When attorney Ken Kutcher of Culver Crest and four other leaders of Los Angeles civic life were summoned to the stage of a Downtown auditorium last evening to be formally certified as heroes — far removed from the nearby jaded faux kingmakers of the entertainment world — not coincidentally, all displayed an old-fashioned gift for self-effacement that was striking.
This was the anti-Oscar ceremony, the anti-Grammy show. In those venues, , winners are expected to shamelessly preen.
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Ine and Ken Kutcher
At the Community Health Councils’ elaborate “Community of Heroes” celebration, the exact opposite talent was rewarded.
Except for Mr. Kutcher, the game-saving architect of last summer’s landmark drilling regulations agreement for the Baldwin Hills Oil Field, the other four heroes were drawn from the healthcare field, honoring their devotion to underserved populations.
Cited as the Environmental Champion of the evening, Mr. Kutcher was no stranger to the sponsoring Community Health Councils. For 2½ years, the two were gritty allies in a fierce showdown war with the County and the oil company PXP to reduce the number of drillable wells, stiffen drilling regulations and tighten the monitoring of health and safety threats.
The narrative where Mr. Kutcher — if you will forgive the oxymoronic concept — is a tiptoe-quiet headliner, is known well throughout the region.
January will mark the six-year anniversary of a middle-of-a-cold-winter-night PXP gas leak — based near West L.A. College. More spectacular than damaging, it drove numerous Culver Crest residents from their homes.
Metaphorically and pragmatically, it was a wakeup call for oil-field-adjacent residents who were close enough to taste or fear fumes and worse.
From that date to this afternoon, Mr. Kutcher, partner in a prestigious Santa Monica law firm, has been laboring, mainly away from public view. Perhaps the most commendable dimension of his remarkably dedicated commitment to a broad, often amorphous, wildly outsized, concept is that he has spent months quietly, doggedly poring over arcane files to find elusive pragmatic solutions.
He might have gone unnoticed. Friends who have known him for years can’t remember his voice being raised.
Lesser attorneys would have folded from boredom or periodic discouragement.
When County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas came to office three years ago on a vow to toughen if not totally reverse the putty-soft drilling regulations promoted by his unpopular predecessor, Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, Mr. Kutcher — as a resident and a lawyer — sprang to the challenge.
He carried one of four separate lawsuits that torturously dragged out for 2½ years before the hardy plaintiffs, and Mr. Kutcher prevailed last July.
Last night’s ceremony at the Cathedral Center Plaza was a grateful community’s thank you.
Halos also were awarded to:
David Carlisle, M.D., President of Charles Drew University of Medicine & Science, designated an Unsung Hero.
Hector Flores, M.D., Medical Director of White Memorial Medical Center, for being a “Bridge Builder.”
Sylvia Drew Ivie, founder of the South L.A. Community Kitchen, honored as “a champion for Hope and Wellness.”
Robert Tranquada, M.D., emeritus professor, USC, recognized as “the premier Healthcare Architect” for changing the shape of healthcare delivery for leading development of the South Central Multipurposes Health Services Center, Watts, in 1965.
