Reclaiming Public Assets for the Community's Use
By Lyric Kelkar
In 2013, a group of organizations came together to address an issue that so many communities in Los Angeles are all too familiar with: vacant lots. Our cross-disciplinary group consists of ourselves, Kounkuey Design Initiative (KDI), LA Neighborhood Land Trust, TRUST South LA and Esperanza Community Housing. We call ourselves Free Lots Angeles.
About 90% of the vacant lots in our city are privately owned, but the City of Los Angeles itself owns 2,000 of them (about 10%), many of which are in low-income communities. These lots are often sources of neighborhood decay. Some have been vacant for over a century. They are symbols of missed opportunities and an example of how city assets can be better utilized to support the priorities of residents who walk by these lots on a daily basis.
The Adopt-A-Lot pilot program formalizes the tactical urbanism that was used from 2013- 2016. During this time, Free Lots Angeles produced five lot activations in communities like Watts, South Central Los Angeles, and the San Fernando Valley, demonstrating what is possible when community members are engaged in reimagining these spaces. Then we began working with city officials to create a formal pathway to activate spaces: we could no longer rely on the good will of a private landowner, or a sympathetic department head. We had to focus on building a system that Angelenos could access if they saw a city-owned vacant lot in the community that they wanted to activate.
In December of 2018, Councilwoman Rodriguez led the motion passing the Adopt-A-Lot pilot program. It allows us to activate up to 10 lots in semi-permanent sub-leases with “adoptee” groups. Our partners at KDI hold the master lease, and then they are able to “sublease” the lot to community groups. Groups go through an application process in order to adopt the lot. Once a steward is selected for the lot, community members go through a participatory design and budgeting process to choose the amenities they want to see on the site.
Two weeks ago, we celebrated the activation of the first lot! Pacoima Beautiful is the first “adoptee,” stewarding the lot and managing the new community gardens, lounge area, and play area decided by local residents. The process to get here taught us three major items:
Data can help make your case. When Free Lots Angeles started, we knew there were many city-owned vacant parcels, but there was no central database that compiled all those properties. When the Mayor’s Office and the City Controller’s Office created databases, these lists helped guide policy, identifying lots that were not suitable for affordable housing development for instance, but could be used for other activities. And when data didn’t exist, we sought it out. In our initial pop-ups, we conducted surveys to understand how community members wanted to use these properties, ultimately informing the policy in place now and the uses written into it.
Cross-departmental teams are key to a successful policy. If it weren't for the different departments at the City helping guide this process, it might not have happened as smoothly as it did. Having the multiple departments who are involved with this program at the table made it easy for us to understand the needs of each and execute on them as seemlessly as possible. Similarly, our internal FLA team had expertise from many organizations, from design and community engagement, to organizing, to cultural programming. This is how we were able to be inclusive with our recommendations and know the best ways to prioritize the voices of those left out.
A Council "champion" is an incredible asset. Councilwoman Rodriguez' leadership pushed this policy forward and got it to gain momentum both behind the scenes prior to adoption and after the policy was passed. We saw firsthand the value of having a strong leader who prioritized community engagement and who ensured that city departments were engaged and invested in the project from beginning to end. A leader with a vested interest can also help identify ways for a “pilot” program to mature into a permanent program.
We believe that publicly owned land should be used to support community priorities. While the lots used in the program are small and not ideal for large development, we have already seen the value of engaging community members in reimagining what these spaces could be if they are kept in the hands of the public. We are looking forward to activating more lots, but we also see this work as a model for how cities can use other publicly-owned assets. Public land should serve public interests. To achieve this, leaders must invest in building systems that encourage community members to get involved and advocate for what they want to see in their community.
