Blacks Southern California

Retail giant J. C. Penney Co. is about to adopt a first-of-its-kind minority merchandising program--catering to African-Americans and Latinos--that will have its focal point in Southern California. By October, two dozen Penney stores in Southern California will join the program, offering merchandise that includes new pantyhose developed by Essence magazine, linens with bold African prints and Flori Roberts Cosmetics for women of color.

Ja'Quan Combs and James Stephens, two teenagers from Los Angeles, sat in a bank vice president's office Friday morning in Sherman Oaks and studied the week's receipts from 21 Cal Fed branches. Stephens, in particular, did not like what he saw. Half the branches had not sold a single stock or bond this week. "Too many zeros," Stephens wrote in a note that would soon be blast-faxed to all the branches. And why didn't two Century City branches process any new consumer loan applications this week?

Ja'Quan Combs and James Stephens, two teenagers from Los Angeles, sat in a bank vice president's office Friday morning in Sherman Oaks and studied the week's receipts from 21 Cal Fed branches. Stephens, in particular, did not like what he saw. Half the branches had not sold a single stock or bond this week. "Too many zeros," Stephens wrote in a note that would soon be blast-faxed to all the branches. And why didn't two Century City branches process any new consumer loan applications this week?

If you hung out at independent bookstores like Esowon in Inglewood, Dutton's in Brentwood or the Midnight Special in Santa Monica, you might have noticed an older African American man in corduroy slacks and patch-sleeve jacket who wore his silver hair in a ponytail. Toting a briefcase and a worn leather journal, he went to every book-signing by a black author that he could. Often, he was the only person in line for an autograph.

What is the role of a pastor today? "Enabler, expediter, mobilizer, catalyst, port in time of storm, welcome arch, social activist, priest, economic developer, heart fixer," says Pastor Cecil Murray of the First A.M.E. Church. Murray lives what he preaches. His days and nights are filled with social service and spiritual blessings. He presides over the cycle of life--baptisms, weddings and funerals--with special attention paid to reaching out to those on the edge of trouble.

In the shadow of internal feuds, last spring's riots and the coming verdicts in the Rodney King beating trial, local chapters of the NAACP are struggling to maintain their credibility and voice in Southern California's black community.

It started as a teen-age prank: Dennis had hidden Albert's notebook. One boy started pushing, the other shoved back. Soon, the two high school students were pounding each other with their fists. The scuffle, as Dennis sees it, went deeper than it seemed. Dennis is black and Albert is Latino. In junior high, they had been friends.

Tempers flared early in a debate Wednesday night at Dorsey High School between Los Angeles school board member Barbara Boudreaux and challenger Genethia Hayes when they were asked to explain what sets them apart. "My record really outstrips my opponent's," said Boudreaux, who is seeking a third term. "I do not speak to people in a very demeaning manner, and I don't tell lies about my opponent."

When Dr. Gloria Powell, a black child psychiatrist at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute, speaks about the troubling disparity between the quality of white and black lives, she often uses a word that whites seldom hear and often have trouble swallowing: Negrophobia, the social science theory that explains discrimination as the result of an innate discomfort whites feel toward blacks.

For thousands of people who lined the boulevard under a dreary Los Angeles sky Monday to honor assassinated civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., it was a day to reflect as much on dreams not realized as on those attained. Gone are the days of whites-only drinking fountains, seats at the back of the bus and police dogs unleashed on peaceful protesters.

Inner-city redevelopment may be the hot topic in political and academic circles, but Los Angeles County's black entrepreneurs continue looking elsewhere for economic opportunity, according to a Los Angeles Times Poll. The survey, which included responses from more than 1,400 minority business owners, showed that blacks are more likely than other ethnic minorities in the county to be considering relocating their firms.

Tempers flared early in a debate Wednesday night at Dorsey High School between Los Angeles school board member Barbara Boudreaux and challenger Genethia Hayes when they were asked to explain what sets them apart. "My record really outstrips my opponent's," said Boudreaux, who is seeking a third term. "I do not speak to people in a very demeaning manner, and I don't tell lies about my opponent."

More than two dozen of Los Angeles' most prominent African American ministers, politicians and activists gathered at the city's oldest black church Thursday to announce an interfaith coalition of about 400 churches statewide to combat what they called an emergency situation in the black community. Since mid-September, the coalition has registered 17,000 new Southern California voters in what it said is their campaign's first step, organizers said at First African Methodist Episcopal Church.

The 1980s transformed Southern California into a racial and ethnic smorgasbord, a community rich with colors and accents. Whites continued to move out to the edges of the map, blacks began to leave inner-city areas in record numbers, and Latinos and Asians appeared virtually everywhere. The truths of our recent past have become the myths of our present: South Central is not black; Orange County is no longer white; Koreatown is only 30% Asian.

Retail giant J. C. Penney Co. is about to adopt a first-of-its-kind minority merchandising program--catering to African-Americans and Latinos--that will have its focal point in Southern California. By October, two dozen Penney stores in Southern California will join the program, offering merchandise that includes new pantyhose developed by Essence magazine, linens with bold African prints and Flori Roberts Cosmetics for women of color.

In the shadow of internal feuds, last spring's riots and the coming verdicts in the Rodney King beating trial, local chapters of the NAACP are struggling to maintain their credibility and voice in Southern California's black community.

Inner-city redevelopment may be the hot topic in political and academic circles, but Los Angeles County's black entrepreneurs continue looking elsewhere for economic opportunity, according to a Los Angeles Times Poll. The survey, which included responses from more than 1,400 minority business owners, showed that blacks are more likely than other ethnic minorities in the county to be considering relocating their firms.

What is the role of a pastor today? "Enabler, expediter, mobilizer, catalyst, port in time of storm, welcome arch, social activist, priest, economic developer, heart fixer," says Pastor Cecil Murray of the First A.M.E. Church. Murray lives what he preaches. His days and nights are filled with social service and spiritual blessings. He presides over the cycle of life--baptisms, weddings and funerals--with special attention paid to reaching out to those on the edge of trouble.

It started as a teen-age prank: Dennis had hidden Albert's notebook. One boy started pushing, the other shoved back. Soon, the two high school students were pounding each other with their fists. The scuffle, as Dennis sees it, went deeper than it seemed. Dennis is black and Albert is Latino. In junior high, they had been friends.