The citizens of Hollywood want more for their tax dollars. The councilor says he is trying

Grab everything. Hollywood's Lexington Park won't be getting a new playground, and that's good news and bad news.

To explain, let me take you back to April 15, when I tagged along with Sabine Phillips on her weekly three-hour assessment of the area's perennial garbage problem. Phillips, a janitor, was hired by one of his clients a few years ago to help clean their driveways.

So every Wednesday, Phillips would head out in his yellow Huffy boat and haul in the 50 or so illegally dumped items he reported to the city's 311 system for pickup. And every Saturday, he would fill four or five large bags with small pieces and scraps of garbage.

At the end of the three hours Phillips and I, who had help that day from volunteer Keith Johnson, visited the Lexington pocket park. There were no children there, and there never have been, Phillips said. That's because of the glass and needles in the sand, drug use, random violence, gang tags on slides and homeless camps.

A young man from the Department of Recreation and Parks showed up and said that the park is in the process of being developed which could cost up to $300,000. In my April 18 column, I questioned the wisdom of investing in a playground that will remain unsafe unless there is a plan to address all of the aforementioned issues.

Nick Barnes-Batista, communications director for LA City Council Member Hugo Soto-Martínez, wrote to tell me that his office was not aware of any playground activities planned for that park.

A spokesperson for Recreation and Parks told me that despite what an employee I met at the park said, there is no “immediate playground replacement project on the books.” But the department is “working closely” with the councilor's office to “identify funding sources and engage with the community in the broader development of parks and/or their use.”

OK, so it's good news that taxpayer funds won't be plowed into a park that could be lost to the area almost immediately, because of all the problems mentioned above.

But it is bad news and a sad commentary that a park in the heart of a densely populated city will remain unusable for the foreseeable future.

The most important consideration, however, is the question of what is being done to prevent the illegal dumping of furniture, mattresses and other items that sit on the side of the road and often end up as structures for new homeless camps.

There are a number of social centers in the area, said Stefanie Keenan, a long-time volunteer and activist. He is the one who hired his housekeeper to help him take care of the neighborhood, and he insists that there is not enough enforcement of existing laws to deal with the problems that plague and threaten public safety, given the crime and the frequent fires.

Soto-Martínez agreed to talk to me about all this on Friday morning, when he came out of the Bresee Foundation, a non-profit organization with a range of activities to enrich youth and families in the low-income immigrant community, as well as programs to prevent homelessness. Workers and volunteers, hired with the support of the council office, would enter the nearby streets with shovels, brooms and garbage bags.

Soto-Martínez acknowledged the many challenges of his district, told the gathering that the strength of the community is its people, and thanked them for their work.

The councilman, a former labor leader who joined the growing LA City Council in 2022 with the support of the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, has three opponents in the June 2 primary (Colter Carlisle, Dylan Kendall and Rich Sarian). He told me that the city should do a better job of educating people about illegal dumping and how to report it. A related challenge, he said, “is how quickly we can get to it. And that's a budget issue because we've cut a lot of positions in garbage collection.”

Soto-Martínez said her office used discretionary funds to hire two LA Conservation Corps workers to pick up trash. In terms of homelessness, he said, he has a team that plans to deal with the needs, and a medical team that works on the streets, and a small home town is working.

But the housing shortage is a big challenge, he said, and when it comes to concentrated homelessness, “now we're starting to deal with the most difficult cases.” Namely serious mental illness and serious addiction, both of which often fall under the category.

“We've created another team that goes out every day. We're knocking on doors, by email and by phone with people who are at risk of being evicted,” said Soto-Martínez, adding that homelessness has dropped by 25% during his three years in office.

So what is his message to voters who say they don't see enough progress?

“Please give us patience and kindness,” he said. “There are many examples like this, where we are not only looking at one thing, we are dealing with four or five things.”

All of that is true, but the patience he's asking for is wearing thin on some voters.

“We need to find common ground and work together,” Soto-Martínez said. “You know, they see trash as a problem, and they do it their way and we do it our way. But how can we come together and do it together? You know, we're happy to build those networks, and under many of the problems they describe, I don't disagree. … We all have the same goal.”

LA City Council Member Hugo Soto-Martínez gives a pep talk to volunteers before they head out to clean up his neighborhood's streets of trash and debris.

(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

When Soto-Martínez went another time, volunteers took to the streets, filling garbage bags. They went up to Vermont, and a Bresee employee told me that they work the same roads every day, trying to clear the way for a “safe route” as students walk to and from school.

As I said in a previous column, it's inspiring to see people fighting for their communities, whether it's out of pride or frustration. And it's reasonable to expect more from City Hall.

I drove to Western and Sierra Vista, met Keenan, and told him about my conversation with Soto-Martínez. He said the city's lax policies and unresponsiveness to citizens' calls for help have created unsolvable problems that residents face on a daily basis. He said city officials should do a better job of helping homeless people on the streets and preventing neighborhood decay.

He was encouraged by a message he received from a representative of the Mayor's office, Karen Bass, who wanted to visit the area with him.

We drove west on Sierra Vista and found an abandoned couch, cabinets, mattresses, and a man who had been living on the side of the road for months. He sat next to his belongings that spilled onto the road.

Why hasn't this been fixed? Keenan asked aloud. She has decided to stop paying a housekeeper to help deal with the needs of the neighbors, and predicts that things will get worse as a result.

I drove to the Lexington pocket park, which Soto-Martínez called a priority, among many other priorities. Friday was a holiday – Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day. With schools closed, the park would become a small neighborhood asset.

But the door was closed, there was a lock on the gate, and two tarred houses were set against the metal fence of an empty park.

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