[dropcap size=big]R[/dropcap]emember when former city council member Jose Huizar’s home and office got raided by the FBI back in 2018? Huizar was supposed to be the pride and joy of Boyle Heights. Then he was charged last summer in a 34-count racketeering indictment; his trial is next year.
Our collaboration podcast with Neon Hum Media, Smoke Screen: The Sellout, delivers on a lot of the drama, but it also goes beyond the salacious details. This is more than a story about a corrupt politician that *allegedly* took a million and a half dollars in illicit financial benefits, his alleged brazen deals behind closed doors, his trips to Vegas, the envelopes stuffed with cash the FBI took from his home. Behind the spectacle is a story about how the community of CD-14 fought skyrocketing rents and neglect and a man who allegedly sold them out.
We’re kicking off this series with Nancy Meza, an organizer who was a part of Defend Boyle Heights, and our own Erick Huerta, a writer, and organizer. Meza retells a story of how high school band kids fought gentrification in 2016 and how that sparked the beginning of an anti-gentrification movement.
Erick Huerta shows us Mariachi Plaza and gives some history of the place. We also get to eat tacos together.