For decades, Central Avenue served as the de facto heartbeat of African American life in Los Angeles. As the late 20th century progressed, economic and demographic changes transformed this historic corridor that featured performance spaces like Club Alabam and the Downbeat. Possibly the greatest single event was the 1948 Supreme Court ruling outlawing racially restrictive housing, which enabled people of color to move further west. This meant an influx of Black and Japanese-American families, particularly in the area served by Dorsey High School. In the latter half of the century, this area, known as the Crenshaw District, would have an inordinate effect on the city and leave its cultural imprint on the world.
Back in the day: showcase for Black achievement
By the mid-century, the epicenter of Central Avenue shifted northwest and settled along the 23-mile Crenshaw Boulevard, specifically between the Hancock Park neighborhood and Inglewood. This north-south thoroughfare teemed with Black-owned businesses, punctuated by a flourishing nightlife anchored by the Total Experience across from Leimert Park and, farther north, Maverick’s Flat, which inspired “Psychedelic Shack,” the landmark 1970 album by The Temptations.
These musical showcases were operated by impresarios Lonnie Simmons (The Total Experience) and John Daniels (Maverick’s Flat), who were about to attract the cream of the always fertile talent pool of African American musical artistry. This top-flight talent in turn drew a well-dressed clientele from the affluent bastion of the immediate area.
An added incentive was the still flourishing Crenshaw Center, which opened in 1948 as the first open-air shopping structure.
Circumstances beyond our control
The economy is cyclical, and the demographic shift encouraged “white-flight,” which in turn facilitated financial disinvestment and commercial abandonment. Any community in any city is subject to the whims of the outside world, and the events of the millennial financial real estate bubble impacted Southern California’s already hyper-expensive housing market.
Local housing, never cheap in this city, has mushroomed to the point where well-heeled home buyers who normally would confine their shopping to places like Venice, Santa Monica, and Culver City on the West Side have expanded the search to more affordable, centrally located areas. This showed up in the lighter hues of pedestrians walking in residential areas.
A community under siege
Coincidentally, the current public official representing the area is a local product, Councilman Marqueece L. Harris-Dawson, who led the 8th district for ten years and, since September of 2024, has served as president of the Los Angeles City Council.
“All the factories that we had along the Alameda Corridor-and in Southgate and in Watts, where people could get good-paying jobs– those places went away, through free trade and NAFTA and all those things. Our economy never really recovered,” said Harris-Dawson.
This created an economic “domino theory” of sorts, with one setback following another and further impairing the area’s fiscal health, as he explained.
“When people lose their jobs, the commercial investment follows, and people don’t have money to spend as they once did,” he said.
“Why would I set up a store if I know people don’t have enough money to buy anything? No reasonable person would invest their money in that way,” said Harris-Dawson.
This is a problem witnessed across the country, as Harris-Dawson notes.
A recent point of contention for his constituents is the status of the former Crenshaw Center, now known as the Baldwin Hills-Crenshaw Plaza, a 40-acre edifice desperately in need of refurbishment. Among the businesses vying for this lucrative contract was the CIM Group, a multibillion-dollar commercial real estate conglomerate that has erected scores of buildings in the West Adams District and along Crenshaw Boulevard.
Among those concerned about outside intrusion into the area was Damien Goodmon, representing the Crenshaw Subway Coalition.
He believes these currency-rich businesses have little interest in the welfare of communities of color, and was at the forefront of blocking the CIM purchase.
“They’re greasing the wheels of gentrification in our communities,” he said in a statement to the Los Angeles Standard newspaper.
CIM, with business ties to Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, stirred up its fair share of controversy, with opposition by local elements including activists, block clubs, and others in the community. Many have sentimental ties and fear outside elements would erase the favor of the neighborhood by pricing out longtime residents along with their customs and traditions.
Among those opposing the purchase was the Rev. William D. Smart Jr. of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) of Southern California. He expressed this to several outlets in the city, including Urbanize LA. This includes his displeasure over what he termed: “The construction of a project that would ignore the community’s needs and wishes and possibly wipe out dozens of minority-owned businesses that are now tenants in the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza mall.”
Rumors abounded that CIM was a foreign-based company. This was proved to be unfounded, as their headquarters is located on Wilshire Boulevard. Nonetheless, CIM bowed out due to community pressure and walked away from a purchase in excess of $100 million.
Harris-Dawson views the collapse of this undertaking thusly.
“I didn’t think it was beyond their capacity – I just thought that the way they came out with it was challenging,” He said, referencing how the media presented the proposal..
“You want the kind of investment that builds up the strong parts of your community and shores up the weak parts.”
Earlier this year, construction began on the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza redevelopment, which has now mushroomed to a $135 million project financed by the multinational asset management company Schroders, which in turn is based in London. It will be overseen by the Harridge Development Group with offices on Wilshire Boulevard.
Reportedly, 25 percent of construction jobs are earmarked for community residents.
He expresses excitement for a separate enterprise, the Stocker Street Creative construction now underway at the intersection of Crenshaw and the eponymous street bisecting the neighborhoods of Baldwin Hills and View Park. This will be a $200 million complex entertainment facility providing production space, slated for completion toward the end of 2027.
Approval has been given by the Los Angeles City Council for the 250,000 foot studio campus featuring square feet of production, office, and restaurants.
Upon its completion, the companies that occupy Stocker Street Creative will provide good, high- paying union jobs. This is a long overdue dividend for a demographic that has historically provided outsized contributions to the culture and entertainment sector.
“African Americans do well on both sides of the camera, in front and behind,” observes Harris-Dawson.
Even more controversial is the hoopla around the highly publicized Destination Crenshaw. Groundbreaking took place in 2020 for a cultural edifice to work in tandem with the Leimert Park station. It has been hampered by myriad complications, not least of which was the COVID-19 pandemic, which coincided with the start of construction.
This, along with blocked automobile and foot traffic and limited access to businesses in the area, added to the turmoil, extending to Councilman Harris-Dawson.
He attributes this to undue criticism, a staple of any undertaking in the service of Black people.
“Putting a $100 million investment focusing on Black people on a public street, we knew it was gonna be challenging, and this was part and parcel of what we expected,” he said.
“Literally any project that’s over $100 million that started before the pandemic, none of them have finished on time, none of them have finished on budget.”
To substantiate this, he points to downtown’s giant Graffiti Towers (officially known as Oceanview Plaza), LAX, LACMA Metro Rail, and other high-profile projects around the city that have not received the same criticism that Destination Crenshaw has.
That said, a council staff member reported that since its inception, Destination Crenshaw has seen a 41 percent increase in Black-owned commercial properties between 2017 and 2025. These are parcels of land right on Crenshaw Boulevard.
