As reported by Betty Pleasant in this week’s The Wave, on Saturday the LAUSD and United Teachers Los Angeles will lead a protest that our Citizens’ Campaign to Fix the Expo Light Rail Line is supporting because they, too, oppose the unsafe street-level railroad crossings near our community's schools.
The goal is to send a message to the MTA and to the Public Utilities Commission that we do not support the MTA’s proposed Expo Line Phase 1 design that forces no child west of La Cienega to walk across the tracks, but forces thousands of South L.A. children to walk across the tracks every day for the next 100 years.
Show up to stand up for our community and children’s safety!
The schedule for Saturday's activities is as follows:
9 a.m. to 10 a.m.:
Assembly at the Foshay Learning Center (Western/Exposition)
10 a.m. to 11 a.m.:
Solemn walk, bike, drive, jog to from Foshay to Dorsey High School (Farmdale/Exposition)
11 a.m. to 12 noon:
Assembly at Dorsey High School to plan next steps
Another Victory
We did it. The Public Utilities Commission Evidentiary Hearing has been moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles next week. This is an important battle in our struggle.
The PUC is one regulatory body that can prevent Metropolitan Transit Authority from building the trains at street level.
Holding the hearing is San Francisco would have been a logistical nightmare for us, and it would have prevented several of our witnesses from testifying.
But because of you, your emails and letters, and your action through your presence and statements of concern at the July 2 PUC Workshop at Foshay, we were victorious.
Special thanks go to State Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas, who promptly responded to the concerns of the community by sending the first letter to the PUC requesting the hearing be moved to Los Angeles. Thanks also go to Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, Assembly Member Mike Davis and even City Council member Herb Wesson for writing letters and contacting the PUC.
Filing Our Protests
Join with fellow community members as we sit in at the PUC Evidentiary Hearings Monday through Friday next week.
From Monday to Friday, the PUC will hold the evidentiary hearing for the street-level crossings by Dorsey High and Foshay Learning Center at their Downtown L.A. office: 320 W. 4th St., Suite 500.
The case will be heard daily, and, typically, these sessions last from 10 o’clock to 5.
Our international and national experts will be on the stand, explaining how the Expo Line street-level crossings are unsafe. Our attorneys will be cross-examining the MTA’s project managers, who believe a South L.A. child's life is worth less than a Culver City child’s life.
We need community members at the hearing to sit in, in protest of the MTA’s unsafe street-level crossings, and in support for the community and LAUSD. If you can devote a couple of hours, or all day, to show your presence and support for our kids, please join the
sit-in.
If you don't want to park downtown, a bus that will depart from Rancho Cienega Park's Rodeo Road parking lot at 8:30 a.m. and will return at noon. Rancho Cienega Park is at the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Rodeo Road
Thanks go to Council Member Wesson for providing the bus.
For further information and assistance email us at dg@fixexpo.org or leave a message on the Fix Expo Hotline, at 323.761.6435.
Planning Session
Tonight from 6:30 to 8, there will be a community organizing meeting at the Foshay Learning Center, Auditorium, 3751 Harvard Blvd., one block east of Western and Exposition.
