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Preservationists Fight to Preserve Historic Interiors

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Category: Community News

Published on Tuesday, 01 December 2009 00:07

Written by Laura Meyers

West Adams area residents played a strong role in persuading the Los Angeles City Planning Commission to continue protecting historical monument interiors through the city’s Cultural Heritage Ordinance at a hearing held Thursday, September 10.  By day’s end, the commissioners agreed by voting 7 to 1 to continue the practice of allowing interiors to be included and regulated as part of a landmark designation.

Dozens of historic preservationists spoke at the commission’s final hearing, arguing that historic interiors can be just as important as exteriors -- sometimes more so.  Speakers argued passionately that in communities such as West Adams, renovations of historic homes and buildings, and adaptive reuse, have helped revitalize the entire community.  The city’s Office of Historic Resources has spent nearly two years in an effort to update the ordinance which has been in effect since 1962. The ordinance governs how buildings and sites can be selected to become Historic Cultural Monuments (HCM), plus their designations; who serves on the Cultural Heritage Commission as well as how proposed updates and alterations -- both structural and cosmetic -- are to be handled.   At present, there are more than 960 designated HCMs throughout Los Angeles, with about 125 of these within West Adams and another several dozen in nearby neighborhoods.

The controversy about the ordinance’s updating arose when a handful of Downtown owners of historic properties aligned with Central City Association, an organization representing Downtown business interests, to oppose many elements of the existing and proposed ordinance.  In particular, these Downtowners argued against including building interiors in HCM designations -- with few exceptions.  But interiors have been a part of HCM designation for 47 years and of the about 70 existing HCMs in Downtown, a large number of these receive tax credits which require their interiors to remain historically intact. There were other Downtown owners of HCMs who simply supported interior designations. So it appeared to observers that the Downtown group represented, at best, about 30 properties.

When the city planners, nonetheless, suddenly adopted the Central City Association’s version in July without either including the historic preservation organizations from neighborhoods throughout the city -- or even notifying these groups of the change -- hundreds of people wrote letters and e-mails and showed up to a hearing to testify AGAINST the proposed ordinance as presented and FOR continuing to include interiors. The ordinance would not only free up downtown commercial property owners allowing them to  change culturally significant interiors but would extend to private property as well, allowing new home owners to gut historic homes if they chose to. West Adams Heritage Association (WAHA),  North University Park Community Association (NUPCA) and United Neighborhoods Neighborhood Council (UNNC) were among many neighborhood-based organizations who argued that “Downtown does not speak for me”.

The Planning Commission listened at that point and deferred taking action, instead sending the ordinance back for new rounds of discussion.  Over two months during the summer, historic preservationists participated in a Working Group formed by the Planning Department that spent more than 15 hours trying to persuade some of the city’s most powerful interests to withdraw their opposition to designating interiors.   The preservation coalition included representatives of the Art Deco Society of Los Angeles, Highland Park Heritage Trust, Hollywood Heritage, the Los Angeles Conservancy, the Los Angeles Heritage Alliance, Heritage Square, the Los Angeles Historic Theater Foundation, NUPCA and WAHA. In the end, at the Planning Commission hearing in September, their reasoned arguments – in dozens of e-mails and one-minute speeches – prevailed. More public hearings will be held in early 2010 at City Council. For more info, contact

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