The Los Angeles Metropolis Council voted unanimously Friday to permit the demolition of a century-old constructing within the Westlake neighborhood that served as a Jewish landmark and later because the coronary heart of labor organizing within the metropolis.
The vote was a victory for Catholic Charities, which purchased the constructing traditionally generally known as the B’nai B’rith Lodge in 2018 however later stated it was “significantly dilapidated and structurally unsound” and will threaten the protection of the encompassing neighborhood.
Catholic Charities, a nonprofit group linked to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, filed a lawsuit towards town in 2023, saying it had wrongly been denied permission to tear down the ornate 1924 construction.
The group stated in court docket paperwork that town wouldn’t permit demolition of the property on South Union Avenue as a result of it “could also be historic,” making it topic to additional further evaluate, in addition to as a result of any future initiatives on the lot should adjust to the California Environmental High quality Act.
Group preservationists and advocates argued {that a} potential demolition could be a blow to essential L.A. historical past. As an alternative, they urged Catholic Charities to restore the constructing and put it to make use of.
The Rev. Dylan Littlefield, the chaplain on the Cecil Resort who has change into concerned in preservation battles, stated the lodge’s demolition would imply the destruction of a spot that stood as a “testomony to the resiliency and the range of town of Los Angeles.”
Esotouric, a tour firm that advocates for historic preservation and public coverage, instructed The Instances earlier than the settlement vote was introduced that the general public ought to have an opportunity to remark. The corporate known as the lawsuit — and any potential settlement — a possible “land-use determination about the precise to demolish a cultural useful resource.”
Town legal professional’s workplace declined to remark, citing the pending litigation.
The B’Nai B’rith lodge was designed by the famed Jewish architect Samuel Tilden Norton, who additionally designed the Wilshire Boulevard Temple.
It was constructed within the early Twenties as the house for an L.A. chapter of the B’nai B’rith, a Jewish service group with New York roots. On the time, members of the B’nai B’rith felt a “want to essentially be accepted by the leaders of town,” in accordance with Steven Luftman, a heritage conservation guide.
“They felt that in the event that they solely constructed a grand sufficient assembly corridor, that that may be one step towards being acknowledged as a part of the group,” stated Luftman, who wrote an software for the lodge to be deemed a historic-cultural monument.
After just a few years of being a group hub for Jewish L.A., the constructing was offered in 1930 to the Fraternal Order of Eagles. It then had a short tenure as clubhouse for the Safeway Workers’ Assn. earlier than it grew to become the headquarters of the American Federation of Labor Teamsters Joint Council 42.
It grew to become the location for speedy development of the labor motion, and is the place the Teamsters elected their first Black official, John T. Williams, in accordance with Luftman.
“The AFL Teamster constructing was the center of the Los Angeles labor motion and floor zero for a lot of the union organizing that reworked Los Angeles right into a metropolitan powerhouse,” stated Chris Griswold, Teamsters Joint Council 42 president.
B’nai B’rith Worldwide stated in a press release that the lodge “represents an necessary a part of the historical past of our group in Los Angeles.”
“Nonetheless that is resolved, it will be necessary to the historical past of Los Angeles Jewry to notice that B’nai B’rith met there,” the assertion stated.
Catholic Charities and the archdiocese respect the constructing’s historical past and “have been in communication with each the Jewish group and labor leaders all through this course of,” the non secular teams stated in a joint assertion. “Our concern has at all times been the protection of the dilapidated property and well-being of our neighborhood.”
Within the lawsuit, Catholic Charities stated it has no initiatives deliberate for the lot, and confused that its intention is to easily demolish the lodge.
“Catholic Charities incurs ongoing prices of lots of of hundreds of {dollars} a yr to keep up and safe the constructing, which is vacant, deteriorated and unstable,” the court docket doc learn. “These funds are being diverted from vital applications to assist deprived communities.”
The teams stated their hope was to “work with the group and the council workplace to ultimately discover a use for the property according to Catholic Charities’ mission, similar to group meals service, an emergency shelter, transitional youth housing, earlier than and after faculty care, and older grownup companies.”
Littlefield, the chaplain on the Cecil Resort, stated Catholic Charities’ rationale was “simply an excuse to justify their want to tear the constructing down.”
“The constructing itself could possibly be a spot of empowerment,” Littlefield stated. “The constructing itself could possibly be a spot the place extra actions like this takeoff, the place extra nice issues occur, the place extra lives are saved and altered.”
