‘The physical incarnation of the new L.A.’ gets ready for launch

By Joe Piasecki

Playa Vista as seen last week from the
Loyola Marymount University campus.
Photo by Michael Kraxenberger.

It isn’t every day that the leader of a sprawling metropolis takes time out to preside over the grand opening of a movie theater.

But this wasn’t just any multiplex, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti would explain.

Last Thursday the nine-screen Cinemark Playa Vista and XD theater became the first business to open in Runway at Playa Vista — the $260-million retail and entertainment complex that, by linking the 460-acre development’s burgeoning technology mega-center to what will eventually be 6,000 new homes and apartments, completes Playa Vista as essentially a city unto itself.

Less than two years after its April 2013 groundbreaking, Runway is only months shy of substantial completion. A 36,000-square-foot Whole Foods Market is set to open as early as May. Sixteen other businesses — restaurants, banks, fitness centers, salons, a CVS pharmacy — are opening between April and late summer, with lease agreements for apparel shops and additional restaurants on the horizon, says Chris Daniell, division retail manager for Runway developers Lincoln Property Company.

Already home to YouTube Space Los Angeles, consumer electronics designer Belkin International, video game designer Konami and more than a dozen other tech-world movers and shakers, Playa Vista’s creative office space campus on the former grounds of the Hughes Aircraft Company (known as the Hercules Campus) is only beginning to take off.

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L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks during last Thursday’s Cinemark grand opening while Runway at Playa Vista’s Chris Daniell (left), L.A. City Councilman Mike Bonin and Cinemark Head of Marketing James Meredith look on. (Photo by Joe Piasecki)

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Google made global headlines in December with a $120-million purchase of 12 vacant acres adjacent to the 320,000-square-foot Hughes’ Spruce Goose hangar, which industry watchers expect Google to lease. The potential for a combined 1.2 million square feet of office space could someday house as many as 6,000 workers, according to estimates.

Internet rival Yahoo wasn’t far behind. In January the company went public about relocating its current Santa Monica headquarters to 130,000 square feet of space in The Collective at Playa Vista, a low-density creative office complex under construction to the south and east of Playa Vista Central Park. The move will bring an estimated 400 jobs to Playa Vista as early as September.

Clarion Partners Vice President Khalid Rashid has led an $8-million remodel of a five-year-old traditional office building being redesigned as creative office space. (Photo by Inae Bloom)

Roughly 3,000 construction workers have been reporting to Playa Vista each day for the past year, says Alison Banks, director of marketing for Playa Vista master developers Brookfield Residential. Brookfield, she says, has employed an entire team of workers dedicated to finding parking spaces for them all.

CLICK HERE FOR PLAYA VISTA BY THE NUMBERS

During the Cinemark opening, Garcetti described Playa Vista’s explosive growth as a positive economic indicator for the city as a whole. Afterward, he described Playa Vista’s walking-distance mix of housing, retail and creative office space in idyllic terms.

“I think Playa Vista is a physical incarnation of the new L.A. — a place where you can live, work and play in your neighborhood; bold architecture, all the city services, good-paying jobs and a vision of our economic future,” Garcetti said. “I think this is a place where you don’t have to get in your car to do everything and you can have a high quality of life, and it serves people of all backgrounds and income levels but doesn’t cut any corners on making a bold statement.”

‘Big Spaces inspire big ideas’

Garcetti, who according to the Los Angeles Times incentivized Yahoo’s arrival by offering to waive the company’s business taxes for three years, is increasingly defining his economic vision for Los Angeles in terms of strengthening its tech sector. He often cites a Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation report released last year that found Los Angeles County supported more high-tech jobs (368,600) than anywhere else in the country, including Santa Clara County (313,300) in the heart of Silicon Valley.

Leading a panel last Saturday at the South by Southwest interactive media conference in Austin, Garcetti said he viewed cities as a physical embodiment
of a technological platform.

“When you think of it, mayors are essentially chief engineers — people who deal with the hardware and the software of the space that we bound as these urban areas,” Garcetti said. “We’re testing a new approach to fully harness the idea of the city as platform, to partner and to integrate tech into a core value of who we are. … I see technology as the core of our economic development strategies.”

Early Playa Vista arrivals say they’ve found value in being part of its technology cluster.

Exterior and interior renderings depict a portion of The Collective at Playa Vista, where Yahoo will relocate its L.A.-area headquarters from Santa Monica. (Courtesy of Tishman Speyer)

“Physical proximity counts, even in this digital world,” said Matt Jarvis, chief strategy officer at the digital advertising firm 72andSunny, among the first companies to arrive at the Hercules Campus. The company leases 68,000 square feet, including Hughes’ former executive office.

“It’s a very vibrant petri dish, with lots of talented people with complementary skill sets coming together,” said Jarvis. “When you create surprising collisions among industries, interesting things tend to happen. For us to be at the center of it is a huge benefit. The rate of those collisions is going to accelerate.”

Case in point: 72andSunny, frequently topping the trades’ agency-of-the-year lists, tapped neighbors YouTube Space L.A. to involve Internet video stars in advertising campaigns for the 100-million-selling “Call of Duty” video game series and the anti-smoking Campaign for Truth. 72andSunny’s accounts also include future neighbors Google (YouTube’s parent company), Samsung and, as of last week, Adidas.

Liam Collins, head of YouTube Space L.A., said the company had bet on Playa Vista becoming a tech-industry hub.

“We are believers that big spaces inspire big ideas,” Collins said. “Playa Vista stood out because of a strong sense of creative history and the promise that it could become a new crossroads for media and technology on a global scale.”

Asked during his South by Southwest panel whether Playa Vista benefitted only the tech-world elite, Garcetti said growing L.A. startups benefit from being able to network with larger firms.

Playa Vista “buttresses all the small startups,” he said, “so that they’re not traveling out of town to make those connections.”

Population: 13,000

Playa Vista’s massive residential component quite literally keeps tech close to home.

Some 2,800 homes, apartments or condos are currently under construction by nine different companies, said Banks. Combined with some 3,100 built during Playa Vista’s first phase, all this housing will be enough to accommodate some 13,000 people, she said.

For tech employees who can walk to work (and soon also to shop), the value proposition is simple. But Playa Vista property is also selling fast thanks to an already red-hot Westside housing market, said real estate broker Tami Pardee.

“There’s such a lack of housing supply that we need inventory,” Pardee said. “There are more than enough people moving into the area to absorb that housing.”

Some 200 newly built Playa Vista homes sold last year at prices ranging from the $900,000s to about $2.5 million, and the three blocks of detached single-family homes that went up for sale last March have completely sold out, Banks said.

Commercial real estate in Playa Vista is selling or leasing so fast that for some smaller players it’s getting harder to find space there, Pardee said.

The future outdoor dining areas for Whole Foods and Hopdoddy Burger Bar will face a public fountain. (Photo by Ted Soqui)

But Playa Vista builders can’t take the market for granted. Creative office space tenants have come to expect certain amenities: natural light, open windows, balconies, courtyards, basketball hoops — even a hammock or two.

Built in 2009 immediately east of the land Google just bought, a pair of traditional six-story office buildings — boxy rectangles with sealed windows and shared lobbies — sat empty for five years. Last July, developers Clarion Partners purchased the empty Latitude 34 complex for $132 million and immediately embarked on an $8-million renovation effort, renaming the space i|o at Playa Vista.

“We’ve punched holes in the building and affixed an external balcony-and-stair structure so you can park and walk up into your own space. We added bi-folding doors to introduce fresh air into the space,” said Clarion Partners Vice President Khalid Rashid. “What we’ve tried to do is create an optimal environment for interaction and innovation. It plays to the overall health and happiness of employees.”

A shared courtyard with indoor/outdoor workspaces will also feature a “hammock forest” among transplanted mature trees, he said.

The strategy has paid off. Even as work continues, three companies (in advertising, digital media and private equity) have already signed leases for 43% of the complex’s 300,000 square feet, Rashid said.

Lincoln Property Company Division Retail Manager Chris Daniell sees Runway becoming a regional draw. (Photo by Ted Soqui)

In developing Runway at Playa Vista — where retail, office and residential uses all come together — Daniell also obsessed over the tenant and shopper experience.

A park will separate Runway’s 420 residential apartments from its retail and office footprint along Jefferson Boulevard, where common areas with plenty of  outdoor seating will feature fountains, fire pits, string lighting and pet-friendly water fountains. One of three levels of office space above first-floor retail features a large outdoor patio with southward views of the Loyola Marymount University bluffs.

Even the Cinemark boasts special features: a 70-by-38-foot XD screen with a 60-speaker sound system, optional easy chair seating and full-service dining; a second-story outdoor dining patio; digital movie posters and information display boards; a satellite hookup for special screenings.

“I see three different audiences — Playa Vista residents, our expansive daytime [office] population and a regional draw,” Daniell said. “If we’re as successful as we think we’re going to be, we’re pulling from as far north as beyond Venice and maybe as far south as Manhattan Beach.”

Ian Joulain, reporting from Austin, contributed to this story.

Tòmas Luna Gomez died near Slauson Avenue and Braddock Drive
Photo by Mia Duncans

A 21-year-old man who was shot multiple times while driving in Playa Vista on Monday night continued driving into Del Rey for more than a mile, striking several cars as he went before paramedics pronounced him dead at the scene.

Police responded to calls of a shooting shortly after 8 p.m. at the intersection of Inglewood and Jefferson boulevards and later found the victim, Tòmas Luna Gomez, inside his pickup truck near Slauson Avenue and Braddock Drive. Gomez had multiple gunshot wounds, according to police.

A motorist near Inglewood and Jefferson told police that he had been rear-ended by a pickup truck that had fled the scene. No one was injured in that crash or the other collisions related to the shooting.

LAPD homicide Det. Steven Katz said police have not identified any suspects in the shooting and declined to comment on whether the violence may be gang-related.

“We’re looking into this to find out why it happened,” Katz said. “We have no one in custody at this time.”

Anyone with information is asked to call LAPD West Bureau Homicide investigators at (213) 382-9470.

Anchor tenant of the Runway at Playa Vista development opens Wednesday

By Bonnie Eslinger

It’s finally here: Whole Foods Market was slated to open
on Wednesday at the Runway in Playa Vista.
Photo by Bonnie Eslinger

Playa Vista’s long-awaited Whole Foods Market is set to open Wednesday, marking a major milestone for the Westside’s newest neighborhood and red-hot tech industry hub.

The upscale grocery store specializing in natural and prepared foods is an anchor tenant for the 11-acre Runway at Playa Vista development. Still partially under construction, Runway will serve as Playa Vista’s restaurant and retail core, but also features office space and 420 apartments. A state-of-the-art nine-screen Cinemark movie theater and a CVS pharmacy opened earlier this year.

“Playa Vista is a vibrant community that’s growing as a popular residential and business area,” reads a statement by Whole Foods Market . “We saw Runway as an ideal location in the midst of community activity.”

At 35,000 square feet, the Whole Foods facing Jefferson Boulevard and McConnell Avenue is designed to serve residents and lunching office workers with “expansive social spaces designed to serve as extensions of the home and cultivate a uniquely connected community,” the Whole Foods statement continues.

There’s also a full-service bar called the Astro Pub, home delivery service to Playa Vista residents and meal plan compatibility for Loyola Marymount University students.

Other businesses slated to open their doors in the coming months at the $260 million-plus Runway development include a Starbucks, several restaurants, two bank branches, fitness centers and beauty salons, said Chris Daniell, retail division manager for Runway developer Lincoln Property Company.

Runway is also finalizing negotiations to lease its 33,000 square feet of office space to a single company; an announcement of the deal is expected soon, Daniell said.

Playa Vista CVS store manager Yasir Chaudhry said he expects the opening of Whole Foods to be a major attraction that enlivens the area.

“That’s going to be the only grocery store around here,” Chaudhry said.

Built on the former grounds of the Hughes Aircraft Company, Playa Vista is already home to YouTube Space L.A. as well as several major video game design, Internet technology and digital marketing firms. Yahoo and Google are soon to launch offices within the 460-acre planned community.

During this second phase of development, about 6,000 new homes will eventually fill in the rest of Playa Vista. Combined with the existing mix of mostly condos and apartments, Playa Vista will soon be able to accommodate about 13,000 residents, according to master developer Brookfield Residential.

Gary and Wendy Niles moved into Playa Vista during its first phase of construction years ago and are happy to see some of the promised amenities finally opening up. On a quiet Sunday, they slipped into the Cinemark to catch a matinee screening of the disaster blockbuster “San Andreas.”

“It’s walkable, like a neighborhood,” Gary Niles said.

* * * * *

The official grand opening of the Playa Vista Whole Foods Market is at 9 a.m. Wednesday, June 17. The first 200 shoppers will receive a free reusable bag with
a unique Playa Vista design and a coffee mug from Allegro Coffee.

Shoppers can get a sneak peak inside the store during a Friends of Ballona Wetlands fundraiser from 6:30 to 8 p.m. on Monday, June 15. The suggested donation is $10.

For more information, visit facebook.com/WFMPlayaVista.

The recently shuttered Abbot Kinney landmark will reopen inside the new Runway retail and entertainment complex

By Gary Walker

Hal’s Bar & Grill co-owners Don Novak and Hal Frederick addressed an overflow crowd on the final Saturday night of their former Abbot Kinney Boulevard location.
Photo by David Comden

The former heart of Abbot Kinney Boulevard’s nightlife scene is headed for new digs in techie-friendly Playa Vista.

When the owners of Hal’s Bar and Grill announced in April that they would be closing their Abbot Kinney Boulevard location after 30 years in business there, managing partner  Don Novack  said he and his partners hoped to be back in business soon at another location.

Little did anyone suspect that “nearby” would mean Runaway at Playa Vista, the $260-million retail and entertainment complex that is the centerpiece of the planned community’s second phase of development.

The new Hal’s will occupy a 4,700-square-foot space (larger than the original, said Novack) at Runway and is slated to open just before the December holidays, said Lincoln Property Retail Division Manager Chris Daniell.

“It’s a home run for the center. We’ve always thought of Runaway as where ‘Abbot Kinney meets The Grove,’ and we think [Hal’s] will make a harmonious blend with our other tenants,” Daniell said.

Novack said he had been in discussions with his landlord on Abbot Kinney about how he could get out of his lease for more than a year. They eventually “worked out a deal that was advantageous to both of us. This was not about being squeezed out [because of an increase in rent],” he said.

That deal allowed Novack to consider the new site at Playa Vista, where Hal’s already has an established clientele.

“We had a lot of customers from Westchester and Playa Vista who would often ask about opening a second restaurant closer to them. We’ve made a lot of deliveries there for years,” Novack said.

Lincoln Property Company Executive Vice President David Binswanger said the addition of Hal’s is an unexpected surprise, given that the bar and grill still had its lease on Abbot Kinney when the firm began sketching out the types of restaurants that they wanted for Runaway.

“We never thought they would leave Abbot Kinney. But when someone like Hal’s shows up and wants to be part of your project, you’re thrilled to have them,” said Binswanger, who was a frequent customer at the Abbot Kinney restaurant.

Lincoln Property executives consider Hal’s one of the flagships for Runway’s restaurant component, which will also include 800 Degrees Pizza, Urban Plates, Panini Café, Hopdoddy Burger Bar and Sol Cocina. A 35,000-square-foot Whole Foods Market with a sit-down dining component opened at Runway this week.

“They’re that true bar and grill concept that has a very large following. We want to maintain that following and create a new following as well. We think there are huge regional implications for Runway with Hal’s relocating here,” Daniell said.

Novack said the Playa Vista location will have live music two nights a week and in many ways will resemble the popular Venice venue that he helped establish 30 years ago.

“It will definitely have a Hal’s feel, but we’ll be catering to a slightly younger crowd,” Novack said.

Laura Alice, a Venice resident and real estate agent with Marcus & Millichap, sees the move to Playa Vista as an opportunity for Hal’s to extend its reach beyond Venice.

“I think it’s great because Hal’s is evolving not because they have to but because they want to. It takes them from a niche market and opens them up for bigger things, and it will make Playa Vista much hipper,” said Alice, a past Hal’s patron.

Novack said the deal he worked out with his former landlord will also allow him the opportunity to reopen Hal’s somewhere in Venice again, where he has a pending deal in the works.

“We will be back on Abbot Kinney again,” he said.

gary@argonautnews.com

Reboot of controversial wetlands proposal now slated for Playa Vista

By Gary Walker

The Annenberg Center would occupy 30,000 square feet of The Collective at Playa Vista creative office campus, which will also house offices for Yahoo Inc.
Photo by Michael Aushenker

Six months after suspending its plan for a $50-million environmental education and animal care center in the Ballona Wetlands, the Annenberg Foundation has announced plans to locate a modified version of the center in Playa Vista.

The newly proposed Annenberg Center — now focused primarily on domesticated animals — would occupy a two-story, 30,000-square-foot space in The Collective at Playa Vista, a five-building creative office space campus soon to house Internet giant Yahoo Inc.’s Los Angeles operations.

Annenberg’s footprint would include three animal program support spaces, two activity areas, two learning courtyards, administrative offices and 159 parking spaces.

“The mission of the Annenberg Center will be to promote and strengthen the human-animal bond as well as the understanding and enjoyment of companion animals for people of all walks of life in a fun, engaging and interactive setting,” an Annenberg Foundation statement reads.

Howard Litwak and Jackie Jaakola, leaders of the foundation’s animal companion project team, gave a presentation about the proposal on Tuesday before the Neighborhood Council of Westchester – Playa’s Planning and Land Use Committee.

Because the building is within 500 feet of homes, the Annenberg Foundation will be required to obtain a conditional use permit from the city to operate the animal care center, Litwak said. There will be a veterinary representative on site at all times to care for animals that are boarded at the facility, he added.

The committee voted 9-0 in support of the project and will forward the recommendation to the full neighborhood council, which will likely hear from Annenberg representatives at its July 6 meeting, said committee chair Patricia Lyon.

In December, the Annenberg Foundation decided to put a halt to plans for a 46,000-square-foot nature education and animal care center in the Ballona Wetlands near the Culver Marina Little League baseball fields.

Billed as primarily a nature education center that would complement wetlands restoration efforts, the facility would have also contained classrooms, and auditorium, exhibits about wildlife and domestic animals, a pet adoption center and veterinary facilities.

Opponents complained that the domestic animal adoption and care components were inappropriate for restoration efforts designed to protect wetlands flora and fauna.

During a telephone interview, Annenberg Foundation Executive Director Cynthia Kennard said building an animal care facility has been a longtime dream of foundation President Wallis Annenberg and that the foundation sees Playa Vista as the ideal setting for the facility.

“It’s a very vibrant area in terms of high-tech and creative businesses. We’re in the middle of this futuristic, vibrant community and we would be thrilled to be part of it,” Kennard said.

Playa Vista resident Marla Kay said the addition of an animal companion center to the neighborhood would be a “phenomenal asset” for two current Playa Vista entities, Playa Vista Elementary School and Discovery Park.

“I’ve been in Playa Vista for nine years, and I hope that someday I can volunteer or work [at the animal companion center],” Kay said.

Marcia Hanscom of the Playa del Rey-based Ballona Institute, a fierce critic of the initial wetland center proposal, also spoke favorably of the new project.

“I’m here primarily to say thank you to the Annenberg Foundation for listening to the community. It seems like wildlife and companion animals are separated now,” Hanscom said.

Annenberg representatives did not address the foundation’s motives for halting the wetlands project at the meeting.

“The project here is for domestic animals, but we will still continue to pursue some of the similar themes of the nature center,” Litwak told the committee.

gary@argonautnews.com

Jesse Jackson stops by Google’s headquarters in Venice to call for greater diversity in tech

By Gary Walker

The conversation at PUSH Tech 2020 included (from left) digital tech strategist Navarrow Wright, gospel singer Erica Campbell, the Rev. Jesse Jackson and YouTube Global Head of Content Malik Ducard

Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson was at Google’s headquarters in Venice last week to call for greater diversity in the Westside’s booming digital technology sector.

The Rev. Jackson and his Rainbow PUSH Coalition (a merger of the Rainbow Coalition and People United to Serve Humanity) teamed up with Google to hold the PUSH Tech 2020 Los Angeles Forum, an event designed both to pressure tech firms to increase workforce diversity and to prepare blacks and Latinos for tech jobs.

Jackson launched a campaign against racial inequity in the tech sector after addressing Google’s annual shareholder meeting last year. In an interview prior to the June 29 event, he used industry vernacular to point out that while many minority groups tend to be heavy users of social media, blacks and Latinos are sharply underrepresented in computer science and engineering jobs.

“In almost all of these companies we are ‘over-indexing’ as consumers and participants and ‘under-indexing’ in the boardroom as well as in employment, as executives and in investment startups,” Jackson said. “We have every right to be a part of these companies. As the public sector closes down on us, we have to look more in the private sector, and we have the mental and financial capacity to do so. There’s no reason to lock us out.”

A study by the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project in late 2012 found that 25% of African Americans and 19% of Latinos surveyed said they used Twitter, compared to 14% of white respondents. Instagram usage followed a similar pattern: 23% among blacks, 18% among Latinos and 11% among whites.

When it comes to working for top tech companies, however, minority participation plummets. According to reports filed last year with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, blacks fill only 1% and Latinos 2% of high-tech jobs at Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Apple and other major companies.

As Mother Jones extrapolated from the same data last week, “the combined black workforces of Google, Facebook and Twitter [758 people] could fit on a single jumbo jet.”

“Race is still very much a factor. We couldn’t play baseball before 1947, so doors had to open. Of 189 board members of the top 20 companies, there are 36 white women, three blacks and one Latino. [Apple CEO] Tim Cook himself has said it’s [the tech industry’s] fault that there’s so little diversity,” Jackson said.

“What PUSH has done is we have bought shares of stock in these corporations and we’ve put pressure on them to expose these bad records and challenged them to respond to their real records. They have great images, but there’s a gap between their images and their records,” he continued.

YouTube Global Head of Content Malik Ducard, who also attended the forum, said that minority underrepresentation underscores how tech companies must work to break down their current homogeneity in the workplace. He thinks the concentration of high-tech companies in Playa Vista (including his own) could pave the way for more minority hiring all around.

“The low numbers show that there is an opportunity to do a lot better in the marketplace. We’re planning on doing more to create opportunities in Los Angeles, and we admire that the work that Rainbow PUSH has been doing to help us,” Ducard said.

The PUSH Tech 2020 event also included panel discussions on how minorities can become digital tech entrepreneurs.

“Multicultural consumers, including African-Americans, are avid users of social media and technology, and we need to turn our usage into creating the next great video game, the next Facebook or Google,” said Sheila Marmon, CEO of the Culver City-based advertising agency Mirror Digital. “People hire people they know, so it’s important for us to facilitate and create bridges between ourselves and these large technology companies.”

Jackson said there is a wellspring of talent at traditionally black colleges such as Howard and Southern universities, but accused high-tech hiring managers of failing to seek them out.

“There are so many qualified African-Americans and Latinos. The narrative is that they can’t find us, but we can be found. They can’t find black engineers? They’ve not been recruiting, training or maintaining them, and we’re changing that,” he said.

Google has committed $150 million to a four-part inclusionary hiring strategy that includes outreach to historically black colleges and developing coding initiatives with high schools in diverse neighborhoods, Google spokeswoman Roya Soleimani said.

“That money is divided into two big categories: the funds we’re using to support external partners in the communities, and the funds we’re using to make Google more diverse and inclusive. We know that money alone won’t make us more diverse — these dollars support a broader and holistic long-term strategy,” Soleimani said.

Otis College of Art and Design in Westchester invites companies to its annual spring Intern Recruitment Day, said Donna Lee Oda, the college’s director of the center of creative professions.

“We’re very well placed here, being so close to Playa Vista,” Oda said.

LAUSD has two initiatives that are designed to help students learn coding — the backbone of computer programming and gateway to the high-tech workforce — and one of them is at Beethoven Elementary School in Mar Vista.

Marmon said the Beethoven program is a good place for children of all ethnic backgrounds to learn skills that could open a wide variety of employment opportunities.

“I think in 10 or 15 years we’re going to look back and say ‘How did we not know how to code?’ Coding is the way that you create in this technology -driven space, and not being able to code is like not being able to write,” Marmon said.

gary@argonautnews.com

Local leaders give a unanimous nod to Annenberg Foundation facility planned for Playa Vista

By Gary Walker

Playa Vista could soon be going to the dogs (and cats), and community members apparently couldn’t be happier.

Plans by the Annenberg Foundation to open a domestic animal care and adoption center next to the site of Yahoo’s future Los Angeles headquarters received a 17-0 vote of support last Tuesday by the Neighborhood Council of Westchester – Playa.

The two-story, 36,000 square foot facility would exist in one of five creative office space suites currently under construction as part of The Collective at Playa Vista.

Annenberg must obtain a city permit to move forward with the plan because the animal center would be located within 500 feet of a residential neighborhood. The neighborhood council’s vote recommends that the city issue the permit.

The facility would focus on caring for homeless pets and finding them homes. It would also offer training workshops as well as classes on how people can become better pet owners. Plans include a leadership institute for animal advocacy as well as a learning center featuring a multipurpose auditorium and classroom.

“Our goal is to promote and strengthen the human-animal bond, with particular emphasis on companion animals, household pets and the role that they play in our lives,” said Howard Litwak, Annenberg’s project manager for the facility.

Litwak said the Annenberg Foundation hopes the center will make a significant difference in support of animal welfare causes.

“The idea of the leadership institute is to have a national impact through forums, discussions, annual analyses of issues and model legislation,” Litwak explained. “We all know that there are dozens of animal issues that come up every day. The point is to have the opportunity to make a policy impact as well as a personal impact.”

Annenberg’s first hearing before the city’s zoning administrator is slated for July 30. Litwak said construction of the facility could be completed by September, making January 2017 a target opening date if the project receives timely city approvals.

An animal care specialist would be on call at the Annenberg facility 24/7 hours a day for the animals that are boarded on site. These would include dogs, cats, rabbits and guinea pigs, said foundation representative Jackie Jakkola.

“I think the Annenberg center at Playa Vista is an excellent, well thought-out project. Our communities and students will benefit from the learning center,” said neighborhood council member Garrett Smith.

The animal care center is a longtime dream of Wallis Annenberg, the foundation’s president and the daughter of Walter Annenberg, the philanthropic organization’s founder.

The foundation had earlier considered building a multipurpose nature and animal care facility in the Ballona Wetlands as part of a $50-million donation toward the restoration center, but the concept was widely criticized by environmental activists opposed to construction on state land.

Prior critics have praised the foundation for moving its proposal out of the wetlands.

gary@argonautnews.com

Bangladesh’s Special Olympics delegation strikes a pose with
state Chief Service Officer Karen Baker (center) in Playa Vista
Photo courtesy of Sean Hassan

With the Special Olympics happening in Los Angeles from July 25 to Aug. 2, last week saw many events throughout the Westside to welcome some 7,000 athletes, 3,000 coaches and roughly 30,000 volunteers arriving from 177 countries.

Santa Monica, declared an official host city last year, produced several special events for delegations from the Republic of Seychelles, Brazil, Romania and Sweden. Santa Monica was also the final leg of the Flame of Hope torch run prior to the opening ceremonies at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

The torch run included a ceremony in Venice at Windward Plaza as well.

Last Thursday, Bangladeshi athletes and volunteers staying at LMU had lunch at the CenterPointe Club in Playa Vista with CaliforniaVolunteers Chief Service Officer Karen Baker, who heads up governor’s office-sponsored efforts to increase volunteerism.

Baker thanked the volunteers and offered words of encouragement for the athletes.

“I hope you realize the role you play as athletes, inspiring the volunteers that surround you,” Baker said.

The event was organized by the Aga Khan Council, an Ismaili Muslim group hosting the Special Olympics delegation from Bangladesh. Many American Ismailis trace their heritage to Bangladesh.

“Part of our ethic and what we believe Islam teaches us is to give back. In fact, it’s considered a blessing to have time to have the ability to give to others,” said Sean Hassan, a member of the Aga Khan Council. “We would have been happy to do this for any country. It’s a little special that it ended up being Bangladesh.”

— Billy Singleton

A dearth of chemical-free baby products inspired actress and mom Jessica Alba to start her
own business

First came movie magic-makers IMAX.

Then video game designers Sony Santa Monica Studios and web giant Yahoo Inc. followed suit.

And now The Honest Company — an online retailer of non-toxic household goods founded by actress Jessica Alba in 2011 — is the latest tech-savvy major employer to abandon Santa Monica for Playa Vista.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti announced Monday that The Honest Co. has signed a long-term lease to move into a three-floor, 83,000-square-foot space at i|o Playa Vista, located at 12130 Millennium Drive.

Developers Clarion Partners purchased the former Latitude 34 complex last year for $132 million and spent $8 million to convert its unoccupied traditional office space into i|o, a creative office space campus with indoor/outdoor workspaces designed to encourage collaboration.

The Honest Company plans to leave their current 18,000-square-foot headquarters at 2700 Pennsylvania Ave., just north of Bergamot Station, and move into their new digs by early next year, according to the city’s office of economic development.

“Playa Vista is the next frontier of technology in Los Angeles and we’re excited to be calling it home,” Alba,
The Honest Company’s chief creative officer, said in a statement. “It’s inspiring to share the imagination and energy at the heart of innovation with like-minded companies as neighbors. We’re looking forward to building a unique cultural atmosphere that creates more tech opportunities in Playa Vista.”

The Honest Co. raised $70 million in venture capital last year and business experts anticipate an initial public offering as early as this year.

“Los Angeles is the perfect home for The Honest Company, an emerging brand committed to service and sustainability, and we welcome the company and its hundreds of employees to the expanding community at Playa Vista. This move proves once again that our city is the place for companies to do business,” Garcetti’s statement reads.

A largely built-out city where many residents are hostile to growth — under threat of voter referendum, the city cancelled approval of a controversial creative office development near Bergamot Station last year — Santa Monica’s economic loss appears to be Playa Vista’s gain.

“Smart, tech-savvy companies like The Honest Company are continuing to create good jobs as they move in to Playa Vista, and I am very excited to see our vision for the community continue to be realized,” L.A. City Councilman Mike Bonin said.

— Gary Walker

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center will expand into Playa Vista next year with a new medical office in the Runway at Playa Vista retail and entertainment complex, the hospital announced Monday.

Cedars has signed an 11-year lease for the three-level, 32,000-square-foot space above Cinemark Playa Vista and next to the Whole Foods Market.

The new medical center, expected to open by the end of 2016, will be staffed by dozens of medical professionals and able to serve hundreds of patients per day.

“We are excited to join the Playa Vista community with the beautiful new office space to be created at Runway for the patients we are privileged to serve there,” Cedars-Sinai Health System President and CEO Thomas M. Priselac said in a hospital statement.

The 11-acre Runway complex includes some 220,000 square feet of shops and restaurants as well as 450 apartments currently under construction. The Cedars lease represents the entirety of its office space component.

“This addition will further strengthen Runway’s reputation as a center for all of our community’s needs, from best-in-class dining and entertainment to world-class healthcare services,” said David Binswanger, executive vice president for Runway builders Lincoln Property Co.

— Joe Piasecki

Investigators scan the damage at Evolution Fitness Center
Photo by Mia Duncans

An SUV heading northbound along South Centinela Avenue on the outskirts of Playa Vista crashed through the front of Evolution Fitness on Monday night after striking another vehicle.

The gym was closed at the time and Los Angeles police arrested the SUV’s driver on suspicion of driving under the influence, said Sgt. Cynthia Barlow of the LAPD’s West Traffic Bureau.

The crash occurred at about 10 p.m. after the SUV struck another vehicle during an attempt to change lanes, Barlow said.

The SUV took out a wall and destroyed several exercise bikes inside the gym, located near the terminus of Bluff Creek Drive at 6826 S. Centinela Ave. in what’s technically Culver City.

Del Rey resident Shannon Rose was at the nearby Chevron gas station when the crash occurred and said he heard the initial impact of the SUV colliding with the other vehicle, which he described as a Chevy Tahoe, before it crashed into Evolution Fitness.

“People often driver really fast on that part of Centinela, especially late at night,” Rose said. “Just an hour before [the accident] people were exercising in there.”

— Gary Walker

Police evacuate area and destroy black gym bag with ‘red type of voltage meter’

By Gary Walker

A bomb scare at Whole Foods Playa Vista on Thursday afternoon prompted evacuations in the area and shut down eastbound traffic along Jefferson Boulevard for more than three hours.

LAPD patrol and Bomb Squad officers arrived on scene at about 2:30 p.m. after a customer noticed a suspicious package on the lower level of the Whole Foods parking structure and notified a store security guard, who called 911.

After determining that the package was suspicious, police began evacuating Whole Foods, the adjacent Cinemark Playa Vista and nearby Playa Vista residents, LAPD Sgt. Art Gallegos said.

“Our Bomb Squad was notified; they arrived and investigated the package and rendered it safe. It looked similar to a bomb, but it was not a bomb,” Gallegos said.

Gallegos described the suspicious package as a black gym bag “with a red type of voltage meter.”

Bomb Squad officers were unable to open the bag and used C-4 explosives and a robot to detonate the bag.

Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics also responded to the scene, and at 3 p.m. parking enforcement officers began closing Jefferson from Beethoven Street to Centinela Avenue. Jefferson was reopened to eastbound traffic at about 6:15 p.m.

Students attending an after-school program at Animo Westside Charter Middle School were placed on lockdown during the bomb investigation. At about 3:30 p.m., a group of teachers led the students to a field next to a storage company while they placed calls to the students’ parents.

Playa Vista residents invited many Whole Foods employees into their homes during the evacuation, said Whole Foods assistant store team leader Patrick McManama.

“It was really neat to see how the community came together around us. Many of them allowed us to use their restrooms and gave our team members water and showed a lot of concern. That was really great to see,” he said.

Even though the package turned out not to be a bomb, Gallegos said it’s better to play it safe than be sorry later.

“Given the times that we’re in, I would encourage any citizen who observes anything suspicious that they call 911 and let us handle it,” Gallegos said.

L.A. Conservancy offers tours of the Playa Vista tech campus born from the remains of Hughes Aircraft Co

By Joe Piasecki

The Ratkovich Company converted formerly derelict Hughes Aircraft buildings into enviable creative office space for 72andSunny (pre-renovation photos courtesy of the L.A. Conservancy Archives; post-renovation photos courtesy of 72andSunny Los Angeles)
Photo credit: Laura Heffington

When the Los Angeles Conservancy first offered tours in 2011 of the former grounds of Hughes Aircraft Company that would become Playa Vista’s Hercules Campus, the condition of the place could be described as raw at best.

“Everything was derelict. There were holes in the roofs and water on the ground. Rust everywhere. It had been more or less empty since the 1980s, except for film companies that used the big spaces to shoot in,” conservancy program manager Annie Laskey recalls.

On Saturday, Laskey and her team return to Playa Vista to once again offer public tours, this time of a thriving creative campus with renovations that reflect the original architecture’s historic purpose and significance.

The Los Angeles Conservancy’s 90-minute “From Hughes to Hercules” tours offer rare access to the massive wooden hangar where the reclusive business tycoon built his Spruce Goose (aka the H-4 Hercules), the former aviation warehouse that is now YouTube Space L.A. and two former administrative buildings that now house the digital advertising firm 72andSunny.

About 2.5 football fields in length and as tall as a six-story building, the hangar is about to undergo adaptive reuse renovations — meaning this is just about the last time visitors will be able to see it in the raw.

In 2011, hangar visitors saw peeling blue and white paint and non-original drywall divisions. Now the structure’s skeleton has been stripped down to the original wood and the drywall is gone, offering a unique glimpse of its original state and aesthetic potential.

YouTube Space L.A.’s fully functional video production facility and the two buildings that are 72andSunny’s L.A. headquarters demonstrate the visual impact of careful adaptive reuse efforts.

72andSunny’s steel-sided Building 1 features a whole wall that opens up to create an indoor/outdoor space, and when closed represents pretty much what the wall looked like back in 1951, Laskey says. The mahogany-paneled walls of former Hughes executives remain in what are now conference rooms.

The firm’s Building 2 features additional highlights, including wood flooring that was repurposed from the original playing surface of UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion and a small portion of the building that has yet to be renovated.

Tours start between 10 a.m. and 3:15 p.m., but most morning tickets have already sold out. Tickets are $35 each, or $15 for students and $10 for children 12 and under. Meeting and parking locations are provided with purchase.

joe@argonautnews.com

How L.A. Clippers Head Trainer Jasen Powell works his magic in Playa Vista

By Gary Walker

Clippers Head Trainer Jasen Powell checks
the injured hand of point guard Chris Paul during an Oct. 27 practice at the L.A. Clippers Training Center in Playa Vista.
Photo by Ted Soqui

It’s the day before their first game of the 2015-16 NBA season, and the Los Angeles Clippers Training Center in Playa Vista is a flurry of activity.

TV news cameras roll as superstar point guard Chris Paul, shooting guard J. J. Redick and reserve point guard Austin Rivers run passing and shooting drills on the practice court.

Off to the side, Clippers Head Trainer Jasen Powell is taping up Jamal Crawford’s right arm so that Crawford, recovering from a tricep contusion after being hit with an elbow, can join the action.

A few moments later, it’s Paul’s turn. Powell massages each bandaged finger on Paul’s right hand and scrutinizes his slightly injured thumb.

“How does that feel?” the trainer asks.

Paul nods in affirmation that he’s good to go.

“Over the course of a season, it’s all about staying healthy,” Paul says during a break in the action. “Everything [Powell] does is pretty much preventive.”

Powell, whom Clippers players and staff have nicknamed “JP,” is about to start his 17th season with the team.

While he may not be a familiar face to fans, those on the court and behind the scenes say JP’s work is vital to the Clippers’ success this season.

“In some ways, he’s the star [of the team]. Health is going to be one of the major factors in winning the Western Conference,” says Clippers head coach Doc Rivers. “You have to have a good trainer, and he’s definitely that.”

Trust, Communication, Balance

Powell says keeping his Clippers in top physical condition begins with building a solid rapport among players, himself and his support staff — a nutritionist, chiropractor, tissue therapist, full-time assistant and two interns.

“My three principles are trust, communication and balance,” Powell, 43, says during an interview before the Clippers Oct. 21 public practice at USC’s Galen Center. “A lot of it involves knowing what routines they like and dislike, getting to know them better, studying what dysfunctions and patterns that they have. You have to have a plethora of approaches.”

That also extends to the offseason. Powell, a former Western Conference representative of the National Basketball Athletic Trainers Association, stays in touch with his guys practically year-round. He checks in to see when and where they are traveling, to find out whether they want to work out at home or at the training center, and to see if they’re following various conditioning routines.

During the season practices typically begin around 11 a.m., but Powell and his staff usually arrive about two hours early.

“Even if they’re not injured, players come in and out of the training room just to get tuned up. You can’t put oil in a gas tank, so we have to make sure that they have the right fuel so that they can perform their best,” Powell explains.

Working with big-ticket athletes who might want to play even when they’re injured is not as difficult as some might think, according to Powell, who played college basketball at Cal Poly Pomona.

“In my experience, a player will let you know if he can’t play. I try to get them to look at the pros and cons of playing with an injury. You lay down all of the parameters for them and then collectively, as a medical staff and as a player, make the decision,” he says.

Part of Powell’s training strategy includes alternative medicine and holistic therapies, an approach that Powell had long wanted to employ. He’s sought advice from naturopathic doctors about such practices and credits the team’s nutritionist, Meg Mangano, with keeping the players on healthy diets to maximize performance and longevity.

Another part of the balance that Powell talks about is players’ time on and off the court. He credits Rivers with understanding the importance of giving players time to recuperate during the grueling 82-game regular season.

“Doc and his staff have done a wonderful job allowing me to establish my ‘infrastructure,’ so to speak,” Powell says.

Game-Changing Technology

Relocating from The Spectrum to the customized Playa Vista training facility in 2008 has also helped Powell and the Clippers create an optimal environment for preventive and rehabilitative care, including a fully equipped weight room and their own water treadmill.

“The fact that we have our own home is huge. It’s really helped our guys be focused and dialed in when they need treatment,” Powell says.

Sports medicine has evolved quite a lot since the Clippers moved from San Diego to Los Angeles in 1984 — especially when it comes to how technology is used to train and treat injured players, said Dr. Bert Mandelbaum of the Santa Monica Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine Group.

“Now you have technology that can measure how a player has recovered from an injury, state-of-the-art heart monitors, recovery parameters and motion analysis that teams use,” says Mandelbaum, formerly chief medical officer for Women’s World Cup Soccer and physician for the U.S. Men’s National team.

“There are also strength coaches, nutritionists, physical therapists and psychologists in addition to the head trainer. We’ve moved to what I call ‘athlete-centric’ medicine,” he says.

Mandelbaum says trainers usually focus on three components: Prevention, treatment of illness and injury, and optimizing performance.

“Prevention often allows you to do the other two, and it’s a collective effort between the player and the trainer,” he says.

Each year all Clippers players go through what Powell calls a movement screen test, which allows his staff to look at the areas that the players need to strengthen.

“We monitor how they move so that we can see what we need to do for each player. We also work with our strength coach to make sure that we synchronize a work regiment where they do manual therapy, joint mobility, range of motion exercises and hip and ankle mobility,” Powell explains. “Then they go into the weight room and do their functional strength tests.”

This testing happens during the preseason, at midseason and again if the team enters the playoffs, which the Clippers have accomplished each of the last four seasons.

One new technological advance that Powell favors is a therapy device called the Shock Wave, which delivers shock impulse waves to muscle tissue.

“We’ve been able to use this for chronic injuries and acute injuries. It helps relieve a lot of muscle pain,” he says.

Powell has also invented Pure Powder, a non-medical herbal salve that’s made from five or six natural plant ingredients.

“We use different types of treatment to help players recover — cold therapy, tissue therapy, massage and chirotherapy [a method of treatment that diagnoses problems associated with the joints, nerves, tendons and ligaments],” he says.

Patience and Optimism

Before becoming the Clippers’ head trainer, Powell worked as the San Francisco 49ers’ assistant athletic trainer for four years — an experience he said pre-

pared him for some of the more challenging injuries he’s addressed in the NBA.

“Football really honed my skills and ability to be a professional athletic trainer in basketball. In football you see a lot of contact injuries, acute injuries every Sunday. In basketball you see a lot of overuse and wear-and-tear injuries,” he explains. “You’re talking about 82 games a year, and sometimes the playoffs. Some players have what I call a timeline of injury patterns that date back to the time when they were in high school, in AAU [American Amateur Union] or in college. In football you had six days to get them ready to play again, but in basketball there are fewer [recovery] days.

The mental portion of rehabilitation can be grueling, and trainers play an important role in making recovery time as easy as possible for the injured player.

“It’s the psychological and analytical aspect of the game that fans and family don’t see. You really have to help them understand what to expect during rehab and to be optimistic about their return,” Powell says. “Sometimes they can get down on themselves, and sometimes there’s a lot of pressure on them to get back to the level that they were before. So it’s about minimizing the pressure as much as possible.”

Powell refers to a devastating injury that former Clippers guard Shawn Livingston suffered in 2007 when he dislocated his kneecap and tore the anterior cruciate, posterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments in his knee.

The late Dr. Tony Daly, the Clippers doctor at the time, was quoted as saying, “I’ve never seen an injury like this in basketball.” Several basketball commentators called it the worst sports injury they had ever seen, and a few predicted that Livingston would never play again. But last year Livingston was part of the Golden State Warriors team that won the NBA championship.

Michael Tillery, a certified athletic trainer who writes for a variety of online sports blogs, credits Powell with potentially saving Livingston’s leg.

“If Jasen Powell didn’t pop Livingston’s knee back in place after he suffered the injury on the floor, there was a chance his leg would have been amputated, because blood circulation would have been affected with his knee and leg basically going in different directions,” Tillery wrote in the sports blog Shadow League.

“It’s probably the second worst injury I’ve ever seen, the first being one that I saw in football,” Powell says, referring to a gruesome compound leg fracture of a 49ers lineman. “We did our part as athletic trainers and medical staff to prepare [Livingston] to get ready mentally to endure the long road that he had to travel to get back to where he is today.”

A Clutch Performance

Paul, no stranger to the media spotlight, says that while much of Powell’s work goes unnoticed by the public, the players appreciate it.

“Fans don’t always see what goes on behind the scenes in order for us to able to go out there and perform the way that we want to. Our bodies have to be in great condition. JP exercises every possible option to keep us healthy and get us back on the court,” Paul says.

Powell treated Paul in May after Paul suffered a hamstring injury early in the Clippers’ dramatic Game 7 first round Western Conference series against the then-defending NBA champion San Antonio Spurs. Paul’s fast return was a key factor in the Clippers advancing in the playoffs — with one second left on the clock, Paul scored the go-ahead basket on a pull-up jump shot to win the series.

“JP and our chiropractor worked their magic on me,” Paul says. “That’s what he does.”

gary@argonautnews.com

L.A. County Public Works has an app for that

A storm drain at Centinela Avenue and Teale Street in Playa Vista is completely clogged with vegetation
Photo by Linda McNally

A little green space can be a welcome addition to a city streetscape — except when it’s a bunch of weeds clogging up a storm drain with El Niño on the way.

That’s the situation on Centinela Avenue near Teale Street, where one of nature’s guerilla gardens is blocking up a drain across the road from the future Playa Vista office of Yahoo Inc.

Local dentist Kevin McNally, whose practice is located behind th e drain, and his wife Linda McNally said they’ve reported the problem to various local authorities. A few years ago, a call to the Hyperion Treatment Plant got the drain cleared out, but this year the McNallys say a Hyperion rep referred them to the L.A. Bureau of Street Services, which referred them to the L.A. Bureau of Sanitation — all, so far, to no avail.

“Recent rains over the last few months fed the growth, and now the drain is effectively blocked and the water puddle can extend into the middle lane of Centinela,” Kevin McNally says. “Aside from the nuisance of passing cars at high speeds splashing water onto the front of my building, the opportunity for an auto accident as cars careen westbound on Centinela and hit this water hazard is predictable.”

Even in dry weather, the area has been prone to crashes. Last year a driver traveling on Centinela lost control and his car jumped the curb, striking McNally’s building. A block away at Major Street, a driver lost control and crashed into Evolution Fitness earlier this year.

L.A. County Public Works spokesman Mike Kaspar, who tells The Argonaut he’ll alert dispatch to the drain, says there are two ways that people can alert authorities of similar problems and expect a quick response.

A department smartphone app called The Works allows users to report clogged drains, graffiti, illegal dumping and other issues — regardless of jurisdiction — by uploading a photo of the problem. The app uses the phone’s GPS coordinates to alert the correct city or county agency, Kaspar says.

Another option is to call the County Public Works dispatch line at (800) 675-HELP (4357).

We’ll keep an eye on the drain. Meanwhile, “I wish I could get my tomatoes to grow like that,” McNally says.

— Joe Piasecki

Playa Vista first-grader leads schoolwide letter-writing campaign to support active-duty military overseas

By Gary Walker

Deklan Emmersen displays a couple of the 500-plus letters he inspired his classmates to create
Photo by Joe Piasecki

For six-year-old Deklan Emmersen, what started out as a simple act to lift the spirits of a family friend quickly turned into a lesson about the power of an idea.

Deklan, a first-grader at Playa Vista Elementary School, was inspired to write letters of support to active duty U.S.  armed services members stationed overseas after seeing a Wounded Warriors Project commercial on television. The TV spot was about returning veterans who were physically disabled and others who found coming home from the battlefield to be a mentally challenging transition.

In a matter of days, Deklan’s decision to take action morphed into a schoolwide effort that will result in more than 500 personal letters from local kids being delivered to overseas service members in time for Thanksgiving. Deklan has enlisted his Cub Scout pack to write letters as well.

Those letters will soon be delivered to Operation Gratitude, a nonprofit organization that sends some 100,000 care packages, complete with letters and holiday treats, abroad each year.

Deklan’s family has a longtime friend who is a commander in the U.S. Navy, said his father, Derik Emmersen. Deklan told his dad that he feels sad the family friend is often deployed far from home for long periods of time.

“I asked him if he wanted to write just one letter or if he wanted to lead this, and he said he wanted to lead it,” Emmersen said of his son. “I told him that he had the responsibility to present the idea to his teacher and the school principal himself.”

After meeting with teacher Tammy Ritch and Playa Vista Elementary School Principal Rebecca Johnson to talk about his plan, Deklan was encouraged to invite the entire school to join his project during one of the school’s weekly Monday assemblies last month.

Deklan was nervous about speaking during the assembly, he said, “but nobody could tell that I was.”

“It’s pretty impressive,” Ritch said. “It means a lot to me because my husband’s in the military, and I think of this every year for a project with my kids. But to have it come from him was even more special.”

Ritch’s husband, who did two tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan and is now in the Army Reserves, was at the assembly where Deklan announced his plan to write to soldiers.

“I didn’t know exactly what the meeting with Principal Johnson was about but when I heard Deklan tell us about what he wanted to do I was just beaming, because I was having all of these connections that I could bring to light to help him make his vision come true,” Ritch recalled.

Ritch said Deklan’s letter-writing idea inspired his classmates and gave her the opportunity to talk about how to be inspired in a broader sense.

“These are the kind of life lessons that we really like to have in the classroom. [The students] really enjoy learning about these types of experiences, and this way they can make that connection,” she said.  “And when they’re able to make these connections as they did with Deklan’s speech, they really light up.”

Learn more about Operation Gratitude at operationgratitude.com.

gary@argonautnews.com

LAUSD approves Playa Vista Elementary overflow satellite on Orville Wright campus but insists that sixth graders mix with other kids

By Gary Walker

Playa Vista Elementary School is expanding to include a satellite campus in Westchester

A reconfiguration of Orville Wright Middle School in Westchester will accommodate overflow enrollment at Playa Vista Elementary School with a satellite campus for the school’s fourth and fifth graders, but the plan stops short of doing what some of their parents wanted: a stand-alone middle school program for Playa Vista kids.

With a $2.5-million investment in laboratory and classroom upgrades, LAUSD hopes to establish a new sixth- to eighth-grade program at Orville Wright, which already has a science and technology magnet program, to serve students arriving from all Westchester-area elementary schools. Construction is set to begin in 2017.

As early as next fall, Playa Vista Elementary fourth and fifth graders will also get satellite classroom space at Orville Wright to accommodate a Playa Vista baby boom driving increased K-3 enrollment at the Bluff Creek Drive campus.

Approved 6-1 by LAUSD board members on Dec. 8, the reorganization plan also earmarks $7.6 million to build four new classrooms and possibly a new library at Playa Vista Elementary by 2020.

A handful of Playa Vista parents on hand to push the board for a stand-alone middle school program for kids aging out of Playa Vista Elementary left the meeting fuming, some saying LAUSD Supt. Ramon Cortines had backpedaled on earlier promises to deliver just that.

Some Playa Vista parents kept their children home from school on Dec. 6 and 7 to signal their dissatisfaction.

Playa Vista parent Alexander Stein touted the tremendous success of the elementary school and implored the board to keep that going.

“There are still new parents in Westchester, there are plenty of new parents in Playa del Rey and Playa Vista who are here today saying to you: ‘Let us create this great school. Give us the tools we need. Give us the collaboration we need with each other and give us, honestly, our own school to create something that will draw in families back into the district.’”

LAUSD Board President Steven Zimmer, who represents the Westside, said during the meeting that district leaders must focus on cultivating the best outcomes for all area students.

Supt. Ramon Cortines defended the reorganization plan and sharply criticized what he characterized as a desire to keep Playa Vista middle schoolers separated from students of other socio-economic backgrounds.

A former superintendent of Pasadena schools, Cortines recalled conversations he had with white parents who were concerned about their children attending school with African-American kids for the first time following a 1970 court order to desegregate the Pasadena Unified School District.

“There are some people in this community who don’t want their children to go to school with other children because of class. There are people who feel entitled because of where they grew up and where they live. You’re going to have to get over that. We cannot escape [integration] anymore,” Cortines said. “I would never recommend to this board that it approve a plan that would not be inclusive of all of the other schools.”

Not all parents in attendance agreed with the notion that Playa Vista should have a middle school program to itself at Orville Wright.

“There is no place in the Westchester area for division and separation,” Westchester resident Kelly Moriaski, a kindergarten teacher at Paseo Del Rey Natural Science Magnet in Playa del Rey, told the school board. “You have an amazing opportunity here to make Orville Wright a great school.”

The reorganization plan for Orville Wright could also have a domino effect on at least two other Westchester-based schools.

Westside Innovative School House (WISH) Charter School is sharing space at Orville Wright and would be required to relocate under the new reorganization plan.

Cortines is recommending that WISH take over Westchester-Emerson Community Adult School, pending a feasibility study and further analysis by district officials.

School board member Monica Ratliff questioned why Emerson alone was chosen as the possible relocation site. Casting the lone vote against the Orville Wright reorganization plan, Ratliff questioned the fairness of the adult school being put forth as the only school that might be uprooted to make room for WISH.

“It sounds like you’re trying to provide WISH with a strategic location. It sounds like we’re trying to do things for WISH that we don’t do for other charter schools,” Ratliff told Cortines.

Cortines, who proposed moving the adult school to the Westchester Enriched Sciences Magnets campus, said he supports adult education but thinks that with a proper redesign WISH would be a good fit for the Emerson campus.

Zimmer cautioned his colleagues that the vote probably won’t be the last time board members are confronted with facilities shortages and tensions between various schools and communities.

“This may be happening in my district now,” he said before the vote, “but it’s coming soon to a district near you.”

gary@argonautnews.com

Editor’s note (12/18): The quote in this story by Alex Stein has been changed to more fully and accurately reflect what was said during the meeting.

Playa Vista is celebrating new bus service to Culver City and 85 new homes coming onto the market.

On Dec. 14, Culver CityBus Line 4 extended its route down Jefferson Boulevard to include stops at E.A. Way and across the street from the new Runway at Playa Vista, connecting the retail and entertainment complex to the West Los Angeles Transit Center and the Expo Line light rail station at La Cienega Boulevard.

The free Playa Vista shuttle also expanded service hours and will run from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays, from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturdays and from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sundays, with plans to expanded demand-responsive service for residents.

On Saturday, Dec. 19, Playa Vista master developer Brookfield Residential will put the 30 three-story detached residences that make up its newly built Marlowe neighborhood on the market starting in the high $2-millions. The newly built Marlow homes, each offering up to 3,341 square feet, have four or five bedrooms, three-and-a-half baths and two-car private garages.

Last month, 55 three-story homes that make up Playa Vista’s Everly neighborhood went on the market at $2 million or more each. Everly homes are each up to 2,449 square feet in size with three to five bedrooms, three-and-a-half to four baths, two car private garages and one guest space.

More than 150 homes in Playa Vista’s actively for sale Skylar and Camden neighborhoods have sold since mid-2014, with many of the buyers coming from tech and creative industries, a Brookfield spokesman said.

“Our previous collections of new homes are almost completely sold out,” said Brookfield Director of Marketing Alison Girard. “We have responded to market demand with neighborhoods that emphasize smart spaces, style and flexibility.”

— Joe Piasecki

The meaning of the mural outside Whole Foods Playa Vista is up to you

By Christina Campodonico

On one side of Dourone’s mural, a lone tree is crowded by buildings (left); on the other, a hand either adds or removes another tree

It isn’t often that you’re arrested by the image of a giant, rainbow-colored hand, but if you’ve visited the Whole Foods inside The Runway at Playa Vista you’ll know what I’m talking about.

The psychedelic appendage studded with celestial objects reaches down from above to either plant or pull up a tree, while a black-and-white cityscape swirls distortedly in the background. On the neighboring wall, a little palm tree sticks out from the center of a ring of blue houses that’s inside a circle of red buildings surrounded by a loop of yellow skyscrapers.

At lunchtime on a sunny afternoon, the image begs the question: Who made that?

Several calls and emails later, I tracked down Dourone (pronounced however you would like, according to him), the Spanish street artist turned muralist who painted the giant work across from the dining patios of Whole Foods and Hopdoddy Burger Bar.

Dourone (aka Fabio López Gonzalo) is not a man of many words, but his images speak volumes.

From Playa Vista to Hollywood to Paris, Dourone has created whimsical worlds that are big and bold. Pouty ingénues with pursed lips and yearning eyes, sliced up like skin on a plastic surgeon’s table, peer out at you (or is it the camera?) in Hollywood. Freeways snake and skyscrapers spike through cracked open craniums in Downtown L.A. A removed human mask reveals an owl-eyed infinity sign in Filipino Town. Wherever he goes, Dourone makes his mark.

He calls his style “sentipensante,”which is a contraction of the Spanish words for feeling and thinking, first coined by Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano. Similarly, seeing Dourone’s work is like a one-two punch — a hit of color to the eye and a seizure of possible meanings to the head.

It was Dourone’s strong aesthetic that attracted Runway developers Lincoln Property Company to commission another work by the artist, who has populated their Kodak Campus in Hollywood with those aforementioned camera-ready starlets. They also commissioned additional artists from Dourone’s Do Art Foundation to create murals for other wall spaces around Runway.

“All of the artists that came over to Runway, they added the final textural element to the project,” says Lincoln Property Co. Senior Executive Vice President David Binswanger.

“Their creativity mixed with their execution surprised all of us,” Binswanger said, adding that Dourone’s mural in particular “brought life to that edge of the project,” which would otherwise be a gray concrete corner.

The mural — called “Extinción,” or “Extinction” in English — took 17 days to paint and has been up since March 2015.

More surprising than the speed of Dourone’s execution is the freedom with which he was able to make the mural. Lincoln Property Co. indicated some of their preferences after Dourone showed them samples of his work, but they really did let Dourone have free reign.

“Here’s your canvas; do what you want,” Binswanger recalls of handing over the aesthetic keys to Dourone.

From the look of it, Dourone didn’t hold back.

— Christina Campodonico

“Extinction” could be interpreted as a statement about the value of green space and the consequences of overdevelopment. Could it be construed as a comment on Playa Vista itself, or a playful reaction to some people’s concerns that Playa Vista itself represented too much development?

As the name of the mural said, to me the interpretation of this design is extinction: We are moving all the trees for building. I do not see it as a critique of Playa Vista, but a general criticism of what is happening worldwide. But [“Extinction”] can have the meaning you want it to have depending on how positive or negative you are, because the hand [in the mural] may set or remove [the tree].

And this is the game I see with this mural — that you can see the hand removing trees to build, but you can also think that it’s planting trees to color the city.

How did you come up with the name “Dourone?” In English, “dour” means “relentlessly severe, stern, or gloomy in manner or appearance.”

Initially it means nothing. I have chosen the letters based on their shape and not based on their meaning. Once I decided that I liked “dour” I looked into a dictionary and saw what the word meant, but it was chance. The “one” was put in at a time in my life that I was doing graffiti and it was the way to say I was the first to paint “dour.”

On your website you have the motto “Art for the People.” How does that philosophy reflect your work?

It reflects my work because the people I meet and my experience with them inspires me a lot. When people are happy with my artwork it makes me eager to work. I think that when you work in the street, whether you like it or not, you do it for the people. You are working in a place where people live and generally in high-traffic areas. There are many parts of my work where people influence me. That’s why I think my work is for the people.

christina@argonautnews.com