“I yelled at the attacker, and took water to the victim and washed his face. “I was walking to work, and I saw someone pepper-spray a homeless man,” Shomof remembered. But the neighborhood is also where Shomof says his perspective on homelessness was forever sealed as a teenage immigrant in the 1970s. Shomof first gained prominence in the 2000s as a downtown Los Angeles developer nicknamed the “King of Spring” for buying and repurposing old commercial buildings. Readers share their memories of the iconic, nearly century-old Sears in Boyle Heights, which will soon close. Opinion Letters to the Editor: How the Boyle Heights Sears was a ticket to the middle class “It’s not just to take people off the street,” he responded. I wish there was more people like Bill.”Ī 50-page white paper claims the Life Rebuilding Center will be “known across the nation as the ultimate solution for managing homelessness issues in cities of all types and sizes.”Īn impossible promise, I told Taormina, as we stared at the enormity of emptiness around us. “But if it gets built, we’ll definitely participate. The Orange County-based nonprofit runs homeless shelters in Orange County, some financed by Taormina. “It’s a little big,” said Illumination Foundation CEO Paul Leon. He toured the Sears building last fall and said his organization “is honored to be a resource for them to see if this might be a solution.” “It’s big, isn’t it?” chuckled Sean Kelsey, general secretary for the California South division of the Salvation Army, for which he also serves as the Los Angeles Metro coordinator. “This is a gargantuan problem that requires all hands on deck to solve, so I am open to all solutions that can address the suffering we see with homelessness.” “I welcome people who want to productively work on solving this humanitarian crisis and house people as quickly as possible,” Boyle Heights Council Member Kevin de León said in a statement. That’s the reaction I got when I contacted some of those in the know. They say everyone who has heard about it has been impressed, if not flabbergasted by its ambition. Shomof and Taormina have shared their Life Rebuilding Center idea with prospective partners and members of the Los Angeles City Council and county board of supervisors, but are now making it public. “This will not be a warehouse and a bunk bed and a bag of Cheetos. “I want you to feel the light,” remarked the soft-spoken Taormina as he gestured to large windows with a great eastern view of Boyle Heights and beyond. We took an old-school cargo elevator to the second floor. “You can’t even get this much concrete anymore.” “To build this today would be completely impossible,” Shomof said. The remnants of an old boiler lay in the center of the floor. Construction workers in neon-green vests and bright-orange, long-sleeved shirts buzzed around. We entered the dusty, empty Sears building, stripped down to cement pillars and roof. I told Shomof his proposal was too good to be true. And once the so-called Life Rebuilding Center is complete, the parking lot would become the site of more than 1,000 permanent affordable housing units for people who graduate from the facility’s six-month rehabilitation program.Īll this makes the California Aqueduct seem as big of an achievement as mowing the lawn.Īnd all of this, frankly, sounds delusional. Shomof would spend an estimated $200 million for the initial build-out, while Taormina would assemble a coalition of homeless nonprofits to oversee day-to-day operations under the auspices of a joint-powers authority between L.A. One of the largest homeless facilities in Los Angeles, Union Rescue Mission, can hold about 1,000 people. To put that number into perspective, the 2021 Housing Inventory County conducted by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority found that L.A.’s shelter capacity was 14,854 beds.
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