ENVIRONMENTAL REPORT RELEASED FOR EXPO LINE

Although I'm sure you've heard already, I just wanted to let you know that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has released its final environmental impact report for the Expo Line Phase I. All the documents are at http://www.mta.net/projects_plans/exposition/feis.htm but I doubt anyone who isn't a traffic engineer would want to read anything but the Executive Summary.

I had forgotten to mention this at the time, but the picture of the "modern bus" that you posted in your July editorial against use of the Cheviot Hills right-of-way for the Expo Line is of a Metroliner that will only be used on the Orange Line busway up in the Valley. Articulated buses of that length cannot easily be used on city streets.

PETER McFERRIN
Oct. 11, 2005
[McFerrin is an occasional contributor to The Sun.]

TOO MANY RED FLAGS TO PATRONIZE WV BANK

Thanks for telling us about Mr. [Robert] Mednick's lack of attendance and indifference to the office he ran for in the Mar Vista Community Council [Village Representation Stinks, September 2005].

I was considering opening up an account at Wells Fargo — since it is the only bank in the Westside Village–Palms area.  I believe it is important to support local businesses.   However, they must support us back.

If the manager and VP of this bank has a poor attendance record [as a director of the Mar Vista Community Council] and is as indifferent to the community as you say he is, then I doubt he will take good care of my money. . . . There are too many red flags to go ahead and open an account at Wells Fargo.

I would like to see a community-oriented bank, and not a unit of a big chain bank, move here and serve us with respect. 

CLIFF CHENG, Ph.D.
Oct. 10, 2005

[Editor's note: In defense of Wells Fargo's relationship with the community, The Sun would like to point out that the management in San Francisco contacted the editor for assistance in decorating the bank before it was opened on Palms Blvd. just east of Sepulveda.

[The result was a large mural on the east wall showing historic views of Palms, including the old Palms Theater (where the post office is now), the Palms Library when it was across the street from Woodbine Park and the landmark Palms Railroad Station, which is now the visitors' reception center at Heritage Square in the Arroyo Seco.

[Branch manager Mednick has also offered space at the bank for the Palms Neighborhood Council — or any other community organization — to distribute fliers or other information about local events.

[There is another Wells Fargo Bank in Palms — on Washington Blvd. But that one (even though it is within the city limits of Los Angeles) is known as the Culver City branch and has no mural or any other sign indicating its connection with Palms.]

Bank manager showed his commitment to a local nonprofit

I just wanted to throw in my two cents about the bank situation in Palms: try the CalNational on Overland. It's not exactly in Palms, but it's just up the street [at Pico], and the people are wonderful.

I run a nonprofit learning center in Palms (also on Overland). Although we serve over 60 students now, when we opened a year ago we had a roster of four kids. And, one afternoon, Wendell New (vice president and the manager of the Rancho Park branch) walked in. We had almost no money — and would never be a big account for them. But he made an appointment with me, came to me (at my convenience), made a presentation and within a couple of days we opened an account.

Not only are Wendell and the rest of his staff consistently friendly and helpful — but they also made a generous donation to our fledging organization and are clearly committed to serving the local community.

They're good folks. So, if you're looking for a bank, give them a try.

TIFFANI CHIN
[Oct. 20, 2005]

[Editor's note: What's more, Palms Business Representative F. Danny Monempour has his office in the same building.]

SHOULD BILLBOARDS BE IN NON-ENGLISH LANGUAGES?

Signs in Spanish are offensive and discriminatory

I would like to find out how I can voice my protest and concerns about McDonald's all-Spanish billboard advertising via Vista Media on Exposition Blvd. just north of Palms Blvd. near the 10 Freeway.
 
I have called Vista Media Group several times to protest this all-Spanish-language sign. My calls fall on deaf ears. They replaced the one sign with an English Honda ad and then put up another McDonald's all-Spanish sign a few feet away. 
 
I find it offensive and discriminatory as I do not speak Spanish. This is the United States, and it should at least have English with Spanish subtext. This letter is not about being racist or prejudiced against Latins or Spanish-speaking people. We more than accommodate Spanish-speaking people now to the point where English is being eliminated, and this is wrong!
 
However, as an English-speaking person, in the United States of America, where English is our national language, I am finding more and more businesses putting up all-Spanish signs. and this is not fair nor inclusive of English-speaking people like myself.  I get the message that English is being replaced; we as English-speaking people are being replaced and ignored, forced to leave or speak their language.
 
I would like to petition to have this offensive sign removed. It is all in Spanish. and I don't want it in my neighborhood unless they are willing to include English in the advertisement. I have tried to contact McDonald's corporate offices and get no return phone calls either. Who can I contact to get someone's ears and attention to investigating this blatant discrimination against English-speaking people? If they start with one all-Spanish ad, then sooner rather than later we will have more signs in Spanish because we allow this discrimination.
 
I encourage any other English-speaking person who feels the same as I do about all-Spanish billboards in our neighborhood to call Vista Media Group at [omitted] and voice your concerns and requests to have this sign removed or replaced with English first and Spanish in the subtext.

If we have to accommodate Spanish-speaking people who refuse to learn English and live here, we can at least set standards that signs in our neighborhoods should be bilingual and certainly be in English primarily, with Spanish subtext.
 
TOM HICKEY
Sept. 20, 2005
[Hickey is a 10-year Palms resident who lives on National southeast of Overland. The sign in question has been replaced by one in Portuguese (above, right), with English translation.]

No group should be made to feel unwelcome in stores

The knee-jerk liberal in me wants to say that Tom Hickey is engaging in bigotry, however unintentional. (Who uses the term Latins anymore, and how the hell does anyone get along in this town without at least a cursory knowledge of Spanish?)

But he's right to denounce the proliferation of Spanish-only signs and billboards.

I disagree with his insistence on English being in a larger typeface than Spanish or other languages, but I don't think anyone can argue that signage ought to be intelligible to as many people as possible; since English is the language of 90% of Americans, it ought to appear at least somewhere on every sign.

No group should EVER be made to feel unwelcome in a commercial establishment owned by a member of ANY ethnicity, which is what single-language signs do in places where there is a multiplicity of languages spoken. In the case of billboards, this feeling of "you're not welcome here" can be extended to a neighborhood as a whole. Business owners in ethnically diverse communities like Palms should try to make their establishments feel welcome to all.

Friends from the San Gabriel Valley — Asian, Latino, and Anglo — have indicated to me that the proliferation of Chinese-only signage, in similarly diverse places like Monterey Park and Pasadena, has contributed significantly to racial tensions in the region. It quite clearly tells non-Chinese that they are unwanted in a store, and that's just not right. Here in L.A., I encountered much the same situation vis-a-vis Korean-owned businesses when I lived in Koreatown — and most of the people in that neighborhood are actually Latino immigrants!

Yes, there's a long and deeply unpleasant history of discrimination against non-Anglos in this town. (To be fair, LA's got nothing on San Diego in that department.) Whether or not we're truly past that, one thing is clear: there is NO tangible benefit to be gained by the Latino community if it advertises only in Spanish.

Some may argue that America is a "salad bowl" instead of a "melting pot," but salads don't have all their ingredients on separate plates!

PETER McFERRIN
Sept. 22, 2005

Excuse me for not knowing what Latin people want to be called this week

I would like to respond to Peter Ferrin's accusation of me being a bigot.  I don't understand — if a person is Latin, Irish, German, Filipino — how is that being a bigot for referring to one's culture? 
 
Recently, I was told Latin people do not want to be called Hispanic, which in school for years we were taught means "of Spanish descent."  Excuse me for not knowing what Latin people want to be called this week.  I asked many of my friends who are LATIN. and they told me that in no way was my letter or reference to their culture in any way offensive or bigoted.
 
We can't keep accommodating everyone to the point of excluding the English language. My great-great grandfather came here from Germany and learned English right away.  They spoke German at home and kept it for the next generation. and we still celebrate that culture in other ways, but they came to a new country and learned the language.   
 
The point is — why is it we have to have Spanish-, Chinese-, etc.. language-only signs, ads, etc.. period?  The very first thing I now see walking into the Bank of America on National and Sepulveda is a full ALL-SPANISH-language sign.  English is on the back. When I asked the branch manager why. he stated, "Well, English is on the back, you know."

'Nuff said — I got the message loud and clear.  
 
I am not alone in this frustration, but then again I feel I am.  I'm not a bigot for questioning and speaking out against the situation. which. by the way. is growing worse.
 
TOM HICKEY
Oct. 1, 2005
[Hickey's letter has been shortened considerably.

[The sign at the Bank of America Sepulveda-National branch has been turned around, as of Oct. 1, with the English side (aimed at people who want to refinance their homes) facing the entrance and the Spanish side (directed at those who want to send money to their relatives in Mexico with a SafeSend® card) turned toward the interior of the bank.

[Of course, somebody might flip the sign again, without notice.]

WHAT WE HAVE HERE IS A FAILURE OF COMMUNICATION

Why should we be separated from our neighborhood assns.?

I have patiently waded through your e-mails of late and have only one question: Why do you care so about whether we are joined in with other associations for more power, rather than separating us from our neighborhood associations?

BARBARA SPIELBERG
Sept. 20, 2005
[Spielberg is a block captain in the Westside Village Civic Assn.]

I truly don't understand your question

I am not sure that I understand your question. What "neighborhood associations" are you referring to? And what do you mean by "separating"? I have never written about "separating" neighborhood associations, only about separating Palms from Mar Vista so far as neighborhood councils go.

The Mar Vista Community Council and the Palms Neighborhood Councils are not "neighborhood associations"; they are part of the city government and are supposed to be formed in accordance with the City Charter. The charter specifies that the neighborhood councils are to be composed of homeowners, renters and business people and that they are to follow recognized neighborhood boundaries, which wasn't done in the case of Mar Vista.

Westside Village was joined with Mar Vista on the signatures of only 15 people in WV [the reader can count them on the map to the left] and with no notice posted anywhere in the Village and with no notice given to any local organization except the Westside Village Civic Assn.

Does "we" refer to the Westside Village Civic Assn., which is a homeowners' association? Nothing keeps the WVCA from joining with other such homeowners' groups. The information sent you in the WVCA bulletins is really inaccurate; the WVCA didn't "join" the Mar Vista Community Council. It didn't have that authority to do so.

I wish I could answer your question better, but I truly don't understand it.

GEORGE GARRIGUES
Sept. 20, 2005
[Garrigues is the editor and owner of The Palms-Village Sun]

But why does it have so much significance?

My query has to do with why this has such significance to you and why it should be important to WV homeowners.

BARBARA SPIELBERG
Sept. 20, 2005

It's something we learned in elementary school

To me, I guess because I believe in democracy and the rule of law. I think the WV homeowners who signed the petitions — more than a hundred, as I remember — feel the same way. We learn about this in the fifth grade.

I hope this helps your understanding of the situation.

GEORGE GARRIGUES
Sept. 20, 2005