Eagle Rock bulgogi | Echo Park Film Center closing storefront | Lincoln Height's "Punching Bag" singer

Now Open

Eagle Rock: Koreatown's Hodori Korean Cuisine has opened a new location next to the Vons on North Figueroa Street.  Unlike the Koreatown location, the new restaurant is not 24 hours but offer a menu with yukgaejang spicy beef soup, ginseng chicken soup, bulgogi stir fry and BBQ. Yelp!

Homeboy Art Academy

Boyle Heights: A Q&A with Fabian Debora, a former gang-member turned artist who co-founded the Homeboy Art Academy, which provides arts education and workshops.  Says Debora: "What I want to do within the art is to shine light on the beauty that comes from within my community, such as Boyle Heights, and most importantly, the core values that come from my people."  Zocalo

Real estate ruin

Eagle Rock - “Pillarhenge” may be getting sold again, Boulevard Sentinel reported. A sales contract has been signed for the property at 1332 Colorado Blvd., which earned its nickname from a row of abandoned concrete pillars that rise above the site like an ancient ruin. In this case, they are the remains of a failed real estate development from 2008. The site has already changed hands at least once since that time, selling to Imad Boukai of Orange County in 2016. His plans for a mixed-used structure were approved in 2018 but failed to move forward.

Closing Soon

Echo Park:  The Echo Park Film Center is ending a 20-year-run on Alvarado Street. The non-profit, which offers classes in addition to screening films, will continue operations but has no immediate plans to re-open a physical location. "Change is healthy and good, said a post on Facebook. "And it's time for us to pivot, adapt and recalibrate in response to times we are living in." Good luck, guys!

"Punching Bag"

Lincoln Heights:  The pandemic has actually helped Wallice Hana Watanabe, in a way, The New York Times said.  “A lot of people had time to listen to music and find new artists, said the 23-year-old Lincoln Heights resident, who is known in the music world as just Wallice. Her song “Punching Bag” landed on an influential Spotify list in 2020. A recent piece, “23,” has also had success on Spotify, with three million streams.

Toxic past

Lincoln Heights: A section site of a controversial 468-unit apartment complex used to be an illegal hazardous waste dump 40 years ago, Capitol and Main reported.  The LA District Attorney's in 1984 found 252 barrels of toxic waste buried at 141 West Ave. 34, now part of the five-acre Avenue 34 Project.  Yet that was not mentioned in a recent review by Department of Toxic Substances Control. A resident discovered the site's toxic past while researching online newspaper archives.

Meeting housing demand

Boyle Heights - A once unpermitted garage conversion is now a modern, two-story house designed by the owner's son. The New York Times says the converted garage behind the Martinez family home is an example of the un-permitted housing that cropped up across L.A. in response to demand and in defiance of the law. “The city rules are finally catching up to how these places are being utilized,” said a recent resident of the unit, said architectural designer Luis Martinez.

Gun store problems

The City has accused the gun store operator at the Los Angeles Police Academy of negligence, the L.A. Times said. It's the latest fallout after a former manager of the store was accused of stealing guns from and then illegally selling them, often to police officers. The city said the store was sloppy in its management and record keeping and negligent in its hiring and supervision.

No Oppression Zone

Silver Lake: A DIY parking sign outside the Trader Joe's on Hyperion Avenue.