A PROFILE OF THE SMALL BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN HISTORIC FILIPINOTOWN: SEARCH TO INVOLVE PILIPINO AMERICANS A Project Presented to the Faculty of California State Polytechnic University, Pomona In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree Master In Urban and Regional Planning By Monica Paderanga 2020 SIGNATURE PAGE PROJECT: A PROFILE OF THE SMALL BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN HISTORIC FILIPINOTOWN: SEARCH TO INVOLVE PILIPINO AMERICANS AUTHOR: Monica Paderanga DATE SUBMITTED: Spring 2020 Department of Urban and Regional Planning Dr. Alvaro Huerta _______________________________________ Project Committee Chair Urban and Regional Planning Dr. Annette Koh _______________________________________ Urban and Regional Planning Fidji Victoriano Director of Operations _______________________________________ Search to Involve Pilipino Americans ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Gusto kong isulti salamat sa kong pamilya. Salamat kaayo kong mama ug papa, ug lola. Kung wala ang imonng suporta, dili unta ako makahuman sa pag-eskwela. Genelle ug Megan, dapat kita mahibal-an kung unsaon pagsulti Cebuano aron mapadayon naton nga buhi ang atong kultura. I also want to thank my committee cohort for helping me develop my project, and for motivating me throughout this past year. We might have been caught up in a pandemic, but our drive, energy, and passion for what we do and what we aim to accomplish will help see us through. Thank you to my friends as well for allowing me to share my project with them and for giving me the confidence at times when I needed it most. To my client project committee: Dr. Huerta, Dr. Koh, and Fidji, thank you for being endlessly supportive inside and outside of the classroom. Thank you Fidji for taking me on board to work on this project. I am inspired by the work that you do and what the community has done to preserve and grow Historic Filipinotown. Dr. Huerta: Thank you for your constant communication and encouragement. Your stories and lessons are invaluable. Dr. Koh: Despite only having spent one semester with you, you have dramatically changed the way I view planning and because of it, I feel passionately towards my work and hope that it will never falter. Thank you for challenging my own perceptions on planning, and for pushing me to go beyond. Lastly, thank you to those who participated in this project. Your input and knowledge helped to make this project come to life. iii ABSTRACT Ethnic enclaves in Los Angeles such as Little Tokyo and Chinatown have become sites for major redevelopment projects within the last decade due to its close proximity to the Downtown core. These projects are often aimed at improving mobility and public transportation, however, they also serve as opportunities for unhindered growth that can dramatically transform the neighborhood’s physical and cultural landscape. Not too far west from Downtown LA is another ethnic enclave, Historic Filipinotown. Historic Filipinotown, or HiFi for short, has been and is currently undergoing its own transformation caused by increased investment and attention to the area. This project examines HiFi’s small business community, particularly its more recent small businesses, and considers a community development framework that is rooted in Pilipino cultural values. This project provides an updated profile of HiFi’s small business community as well as a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) analysis using sociodemographic data, business composition statistics, and interviews with small business owners and community members. Participant observations, personal archives, and interviews were also done to support a community development framework based on SIPA’s practice of Pilipino indigenous values. Findings showed that HiFi’s rich cultural heritage as a main driving force behind the neighborhood’s expanding small business community and overall neighborhood growth. In addition, this was cited as a threat to the neighborhood in the form of rising commercial and residential rent. Most importantly, the interviews revealed a shared vision for what HiFi should be, a Pilipino cultural hub with a strong commercial presence that supports development without displacement. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS SIGNATURE PAGE .......................................................................................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... iii ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................... iv CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................... 1 CLIENT: SEARCH TO INVOLVE PILIPINO AMERICANS ..................................... 3 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................ 4 CASE STUDIES: LOS ANGELES’ AND SAN FRANCISCO’S MANILATOWNS .. 4 ETHNIC ENTREPRENEURSHIP ............................................................................... 11 BACKGROUND OF HISTORIC FILIPINOTOWN ................................................... 12 SIGNIFICANCE OF PROJECT ................................................................................... 15 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY .................................................................................... 19 A. Participant Observations ....................................................................................... 19 B. Personal Archives ................................................................................................. 22 C. Interviews .............................................................................................................. 23 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS ................................................................................................. 26 PART I: AN UPDATED PROFILE OF THE SMALL BUSINSS COMMUNITY .... 27 A. Context .............................................................................................................. 27 v B. Profiling Historic Filipinotown’s Small Business Community ........................ 28 C. SWOT Observations ......................................................................................... 29 PART II: REIMAGINAING HIFI: A CULTURAL FRAMEWORK ......................... 31 A. Unlocking Pilipino Flavors: A Historical Journey ............................................... 33 B. A Gustatory Exploration: Historic Fiipinotown’s Expanding Food Landscape .. 35 C. Reimagining HiFi: Kawanggawa, Damayan, Pagtutulongan ............................... 39 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ......................................................................................... 45 LIMITATIONS ............................................................................................................. 45 FUTURE IMPLICATIONS .......................................................................................... 46 RECOMMENDATIONS .............................................................................................. 51 REFEERENCES ............................................................................................................... 53 APPENDIX A: IRB APPROVAL MEMORANDUM ..................................................... 58 APPENDIX B: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS .................................................................... 60 APPENDIX C: SWOT ANALYSIS ................................................................................. 62 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Cropped screenshot of City of LA’s Planning Commission map showing distribution of Pilipinos, 1940. Area circled in red is Bunker Hill, Downtown Los Angeles. (Source: UCLA Library Special Collections) ...................................................... 7 Figure 2: Survey map of South Bunker Hill area of Los Angeles, 1956. (Source: The Huntington Library, Frederick W. Nelson Scrapbook Collection) ..................................... 9 Figure 3: Historic Filipinotown and its official borders ................................................... 13 Figure 4: Map showing Pilipinos make up the largest Asian population in HiFi. (Source: Mapping the AAPI Community) ...................................................................................... 28 Figure 5: Makeup of HiFi's Eating & Drinking Places ..................................................... 29 Figure 6: Presentation Board at Sangkap event on the history of Pilipino food, as described by Doreen Fernandez ........................................................................................ 34 Figure 7: HiFi's Expanding Food Landscape .................................................................... 36 Figure 8: Philippine Indigenous Values Exemplified in HiFi .......................................... 41 Figure 9: Ellis Act Evictions in HiFi, 2001-2015. (Source: Coalition for Economic Survival, Los Angeles) ...................................................................................................... 48 Figure 10: Ellis Act Evictions in HiFi, 2001-2020. (Source: Coalition for Economic Survival, Los Angeles) ...................................................................................................... 49 Figure 11: Reimagining HiFi: A Cultural Framework ..................................................... 52 vii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Historic Filipinotown has been of major interest to the Los Angeles Planning Department and outside developers who identify the neighborhood to be desirable due to the influx of commercial