Podcast summary

SurveyLA marks a coming-of-age for LA's historic preservation movement. Join amateur historians and LA aficionados for the public kick off of SurveyLA, share your knowledge of LA's hidden gems, view a screening of the SurveyLA video, and attend a lively panel discussion with city officials, preservationists, community organizers and developers regarding this historic survey.

Participant(s) Bio

Ken Bernstein is Manager of the Office of Historic Resources for the City of Los Angeles' Department of City Planning, where he directs Los Angeles' historic preservation policies. In this capacity, he serves as lead staff member for the City's Cultural Heritage Commission, is launching a multi-year citywide survey of historic resources, and is working to create a comprehensive historic preservation program for Los Angeles. He previously served for eight years as Director of Preservation Issues for the Los Angeles Conservancy, where he directed the Conservancy's public policy and advocacy activities.

Adriene Biondo is the Commercial Chair Emeritus, and Residential Chair Emeritus of the Los Angeles Conservancy Modern Committee (Modcom). Adriene is working to establish a Historic Preservation Overlay Zone (historic district) for the Granada Hills Eichler tract where she resides, and participated in writing National Register nominations that were unanimously approved for two Bay Area Eichler tracts. She helped pave the way for the Modcom program to nominate the remaining Case Study Houses for listing in the National Register of Historic Places and she a wide range of preservation efforts, including the preservation to date of the 1958 Johnie's Broiler in Downey, which has officially been declared eligible for the California Register.

William Deverell is an American historian with a focus on the nineteenth and twentieth century American West. He has written works on political, social, ethnic, and environmental history. He is currently working on a book exploring the history of the post-Civil War American West. With David Igler of UC Irvine, he is co-editing The Blackwell Companion to California and with Greg Hise of USC, The Blackwell Companion to Los Angeles. William Deverell is the director of the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West.

Michael Diaz serves as the current chairperson of the Lincoln Heights HPOZ Board and is the founder of the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood and Preservation Association. His civic involvement is extensive and varied including serving as a board member of the Los Angeles Conservancy, as a commissioner of the Los Angeles Historical Records & Landmarks Commission, a member of the Northeast Community Plan Advisory Committee and the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council Steering Committee, as well as the founding president of the Latin-American Cinemateca of Los Angeles.

Larry Mantle is the host of KPCC's AirTalk, the longest continuously airing daily radio talk program in Southern California. A fourth-generation Angeleno, he has interviewed thousands of prominent guests on an extraordinary array of topics and is the recipient of numerous journalistic awards.

Mott Smith has built his career crafting original real estate solutions in both the private and public sectors. He co-founded Civic Enterprise (CE) in to plan and build innovative, replicable, socially-conscious projects in emerging neighborhoods. Immediately prior to forming Civic Enterprise, Mott was Acting Director of Planning for the Los Angeles Unified School District, where he helped launch the District's $1.6 billion Phase II school construction program. Before joining LAUSD, Mott developed affordable housing and served as founding Executive Director of New Schools-Better Neighborhoods, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit that develops creative, community-based solutions for school and housing development.

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