the school where we live

ok, here is a first for me. this is a short, awkward video of the campus of Discovery Prep where we are living this summer. i hope it is helpful and doesn't freak you out.  Be sure to turn the sound down because it's not v interesting and it plays too loud.   xo pd

More May Meetings in Pacoima

2:00 Discovery Prep

Met with Sheryl S. to tour the school spaces.  We needed another, more thorough look as we plan the details of living there.  I had a list of questions, many of which got answered.

Xanthia used a Flip Cam to really help us remember the spaces and it’s a good thing she did.  I see things on film (well, you know..) that I didn’t in person.

3:00p  Maclay Community Center

Esther V is really maybe our biggest advocate in Pacoima right now.  And she is really helping us out herself as well as introducing us to others and giving us access to people who know people!  It was great for Xanthia to meet Esther for the first time.  (X has been in 3 Truths rehearsals more than Pacoima lately.)  Esther is going to let us use the two empty bungalow classrooms for rehearsal space!  She is going to work with us to make all our hours—including nights and weekends—happen!  She also sounded prepared to host us as a venue if need be, too, though we didn’t discuss that too much.  She is very enthusiastic about performing the play at the community garden which is great to hear.  She recommended making an appointment with City Councilperson Richard Alarcon to tell him about the project in person and asking for his assistance.  She also said that it takes at least 2 weeks to get onto his schedule. 

5:30p  Mesa Meeting at Community Garden

Juliette was able to join us for this meeting!  The Mesa Meeting was less formal than I expected, even for a meeting in a garden!  Roxana from YSC was there.  Also Odelia who we met at the Parent Center Directors’ meeting hosted by Esther.  [Odelia is fantastic.  She is one of the founders of the garden.  She’s ready to audition for the play.  She told us about a play she was in not long ago—a benefit or other special event at one of the schools?) and how fun it was to wear a costume, to pretend to be someone else, even though she had to tell her legs to stop shaking.  Odelia’s 15 yr old daughter Nubia is also apparently a powerhouse onstage, acting and singing.] 

Also at the meeting Laura Robledo (another founder, maybe 20 yrs), Julio Alfaro, youth organizer for YSC at the garden, who we met 2 weeks ago.  Carlos, a gardener.  Juan, another gardener who was trying to resolve an increasing problem regarding keys and access for gardeners.  Javier a young person who was extremely polite and friendly and shy.  Another gardener and another boy.  Later another couple gardeners stopped by. 

We started off the meeting with Roxana introducing us.  Everyone present seems to know about the play idea, everyone is supportive.  We suggested they do share the idea with the individual family gardeners too. 

They discussed the key/access issue and created a schedule for volunteers to take turns minding the gate and access a few designated hours each day.

I’ll go to the Youth Council Meeting at the garden on Friday afternoon.  I’d like to talk with them about what their ideas are, how we can help facilitate some of their dreams (ie: performance stage), and maybe they can take advantage of audience coming in and sell water, or do something to represent as Project Youth Green.

6:30p  Neighborhood Council Meeting

Juliette and I attended, arrived a bit late because of previous meeting.  There was even more loud music and women dancing with their class in the courtyard!  I find it pretty great rather than distracting.  It’s fun to see, at any point in the meeting, EVERYONE slightly dancing in their chairs to the influential rhythms of Stevie Wonder, for example.

Started with 10 Council members present, 2 absent.  16 stakeholders in attendance.  Ended with 13 Council members plus 3 absent and 4 stakeholders, and 3 of us were not really stakeholders.

Announcements included: a gentleman marking Malcolm X’s birthday and somewhat vaguely seeking the council’s condemnation of Arizona’s latest anti-immigration laws, Pacoima Beautiful (4 women, 3 of whom maybe were working w/P.B as volunteers on this project) sharing a report that supported a request to create “No Trucks” routes in specific neighborhood locations with proposed alternate truck routes, and “Chef Jeff” a new resident who has training (experience?) as a first responder with the Red Cross and is also a self-employed caterer, and john Hernandez, another new resident who is opening an insurance office in Pacoima also introduced himself.

A presentation was made by someone with (probably) city development office about some programming cuts (budget) and a lawnmower trade-in program (old mower for new environmentally friendlier one).

Similar to last month, some new council members were voted in on the spot including: Fanny Long (former board member and mother of current board member Rebecca Long), Mr. Jeeter (former board member who is retiring from CSUN-35 yrs-- in June) as well as Chef Jeff and John Hernandez.

Maggie Estrada, Pacoima Field Rep for Alarcon’s office, then presented the outgoing Councilmembers with certificates of thanks and acknowledgement – even though most of them rejoined the board immediately!   Maggie looked gorgeous in a fuschia pink dress, btw.

Lots of mutual thanks and good will was formally expressed.

Then committee chairs and vice chairs need to be nominated and elected and committees formed. 

Rosie invited all to join the chamber of commerce which meets on 3^rd Thursdays and the Vice President of the Sylmar Neighborhood Council invited everyone to attend their meetings. 

After the meeting, as the next meeting impatiently burst in (PNC went over 10 minutes), Juliette spoke with Council President Ed Johnson and with former president Ruben Garcia and GOT THEIR CONACT INFO!  Ruben is very ready to audition—he wants to be the latino John Candy.   I spoke with Maggie about how to get approval for park access after hours for 11 days of our project.  She says budget cuts might make that difficult.  (Ugh.)

It was a gorgeous evening as we left.  And we were reminded about how very hot it will be in July.

pd

Pacoima Adventures with Mikiko and Juliette

I-7 Scenic Designer Mikiko Suzuki MacAdams visiting Los Angeles this past weekend to start work on design ideas for It’s All Bueno: A Pacoima Tale of Optimism. To help in that direction, Sigrid Gilmer sent out a bunch of starter scenes and some notes about her plans for settings in the play.

On Friday Juliette, Mikiko and I went to Pacoima to visit each of the locations referenced in the script as well as our known performance venue options however undetermined. Here’s our itinerary list and accompanying notes.

Pacoima Charter Elementary – school was letting out. We peeked at the playground atop the parking garage. Did not get to peek inside the small auditorium.
David Gonzalez Park Gym – we peeked into the locked second gym at the park- a gym dedicated to Boxing Club.
We walked from Gonzalez park to get some lunch at a restaurant at the strip mall on Van Nuys at Norris. We took photos of the bus stop on Van Nuys and talked with a vendor – tamales and more—at that intersection. Extremely hot (temperature) tamale was very delicious (and still quite hot) when we ate it later on.
San Fernando Gardens – we walked by, and drove by these unique looking public housing complex/buildings a few times.
Discovery Prep
Humphrey Park – took a peek inside the gym where a martial arts class of young children seemed to be led by another equally small child. In the park we talked with a vendor and her friend and two middle school aged girls. Maria Perez is a beautiful and friendly mom who talked with Juliette in Spanish for awhile. She had heard of our project through the Moms group at Hilary Broadus School! Her daughter Noemi Barajas was wearing PUC/Community Charter Middle School gym shorts so I asked her about her school. She really likes her school! I sure hope Maria and Noemi get involved in the play. I don’t remember the name of the mom/vendor. She was much quieter. We asked if we could film her making a raspado (finely shaved & syruped ice). Mikiko ordered a blue one which was chicla (bubblegum) flavored and not very delicious. Maria suggested we ask the Census workers meeting in the park to help promote our project as they began door-to-door visits, but we did not.
Maclay Middle Schoool Multipurpose Room – school was locked up, we looked at the building from the street as we drove by.
Maclay Community Center – Mikiko, Juliette and Kerry are in agreement that doing the play in the oddly shaped parking lot there is not ideal. Esther was there on her way to a meeting with Maclay Middle School Principal and vice principal. Not about us, but maybe she’d throw a reminder/request in…
Sara Coughlin Elementary – a biggish very new elementary school a block away from the Maclay Comm Center. Again, locked up, but maybe there is space to work with in there. An LAUSD school, not charter.
Hansen Hill – It was interesting to drive around on Hansen Hill, a unique promontory in Pacoima. Some of the homes on certain streets are much nicer there, but some of the homes seem like the rest of the neighborhood, esp on the north side of the hill. It was there that I realized that ice cream trucks in Pacoima do not play music, but play a weird amplified tone every 15 seconds or so. Unsettling and strange but maybe better than repetitious mechanical songs.
George’s Hand Car Wash – We pulled over on the north side of Van Nuys to look for this place by address. Juliette had seen the “Hand Wash” sign from a little distance off. We kept staring at the closed car wash, asking “George’s??” Then we realized we were parked directly in front of George’s – “The Original”—and the rival was the one across the street. Good signs!
Community Garden – also known as Project Youth Green. The garden is located in the back of a city park. The garden wasn’t open exactly but a youth meeting was happening so they let us in to wander while they had their meeting. The adult advisor (I don’t know what his title is) turned out to be Jorge Martinez who we’d met at Garden Volunteer Day in March. Sigrid interviewed him last month. Mikiko and Juliette were mentally trying out the idea of the common/youth/instruction area of the garden as performance space. We were taking photos and video and when Mikiko got her measuring tape out I went over to speak with Jprge and the youth who were meeting. When I said that we might be interested in performing the play there, the youth coordinator, Julio Alfaro was off and enthusiastically running about what a great idea it was and why. Eventually it seemed like the four other youth at the meeting were supportive of the idea especially when we said that we might be able to leave a little stage behind for them to continue using after we’d gone. Julio who is kind of like Candide in his enthusiasm, energy and positive outlook. He gave us a tour and some advise about how to move forward. Jorge also gave us a little advise too. We will actively look into the possibility of performing the play at the Community Garden. More on this soon.
Community Center – quick pass by since although it had been a dream to do the play there for awhile, we have a pretty solid NO about permission so we moved on.
Boys & Girls Club – after hours and we now know that they can’t have anything happening there after 8pm ever, so we moved on.
Swap Meet – was closed and so was strangely desolate with odd structures inside a fenced area in the middle of a large very empty parking lot. (Sigrid and I visited before. Kind of on the low end of swap meets.)
Valens Park – there was a small very plastic fair happening in the park. We stopped to gaze at the skaters and their specially designed part of the park for awhile. I made Mikiko try the natural tamarindo pod/goo/whatever while we hung out for a few minutes. Juliette introduced me to this when she found it in a bulk bin at Food4Less. It’s weird and tart and I like it a lot.
Costco – Yes, still rather pristine.

On Saturday, May 8 we had a Design Meeting at my house at 1pm—Kerry, Juliette, Mikiko and Costume Designer Garry Lennon. We talked about the Community Garden for awhile and also about the story of Candide and about It’s All Bueno. Then we all headed to Pacoima to finish visiting play locations.
Hansen Dam / Park – we stopped and walked part of The Mile—a walkway/bikepath along the top of the dam. Then we went down into the other part of the park on the Osbourn Ave side. Saw the two “lakes” – one for fishing/boating, one for swimming. We saw the outside of the halted-construction Children’s Museum Bldg. We saw a few people riding horses and plenty of people playing in the park , and some other people playing cards on a card table set up in the parking lot.
El Cariso Park / Sylmar – there was a kind of fair – vendors, music and farmers market going on at the park. Lots of vendors but no shoppers. This might have been because it was just time for the event to begin when we were there.
Mission College / Sylmar – next door to the park. We drove by the campus and the adjoining golf course.
Tia Chuchas Cultural Center and Bookstore – of course 3 of the four of us bought books. Mikiko bought a gorgeous book about the LA River & Art on/about the River and another book mostly a photographic study of East Valley ganglife.
MEND – the building was officially closed but there was a lot of activity going on in the kitchen/food drive part of the building. Mikiko and Kerry were able to take a look inside.

Parent Center Directors’ Meeting at Maclay Comm Center

Esther V invited Sigrid and I to attend a meeting of people active with Pacoima area schools.   Others in attendance along with Esther:

Robyn Regan – Los Angeles Education Partnership, which focuses on school readiness

Eva Torres – Pacoima Charter Elementary

Marta Silva -

A woman who recently moved from the town of Imperial (near Holtville)

Chile Nakamera – Olive Visita Middle School

Maria Molina – Maclay Middle School

Blanca ___? - ?

Silvia Vazquez – Sara Coughlin Elementary

Odelia __? -  San Fernando Middle School

Shane Coleman, founder/CEO of Heroes of Life  (Mission: To develop our community’s youth and young adults by providing mutual technological business and other opportunities for the sole purpose on helping them discover and reach their fullest potential, we believe these things are done through caring, sharing, discipline, respect, love and forgiveness.)  Heroes of Life is presenting a community talent show this Saturday, May 8 (11a- 4pm) at El Cariso Park (13100 Hubbard St, Sylmar 91342).  This will also include a farmers market which is actually a regular event there on Mondays from 5:00 – 9pm.

Shane invited participation in both events and spent some time talking about the various programs that they offer and the good they do for local youth and the greater community.

I did a short presentation and invitation to the Parent Center Directors & Robyn about our project including an invitation to talk with Sigrid about the community, to get involved with the project in July and to spread the word about our Pacoima community play.  We also talked for a little while about performance and rehearsal venue possibilities.  A number of ideas for places in San Fernando, not so much for Pacoima locations.  Many of the women requested specific needs information so that they could explore options at their schools, specifically Sara Coughlin (a block away from Maclay Comm Center), Pacoima Charter, and Olive Vista Middle School (14600 Tyler Street - Sylmar, CA 91342).

Each Parent Center Director gave an update about events and classes offered at their schools/centers.  The Los Angeles Unified School District very recently announced that the school year will end one week earlier than originally planned. The last day of school will be June 18 rather than June 25.

Esther invited the Parent Center Directors to stay and talk with Sigrid about Pacoima and a few of them did.  Esther also invited two dynamic longtime Pacoima residents to come talk with us at the end of the meeting:  Steve Martinez and Liliana Hernandez Jarieque.

Odilia who was born in Mexico thinks it very important that we include the fact that communication within the family, between parents and children, is the key to success and survival no matter what the circumstances.  Only one son of many children was unsuccessful in avoiding gang life.  This one son was jumped and drugged with a combination of Ecstacy/Chrystal Meth and almost died from the experience.  People at the hospital recognized him as Odelia’s son and gave him dedicated attention which probably prevented his death.  Unfortunately the drug in his system left him schizophrenia. 

Eva Torres has lived in Pacoima for 28 years, very near Pacoima Charter Elementary & San Fernando Gardens housing.  She also raised many kids and faced many difficulties. She’s been active with the school and the community for a long time.

Marta Silva was born in Mexico and married into a generational San Fernando/Pacoima family.  Her father-in-law owns a market in Pacoima that years ago was in San Fernando.  She has struggled in her family because she and her husband do not agree about discipline and how to parent.  She continues to work in the schools to help families find a way to be strong and get the kids a good education.

Liliana (48) was raised mostly in San Fernando.  She went to SF Elementary, Middle and High schools.  Her mother responded to the trouble all around her family by working all the time.  Liliana and her siblings and her cousins all lived together at her grandmother’s house.  There were so many of them they shared beds and had beds all over the house.  They never thought of themselves as poor.  Her cousins and brothers got into every kind of trouble and a lot of the bad activity—drugs, sniffing fumes, etc—all happened in their garage.  Liliana was first hand witness to a lot of rough activity.  She raised a number of kids and was a strong parent and open communicator with her children which she sees as the key to their success and intelligence in navigating the world.

Liliana thinks that the younger generations need to know and value where they came from, what came before to help them respect parents and older generation.

Steve M (42) was born and raised in Pacoima.  He had a strong governing mother and a few different Mexican step-fathers.  He went to many schools including Laurence Middle School in Chatsworth as part of 70s integration plan. Steve works in gang intervention.  He told us the story of how he came to do that:  In 1993 he was working as a carpenter in Las Vegas and coming home to Pacoima on weekends & between jobs to be with his fiancé and 3 step-sons.  Someone called him and invited him to participate in a gang truce meeting and he agreed.  Two days before the meeting he was out in his car picking up his little brother and other younger people from school and he saw some gang kids jumping younger/smaller kids.  Jumping as defined as “beating on,” and in this case with (a) baseball bat(s).  Steve has a temper that (back then) became physical.  He stopped the car and told them to stop.  One of the gang went to the back of their van and came back with a gun and shot at Steve in his car, then the gang kids took off in the van.  Steve was mad and chased them, anticipating their route.  They shot at him again and he could feel the bullets go by him, could feel the heat of one on his face as it went by his head.  He got out of the car and the guy with the gun approached him and changed clips right in front of Steve while keeping his weapon pointed directly at him.  Steve was shot in the shoulder and the chest.  The younger people with him were unharmed.  Steve drove halfway to the hospital before he passed out from loss of blood.  Two days later he was late to the gang truce meeting.   When he spoke about the need to end the violence among gangs in the community, he mentioned that he’d been shot and that the people who shot him were in the room.  Everyone stood and shouted and reacted with anger and threats, but Steve would not identify the shooters and argued for all to stay in conversation to reach a truce.  He works with a non-profit called Victory Outreach (I think) and grassroots/community project called Valley Unity Peace Treaty.

Liliana and Steve talked some about what it was like to grow up in the 70s/80s in Pacoima/San Fernando.  They sited examples of economic and cultural injustices such as freeway placement, building SFHS across the street from a slaughter house, the lame parks in their neighborhoods growing up.  They talked about the changes in how Spanish-speaking kids are treated in school.  They talked about the changes in gangs and gang-culture. They talked a lot about changes in how culture influences youth’s attitudes toward adults and authority.  The talked about the challenges of LAUSD for youth in schools then and now.  They talked about changes in the community due to the closing of Lockheed and GM plants. 

Paula Donnelly

Institute Director

venue update

On Friday Juliette and Sigrid and I met with Esther V. She heads a program called THRIVE and has been involved and connecting people and service organizations in Pacoima for many years. Additionally, she is on the board at Pacoima Charter Elementary School and she is life long friends with the Vice Principal at Maclay Middle School.

MACLAY COMMUNITY CENTER

She has recently taken over a space adjacent to Maclay Middle School-- it's called MACLAY COMMUNITY CENTER. Formerly a small elementary school connected to the middle school, the Center is a series of 4 or 5 "portable" buildings. Each building has 2 classroom size rooms, often with a connector door in the wall between the 2 rooms. The first bldg at the center has a reception office, and a meeting/reception room. A second building is empty and might be set up as a day care space in future. Another building has staff offices in half and a conference room in the other half. There is also a kitchen area and a shaded outdoor lunch area with picnic type table-benches for small people. All this area plus a smallish parking area is chain-link fenced in. I believe from what Esther said that it is all under her purview.

Two fence "walls" are shared with the middle school. Another is shared with a yard & office for LA Police Dept that specifically serves the local schools. The fourth border is to the street. The opposite side of the street is residential.

MACLAY MIDDLE SCHOOL MULTI-PURPOSE ROOM

ALSO, Esther took us onto the Maclay Middle School campus to meet the vice principal, to see two spaces there, to get information about potential obstacles for use of school space in July and to lay groundwork for asking to use school campus space.

The two Maclay campus spaces are an outdoor grassy plaza with a small raised stage area and a square of walkways all around. It is lovely but I do not think they would ever let us use that space because it would ruin the grass there.

The other space is, to me, the best indoor space we've seen yet-- the MPR - Multi-Purpose Room. Good acoustics, a stage space we could use as a stage or not, some backstage support area options, enough room to stage the play on the floor with a variety of audience configurations. And there is a disco ball.

Access to school spaces is complicated:

We'd need approval and permission from the principal, Ms. Arriguen.

The school needs to be "open," either in session with a program or, if not open for a program, at least open because staff are on contract at that time-- mostly the principal. There is no getting around this factor. It's tied into the city-wide school district and rules about having a Plant Manager present when the school is open. The Plant Manager has all the keys. It's like having a House Technician at a theater.

Even in all these circumstances, the usual LATEST time for an activity on campus is 9:00pm.

The principal might start back to work July 26.

This school might be in a "bridge" session starting July 28.

ESTHER FACILITATED OPTIONS

Here are things that are very appealing about Esther's community center facilities:

Good neighborhood in relationship to the community (ie: accessible) and good proximity to our housing home-base. Also it is a place that community comes to/will come to for community related events and services. Feels neutral.

Potentially 24 hour access. Definitely later access than anyone else seems able to offer so that we could have evening rehearsals as we'd like to.

Fenced in and next to a police facility-- safe.

Storage and support spaces, including kitchen for occasional use.

The classrooms at Esther's space are small for rehearsal-- half the size of what is usually best/available. If only there wasn't a wall between the 2 rooms!!

There is a driveway yard that, while not appealing to Juliette, could be an outdoor venue. Kerry would definitely need to take a look and see what his evaluation is regarding capacity and technical needs.

I am intrigued by the MPR on Maclay Middle School Campus-- it could be a great and INDOOR space! pursue the MPR at Maclay and see if we can manage to move in there for 10 or so days at the end of July.

OTHER OPTIONS

Other ideas with their own challenges and obstacles so far are all connected to schools and city parks. With LAUSD schools we will encounter the same problems as at Maclay but with probably less sway from Esther and maybe in less helpful locations. It is so so so ideal for rehearsal and performance space to be in proximity to each other as well as Discovery Charter Prep.

With charter schools the hours might be easier.

We might make some headway with Pacoima Charter Elementary-- it's a charter and Esther is on the board there. Their theater-like space is smallish and has fixed chairs. We should maybe try to see it properly. (X and I saw an Unusual Suspects performance there in November.) This school is still in good proximity for community access and in relation to the home-base location.

With parks (Humphrey and David Gonzalez parks are in the area of Discovery) and anything outdoors security and lock-up is a big issue. I think parks are unlikely to provide and/or allow storage of anything overnight.

There is a Baptist Church on Norris-- still in the right location zone-- that might have space, but it really does not feel neutral there to me. We can ask around and see what local opinion is about that. We have never been inside there.

Unknown at this time but there might be some other building in the area that is not in use. I'm not sure how to pursue this. Maybe Kerry can help with this inquiry.