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Life & Times Transcript
10/27/06 Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times -- If you build it, they will come. But how will all those new families impact the quality of life? Jeff Foster>> At virtually every high school up here, you'll see between thirty and forty percent of the campus in portable classrooms due to growth. Val Zavala>> And then, these performers have all the right moves and we'll meet the man who keeps them on a string. It's all straight ahead on tonight's Life and Times. [Film Clip] Announcer>> 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 Zavala>> We all know someone who does this: drives an hour and a half to two hours to their job just so they can own a home. Well, that's what's fueling the phenomenal growth in the Antelope Valley, but not far behind those commuters are some big city problems like crowded schools and crime. Sam Louie heads fifty miles north of Los Angeles for our story. Sam Louie>> The construction boom in the Antelope Valley cities of Lancaster and Palmdale has propelled these communities into the two fastest growing areas in Los Angeles County. With the median price of a new home at three hundred fifty thousand dollars, buyers are snapping up houses as quickly as they go up. Gretchen Gutierrez>> It doesn't surprise me at all and the reason it doesn't surprise me is because Lancaster and the Antelope Valley as a total is the last place in Los Angeles County with an abundance of flat developmental land. Sam Louie>> Gretchen Gutierrez is with the Building Industry Association of Southern California. Gretchen Gutierrez>> We are without the geography challenges that other parts of the county have in terms of hillside construction or current sites that have already been developed. Sam Louie>> But growth this fast also delivers problems and challenges. The most obvious place to see them is here at Antelope Valley High School. They are bursting at the seams. Jeff Foster>> The growth is a major concern for school districts in our valley. Sam Louie>> Jeff Foster is the District Deputy Superintendent. He gave us a tour of Highland High School in Palmdale, one of three new high schools built since 1991. Despite three new campuses, there is still demand for more. Jeff Foster>> Our schools are all very crowded with approximately thirty-five hundred-plus students, thirty-six hundred at this particular high school of Highland, and each of our schools has grown from its base of somewhere in the two thousand range to over thirty-five hundred now because of valley wide growth. Sam Louie>> They tried to expand, but voters said no. This past spring, the district lost a one hundred seventy-seven million dollar bond measure that would have built two more high schools and expanded existing campuses. So how does that loss affect students? At Highland High School, more than a thousand of them have to go to class in these: portable classrooms that may end up permanent. Jeff Foster>> That's a phenomenon throughout our district. At virtually every high school up here, you'll see between thirty and forty percent of the campus in portable classrooms due to growth. Sam Louie>> The portables are located up to half a mile away from the main school building, often isolating teachers. Jeff Foster>> Teachers in this area that we're standing in, for example, don't tend to interact much with the main campus because of the distance involved. They do their day here and they interact with their children here and then they tend to go on about their business at the end of the academic day. They may go for days on end without going into the main part of the campus because of the distance issues involved. Sam Louie>> Even routine activities like serving lunch is a struggle. Jeff Foster>> Our lunch periods are about thirty-seven minutes in length and, candidly, some of our students were not getting served in that period of time. Sam Louie>> To cut down on the long lines, the school now has two lunch periods. But even with the creative measures in place, school officials can only wonder how much more the district can take. Jeff Foster>> Basically, our district has doubled in the last twelve years or so. We have twenty-four thousand four hundred-plus students in our district now. This year, we grew by an additional four hundred fifty students. Last year, we grew by over fifteen hundred students. Sam Louie>> Foster says student learning and achievement have not been affected yet, but that could change if growth continues without expansion. So if taxpayers said no to school bonds, where does the money come from? That takes us back to the developers. Developers are mandated by the state to help pay for a portion of school construction, but school representatives believe the fees are way too low, estimating they cover only about ten percent of school building costs. Jeff Foster>> We'd love to see developer fees increased to more appropriately reflect the cost of construction that we have to deal with. Gretchen Gutierrez>> We do have a shared concern with the school districts and with the cities and with other municipalities and agencies in terms of the impact that new residents are going to cause on the valley. Sam Louie>> Gretchen Gutierrez with the local Building Association says developers are doing more than their fair share. Gretchen Gutierrez>> Builders do contribute to a community whether it's here or elsewhere throughout the state of California in terms of providing funding for things such as schools, such as parks, public facilities, hospitals, fire stations, police stations, those type of things. Sam Louie>> If forced to pay more in fees, Gutierrez says it would hurt potential homeowners. Gretchen Gutierrez>> It's a very big concern because every time a new fee, whether it's a school fee or a city fee, gets passed along to a developer, that in turn gets passed along to the new consumer and the new home buyer. Sam Louie>> Growth has also taken a toll on law enforcement. The continued influx of residents has meant a spike in crime. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Station based in Lancaster has seen property crimes and drug trafficking shoot up. Captain Carl Deeley>> Instead of out there doing proactive police work, the deputies are running from call to call to call. We're just basically chasing the radio. Sam Louie>> Captain Carl Deeley says the response time to non-emergencies was embarrassing. Captain Carl Deeley>> It was taking us close to an average of nearly three hours to respond to those routine calls. Sam Louie>> For some relief, the Sheriff's Department hired trained civilians to help with non-police functions like filling out paperwork and reports, leaving the deputies to respond more quickly to emergencies. While that can help, the housing boom worries the department. This Sheriff's Station leads the county in the number of arrests made and it receives the second highest number of emergency calls. Captain Carl Deeley>> I don't believe that anyone is going for stopping growth, but maybe a little more reasonable growth. Sam Louie>> So how are cities like Lancaster and Palmdale coping with growth and how are they preparing for the hundreds of thousands more who are expected to move here? Brian Ludicke>> This is a real crossroads for the city. Sam Louie>> That job is being tackled by people like Brian Ludicke, Lancaster's Planning Director. Brian Ludicke>> By the year 2030, Lancaster will grow from its current population of about a hundred thirty-eight thousand to approximately a quarter of a million. Sam Louie>> It's quite a change from Lancaster's humble beginnings as a railroad stop and agricultural community. Homes have now replaced farms and, as long as the prices are relatively low, it will continue to be a magnet drawing families to the Antelope Valley even if the commute to Los Angeles could take up to an hour and a half. In fact, forty-five percent of residents here drive to jobs in Los Angeles. City officials realize that, without some restrictions on growth, the quality of life here will suffer. Brian Ludicke>> It's important because the city and the service agencies are not able to accommodate growth scattered all over the place. Sam Louie>> So the city is working on a master plan. The plan could restrict the number of building permits for new homes or they could limit growth to certain areas of the city. But whatever the approach, Lancaster and Palmdale will have to find a way to meet the demand for vital services. If not -- Captain Carl Deeley>> The growth now, if it continues the way it is, it will outgrow the city's ability to provide services. Sam Louie>> I'm Sam Louie for Life and Times. Announcer>> Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, plus transcripts and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most interesting features. Just go to kcet.org, scroll down the page and click on "Life and Times". Val Zavala>> It's incredible to think that fifteen or twenty years ago, Old Town Pasadena was considered Skid Row, a slum. Nobody wanted to come here. Then something happened that transformed everything and what was that something? Would you believe, parking meters? Looking at Old Town Pasadena today, it's hard to imagine it was once what some people called just dirty old buildings. The decline started in the Depression and continued through the 1970s. Then when ugly black buildings started going up, citizens revolted and decided to revive their historic downtown. But where do you start? UCLA Professor Donald Shoup is a foremost expert on the science of parking and, believe me, it's a science. He's charted the dramatic changes in Old Town Pasadena. In the 1970s, what was it like? Professor Donald Shoup>> It was Skid Row. You're too young to remember, but nobody would come here after dark. The stores were largely empty. There were a few foreign theaters, pawn shops and tattoo parlors. Val Zavala>> It's incredible to believe this was Skid Row. And one of keys to success is something that most people would not even think about: parking meters. Professor Donald Shoup>> That's right. There were no parking meters until 1992. People complained that there was no place to park, although it was the shop owners and employees of the few shops that parked here and complained that their customers had no place to park. The city wanted to put in meters, but the merchants were afraid it would chase away the few customers they had. Val Zavala>> After arguing over meters for two years, the city finally made merchants an offer they couldn't refuse. Professor Donald Shoup>> What turned the tide is the city said to the property owners and merchants and residents, "If we put in parking meters, Old Pasadena keeps the revenue for public facilities" and, like that, they changed their attitude and they said, "Let's run the meters until midnight and let's run them on Sunday." Val Zavala>> (Laughter) Because the money would stay here. Professor Donald Shoup>> It pays for all the wonderful services that you see in Old Pasadena. It's over a million dollars a year to pay for the debt service, all the money they borrowed for the sidewalks and the alleys, which were completely cleaned up. You know, alleys are usually dumps. Val Zavala>> Just quarters from parking meters? Professor Donald Shoup>> That's right. If you (laughter) run them until midnight and on Sunday, and all the money that comes in the parking meter comes out the other side and cleans the sidewalk, it makes a huge difference. I mean, the city is doing what only the city can do which is to provide the public services that make it an attractive area. Then the landlords responded by fixing up all their buildings. Merchants came in and it produces a lot of tax revenue as well. Val Zavala>> That million dollars a year goes for landscaping, advertising, security. Graffiti is removed every day and the sidewalks are steam-cleaned twice a month. They were also very smart in terms of PR. They let people know specifically that the money was going to stay local? Professor Donald Shoup>> That's right. They had a graphic artist produce a wonderful poster that could go into everybody's shop windows showing what was going to happen with this money, that they were going to rebuild the alleys, for example, which were dumps everywhere, as they are in the United States. They cleaned them out, they put the wires underground, they planted trees and now they open out into restaurants and shops. People love to wander in the alleys of Old Pasadena. How many people want to go into the alleys in downtown or in Hollywood or in Westwood? I think that they've created a wonderful opportunity for small businesses to open up. Val Zavala>> Street parking in Pasadena costs $1.25 an hour. It may seem steep, but Professor Shoup says the price is very important. Professor Donald Shoup>> The right price for parking is the lowest price you can charge and still have a few vacant spaces. Val Zavala>> So you want to make it low enough so that people won't be deterred, but high enough so that they won't park their all day. Professor Donald Shoup>> That's right. Whenever you drive along the street, you'll see maybe one out of eight spaces might be vacant. Nobody can say there's no place to park. Val Zavala>> Well, except for these days, it's getting so crowded. People are starting to complain there's no place to park in Old Pasadena. Professor Donald Shoup>> Well, another good thing they did was to build a couple of off-street parking structures with ground floor retail and the first ninety minutes is free. So if anybody complains about the price of parking here, they can get ninety minutes of free parking in a parking structure. Val Zavala>> There are, of course, the down sides like hunting around for quarters or getting stuck with a ticket. But overall, says Professor Shoup, the benefits far outweigh the inconveniences. Professor Donald Shoup>> People are paying for parking, but those payments have provided the catalyst for everything that you see going on here in Old Pasadena. Just think of all the jobs here that are supporting families. This area didn't have any jobs before. I think that a sensible use of the parking revenue has led people to say, yes, it is a good idea to charge for parking because all the money will come right back to benefit the people as soon as they get out of their car. As soon as you get out of your car on Colorado Boulevard, you step into a fine public environment. Now I think that's a lot better than having a place that people will come to only because the parking is free. I think we've made Old Pasadena a place where people want to be and they're willing to pay to be here and that's a lot better than having a place with lots of parking and nobody really wants to be there. Val Zavala>> And now downtown Los Angeles, Westwood and Eagle Rock are all looking very closely at the parking meter policies that have turned Old Town Pasadena into the city's most lucrative shopping district. Professor Donald Shoup>> One of the advantages of a region like Los Angeles is that some cities try out good ideas and the other cities can just look and say, "Well, we could do that", or their citizens could tell their leaders, "Well, why don't you do that?" Val Zavala>> And consider this: more real estate is devoted to parking than any other purpose in our cities, more than retail, more than offices, more than government. Professor Donald Shoup>> Well, it's the single biggest land use in any city. You know, I think that the surprising thing is that nobody's really looked at it carefully before. Val Zavala>> In fact, Professor Shoup believes that real estate is so expensive here in California that no parking should be free, but then Americans are spoiled. Professor Donald Shoup>> Americans park free on ninety-nine percent of all their vehicle trips. It's not my estimate. It's by a professor up at UC Davis. The annual subsidy for parking in the United States is somewhere between what we spend for Medicare and national defense. Val Zavala>> But that seems so anti-American, not to have free parking or ample parking. We are so spoiled. Professor Donald Shoup>> On the other hand, I think it's very American to charge people for something they use. I don't think we should think of America as the place where people are free-loaders, that they expect something for nothing. Val Zavala>> Professor Shoup, thank you so much for spending some time with us. Professor Donald Shoup>> Well, thank you for inviting me. Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address: Life and Times 4401 Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles, California 90027 You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org. Val Zavala>> They say it's never too late to have a happy childhood and here is your chance. We take you to the outskirts of downtown Los Angeles near a freeway off-ramp in a plain cinder block building. But as Vicki Curry found out, once you go inside, you've entered another world, the world of Bob Baker's Marionettes. [Film Clip] Vicki Curry>> No one understands a child's fascination with puppets like Bob Baker. His shows have delighted children for forty-five years, making the Bob Baker Marionette Theater the oldest continuously running theater of its kind. Bob Baker>> We try to entertain the children. When they're sitting on the floor, they're looking almost into the puppets' eyes, so they become very real. I have people come here today who tell me that they came here when they were small kids when they had their birthday parties twenty-five years ago or they're bringing their child to see a theater here that they saw when they were kids. Vicki Curry>> Baker is a native of Los Angeles. His father took him to a puppet show when he was five and he was hooked. By age eight, he was staging his own shows. Bob Baker>> I had an hour lesson every day but Sunday and I had to practice mostly two hours a day. I was really learning the skill of not only working the puppets, but making the puppets. Vicki Curry>> Baker's talent soon brought offers from Hollywood. He's worked on hundreds of television shows and movies, including "A Star is Born", "Bedknobs & Broomsticks" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". It was his onscreen experiences that led him to create the theater. Bob Baker>> We kept saying we want to do puppets on film. About that time, we put this theater together so we could show people production numbers and things that could be done. [Film Clip] Vicki Curry>> Countless people have witnessed what Baker's puppets can do not just in Los Angeles, but around the world. He has two traveling companies and they've performed at thousands of county fairs and private parties. Bob Baker>> You know, there's very few places I haven't performed somewhere along the line. "Have puppets, will travel", I guess, is the slogan. Vicki Curry>> He can take the show on the road because of a technique he pioneered decades ago when he had to put on a show with no stage. Bob Baker>> Well, I did it out front this way and they liked it. I thought, well, why bother with the stage? I'll bring more puppets and do a longer show and not have to carry in that great big old bulky stage. We do nothing to really camouflage the puppets here. We come out as ourselves. The puppet is down below us and the children are on the floor. Also, it gives us the freedom of, if we want to do a skating number or a dance number, we can actually do it. This is more fun. We've broken the barrier. [Film Clip] Vicki Curry>> Even without a stage, the shows are elaborate productions. How many puppets do you usually have per show? Bob Baker>> A hundred to a hundred twenty-five. Vicki Curry>> For each one-hour show? Bob Baker>> For one hour. Vicki Curry>> Wow. And how many puppeteers? Bob Baker>> Five to six. And back in here, we have a light board. It's an antique board. Vicki Curry>> Now the people who work here really learn the fundamentals and they can in the theater. Bob Baker>> They have to learn how to be a lighting designer and figure out what lights to use and dimmers when they come in and out. Also, what colored lights are best. We have painted ceilings that come down here besides having drapes. Each show has its own set. Vicki Curry>> And so everything that you have in a show is created and built here? Bob Baker>> Built right here. Vicki Curry>> In this theater? Bob Baker>> Um-hum. Vicki Curry>> Every bit of it? Bob Baker>> Every bit of it. Vicki Curry>> That includes, of course, the marionettes themselves. Besides building puppets for their shows, Bob Baker and his team hand-craft puppets for sale. He's overseen the Disney character collection for fifty years. When you make the puppets that you sell as collectibles, you hand-make each individual puppet? Bob Baker>> Every puppet is handmade. It's hand-crafted, handmade. It's strictly one of a kind. Vicki Curry>> Baker's team is made up of a few long-time colleagues plus a group of young people from the neighborhood. Bob Baker>> A lot of people come here -- they don't come here to be a puppeteer. They come here to work and do something and, before long, they're working a puppet. I'd rather teach a puppeteer how to work a puppet than to have one that has had bad training because it's very hard to break the habits that they have with moving the puppets, especially the way we work. [Film Clip] Bob Baker>> While we're working the puppet, I'd be moving around like this with the puppet. Vicki Curry>> The puppet in some ways mirrors what you're doing. Bob Baker>> Yeah, I move my body with the puppet. Anyway, it helps get the action because they're able to swing out and do various things. It involves acting, body movement, a little bit of drama, a little bit of just personality, also kind of wanting to show off. [Film Clip] Vicki Curry>> Bob Baker says he's proud to be teaching something to both the young people he trains and those in his audiences. Bob Baker>> Most children today are not exposed to a lot of music. They're not exposed to a lot of theater and they bring them in from the schools. They get to see a theater, kind of a miniature theater, in operation with the lights, with the scenery going up and down into the gallery. The puppets, you can feel that something alive is coming through. [Film Clip] Bob Baker>> Every time I try to do something else, something brings me back to puppetry. I've never really quit a hundred percent. I won't be sitting in a rocking chair and I won't retire because I don't have a hobby (laughter). I'm hoping that there will be legacy that I can leave, that all the puppets and the theater will be carried on. I have determination that it's going to stay here a long, long time. [Film Clip] Val Zavala>> For more information on the puppet theater, you can go to bobbakermarionettes.com. And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for watching. We'll see you next time. Announcer>> 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. Sponsored in part by:  | |
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