Tezozomoc and Rufina Juarez, an MTA transportation planner, are the\r\nelected leaders of the South Central Farm. Their fight with City Hall is, at this juncture, an act\r\nof love and determination. A win means the Farm will be turned over to the Los\r\nAngeles Neighborhood Land Trust, a non-profit assembled by the Mayor’s office\r\nand the City Council in 2002. LANLT is committed to addressing \"the\r\ninequity of open spaces in Los Angles’ underserved neighborhoods, and to\r\nensure community participation and collaboration.\" Juarez and Tezozomoc\r\nhave no assurance that their services would still be needed, even if the Farm is\r\nturned over to LANLT, although Trust for Public Land area director Larry Kaplan\r\nleft open the possibility that they might play a role in a nonprofit garden.\r\n\"I would imagine they would have a role, because they’ve been so involved\r\nin it to date, but that’s not my decision,\" Kaplan said. The Trust is mediating negotiations between the Farmers and Horowitz.<\/p>\r\n
The two have held together and educated the vast majority of the Farmers,\r\nwho, on the whole, had little experience negotiating the corridors of City Hall\r\nprior to the City’s betrayal. Rising to the struggle, only twenty farmers of\r\n350 Farm families have expressed discomfort in the fight to save the farm, and\r\nonly a handful of those have been nervous enough to leave in the three-year\r\nstruggle. One, \"Don Eddie\" Luviano, 82, explains he has opted for the\r\ntranquility, absence of discrimination, and low profile of another nearby\r\ngarden, the Stanford Avalon Community Garden. Some of the South Central Farm\r\nlots remain barren, mostly the result of attrition and the uncertainty of the\r\nFarm’s future.<\/p>\r\n
But the vast majority of the Farmers have opted to stay in the fight,\r\nrejecting a City-suggested move to a waiting list for Stanford Avalon, according\r\nto Tezozomoc.<\/p>\r\n
The South Central Farm draws environmental-justice and Latino activists\r\nbecause it symbolizes the issues that define urban areas with large immigrant\r\npopulations: the preservation of green space and the agricultural traditions\r\nbrought to the U.S. by immigrants.<\/p>\r\n
\"People who come, whether [from] Laos or El Salvador or Mexico, bring\r\nwith them farming skills and farming knowledge that has to a greater extent been\r\nlost in this country,\" said Robert Gottlieb, an Occidental College\r\nurban-environmental-studies professor. \"There have been all kinds of\r\nfascinating stories of people who have taken median strips in major roadways,\r\nplanted in alleyways. The farm at 41st Street is part of that broader\r\nphenomenon.\"<\/p>\r\n
Founded in 1992 as a community garden under the management of the LA\r\nRegional Food Bank, area farmers, largely from Mexico and Central America,\r\nrescued the informal dump and drug site, and over years developed a natural farm\r\ngrowing native fruits and vegetables, sometimes from ancient seeds. When the\r\nCity turned the land over to developer Horowitz in 2003, the farmers organized\r\nto save the farm in spite of warnings that there was little they could do to\r\nprevent the closure of the garden.<\/p>\r\n
The food bank continues to collect $12 per month from each Farmer, or $420 a month from a fully occupied Farm, for the Farm’s water and sanitation\r\nservices. Other than that, the food\r\nbank handed over management to the farmers themselves. \"They basically\r\nlocked a lot of the gates that we used to have keys to,\" said food bank\r\nspokesman Darren Hoffman. He pointed to the success of current management:\r\n\"We don’t go on the property much anymore.\"<\/p>\r\n
The South Central Community Garden has drawn support and contributions\r\nfrom such disparate groups as Food Not Bombs, the Bus Riders Union, Common\r\nVision, local high school MEChA chapters, Green Party gubernatorial candidate\r\nPeter Camejo, environmental activist Julia Butterfly Hill, and Zach de la Rocha, lead singer for Rage Against the Machine, who gave\r\na free concert at the site in November that drew an estimated 3,000 people and on March 12 issued a statement in support at a Farmers' press conference.<\/p>\r\n
Soccer Field in Limbo<\/u><\/p>\r\n
Unresolved in current negotiations between the Farmers and developer Ralph\r\nHorowitz is the future of 2.6 acres of the 14-acre farm that Horowitz promised\r\nto return to the City for use as a soccer field. During the City’s sale of the Farm\r\nto developer Ralph Horowitz, Concerned Citizens of South Central Los Angeles, a\r\nneighborhood group, negotiated and gained 2.6 acres of the 14-acre farm for a\r\ncommunity soccer field through Councilmember Jan Perry. Perry represents\r\nDistrict 9, home for most of the farmers, and was a major beneficiary of Chamber\r\nof Commerce support for her election. Perry has yet to propose to the City any investigation or action on behalf of the Farm.<\/p>\r\n
Perry was stirred to claim the soccer field by community activist\r\nJuanita Tate, according to Tate’s son and Concerned Citizens board member Mark\r\nWilliams. Perry is intervening in the current negotiations for the Farm to\r\npreserve the field. Using a motion from the City Council asserting the\r\nCity’s claim to the soccer field, Perry called on negotiators to report to\r\nCity Council on March 17, although the item apparently was removed from the agenda shortly\r\nbefore the Council meeting.<\/p>\r\n
Williams, seemingly unaware that the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust\r\nwould take over the management of the Farm if the Farmers are successful, was\r\nworried about more than the soccer field. Without reference to the bizarre series\r\nof events that have led to the fight for the Farm, he was concerned that the process\r\nmight be duplicated in the future: \"If you sign an agreement saying you are\r\ngoing to have tenancy on a temporary basis, then when it comes time to go, you\r\nhave to go,\" said Williams. \"We thought it would be two to three\r\nyears, and it turned into 10 to 12. But that doesn’t mean they should receive\r\nsquatters’ rights. How will we ever get people to buy property here or do\r\ndevelopment here?\" It was unclear what plans Concerned Citizens had for the\r\nFarmland a decade ago.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Dissent in Democracy<\/u><\/p>\r\n\r\n
Al Renner, president of the Los Angeles Community Garden Council, after\r\nmeeting with South Central Farmers recently, explained that farmers are not\r\nautonomous in the leadership styles they prefer: \"There are several ways of\r\nrunning a garden. There are the standard democratic rules of organizing, then\r\nyou have benevolent dictators, then you have non-benevolent dictators of\r\ngardens. I find that I would rather do what the will of the people want,\"\r\nRenner said.<\/p>\r\n
As with all democratic organizations, there is dissent. In this case, some\r\nof it has been particularly ugly. Farm leaders have been charged with evicting\r\nfarmers, requiring attendance at City Council meetings, intimidating farmers\r\nwith restraining orders, allowing anonymous flyers attacking some of the\r\nFarmers, and collecting cash as a nonprofit 501(c)3.<\/p>\r\n
The Farm is not a legal nonprofit, although it is filing for nonprofit\r\nstatus, but no donor has claimed that they were advised their contribution was\r\ntax deductible. As to the other charges, Tezozomoc, in an interview, clarified\r\nthat he and Juarez are enacting and enforcing rules that the farm’s membership\r\nvoted to approve. He and Juarez were elected in February 2004 to be the farm’s\r\nleaders and public representatives, and have been reaffirmed in two or three\r\nchallenges to their office. Enforcing the rules is his job, Tezozomoc said, but\r\nadded \"It’s all volunteer. We’re not forcing anybody to be there. We’ve\r\nempowered people to struggle.\"<\/p>\r\n
A few dissident farmers have complained about required participation in\r\npolitical actions, but the food bank, the Farm’s attorneys, and outside\r\norganizations have declined to intervene in democratically-determined farm\r\npolicies. A USC graduate student claimed she and fellow social work students\r\nwere asked to leave when they interfered in Farm policies. However USC graduate\r\nstudents in urban planning remain involved with the Farm.<\/p>\r\n
Juan Gamboa remains on the Farm, despite being arrested and briefly\r\nhospitalized after a November 8 fight with Juarez and Tezozomoc. He accused\r\nJuarez of provoking the attack by saying, \"I have more pants than all of\r\nyou. Put on your skirts, bunch of ignorants.\"<\/p>\r\n
And finally, there’s Margarito Salgado, who has left for the Stanford\r\nAvalon garden with Don Eddie: \"We began to realize that they were not\r\nreally concerned with the interests of the garden,\" said, 59, who, like\r\nmany gardeners, left the South-Central farm earlier this year and now gardens at\r\nthe new Stanford Avalon Community Garden near Watts. \"We’re not opposed\r\nto the other farm. We don’t want it to close. But there needs to be another\r\nadministration.\"<\/p>\r\n