Blighted Homes Razed for Library Expansion

SUN VALLEY —  A group of library officials, community activists and neighbors joined Los Angeles City Councilman Alex Padilla on Thursday to watch workers begin the razing of three rental houses to make way for a library branch renovation.

“This is a victory,” said Tony Alcala, a literacy advocate from Sun Valley, who said neighborhood children would get the most benefit from a renovated library.

Last November, city officials bought the properties on Vineland Avenue and Strathern Street with Proposition DD funds as part of a $3-million expansion and renovation project of the nearby Sun Valley library branch, said Peter V. Persic, a Los Angeles Public Library spokesman.

Once the buildings are knocked down, construction crews will begin work on a 30-space parking lot and a 7,500-square-foot addition to the existing 5,000-square-foot library, officials said.

New amenities will include computers, a multipurpose room and outdoor terrace.

Among those watching the work crews Thursday was Michelle Epstein, a youth librarian who said that for years she had watched the occupants coming and going from the three rental houses.

She said she saw drug dealers, scantily clad prostitutes and brazen gang members occupy the ramshackle houses, showing little regard for the properties.

“The day they boarded up the houses I breathed a sigh of relief,” Epstein said. “The neighbors are ecstatic.”