecue joints, and a high-rise driving range. This same neighborhood, and other swathes of Los Angeles, seemed doomed 25 years ago when more than 2,000 Korean business were damaged or destroyed during the three days of civil unrest that followed the infamous verdict in the prosecution of police officers who beat Rodney King.

The distance LA has traveled between then and now marks a journey that has landed this city in a place very much of its own making. There have been strides and setbacks, and not everyone will agree about what constitutes progress or why some big problems remain unresolved. But, if this is a different city— we would say a better city—than the one that burned in 1992, the explanation lies in decisions Angelenos made about how they govern themselves.

First though, the LA story of the past quarter century has to begin with hitting bottom after 1992. In 1994, the Northridge earthquake struck, killing 57 people, injuring thousands more, and costing billions of dollars in property damage. That same year, California voters, including a majority in Los Angeles County, backed the Prop 187 ballot initiative, which prohibited unauthorized individuals from using state-run public services. The isolation, anger, and racial tensions of the 1990s continued with police scandals that eroded trust.

But those scandals also produced reform efforts that, haltingly, created a new model of community-centered law enforcement. And then, in the early 2000s Los Angeles began moving toward a shared destiny, as the region’s economics and demographics shifted.

In 1992, the non-Hispanic white population accounted for 41 percent of Los Angeles County, according to census data; that population now composes only 28 percent of Los Angeles County residents. That happened because whites left, and the non-white population grew not with immigrants but with their children. The flow of new immigrants to Los Angeles peaked in the 1990s as other destinations offered lower living expenses and better job opportunities. The big numbers already here largely stayed in place and made families. Children of immigrants now account for more than one in five residents, the highest share of any major metro.

The remains of a commercial building smolder, as another building burns out of control, in Los Angeles, early on the morning of April 30, 1992, after riots broke out in response to the verdict in the Rodney King beating trial. Photo by Douglas C. Pizac/Associated Press.

Now coming of age, this huge generation of young people has grown up navigating cultural and racial differences. According to a 2013 study by the Pew Research Center, second-generation Latinos and Asian Americans are much more likely than members of their parents’ generation to have diverse friends, feel comfortable with interracial marriage, and get along with people of other groups. By necessity, that has become the default attitude in L.A.’s school corridors and playgrounds.

Of course, a whole lot of young people, members of minority groups and growing up without many advantages, could have spelled trouble in the streets. But, as this second generation came of age, crime dropped—a lot. The violent crime rate was more than six times higher at the time of the unrest than it is today. As crime declined and this new home-grown population of cosmopolitans matured, Angelenos began making investments in their collective future.

Over the past decade and a half, voters repeatedly have endorsed tax increases to expand affordable housing, homeless services, school construction, and transit development in the region. These investments benefit everyone in the region, not just specific neighborhoods or populations. The success of these recent ballot measures, which often required support from supermajorities of voters, exemplifies Angelenos’ willingness to take responsibility for the common good.

Los Angeles also has repeatedly chosen to invest significant funds in the city’s arts and cultural resources over the past 25 years, enabling us to examine our history, heal past trauma and racial divides, and build a shared and inclusive cultural identity. Annual income for Los Angeles County arts-related nonprofits is estimated at $2.2 billion, and the arts and creative industries account for nearly 1 out of 6 jobs in Los Angeles County—a significant part of our economy.

These investments allow organizations like the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to defy national trends by increasing audiences and revenue, and to provide a wide range of diverse communities with performances and educational programs. Meanwhile, small theaters, studio spaces, and storefront galleries have become focal points of neighborhood regeneration. Simply put, the arts increase social capital and provide a rich cultural landscape in which civic vitality can thrive.

Among the most encouraging developments are moments of civil dialogue that have brought diverse populations together around shared objectives, and there is a valuable example near the burn zone of 1992.

The flow of new immigrants to Los Angeles peaked in the 1990s as other destinations offered lower living expenses and better job opportunities. … Children of immigrants now account for more than one in five residents, the highest share of any major metro.

Consider the Central Los Angeles Promise Zone, one of the first three designated zones (the others were in Philadelphia and San Antonio) under President Obama’s signature anti-poverty initiative that provides preferential status and technical assistance on federal grant applications. The Central Los Angeles Promise Zone encompasses Hollywood, East Los Angeles, Pico Union, Westlake, and, perhaps most significantly, Koreatown. These neighborhoods are collectively home to 165,000 people, 35 percent of whom live in poverty.

Like many urban neighborhoods on the edge of a central business district, this area just west of Downtown Los Angeles had seen slow deterioration of its housing stock, a loss of jobs, weak transportation infrastructure, and growing homelessness in the years leading up to the civil unrest. After much of Koreatown was destroyed in the civil unrest, representatives of many economic interests and a variety of ethnic communities found common cause in the process of drafting redevelopment plans based on public-private partnerships, such as the Wilshire Center/Koreatown Redevelopment Project Area.

Now, more than two decades later, the Central Los Angeles Promise Zone is bringing the community together again to identify shared goals and desired outcomes around good jobs, safe streets, and improved educational opportunities for young people in the community. This process alone has not directly solved problems, but proposed solutions have a much better chance of becoming real when they are based on a deliberative process of community engagement and collective goal setting.

Lastly, Los Angeles has chosen policies that treat the undocumented population as part of the civic family. And they are, literally, a big part. One of every 10 adults in Los Angeles County, and the parents of one of every six kids in the public schools, are undocumented immigrants: one million people, the largest concentration in the country. The region’s commitment to including the undocumented in plans for the future goes way beyond “don’t ask, don’t tell” policies in law enforcement. Angelenos, often in concert with the state government, have helped ensure that unauthorized immigrants have access to health care, public education, drivers’ licenses, and community policing that unambiguously aims at protecting them and their neighbors.

They are part of us. That realization developed slowly, and it applies not just to the undocumented. Los Angeles was a city of contested spaces and tribal rivalries 25 years ago. It’s not that now.

(Roberto Suro and Gary Painter are professors in the Sol Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California, which is co-hosting a two-day conference April 27-28 that will reflect on the 25 years since the 1992 civil unrest and look at the new community revitalization opportunities facing Los Angeles. Visit socialinnovation.usc.edu for more information. This retrospective was posted first at Zocalo Public Square)

-cw

INSIDER REPORT--Last week, as far-right political agitators made plans to descend on Berkeley, California, I heard that some members of the Three Percenters militia movement would be among them. Having gone undercover with a border militia last year, I went to Martin Luther King Jr. park to observe them and a hodgepodge of other right-wingers seeking to hold their second "free speech" rally in less than two months in the historically liberal college town. Anarchists and left-wing activists—who viewed the event's "free speech" billing as nothing more than cover for white supremacist and fascist groups to gather—organized a counter-demonstration called "Defend the Bay." Here's what I saw. 

At 10:45 a.m. I arrive at the park, which is surrounded by flimsy, three-foot-high traffic-orange plastic mesh. It's sunny and warm. At the entrance, the police are inspecting bags, confiscating anything that could be considered a weapon. They take knives, mace, a stun gun, bear spray, an ax handle, and a can filled with concrete. The park is split down the middle with more orange mesh, creating a six-foot buffer between the left-wing side, represented largely by black-clad "antifascists," or "antifa," and the right-wing side, with pro-Trump banners and American flags. Antifa protesters are holding a large banner saying "FASCIST SCUM YOUR TIME IS DONE." The other side is facing them with a banner that reads "Defend America." There is a lot of shouting. Riot police file in and form a line between the two groups.

I walk into the right-wing side. A group of white men with matching comb-over haircuts are wearing skull half masks and shouting at the left-wing side. I pull out my phone and start to film the skull guys.

"Are you with us?" one asks.

"I'm a journalist," I say.

"Get the fuck out of here then," another says, shoving me. I continue filming.

"Fake news!" one says into a megaphone pointed at my face. He wanders off and starts chanting, "Build a wall! Build a wall!" Another puts up his fists and shuffles his feet like a boxer.

Nearby, I overhear two men discussing the nuances of their white nationalism. One has a shield made of skateboards painted with the flag of the black sun of Odinism, an archaic symbol appropriated by neo-Nazis. The other calls himself a National Socialist. When I photograph them, they both sieg heil.

Another man, with an American flag wrapped around his face, tells me he came to defend "Western civilization." Nathan Domigo, a 30-year-old ex-Marine and the head of the white nationalist group Identity Evropa, is milling in the crowd. Later in the day, he'll be filmed punching a woman in the face during a street brawl. (After the video goes viral, the woman, Louise Rosealma, says she has been facing harassment and death threats.)

The right-wing side is almost entirely male. Some are dressed in motorcycle half helmets, ski goggles, gloves, and various forms of ghoulish masks. One is wearing a shirt that says "Proud Supporter of the Muslim Ban." Another's shirt says "Straight Pride." They aren't entirely white. A Latino man wearing a protective vest goes around shouting "Latinos for Trump!"

I talk to an African American man in a Trump "MAGA" hat who says his name is Malechite. He tells me he came up from Los Angeles to show support for the president because Trump is "a businessman." "He's all about building the entrepreneurs up. It's about people owning stuff, having businesses, owning houses, cars, things of that nature. We don't need these things, but we like to have these things. We gonna stand for something." I ask whether he thinks Trump is racist. "He's our president," he says. "There's nothing we can do about that, so it's either work with this man or go against the grain, and it could be a horrible four years for us."

Many of the signs people carry relate to free speech or references to the obscure, online subcultures of the far right. A few carry the green flag of the Republic of Kekistan, a fictional country for internet trolls invented on 4chan. One man is holding a sign that says "Da Goyim Know," a 4chan meme about uncovering Jewish conspiracies to run the world. Another sign says "Green Lives Matter" with a picture of Pepe the Frog, a cartoon character appropriated by the so-called alt-right, the loose-knit movement of white supremacists and other bigoted groups that gained attention in the 2016 election.  

Some people on this side came in from other parts of the country. A white man named Ian Herrin tells me he came from Colorado Springs to be "part of the movement." He says he was inspired to come by Lauren Southern, an alt-right activist and writer. Southern is walking around in a helmet surrounded by a security entourage of Proud Boys, a group of self-proclaimed "Western chauvinists" led byVice magazine co-founder Gavin McInnes. I approach a man dressed head to toe in camouflage, who wears a mask reminiscent of Jason from Friday the 13th. Mike won't tell me his last name, but he says he's from Orange County, California, and a member of the West Coast Patriots Three Percent, a militia-type prepper group that does armed paramilitary training. "The last rally when they shut down Milo, it kinda pissed me off," he tells me. "Everyone has a right to say what they want to say, regardless of whether you agree with it or not. That's what the Second Amendment—uh, First Amendment—is for."

There are perhaps a few hundred protesters in total, with the right appearing to slightly outnumber the left. At the front line between Trump supporters and antifa, there is a white man in a Spartan helmet with a red, white, and blue crest. He is wearing a GoPro on his chest, American flag shorts, and a Trump flag on his back, like a cape. "I ain't no fascist!" he shouts across the line at an antifa protester. A woman next to him, in a pink MAGA hat with an American flag painted on her cheek, shouts at the antifa man, "You're a fucking piece-of-shit terrorist! That's what you guys are: fascist terrorists!"

"Suck a dick!" the Spartan shouts to the antifa man.

"I love sucking dick!" the antifa man shouts back.

Suddenly, there is a loud bang, possibly from an M-80 firecracker, on the right-wing side of the demarcation. The men in skull masks rush across the barrier and start punching people. Dozens of people are brawling, throwing punches, curling up on the grass, taking kicks. The police slowly move in. "Let the cops take care of it!" someone from the pro-Trump side shouts. "Fall back!" They go back to their side. People resume shouting at each other. Some police officers start filming the crowd. A Berkeley man walks around offering people Hershey's kisses. His shirt says, "Empathy as the basis for action is key to a better world."

By late morning, under a stand of trees several hundred feet back from the front line, people gather in front of a stage to hear the event's speakers. Three Percenter militiamen dressed in camouflage stand with their backs to the stage, looking out over the crowd. Their flag, and others from far-right groups, hangs from a tree. Speakers include Brittany Pettibone, a writer for AltRight.com who pushes the conspiracy theory of "white genocide." A man from a group called Based in LA identifies himself as a "gay, Christian, Trump supporter" and says, "If you wanted to call me a faggot, you can do that." An Oathkeeper leader calls for a round of applause for the Berkeley Police Department "because they didn't run" from the antifa.

Kyle Chapman, known as "Based Stickman," takes the stage. Chapman became a figurehead of far-right street brawlers after a video went viral of him breaking a wooden signpost over the head of an antifa activist during the clash in March over Milo Yiannopoulos's thwarted Berkeley appearance. "No longer will we cower in the shadows," Chapman says. "It is time we push back against the assault on freedom-loving Americans! This assault comes from all directions—the mainstream media, corrupt government officials, crony capitalism, and our education system which indoctrinates our youth. But today we stand opposed to one specific threat. And that threat is domestic terrorism!" he shouts, pointing in the direction of the left-wing side. "They have been relentless in trying to annihilate our constitutional right of free speech. They have destroyed and buried our communities. They are intent upon the destruction of Western civilization. Enough is enough! Your days are numbered and Americans will rise up against you!" The crowd cheers. Later, Chapman is arrested by Berkeley police on a warrant for the March assault.

An African America woman from LA, wearing a Trump T-shirt and an American flag bandana, takes the microphone. "Do I look like a racist?!" she says. "Do I look like a Nazi?! I am a black American!" Another M-80 explodes in the distance. "African Americans are being put in categories as Muslims. We are not Muslims! We are not from Africa! We are black Americans. And for all you mothers and fathers out there: Protect your daughters because the Muslim Brotherhood believes in marrying nine-year-old girls. They are kidnapping these little girls in America. We as Americans have to take matters into our own hands."

"We love you!" someone shouts.

"Black Americans helped build this country. We were brought here 400 years ago as slaves and we have developed this country for anybody to be here to enjoy!"

"Except for the illegals!" someone shouts.

"Except for the illegals," she repeats, laughing nervously. "Black Americans built the White House on the backs of slaves and we'd be doggoned if we let these foreign people come to our country and take America away from us. We will fight you tooth and nail and we will conquer our country back! We will fight for Donald J. Trump!"

Nicki Stallard, a white trans woman, takes the stage. She is from the Pink Pistols, an LGBT "self-defense" group whose membership grew after the Orlando shooting. They reference the tragedy as a reason to support Trump's Muslim ban. "Now I know that with many of you here we may have disagreements," Stallard says to the crowd, "but how many here love the US Constitution? Say yeah!"

"Yeah!"

"How many of you support the Bill of Rights? Say yeah!"

"Yeah!"

"I'd like every single one of you to turn to the person next to you and high five them." The crowd ripples with slapping palms. "Because you are brave. You are standing up here for the First Amendment, for free speech. It's kind of funny. They say anti-fascism," she says, pointing at the antifa, "but boy, they are surely demonstrating how they've perfected it. They don't have brown shirts. They have black shirts. But they are still authoritarian fascists. America was founded on freedom. We don't necessarily have to like each other, but we have to defend each other's right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. America is about freedom, not slavery, not submission, not authoritarianism. If you agree with me, say yeah!"

"Yeah."

The counterprotesters, she says, are "Americans in Name Only: ANOS. Okay? ANOS. If you agree with me, say yeah!"

"Yeah!"

Around noon, a group of people dressed in black come up the street with a sound system blasting YG's song "FDT." The left-wing sidesteps over the orange fencing and pours onto the street, singing the chorus, "fuck Donald Trump." Trump supporters chant: "USA! USA!" People stare each other down along the front line. Soon, bottles and rocks start to fly through the air. The street erupts in punching and kicking. Hundreds of people flock to and surround the spasms of violence.

It goes on like this for nearly two hours. The riot police are conspicuously absent. The left-wing side makes attempts to break through right-wing lines and enter the park. The groups face off, brawl, and retreat over and over again. When the leftists get close to the stage, the leader of the Three Percenters orders his men to rally up and take defensive positions. The man in the Spartan mask yells out a battle cry, lunging into the left-wing side, and someone pepper sprays him. He takes his shirt off, squirts milk into his eyes from a spray bottle, and continues fighting.

A man in an InfoWars T-shirt stands on top of a dumpster and gyrates to the antifa's music. A comrade dancing with him wields a Pepsi can.

Two men who appear to be cops film the scene from a nearby rooftop. At times, it feels like a war zone, yet the violence becomes ritualized and predictable. Various participants get seriously pummeled and bloodied. People on each side retreat for care from their medics or to debrief with friends and comrades. Away from the fighting, there is an "empathy tent" set up by a small group of people with a sign saying, "Want to talk? We listen." It is empty.

By 2 p.m., the right-wing Trump supporters charge up a street toward downtown Berkeley, chasing antifa. Some antifa attempt to stop their momentum, picking out individuals to fight with. A group of antifa pull a fence into the street, but the right-wingers plow through it. A man in a skull mask jump-kicks an antifa activist. People cough from breathing tear gas.

Soon, roughly 100 Trump supporters, members of the alt-right, Proud Boys, militiamen, and neo-Nazis swagger into downtown Berkeley. From their point of view, the ability to say whatever they want has been triumphantly upheld in a city known as the lefty home of the free-speech movement.

But the left continues to confront them. For the next hour, hostilities continue to ebb and flow. A right-wing guy shouts at an antagonist, "This is funded by Soros! You are fighting for the man! Do your research!" A Trump supporter pulls out a knife but backs down after being surrounded by opponents. A man blows bubbles over everyone. Both sides throw some more punches, but they have become less committed. People have been fighting for hours and most seem to be fading. A local man sets up an easel and begins painting the scene.

A block away, police stand near their cars. I approach an officer and ask why they haven't intervened more during the last couple of hours of mayhem.

He shrugs. "That would be a good question for the chief of police."

"I've been seeing people get beat up all day. I haven't seen you guys around much."

"Mmmhmmm. Okay. And?" By the end of the day, they will have arrested more than 20 people, on charges including assault with a deadly weapon, battery, and committing a criminal offense while wearing a mask. (The Berkeley PD didn't respond to my request for comment, but in a written statement disseminated after the event, it said, "The Berkeley Police Department remains focused on protecting the peaceful expression of free speech and will continue to develop criminal cases and seek prosecution against all those who infringed on the rights of others and participated in riotous acts." It added that "police will be reviewing social media video footage to identify and arrest anyone involved in crimes on Saturday.")

By mid-afternoon, people slowly trickle away and the remaining members of the far-right contingent march back down the street, cheering. A man plays a snare drum as if he's some marching soldier from the Civil War. The day's events suggest that violent street battles between the far right and left could continue, perhaps here—with right-wing demagogue Ann Coulter scheduled to speak on the University of California-Berkeley campus on April 27—or perhaps in other cities. As the rally fizzles out, several people point their cameras at Chapman, a.k.a. Based Stickman. "Boston, Seattle, we are coming for you," he says. "You will no longer take our constitutionally protected rights from us."

A bearded man standing next to him in goggles, a bike helmet, and a Captain America T-shirt let's out his best menacing

(Shane Bauer is a senior reporter at Mother Jones … where this special report originated … and recipient of numerous awards, including the Hillman Prize for Magazine Journalism. He is also the co-author, with Sarah Shourd and Joshua Fattal, of A Sliver of Light, a memoir of his two years as a prisoner in Iran. )

-cw

A SPECIAL REPORT--It’s Monday afternoon in Bellflower, a small suburb in southeastern Los Angeles County, California. Juana, 34, and a neighbor from her apartment complex are watching their sons. (All names in this story have been changed to protect undocumented people’s identities.) It’s one of Juana’s two days off per week from the luxury hotel she works at in Beverly Hills as a housekeeper. 

The two boys, both 3 years old, are playing on the couch in the small living room that doubles as a dining area, with a kitchen tucked into a corner. Aside from helping watch over the children, Juana’s neighbor holds a gaze through an opening in the front window curtain, and eventually spots someone outside. “That’s the man with the gas company,” she tells Juana in Spanish. “It’s fine if you want to open the door when he knocks.” 

Both women are originally from El Salvador. They help one another with ordinary neighborly tasks like saving a washer in the building’s laundry room for a load of clothes. As women from Central America who are terrified of Donald Trump, they watch one another’s backs the way immigrants and refugees would under a new administration that partly came into power on the promise of mass deportations. These days, the women say, every knock on the door, every step outside, and every ride on public transit merits scrutiny. 

I spent the better part of a week with Juana – morning, noon and night – to try to make sense of her life under Trump, watching her calculate and recalculate even the smallest decisions in her life.

The man at her door, it turns out, works with an energy-savings assistance project and he’s here to let Juana know she’s eligible for a free, brand-new refrigerator. He just needs to confirm she qualifies for the program, which rewards low-income residents with energy-efficient appliances. He enters the tiny one-bedroom apartment to inspect the existing refrigerator, as Juana explains there are three others living here: her husband Roberto, her 9-year-old daughter Bella and her son Bobby. The man jots down some notes and leaves. 

Juana’s friend – who currently has an open asylum claim after fleeing El Salvador with her then-toddler son two years ago – is part of an informal support network that helps keep Juana safe as an undocumented immigrant in Los Angeles, the place she’s called home since shortly after arriving here in 2006. Conversations between the women persistently return to the issue of immigration; Juana’s husband, Roberto, is undocumented, while her children are both United States-born citizens.

Later, she tells me that had her friend not been there to inform her that the man wasn’t an agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, she wouldn’t have opened the door. Instead, she would have hidden inside all day and into the night. 

ICE employs what it calls a sensitive location policy, which dictates that agents should take considerable measures to avoid enforcement actions at hospitals, schools and churches. Yet since Trump assumed office, ICE has detained a woman at a hospital, a father a few blocks from his daughters’ schools and a group of men leaving a church shelter where they were keeping warm. 

“Did you hear about the young woman who entered on a visa from Argentina and talked to the press?” Juana asks me one evening. She’s referring to Daniela Vargas, who was detained by ICE moments after speaking at a news conference. Juana knows the story of every high-profile detention and deportation since Trump took office. Although ICE’s policy discourages agents from targeting people at the site of a public demonstration like the one Vargas addressed, that didn’t stop her from being detained. “It’s a risk for us to talk to reporters,” Juana reminds me. 

A few weeks ago, Juana was on her way to work on a Metro train when she saw a friend’s Facebook post about ICE’s presence at Union Station – a stop she wasn’t headed toward but which, nevertheless, is on the same line she was riding. When her shift ended, she asked her friend at work for a ride back home, rather than risk the train. She avoided public transportation entirely for the next five days. 

In addition to verifiable news about ICE’s enforcement, and warranted warnings from her network of supportive friends, false rumors have also taken root in Juana’s life and have caused her to drastically alter her decision-making. She’d long planned to send her daughter, Bella, to visit El Salvador for the first time, either during winter or spring break, but heard that immigration agents – with vicious dogs – were swarming LAX. Although there’s no evidence of this, the rumor alone is enough for Juana to completely avoid an airport she’s visited in the past. Juana’s fear means Bella can’t visit her parent’s homeland – at least until Trump leaves office. 

Juana does have rights as an undocumented immigrant, but she’s not sure what those rights are. The labor union she belongs to holds know-your-rights workshops, but she’s terrified that if she attends, her co-workers will figure out her status. Only one friend at work knows Juana is undocumented; she fears if more find out, it could all be downhill from there. 

Aside from the psychological toll the constant vigilance since Trump’s election has taken on her, Juana is also risking her physical health. While she has employer-based health insurance through Kaiser, she canceled an annual physical because the fake document (which contained her real name and birthday) she was previously using to identify herself, has expired. “There are a lot of racist people,” she tells me. “What if one of them starts questioning me about my documentation?” Although she’s been struggling with digestive issues and poor circulation, she’s willing to forgo a doctor’s visit because of her uncertainty. 

I explain how she can use another form of identification to go to Kaiser, like a passport. Sometime later, she shows me her Salvadoran passport and wonders why her initial panic stopped her from thinking about using it as a different form of ID. What Juana knows about this administration hurts her – but what she doesn’t know about her rights under Trump harms her, too. 

Juana came to the United States in 2006, when she was 23. El Salvador’s civil war had ended in 1992, but the vast rift between the haves and have-nots that largely fueled the war lives on – and it continues to inform the country’s violence. 

Juana had done especially well in mathematics in school but her family couldn’t afford to send her to college to prepare for her dream of becoming an accountant. Instead, she worked factory jobs after graduating high school. She came to the U.S. at a time when there were no real options for her to escape poverty at home. In the decade she’s been gone, El Salvador has exploded with a kind of violence that scares her far more than the threats from Trump’s administration. 

“The first tragedy we lived through was in 2011, when my mom’s older brother couldn’t pay the rent,” she says. The rent she’s referring to isn’t a payment made to a landlord, however, but payments extorted by local gangs. Her uncle was killed. Then, in 2012, a second uncle was killed because he, too, couldn’t pay the rent. That left one uncle behind, who came to the U.S. that year and was granted asylum here. 

In 2013, her aunt came to the U.S. and was also granted asylum along with her two children. That year, however, Juana’s father was shot in the legs but can apparently still walk. “I can’t really tell you how well my dad is doing,” shrugs Juana. “I haven’t seen him since before he was shot.” 

In 2015, her brother-in-law, an undercover cop who had helped put away several gang members, was killed after his boss set him up for a pay-off. His wife, Juana’s sister, became a target after it was rumored that she was a police informant. Her sister went into hiding along with her 11-year-old daughter before fleeing north. They were apprehended just over this side of the U.S. border but were soon released pending an asylum hearing. 

But there’s no such process that Juana thinks is currently available to her – she can be an undocumented immigrant, but not an asylee. This, despite the fact her family has consistently been hunted down in El Salvador, a place she’s seen grow increasingly violent from a distance. “I can’t imagine myself back there,” she says. 

Juana wakes up at 5 a.m. on her workdays, Wednesday through Sunday. Roberto does custom construction work six days a week and has Sundays off – which means the two rarely get to spend a day together. Roberto drives and has a license under California’s undocumented driver program. The license, which is part of a database, is marked to distinguish his undocumented status, but Roberto says it’s better to be licensed and insured than to fly under the radar. Juana never got a license and the car she was using for short errands started acting up recently; instead of getting it fixed, she’s opted to stop driving. It’s too risky now, anyway. 

It’s still dark out and Roberto yawns while he puts his boots on. “There’s no rest here,” he tells me, adding that it’s all work and bills in the United States. He works 48 hours a week earning $12 an hour as an independent contractor. The pay could be worse but it’s challenging every April when the couple forks over their share of taxes to the government. 

By 5:35 a.m., Roberto is warming up the car. Bella is walking with her backpack on as Juana carries a sleeping little Bobby in a blanket. They all get into the car and drive a few minutes over to the friend who will watch the children; she’ll walk Bella to school and back, and watch Bobby all day. By 6:10 a.m., Roberto drops Juana off at a rail stop. 

Juana works the 8 a.m. shift cleaning rooms. She likes the union job and its perks – but as with any job, it comes with its challenges. People who can drop a thousand dollars a night on a hotel stay tend to be demanding. Some can say inappropriate things. There was a fistfight between two guests at the hotel several months ago and the police were called. She didn’t think much of it then, but is terrified of being near police since Trump got elected. 

After an eight-hour shift, Juana walks back to the bus to begin her commute home, along with her friend from work – the one who knows she’s undocumented. This afternoon we’re all walking down a posh but ill-designed residential Beverly Hills street that’s become a throughway for heavy traffic, when the driver of a new sports car almost runs us over. Juana and her friend keep walking as if nothing happened. She tells me later that some Beverly Hills residents assume that because of our skin color, we’re all housekeepers and are therefore not worthy of common courtesy. Confronting the driver could result in further scrutiny from law enforcement – so rather than say anything to him, the women ignored the incident. 

On the last train back home, I spot a sheriff’s deputy quickly board the car in the front of us. As soon as I let her know, Juana calmly puts her phone away and tries to distinguish the deputy through the shadows caused by the sun beginning to set on Los Angeles. For the next three stops, Juana trains her eyes on him without flinching. If I didn’t know what she was doing, I’d guess she was zoning out. She’s not. 

When we detrain, Juana asks me to look back and confirm the deputy’s not following us. He’s not, I assure her. She explains she was extremely alarmed because he was alone when he should have been with a partner, since that’s how they always patrol railcars. Even for people terrified of law enforcement, one deputy shouldn’t garner more trepidation than two deputies, but in Juana’s case, it makes sense. There was something out of the ordinary and it required closer examination – this time, her complete attention to make sure the deputy wasn’t an ICE agent. 

Immigration enforcement is a system – abstract and difficult to put your finger on. Sure, Juana fears the system, but that fear has also caused her to fear individuals, too: the obliging appliance man, the imaginary Kaiser receptionist, the obnoxious sports car driver – they all present a potential danger to an undocumented woman surviving the Trump era.

(Aura Bogado is a writer based in Los Angeles. She has written for the Guardian, Teen Vogue, Mother Jones and the Nation. This piece was co-produced by The American Report and Capital and Main.)

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GUEST COMMENTARY--In recent years' videos of law enforcement in action have become commonplace. Departments have adopted video cameras to record their deputies and officers in action, bystanders have posted cellphone videos of police action, and surveillance cameras have captured images which have been replayed on local and national media.  

Cameras have proven to be another tool to improve officer safety and accountability, enhance training and improve prosecution of criminal cases. Review of videos by officers has proven valuable in the accurate documentation of criminal activity as well as an enhancement to subsequent testimony and presentation of evidence in court.  

We expect video recordings will increase deputy sheriffs' effectiveness by documenting crimes and refuting frivolous claims of police misconduct. Time and again, we have seen that some of the best evidence against made-up tales of law enforcement abuse is the complete, unedited video footage of an incident captured in its entirety and with proper context. 

In this age of videos, one concern that law enforcement leaders now face is that the public believes that they know the whole story after a snippet of video on from an incident is captured posted online or shown on television. Unfortunately, while outwardly compelling videos images tell only part of the story, they often do not depict what occurred before and after an incident. Those few moments in time do not provide context and may not reveal the subtleties behind an encounter, what led up to it and the totality of what occurred during it. It is understandable that for most people a collage of images might be all they need to pass judgment, and this leads to a  disconnect as to why law enforcement leaders and prosecutors cannot come to the same quick judgment. 

The narrow scope of a video lens cannot show a deputy's perception of what occurred or in some cases what actually occurred. Cognitive science research has clearly demonstrated that perceptions and memories are not literal representations of reality, and a deputy's behavior is affected by our perceptions of reality not necessarily reality itself. A peace officers' actions reflect their perception of the event from their point of view. 

Videos, whether they be cell phones or body cameras are a tool to document events; they are not the whole story. Interactions with the public, particularly stressful situations such as uses of force, are dynamic and deputies are not able to stop and take notes or record information as cameras can. That is why we have long been a strong proponent of having deputies review videos of incidents before writing their report. Viewing a video allows them to recall details more accurately or at the very least account for those details they didn't perceive or do not remember. The fact that something is recorded doesn't mean the entire context of an event is captured, as this New York Times video documents.  

A complete airing of all the facts can often end up in a different conclusion. For example, as video of three LAPD officers led to public outcry and a civil lawsuit, a federal jury later unanimously rejected the civil rights lawsuit after examining all the facts, and not just focusing on the most sensational piece of video "evidence." In another high-profile case, after repeated airing on television, it was later revealed in court that a video used by a gang member and his attorney to smear the good names of two honest police officers had been doctored. 

We certainly do not quarrel with the use of videos. In fact, they often provide key evidence which can exonerate deputies and officers in the face of questions regarding the use of force actions or claims of misconduct While on television crimes can be solved in in an hour, the intricate legal issues often seen on videos, including those related to law enforcement training, department policies and procedures, control and perception, take more than an hour to analyze. 

Despite their usefulness, it is critical that everyone understands that videos have limitations. Videos are only part of the evidence in an incident, not "all the evidence."  This key point needs to be remembered every time there is a claim that a snippet of video "proves" what happened in any incident. 

(The Association for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs (ALADS) is the collective bargaining agent representing more than 7,900 deputy sheriffs and district attorney investigators working in Los Angeles County.)

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PLATKIN ON PLANNING--If your email box is like mine, it is filled with invitations to Saturday’s Climate Change march and rally in Wilmington’s Banning Park. This rally begins at 11 AM, and it will be followed by a march to the nearby Tesoro Refinery, 1331 Eubank Avenue, in Los Angeles.

If you are already going to this rally, the three articles I discuss below will give you a deeper understanding of why this march is so important. Plus, I end with specific suggestions about what you can pursue locally to adapt to and, more importantly, to mitigate climate change. 

If you haven’t thought about going to the rally, or are on the fence, then please check out the articles I link to below. I consider their authors – Bill McKibben, John Bellamy Foster, and Michael Klare -- to be the best U.S. writers on climate-related issues.   What I appreciate is their accessible writing style and thorough scientific knowledge about climate change. But, more importantly, all three writers dig deeply into the economic, political, and social processes responsible for global warming. These are not writers who fall back on a vague concept of human-caused climate change. Instead, they identify the industries, companies, political forces, and politicians most responsible for what all three writers consider inevitable terracide if not abruptly stopped.

If this strikes you as alarmist, then you are absolutely right. Despite their differences, all three writers are alarmists, and they explain, in painful detail, the political and economic processes that are already leading to planetary-wide destruction. Furthermore, even though their solutions differ, all three call for deep systemic changes beyond their harsh critiques of the Trump administration and of trendy life-style changes dubbed “going green.” 

The lead story in the week’s issue of The Nation, On April 29, We march for the Future, is authored by Bill McKibben, this country leading climate writer, advocate, and political organizer. Widely known through his many articles and appearances, McKibben is also the founder of Saturday’s Climate March in Washington, DC, and in many other cities, like Los Angeles. 

McKibben describes our current situation in these unsparing words: 

“It is hard to avoid hyperbole when you talk about global warming. It is, after all, the biggest 
thing humans have ever done, and by a very large margin. In the past year, we’ve decimated the Great Barrier Reef, which is the largest living structure on Earth. In the drought-stricken territories around the Sahara, we’ve helped kick off what The New York Times called “one of the biggest humanitarian disasters since World War II.” We’ve melted ice at the poles at a record pace, because our emissions trap extra heat from the sun that’s equivalent to 400,000 Hiroshima-size explosions a day. Which is why, just maybe, you should come to … a series of big climate protests that will mark the 100^th day of Trumptime. Maybe the biggest thing ever is worth a day.” 

McKibben’s solutions largely rest on a combination of mass political pressure on both political parties and extensive technological change. His goal is to keep as much carbon in the ground through total bans on fracking and the Dakota Access and Keystone pipelines. He also calls for the full transformation to renewables: solar panels, bikes, buses, electric cars, wind power, and improved batteries. His ultimate goal is the elimination of all new fossil fuel infrastructure and the transition to 100 percent renewable energy by 2050. 

In Trump and Climate Catastrophe, University of Oregon environmental sociologist John Bellamy Foster carefully describes the combined political and economic processes that have lead to the current climate catastrophe. Like McKibben, Foster considers the current crisis to be much larger than Donald Trump. And like McKibben, Foster thinks Trump’s efforts to stop climate research and fully deregulate the fossil fuel industry could move the existing current climate crisis past the point of no return. In Foster’s words: 

“The effects of the failure to mitigate global warming will not of course come all at once, and will not affect all regions and populations equally. But just a few years of inaction in the immediate future could lock in dangerous climate change that would be irreversible for the next ten thousand years. It is feared that once the climatic point of no return—usually seen as a 2°C increase in global average temperatures—is reached, positive-feedback mechanisms will set in, accelerating warming trends and leading, in the words of James Hansen, … to “a dynamic situation that is out of [human] control,” propelling the world toward the 4°C (or even higher) future that is thought by scientists to portend the end of civilization, in the sense of organized human society.”

Where Foster disagrees with McKibben is over the latter’s faith in a transformation to renewable energy. In Foster’s words, “Even though a conversion to renewable energy is hypothetically conceivable within the system, capital’s demand for short-term profits, its competitive drive, its vested interests, and its inability to plan for long-term needs all militate against rational energy solutions.” In other words, the economic and political barriers of modern capitalism will effectively block the total technological energy transformation that McKibben calls for. Foster is not opposed to such an energy transformation in theory, but in practice he believes that the political barriers cannot be overcome without a parallel economic transformation. 

As a result, Foster comes to a dire conclusion; we can continue to live under capitalism or we can make the wide-ranging political and economic changes that will ultimately prevent imminent planetary catastrophe. But, we cannot have our cake and eat it too: we can choose one or the other, but cannot choose both.   

Foster calls his alternative political/economic program eco-socialism. He also points out that many others have reached the same radical conclusion, such as Eric S. Godoy and Aaron Jaffe in their October 31, 2016, op-ed piece in the New York Times, “We Don’t Need a ‘War’ on Climate Change, We Need a Revolution.” Their point, like Foster’s, is that we are now at a critical juncture in human history. Governmental and corporate allegiance to fossil fuel profits has become a death knell to humanity. We must now assure that a dangerous economic system ends, not the planet and human civilization. The choice is stark, but it is ours. chael Klare’s recent article, Climate Change is Genocide: Why Inaction equals Annihilation, first appeared on-line at TomDispatch and then was widely republished. 

Like McKibben and Foster, Klare, who teaches at Hampshire College, contends that humanity is at the precipice. Emerging conditions in Africa reveal what this catastrophe eventually portends for the entire planet. In Klare’s words:

“The overwhelming majority of the world’s scientists agree that any increase in average world temperatures that exceeds 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above the pre-industrial era -- some opt for a rise of no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius -- will alter the global climate system drastically.  In such a situation, a number of societies will simply disintegrate in the fashion of South Sudan today, producing staggering chaos and misery. So far, the world has heated up by at least one of those two degrees, and unless we stop burning fossil fuels in quantity soon, the 1.5-degree level will probably be reached in the not-too-distant future. Worse yet, on our present trajectory, it seems highly unlikely that the warming process will stop at 2 or even 3 degrees Celsius, meaning that later in this century many of the worst-case climate-change scenarios -- the inundation of coastal cities, the desertification of vast interior regions, and the collapse of rain-fed agriculture in many areas -- will become everyday reality.

Klare’s program is not fully articulated in his Tom Dispatch article, but he does spell it out in more detail elsewhere, and he also calls for readers to join one of the April 29 Climate Marches. More specifically, Klare proposes that those who understand the calamity already underway work on two fronts. The first is broad political struggle, similar to McKibben, especially against the Trump administration, as well as a full energy transformation. The second is local actions that can proceed with or without hostile laws and regulations from the Trump administration. 

Therefore, let us consider a few of these local actions, especially since the effects of climate change are already appearing in California as more intensive forest fires, droughts, heat waves, tree dies offs, beach erosion, and heavy rains. 

What you can do at the local level: As I have previously written at CityWatch and Progressive City, despite weak leadership in both major parties on climate issues in Washington, DC, there is still much we can achieve at the municipal level. 

Extensive urban tree planting: As explained by a recent LA Times investigative study of tree die-offs in Southern California, climate change plays a decisive role.   It expresses itself as five years of drought, which weakened trees, followed by an extremely wet year in which insects now thrive, including invasive species. The result is millions of dead trees, with no end in sight. Therefore, we need to accelerate our planting of a highly diverse urban forest in Los Angeles so future combinations of extreme climate events, plant dise ases, and invasive species will not devastate entire neighborhoods. 

Once achieved, this vigorous urban forest will reduce CO2 levels, which have recently reach 410 parts per million (ppm). Trees can also filter out other dangerous air pollutants, such as particulate matter. In addition to climate change mitigation, trees also play an important role in adapting to climate change by creating shade that protects us from heat waves and makes walking more inviting, while buffeting heavy rains and allowing percolation into aquifers. 

Alternative Transportation Modes: Los Angele already has a range grass roots group that advocate for more transit, bicycle infrastructure, and pedestrian improvements. While all these options require money, they also need public supporters who are fully engaged. They must write articles and letters-to-the-editor, heavily lobby elected officials, make their case at public meetings and hearings, organize participatory events and demonstrations, and when necessary, engage in civil disobedience. 

California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA): On one hand, we have a powerful tool to understand the climate impacts of plans, programs, and public and private projects. It is the California Environmental Quality Act, which also provides elected officials with a lever to stop or downsize projects that contribute to global warming. On the other hand, our elected officials have a developer-guided political agenda to reduce the scope and power of CEQA. Since the developers have no intention of changing this cozy relationship, it is up to local activists to drown out and expose the City Hall pay-to-play that is contributing to terracide. 

Conclusion? When Saturday’s march is over, roll up your sleeves for the long haul. Through CityWatch, you will get some report cards and action plans for the tumultuous years ahead.

(Dick Platkin is a former LA city planner who reports on local planning issues for CityWatch. He recently taught courses in sustainable city planning at USC’s Price School of Social Policy, where he used articles by the three authors cited in the above column. Please send any comments and corrections to [email protected].)

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THE PREVEN REPORT-It was “La La Land” at City Hall…the Greatest Show on Earth! Bungee jumpers (photo above) plunging from impossible heights -- and Mayor Eric “move-over-Scott-Joplin-there’s-a-new-sheriff-in-town” Garcetti jamming hard on the piano. (He’s good. See photo, below left.) 

Not advertised but taking place at the same time on the 15th floor of City Hall East was a magnificent pick-pocket demonstration by the Prop HHH Administrative Oversight Committee (AOC), headed by Richard Llewellyn, who made the unorthodox leap from being Eric Garcetti’s personal lawyer to being the Chief Administrative Officer of the City of Los Angeles. The public couldn’t believe its wallet was gone. How’d they do that? 

Since we last wrote about this group, things have gone from bad to worse. 

Prop HHH was a great victory for Mayor Garcetti, no? He was proud to have led the charge, and wasn’t shy about saying so on TV. 

So why the sudden secrecy? Don’t they want to keep that Great Spirit going? Fill the room with excited members of the public? Celebrate our progress towards ending homelessness in LA?  

Apparently not. Just the opposite. Now, it’s round-the-clock evasion, obfuscation and silly tricks. 

Is this because they’re doing a great job?  Are they planning a surprise party? 

It’s time for the public to send a message to Mayor Garcetti and his team: We are watching. It is not OK to persuade Angelenos to give money for a cause they believe in only to have that money diverted to serve an alternate agenda.  

Here’s some specific demands: 

Meeting agendas must include links to all supplementary materials to be discussed at the meeting -- and audio recordings of those meetings should be posted without delay -- just as every other meeting does. 

The AOC discussed the need for the city to be compensated for the time it spends on work related to Prop HHH. It would take the form, in effect, of a “commission” on each project.  

The precise percentage has not been determined, but it’s not a good sign that when co-author Eric Preven asked what the commission would be on a $3.5 million project and, as the presenter started to answer the question, the CAO shushed the staffer, saying that they weren’t taking questions from the floor. He then authorized another employee to not-answer the question. 

It's true the proposition allows for the City to recoup “costs incidental to issuing the general obligation bonds,” but those should be minimal. And that phrase does not give permission to set up a “billable hours” system.  

It’s the City’s job to handle various funding sources. If we’re going to take a commission off every HHH project, then let’s go to the car dealership model. There are slow months and busy months in any job. You don’t get paid extra for the busy months.  

Also, the bond will save the City money by, as the bond says, mitigating “financial pressures on the General Fund.” 

Something’s got to give. If Mayor Garcetti keeps pushing forward with his public-unfriendly agenda (why else would his team be hiding themselves away?) then public outrage will mount until the whole ugly story winds up on the front page of the New York Times. There is such a thing as bad press, and it’s called “being accused in a national newspaper of stealing money from the homeless.”  

Alternatively, the Mayor can throw in the towel on his agenda, open up the whole process, and wind up on the front page of the NY Times as a star. La La Land forever!

(Eric Preven and Joshua Preven are public advocates for better transparency in local government. Eric is a Studio City based writer-producer and Joshua is a teacher.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.