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07/25/05
This program is made possible in part by a grant from the City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.
Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --
Inside the red tag zone at the Laguna Beach landslide. Should these homes be rebuilt?
Ginger Kelly>> The press is making it seem like we deserve it because we chose to build on a hill, and most of the people on that street lost everything and they have nothing left.
Val>> And then, a heartfelt thank-you across the years. What's behind this concert commemorating the end of World War II?
It's all coming up next on tonight's Life and Times.
Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.
And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.
Val>> We all watched in shock as scores of expensive homes slid down the hills in Bluebird Canyon and now the big questions remain. Should homeowners rebuild? Should taxpayer money be used to help? And has the hill stopped moving? Those are the questions our Orange County reporter, Roger Cooper, put to city officials, geologists and homeowners in Laguna Beach.
Roger Cooper>> It's a cycle as endless as the tides. Yet another disaster in Laguna Beach. This time it's the June 1 landslide that destroyed homes and forced families to evacuate Bluebird Canyon. The slide came months after near-record rainfall, a shock to the families that lost their homes, and the danger isn't over. The concern here in Laguna now is that even at this time, days after it all happened, this earth is still moving. The streets that are buckled now could buckle more and more houses could head down this hill.
Dr. John Foster>> I definitely wanted to see this and record it. I teach a class in landslides analysis.
Roger Cooper>> Dr. John Foster is a geologist and professor at Cal State Fullerton. He's convinced this slide was a delayed reaction to record winter rains.
Dr. John Foster>> And it soaks down until it gets to a point where it is basically supporting the rock almost like a boat in the ocean and it basically weakens the rock itself and causes it to slide like it's on ball bearings.
Roger Cooper>> Displaced homeowners gathered at City Hall to be briefed by city officials and geologists. That's when reality was beginning to sink in.
Ken Frank>> "Our guess is, realistically, if everything goes well, being positive, best case, somebody could start building a house in two years."
Roger Cooper>> Ginger Kelly had just finished putting every cent she had into a hillside home that's now red-tagged and can't be entered. How are you bearing up under all of this?
Ginger Kelly>> I'm handling it pretty well, but it's getting harder every day to handle it this well. Laguna Beach is a great city and, if we were to live somewhere else, I don't think we'd be getting the support that we have. Like everybody is saying we're rich and so we can handle it. Like Rush Limbaugh was saying that. Well, he needs to take another Oxycontin because we're not. This was my life savings and now I'm going to have to go back to work full-time when I was about to be able to spend time with my daughter.
Randall Bell>> I think it's an economic mess because these people do not have -- generally, the insurance doesn't cover this kind of loss.
Roger Cooper>> We made a trip inside the red-tagged zone accompanied by Randall Bell. Known as the master of disaster, he's hired to determine economic damages at disaster sites all over the world.
Randall Bell>> Yeah, this is ground zero and these areas really kind of give me the heebie-jeebies because I stood in an area like this about two years ago and, a few hours after we left, it dropped a hundred twenty-five feet (laughter), so you've got to take this stuff seriously.
Roger Cooper>> Bell has documented his trips to disasters in a new book, "Disasters: Wasted Lives, Valuable Lessons". He says some property values may not drop.
Randall Bell>> As far as the surrounding neighborhoods, you might be surprised to see how resilient they are. They may not be as impacted negatively or at all, which might surprise some people. The damages economically usually go right with the actual landslide area.
Roger Cooper>> But the big question on everyone's mind is whether it makes sense to build back in such a dangerous area. With a lot of money, could all those houses be put back and be sound?
Dr. John Foster>> Absolutely, and I expect that's what will happen.
Roger Cooper>> But for a lot of money.
Dr. John Foster>> For a lot of money.
Roger Cooper>> UC Irvine professor, Dr. Judy Rosener, at the Mirage School of Business, has been watching the California disaster cycle for some time and opposed development there three decades ago. When you look at the Laguna slides, what jumps out at you?
Dr. Judy Rosener>> Well, what jumps out at me was that I feel terrible because, thirty years ago when I was on the Coastal Commission, the Bluebird Canyon slides came up. We had jurisdiction there. We were giving permits. I remember that I voted against it because I heard geologists from both sides.
Roger Cooper>> Dr. Rosener thinks the local officials who approve hillside building these days have trouble saying no because the requests come from people they know who are determined to live the California dream. No matter what happens in California, people always seem willing to go back and to rebuild.
Randall Bell>> Right. We call that idea the Malibu function or the Malibu factor because there are areas in Malibu that are constantly being hit by big waves, by mudslides, by fires, by floods, and the people keep rebuilding over and over and over again. Laguna Beach has the same kind of mentality.
Roger Cooper>> If people are determined to rebuild, should the taxpayers subsidize them through low-interest loans and infrastructure?
Dr. Judy Rosener>> If people decide to build in a hazardous area anywhere, should they not assume the liability? Why should that liability be borne by others who have nothing to do with that area? It seems to me the building of those roads in Laguna and the shoring up is not just going to be the Laguna taxpayers.
Roger Cooper>> Let me ask you a blunt question. Should houses be built over there?
Dr. John Foster>> Houses probably should not be built over there in the natural condition they're built. I've looked at some reports on some of the homes. Even the fill conditions that they're actually on are not compacted properly.
Randall Bell>> As far as coming back in and rebuilding, it's happened in Malibu and it's going to happen here in Laguna Beach.
Roger Cooper>> Should they?
Randall Bell>> If they can accept the risks. If you're going to be upset when these kinds of things happen or it's going to ruin your life, then my advice is don't. But if you can handle the risks and take your chances, because there is a chance, then, you know, that's your call. Go for it.
Roger Cooper>> But you're a geologist. You know the danger as well as anybody. Can you blame somebody for wanting to have that view over there?
Dr. John Foster>> No, I don't blame anybody. I used to live here and I wanted the view over there. No, I understand why people want to be there. I understand why they want this environment. Sometimes this comes with it.
Roger Cooper>> Is Laguna Beach worth it?
Ginger Kelly>> Yes. Laguna Beach is one of the last small towns left and I'm not originally from Orange County and this is the best place to live in the entire world.
Roger Cooper>> And the cost? Thirty years ago, it took four million dollars in federal money to reinforce Bluebird Canyon's hillsides. Who will pay for this disaster in today's dollars is still being ironed out. In the meantime, homeowners say they are not to blame.
Ginger Kelly>> We took every precaution that we were told to take and now to come to find out we're adjacent to a slide zone. There's no way to know and people in the press and everybody is saying that we deserve it. We didn't deserve this. We're homeless.
Dr. Judy Rosener>> Should we be willing to pay the price for a few people to have a lovely view and build a house on top of a hill? I'm not sure about that and I think this is a debate we have to start thinking about.
Roger Cooper>> A popular reaction in Laguna Beach to the landslides can be found as close as the Hobe Surf Shop where t-shirts are being sold that say "And Bluebird Canyon Shall Rise". And on the flip side, a pop quiz: "What Disasters Can We Overcome? Flooding, fire, landslides, all of the above. Would you consider living elsewhere? Never." In Laguna Beach, I'm Roger Cooper for Life and Times.
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Val>> I'm here in front of the beautiful San Gabriel Civic Auditorium where a very special event is about to take place that brings together two cultures that you normally don't associate with each other, the Chinese community and the Jewish community.
It was a full house. The orchestra was tuning up for this commemorative concert, the sixtieth anniversary of VE and VJ Days, Victory in Europe and Victory in Japan. Rita Feder Attermann arrived early. She would be taking the stage at intermission to thank the Chinese community for saving her life.
She was born in Germany. In the late 1930's, Hitler began his reign of terror. The Chinese Consul General in Vienna, a man named Feng Shan Ho, took the rare step of issuing lifesaving visas to twenty thousand Jews. Rita's family was among those who escaped the holocaust and took refuge halfway around the world in Shanghai, China.
Rita Feder Attermann>> Hitler came to power in 1933 and things were getting very bad for the Jewish people and, by 1937 and 1938, they were smashing synagogues, they were taking Jews to concentration camps. Unfortunately, my father didn't have the foresight to see what was coming. We all thought it would pass. And in 1939, we were fortunately asked to leave the country and became stateless. Nothing was open to us. Nobody wanted us. China was the only country that allowed us to migrate.
We arrived in China on my eleventh birthday in August and, lo, here we were, hot, muggy, miserable. We were very fortunate that somebody had obtained a room for us. The four of us moved into that one room. No flush toilets, no running water, but we were happy to be there.
[Film Clip]
Val>> These are current day pictures of the room that the Attermanns lived in. Not much has changed and one of the doors still has the metal plate that designated the room as the Attermann's.
Rita Feder Attermann>> My father was a tailor. He worked in that room. We had no stove. We had no kitchen. My mother had to learn to cook on a Chinese hibachi. But the Chinese people were kind. They allowed us to follow our religion. They allowed us to practice our way of life as much as we could. We had a very hard time in China, extremely hard, but I had a good time. When you're eleven, twelve and thirteen years old and everybody is in the same position, because I didn't know any better.
Val>> They thought they would be in China for only a couple of years, but their stay in Shanghai stretched out to eight years. Finally, she and her brother were able to come to America.
Rita Feder Attermann>> In 1947, I came here. I had relatives here which I had never met and they sent affidavits for my brother and myself. We came on a German quota. My parents were born in Poland and could not come to this country because the Polish quota was closed.
Val>> So you came without your parents?
Rita Feder Attermann>> With my brother.
Val>> Just you and your brother.
Rita Feder Attermann>> Just me and my brother came to this country by ourselves on a troop transport ship.
Val>> And you settled in --
Rita Feder Attermann>> We settled in Los Angeles because we had relatives here. My brother found a job, I found a job and I practically kissed the ground when we arrived here.
Val>> So what's happening tonight that is so wonderful?
Rita Feder Attermann>> Tonight they're having a concert and they're honoring the holocaust and they're honoring people who saved lives.
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Val>> The United Musicians Symphony Orchestra of Los Angeles led by conductor, Zhang, played "Ode to the Red Flag" by Qi Ming Lu.
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Val>> At intermission, Rita took the stage to tell her story.
Rita Feder Attermann>> "I'm here on behalf of myself, my family and twenty thousand other Jewish people that were allowed to come to China and save our lives."
Val>> A Chinese interpreter translated.
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Rita Feder Attermann>> "China was the only country that would accept us. It was very far away in a different land. I spent the best part of my life, until I was nineteen. I grew up there and I learned a lot. It was a hard lesson to learn, but I'm here and I want to say thank you again to China, to the Chinese people, for having accepted us and letting us live amongst them and, most of all, being kind to us because, after the war when we found out about the holocaust and all the families that were left behind and lost, we were twice as thankful. We had no idea how cruel people can be against each other."
Val>> Rita and her daughter have traveled back to Shanghai. This is the front door to her family's apartment building and this is a plaque in her old neighborhood commemorating the stateless refugees who once lived there. Their visit even drew the attention of the local newspaper.
Rita Feder Attermann>> I have been back to China with warm feelings even though we had a very, very poor life.
Rita Feder Attermann>> "In closing, I would like to say thank you to all of you for befriending our people, and the best thing is that I learned how to eat with chopsticks real well (laughter). Thank you again and please enjoy the concert which is in honor of a wonderful, wonderful cause. And as we Jewish people say, we hope never again."
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Val>> Southern California is home to world-class art museums, theater, architecture and, of course, concert halls, but what about dance? Why does dance seem to be out of step with our cultural renaissance? Well, Vicki Curry tells us there is in fact a thriving dance scene. The challenge is being seen.
[Film Clip]
Vicki Curry>> Los Angeles may not be known for dance, but those who know it say it should be. Los Angeles has been home to some of the most influential pioneers of twentieth century modern dance.
John Pennington>> We've been one of the richest histories. We have importance. Alvin Ailey started here. Martha Graham was from Santa Barbara, Isadora Duncan, Ted Shawn Dancers. The history goes on and on.
Vicki Curry>> Two of the earliest modern dancers were Ruth St. Denis and her husband, Ted Shawn. They opened the Denis-Shawn School here in 1915. A year later, Martha Graham moved from Santa Barbara to study with them. In 1928, Lester Horton moved to Los Angeles to start his company and, in 1946, he and Bella Lewitzky founded the Dance Theatre on Melrose Avenue. It was the first American performance space devoted exclusively to dance and one of the first places to house both a company and a school. One of its first students? Alvin Ailey.
Loretta Livingston>> There's definitely a lineage here in Los Angeles of artists in dance and that profile, that lineage, has to do with individuality. People who prioritize freedom and autonomy, that's a profile of an artist who enjoys being in a city that's not like other cities.
Vicki Curry>> Despite this distinguished history, most people don't think of Los Angeles as a major dance center. Yet there is a vital theme here. Artists are still attracted to the freedom and experimentation associated with California's wide open spaces.
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Lynn Daly>> It's like a big space where a lot of different people can come together and make something new happen.
Loretta Livingston>> What I like about living here is that it's an interesting place. It's a global mix. I feel happy being in the west and I have a lot of room.
Vicki Curry>> But that room which inspired innovators of the past may be hindering them today.
Loretta Livingston>> Some cities have a more definable center, a more definable and visible community of dance. Los Angeles doesn't have that.
John Pennington>> The same reason that people come to Los Angeles because it's diverse, it's geographically spread. People can come here to recreate themselves. I think that's the same reason that you don't have a cohered dance community.
Vicki Curry>> There have been notable attempts to start a major ballet company in Los Angeles. The New York City Ballet sent dancers here in 1979 to create a Los Angeles Ballet and, four years later, New York's Joffrey Ballet made Los Angeles its second home, but left after eight years.
Loretta Livingston>> The super imposition of a model that works in other places on this community here isn't a good fit.
Vicki Curry>> But in the meantime, the modern dance scene continues to grow. There are more than one hundred nonprofit dance companies in Los Angeles County, plus numerous informal groups, reflecting a range of forms and cultures.
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Donna Sternberg>> I think there is some really good stuff going on here and I think that there are actually more companies now than there have been for quite some time. People are leaving other big cities like New York to come here.
Vicki Curry>> Choreographer Donna Sternberg started her company in 1985. She says one of her biggest obstacles is finding places to perform.
Donna Sternberg>> There are so few affordable theaters for dance where you have a sprung floor and where the stage is big enough and the audience isn't huge.
Vicki Curry>> Loretta Livingston has also had her own company since 1985. She thinks there are several great dance venues in Los Angeles, but admits they aren't always available to smaller local companies.
Loretta Livingston>> There are many presenters who support dance comfortably. They want it on their season. They may not have a spot every season for dance or for a local artist to be there, but I sense there's a lot of support.
Vicki Curry>> John Pennington spent fourteen years dancing with Bella Lewitzky, the last of the early pioneers. She spent years trying to build a permanent dance theater in downtown.
John Pennington>> We need a dance space that is specifically for dance. We have places that are trying to service the dance communities, but we don't have a place that elevates it. The idea of nurturing local artists and giving them a place to do what they do in a place to fail and a place to succeed is not available.
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Vicki Curry>> Hollywood also exerts a strong influence on the Los Angeles dance scene.
John Pennington>> I would say that a majority of dancers come to Los Angeles to be in video and film.
Lynn Daly>> If they're really skilled, they can often make a lot of money doing commercial work which is much more lucrative.
Vicki Curry>> You would think these paying jobs would bring dancers with strong training and talent to Los Angeles, but there's little cross-over between the concert dance world and the commercial world.
Debbie Allen>> Every time I've had to choreograph the Oscars or any movie or anything that I've ever had to do with professionals, I've had to stop to teach dance because they don't know. They don't know the source of the language.
Vicki Curry>> Debbie Allen is one of the rare dancers who was classically trained, but found commercial success. She's been frustrated with Los Angeles's dance scene.
Debbie Allen>> So I decided, after I had to send my daughter away to the Kirov Academy to study dance to get the tools that I wanted her to have, that we needed to have it here. So I'm looking to develop that next generation of dancers and choreographers.
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Vicki Curry>> Building the next generation of arts audiences is a common theme for Los Angeles choreographers.
Donna Sternberg>> There hasn't been arts education in the schools for decades and I think that is showing in the arts audience, which is shrinking and shrinking.
John Pennington>> It's training people to see and to value. You know, we only value what we're trained to value and, if that isn't going on in our schools, if art is not being valued, then we're lost for the future.
Vicki Curry>> But those same people say audiences are still interested in dance. Sometimes they just need to be lured in.
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Heidi Duckler>> Instead of doing our work on a stage, we decided to go out to where real life was really happening, into environments that we could explore. And we found that, as we started to go, we developed an audience that was interested in site work, the kind of an audience that didn't typically see dance.
Loretta Livingston>> I work with live music, I work with video as a component. I think that it has expanded the audience or the family of audience, people that would never come to see what we do.
Vicki Curry>> Performers and choreographers agree that there is a vibrant dance scene in Los Angeles. You just have to look to find it.
John Pennington>> I have great hope for the artists of Los Angeles. There are people here that are sticking here, that are not leaving, and that are trying to make this home and to make this their community and they're doing a damn good job of it.
Val>> And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.
Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.
And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.
This program was made possible in part by a grant from the City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.
Val>> Next time on Life and Times --
It may look like play, but these kids are learning an important lesson.
>> "Okay, I decoded it and it's the human stomach."
>> In this day and age of so many parents raising their children on the television that's got things blinking and blopping at you all the time, I think this is a perfect segue to where you really can come and get some information.
Val>> That's next time on Life and Times.
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