Labor-Community Coalition Organizing Around Transit and Housing
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Rebuilding Los Angeles: Labor-Community Coalition Organizing around Transit and Housing A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology by Mary Caroline Stepick 2019 © Copyright by Mary Caroline Stepick 2019 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Rebuilding Los Angeles: Labor-Community Coalition Organizing around Transit and Housing by Mary Caroline Stepick Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology University of California, Los Angeles, 2019 Professor Edward T. Walker, Co-Chair Professor Marcus A. Hunter, Co-Chair Los Angeles has long been infamous as a sprawling megalopolis, where racialized inequalities are embedded in and perpetuated by land use. L.A. has also been the home of the prototypical growth machine, which helped create and deepen these inequalities through direct and indirect displacement and racialized uneven development. This history of uneven investment has left neighborhoods of color with rent gaps that increase vulnerabilities to gentrification and displacement. In more recent decades, with the rise of slow growth movements, scholars have argued that this prototypical growth machine has died or at least lost its consensus. However, I argue that the L.A. growth machine has more recently re-formulated itself around an agenda of transit-oriented development that aims to take advantage of racialized rent gaps in ii historically disinvested neighborhoods. Despite its popular image as dominated by freeways and single-family housing, L.A.’s public transit build out is the largest contemporary public infrastructure project in the country, rebuilding L.A. by reshaping transportation and land use. Community-based organizations and advocacy groups have responded to gentrification and displacement pressures around this influx of investment in transit and accompanying transit-oriented development, and have put forward an alternative vision of equitable development, distinct from the anti-development NIMBY vs. pro- development YIMBY binary of urban development logics. These equitable development organizations have strategically responded to slow growth radical flank effect threats to the traditional growth machine and bridged tensions between organized labor and community groups around urban development to form a labor-community coalition. This coalition leveraged its members’ unique resources to push for and win innovative equitable development policy. I address the broad conceptual question of how do urban development politics shift in response to multiple countermovements? How does this help us better understand how residents of color form cross-sector coalitions to bridge city trenches? iii The dissertation of Mary Caroline Stepick is approved. Aaron L. Panofsky Stephanie Pincetl Edward T. Walker, Committee Co-Chair Marcus A. Hunter, Committee Co-Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2019 iv This dissertation is dedicated to my parents, Carol and Alex Stepick, and to the Los Angeles community residents and organizers who welcomed me into their community building, visioning, and strategizing spaces. v CONTENTS Acknowledgments vii Vita viii Chapter 1 1 Rebuilding and Reimagining L.A.: Contested and Racialized Urban Development Politics Chapter 2 29 How the L.A. Growth Machine Shifts and Adapts in Different Periods of Racial Capitalism Chapter 3 96 Radical Flank Effects and Authenticity in Labor-Community Coalition Formation: Uneasy Partnerships and Innovation in Urban Development Policy Chapter 4 135 Neither NIMBY nor YIMBY: Urban Organizations’ Strategic Positioning with a Multiplicity of Countermovements Chapter 5 163 Conclusion: Building from Here References 173 vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would primarily like to thank the brilliant Los Angeles organizers and community residents for welcoming me into their organizing spaces to witness their visioning processes and relentless efforts to build power in critical, innovative, strategic, and authentic ways. I am so grateful to have co-chairs and committee members who shared their thoughtful insights and patiently guided me to sharpen my analyses. I would not have made it through graduate school and into work I care about without the friends and family who checked in with me along the way, particularly Rocio Garcia, Saskia Nauenberg, Yewon Lee, Mindy Chen, Preeti Sharma, Gloria Gonzalez, Maira Sanchez, Jairi Sanchez, Nikos Syropoulos, and my parents. I am grateful to my colleagues at the UCLA Labor Center, the University of Oregon Labor Education and Research Center (LERC), and the Dolores Huerta Labor Institute, for providing me opportunities to grow as an applied researcher and labor educator. Thanks to my undergraduate advisor at Dartmouth, Marc Dixon, for inspiring me to apply to graduate school and supporting me through the process. I would also like to thank Marcos Feldman for originally giving me a framework to understand gentrification and displacement in my home of Miami, FL, Lydia Avila, who shared a brilliant framework for understanding these processes in her home of Boyle Heights in Los Angeles, and all the other brilliant organizers at ELACC and ACT-LA. This material is based on work supported by funding from the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, the UCLA Sustainable Los Angeles Grand Challenge Policy Fellowship, the UCLA Graduate Dean’s Scholar Award, and the Dartmouth College Postgraduate Project Fellowship. vii VITA Education 2016 CPhil, Sociology University of California, Los Angeles 2014 MA, Sociology University of California, Los Angeles 2010 BA (High Honors), Sociology, Anthropology, Gender Studies Dartmouth College Publications Walker, Edward, Lina Stepick. Accepted, Forthcoming. “Valuing The Cause: A Theory of Authenticity in Social Movements.” Mobilization: An International Quarterly. Brenner, Mark and Lina Stepick. 2019. “The Union Advantage in Oregon: How Oregon Unions Raise Wages, Improve Benefits, and Contribute to the Oregon Economy.” Labor Education and Research Center at the University of Oregon. Sharma, Preeti, Saba Waheed, Vina Nguyen, Lina Stepick, Reyna Orellana, Iana Katz, Sabrina Kim, and Katrina Lapira. 2018. “Nail Files: A Study of Nail Salon Workers and Industry in the United States.” The UCLA Labor Center. Shadduck-Hernandez, Janna, Saba Waheed, Preeti Sharma, Lina Stepick, Vina Nguyen, Monica Macias, Reyna Orellana. 2018. “Hour Crisis: Unstable Schedules in the Los Angeles Retail Sector.” The UCLA Labor Center. Stepick, Lina. 2016. “Vendors First: How Street Vendors Guide the Policy and Strategy Development of the Los Angeles Street Vendor Campaign.” The California Endowment. Stepick, Lina. 2015. (As Author and Guest Editor). "How Organizations Develop viii Activists: The Challenges and Potential of Combining Organizing and Mobilizing" Mobilizing Ideas. Stepick, Lina. 2015. Review of New Labor in New York: Precarious Workers and the Future of the Labor Movement, edited by Ruth Milkman and Ed Ott. Labor Studies Journal. Walker, Edward, Lina Stepick. 2014. “Strength in Diversity? Group Heterogeneity in the Mobilization of Grassroots Organizations.” Sociology Compass, 8(7): 959- 975. Stepick, Lina. 2014. "How Do Citizens Participate in Politics Beyond Elections?" Monkey Cage Civic Engagement Series, The Washington Post. Stepick, Lina. 2013. Review of Beyond Green Jobs: Building Lasting Opportunities in Energy Efficiency, Daniel Villao, Uyen Le, Hugo Sarmiento, Stefanie Ritoper. Labor Studies Journal. Stepick, Lina. 2012. Review of Rallying for Immigrant Rights: The Fight for Inclusion in 21st Century America, eds. Kim Voss & Irene Bloemraad. Labor Studies Journal 37(3): 328-330. Employment University of Oregon Labor Education and Research Center (LERC) 2018- Present Labor Policy Research Faculty University of California, Los Angeles Labor Center 2017-2018 Lead Quantitative Researcher Los Angeles Community College District Dolores Huerta Labor Institute 2017-2018 Labor Educator ix Chapter 1 Rebuilding and Reimagining L.A.: Contested and Racialized Urban Development Politics Introduction Los Angeles has long been infamous as a sprawling, fragmented megalopolis, where racialized, extreme inequalities are embedded in and perpetuated by land use (e.g. Davis 2000, Morrow 2013). L.A. has also been the home of what has been understood to be the prototypical growth machine, which has created and deepened inequalities through racialized uneven development. L.A.’s patterns of uneven investment and historical disinvestment, which have left communities of color with rent gaps that increase vulnerabilities to displacement and gentrification, help illustrate the racialized political economy in American cities. In more recent decades, with the rise of slow growth homeowner movements, some scholars have argued that the L.A. growth machine that created and deepened these inequalities, has died (Fulton 1997) or at least lost its consensus (e.g. Purcell 2000). However, this does not fully explain what has happened to the growth machine’s underlying interests or how it has transmuted its practices into different forms of rent exploitation. This also leaves open the question of whether or not the slow growth movement and the erosion of the pro-growth political consensus opens opportunities for other countermovement groups outside of the binary 1 anti-development not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) vs. pro-development yes-in-my-backyard (YIMBY) of urban development logics. In this dissertation I argue that the L.A. growth machine has re-formulated