Opinion: USC: a good neighbor

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Dr. Stephanie Taylor-Dinwiddie is the president and CEO of Spirit Early Intervention Program and Spirit Child Development Center Inc., a nonprofit corporation; both programs are community based, serving preschool-aged children in inner-city Los Angeles. Here, she responds to an article in The Times. If you would like to respond to a recent Times article, editorial or Op-Ed in our Blowback forum, here are our FAQs and submission policy.

Larry Gordon’s Sunday L.A. Times article, ‘USC outgrowing its neighborhood,’ described the significant need for student housing in the area immediately surrounding the university.

I am concerned, however, about how the surrounding community, and in particular the congregation of St. Mark’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, were described in the article because I am a stakeholder in both. The congregants of St. Mark’s were characterized as a low-income population that has been in decline over the last several years. But for the most part, the church serves a middle-class population, including a number of professionals. There could be many factors that would impact a declining attendance. Too often, USC is looked on as ‘imposing’ when in fact the presence of the university has greatly benefited its surrounding community in multiple ways.

The area in question falls under rent control, and as such, renters cannot be charged ridiculous price jumps on their rent. If residents have been evicted, reasons for those evictions should be made clear, rather than (again) laying the blame on USC and its increased need for housing.

Some years ago, USC was the third-largest employer in Los Angeles, and it probably remains at or near that level today. No one complains about how many middle- and low-income families benefit from employment at the university, nor do they complain when their children receive a first-class education from the university as a benefit of their labor. There are also no complaints from community resident when they sell their property for much, much more than it is worth, knowing that the buyer plans to use the property for student housing.

I am challenged by the notion that a major university should not have the opportunity to develop a true university community, which must include expanded student housing. I am in favor of USC expanding its reach and its presence in the community.

I am concerned that the public, including our councilman, Bernard Parks, is being given a skewed picture of the situation. People are not being run out of the neighborhood for student housing. People in the neighborhood have sold their property of their own free will, seeking and achieving significant financial gain and opportunity.

The university has done a great deal for this community. Is a little living space for their students too much to ask?