Why Gardena said "no" to Soul Housing, before their recuperative care facilities ran into trouble in L.A. and Fresno

Plus red alert and opportunities to speak out for MacArthur Park (fenced?) and Beaulyland (demolished?)

Gentle reader,

When you’re an information junkie living in a news desert like Los Angeles is, you slurp up information where you can find it.

That’s why we read the agendas and filings that come out of Los Angeles City Hall, although most are dry as dirt, and can sometimes break news like the proposed $2.3 Million fencing of historic MacArthur Park, a concept that will be discussed in public for the first time at the October 16 meeting of the Recreation and Parks Commission.

Because the park is a protected landmark (HCM #100, designated in 1972), “impacts to Cultural Resources under CEQA will need to be closely analyzed.” Members of the community can monitor the meeting virtually, or attend in person. If you wish to make comments, that can only happen in person or by in writing ahead of the meeting. To send written comments, email RAP.COMMISSIONERS@LACITY.ORG, and put as your email subject “#25-177 - MacArthur Park – Conceptual Approval of Perimeter Fencing Project – Reallocation and Transfer of General Capital.” Info for attending or listening remotely is on the agenda.

Our email to the commission is embedded below, and you are free to use what we wrote as inspiration for your own written or spoken comments at the meeting. Make it personal and let them know you care!

Esotouric's Macarthur Park Fencing Comments To Rec And Parks Commission October 13 2025

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The Rec and Parks Commission meets at the same time on the morning of 10/16 as the Cultural Heritage Commission, and many of you have already submitted written public comments about the threat to Beaulyland, the newly discovered 1912 house by master architect Arthur B. Benton, and the City’s refusal to accept a landmark nomination.

Thank you for speaking up for historic housing in the Westlake District!

It’s not too late to submit written comments, or to call in or show up in person at City Hall on Thursday at 10am. Unlike Rec and Parks, which was overwhelmed by comments from non-local animal rights activists during the Griffith Park Pony Rides debacle, citizens are still welcome to participate with Cultural Heritage matters remotely. Instructions for doing that during the general public comment period (item #3) are on the agenda.

Let’s make it clear to the Commissioners that we trust and expect them to be leaders in heritage preservation, and that we know they have the power to speak up for a great house that will be demolished if they don’t act quickly.

Agendas and public filings can be informative, but we find that the really juicy news gets broken around the virtual water cooler, when an observant citizen notices something screwy and takes the time to share online, where others can chime in.

In June, a viral Reddit post alerted Angelenos to a crisis brewing at Soul Housing, a large recuperative care provider that was allegedly about to displace hundreds of disabled and mentally ill people onto L.A.’s streets—including the person who made the post. They were worried about other residents who were less equipped to handle this challenge handed them on a Friday afternoon than they were.

This post got our interest, firstly because we hate to hear about vulnerable people being put into harm’s way. Also, we knew that Soul Housing had previously evicted tenants who were living in slum conditions in a former hospital at 5700 South Hoover.

But we were especially alarmed because the facility where Daniel-Cali424 said they were living was a brand new upzoned Transit Oriented Communities (TOC) development, permitted for 38 apartments (including 4 for very low income residents), that had replaced historic residential buildings.

So why was this building that had been approved as transit adjacent housing for Angelenos operating, however poorly, as a short-term medical care facility?

Isn’t the whole point of upzoning land and demolishing historic buildings to build dense new housing to actually provide dense new housing? And if it’s not, should the City be making it so easy to tear existing housing down?

Digging into City Council files, we found that shortly after property owner D and K Con LLC obtained a Certificate of Occupancy, they sought to have the new apartment building leased by the City as interim or supportive housing. A motion seeking a report to do so with an option to buy was advanced by councilmembers Heather Hutt and Nithya Raman (who herself is actively seeking to demolish historic housing for new construction).

No report has yet been produced, and the City has not leased 1540 St. Andrews. Nor have the 34 market rate units and the 4 very low income units ever been made available to long-term tenants.

1540 St. Andrews was, until last week’s sudden shut down of operations as reported by LAist, operated by Soul Housing, a for-profit enterprise described as “L.A. County’s largest recuperative care provider, with… [1,300+] beds across 16 facilities.”

The same week that he signed a three day notice to vacate addressed to Daniel-Cali424 and their neighbors, Soul Housing’s Chief of Operations Casey Reinholtz (late of cannabis industry entity HOTBOX) appeared on his wife Kirsten Von Reinholtz’ now private Instagram account in a photo with Mayor Karen Bass, memorializing a conversation about unsheltered homelessness in Los Angeles.

Kirsten Von Reinholtz wrote, “It’s this relentless commitment to protecting our most vulnerable that first made me fall in love with this town.”

This conversation with the most powerful person in Los Angels, the person who could direct City staff to find the funds to purchase 1540 S. St Andrews and make Los Angeles Soul Housing’s landlord, followed immediately by the attempted mass displacement of residents, seemed newsworthy, but no news outlet picked up on our scoop.

In the aftermath of the viral Reddit post, Soul Housing continued operations in Los Angeles. In May, they had expanded into Fresno. But issues persisted. The Fresno facility also shut down suddenly last week due to problems with its insurance provider, forcing City staff and local nonprofits to scramble to provide support to residents and employees.

Katie Wilbur, executive director at RH Community Builders, which is taking over the Fresno operation, minced few words:

“I think that the biggest thing that we heard coming out of this, was like, ‘Oh, this is the city’s fault, or this is CalVIVA [a Medi-Cal provider] and [insurer] Health Net’s fault,’ Wilbur said. “It’s neither of their fault. This is Soul Housing’s fault. They’ve known for a long enough period that their contract was being terminated. They continued operations and then decided at the eleventh hour that they were going to make it somebody else’s problem.”

[Update, first night of Hanukkah 2025: This newsletter has been edited as a kindness to someone who reached out to request the grace of a second chance. We appreciate the work that Dez Martinez does to advocate for Fresno’s homeless community and for government accountability, and believe that not until there is full transparency around government programs to house and care for those experiencing homelessness will these programs actually begin to make a positive difference in California.]

[The confusing, serious problems at Soul Housing facilities] suggest a failure by State and insurance regulators to impose timely restrictions, and of local officials to provide oversight. And in Los Angeles and in Fresno, hundreds of vulnerable residents and low wage workers are now struggling to pick up the pieces.

So what happened in Gardena that was different? Something rare and refreshing: local officials simply did their jobs, asked the right questions and looked out for their community’s interests.

In early 2024, Socially Oriented United Living, Inc. dba Soul Housing sought to take over operations of the Gardena Terrace Inn at 15902 South Western Avenue, and to use the facility to provide recuperative care services to be paid for by the taxpayers under Medi-Cal’s CalAIM program.

City staff reviewed and then denied Soul Housing’s request for a business license on the grounds that the applicants intended use of the property would fall under Gardena’s definition of a group care facility (intended to provide state-authorized residential facilities for medical or non-medical care to individuals facing chronic illness, developmental disabilities or other handicaps, which can include alcohol and drug abuse recovery), and that the Gardena Terrace Inn was permitted as a motel serving travelers—albeit a pretty nasty one.

Soul Housing filed an appeal, and a hearing was held before City Council on May 14, 2024. At the hearing Eric Schames testified on behalf of Soul Housing, explaining the business model, which had up to three strangers sharing each of the 48 motel rooms, and asking the city to approve this use—use which was apparently already happening, despite the lack of a business license.

Schames asserted that Soul Housing operated just like a motel and had no license from the State. And he attempted to present the City with a $5,192 check for first quarter Transit Occupancy Taxes (reflecting 11% of $47,200 in revenue).

After discussion, the council voted to deny the appeal and directed Soul Housing to seek a Conditional Use Permit for a group care facility. (A new State law was signed three months later to streamline use of motels as homeless shelters, and locals report that Gardena Terrace Inn is now operating in that capacity. We do not know if Soul Housing is the operator.)

[So that’s one small town demonstrating how to handle homeless services organizations that seek to move into existing buildings not zoned it. And that’s Sacramento deciding that citizens and their representatives have no right to ask questions and demand mitigations to help make things better for those receiving services and those who live, work, shop and study nearby.]

How will California ever solve its intertwined homelessness, addiction and housing crises without an honest accounting of what is really happening, who the bad actors are, how the system is failing our most vulnerable and why so many elected and appointed officials are in such a hurry to meet with those who profit from homelessness, while shunning caring, loudmouthed, informed and righteously angry citizen advocates who want to see people get the help they need?

The most powerful force for good in the world is smart citizens who give a damn and keep showing up. If we would just listen to them, everything would be different.

But here’s the thing: none of this is the job of citizens. It’s only when our elected and appointed officials—and journalists and news editors—abrogate their responsibilities that some people feel compelled to document and call out their failings. In our broken society, with fiscally irresponsible and mismanaged cities, counties and states, this is time consuming, infuriating work, and so demanding that it’s hard to do much of anything else.

But every time a citizen advocate breaks a story that’s been otherwise ignored, it shines a light on why things are so screwed up, and suggests new paths to prudent, responsive leadership. This doesn’t seem like too much to ask to us—does it to you?

Back to St. Andrews Street in Los Angeles, and the historic multi-family housing lost for denser multi-family housing that turns out to be no such thing.

Before it was demolished, the Col. and Mrs. I.N. Peyton Winter Residence at 1546 South St. Andrews (Spokane gets chilly, even for successful downtown developers) was a six bedroom Craftsman house built in 1905 with each room rented as a studio unit; all the tenants were displaced under the Ellis Act in 2019. The property listing suggests individual rooms were also being rented out in the Albert and Rosa Rimpau Residence at 1540 South St. Andrews (1905), as well.

The houses were demolished, they are gone forever. But all is not lost on St. Andrews: D and K Con LLC also own the corner parcel, and likely would have built an even larger “apartment” building if allowed.

But preservationists stepped in and with the support of the Cultural Heritage Commission successfully designated the streamline moderne School of Eye Education compound as a city landmark. The unorthodox methods promoted here were followed by Aldous Huxley, with some success.

We plan to keep an “eye” on this pretty spot, and hope it won’t fall victim to blight if the structure next door stays empty for long.

Here’s a fresh idea: how about renting the apartment units out as apartments, and adapting the School of Eye Education into a mixed-use compound where Angelenos can live and work once more?

Saturday’s tour is The Run, sharing tales of the shadow world of queer social life in the 20th century, from discrete bars to cruisy parks, steamy bath houses to sleazy speakeasies, camp cafeterias and late night haunts. Join us, do!

Yours for Los Angeles,

Kim & Richard

Esotouric

Are you on social media? We’re on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Mastodon, Threads, Bluesky, Substack Notes, TikTok, Nextdoor and Reddit sharing preservation news as it happens. New: some of these newsletters are on Medium, too.

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Our work—leading tours and historic preservation and cultural landmark advocacy—is about building a bridge between Los Angeles’ past and its future, and not allowing the corrupt, greedy, inept and misguided players who hold present power to destroy the city’s soul and body. If you’d like to support our efforts to be the voice of places worth preserving, we have a tip jar, vintage Los Angeles webinars available to stream, in-person tours and a souvenir shop you can browse in. We’ve also got recommended reading bookshelves on Amazon and the Bookshop indie bookstore site. And did you know we offer private versions of our walking tours for groups big or small? Or just share this link with other people who care.

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UPCOMING WALKING TOURS

• The Run: Gay Downtown History (10/18) • Know Your Downtown LA: Bradbury Building, Basements, Dutch Chocolate Shop (10/25, sorry sold out) • Evergreen Cemetery, 1877 (11/1) • Highland Park Arroyo Time Travel Trip (11/8) • Richard’s Birthday: Alvarado Terrace & South Bonnie Brae Tract (11/15) • The Real Black Dahlia (11/22) • Hollywood Noir (11/29) • Hotel Horrors & Main Street Vice (12/6) • Westlake Park Time Travel Trip (12/13) • Miracle Mile Marvels & Madness (Sunday, 12/21) • Human Sacrifice: The Black Dahlia, Elisa Lam, Heidi Planck & Skid Row Slasher Cases(12/27)

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CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS

310-14 S. Crescent Heights, the Charles Walter Sahland Apartments (Milton Black, 1936) which sold 75% empty earlier this year are coming back online as rentals with an extremely loud interior remodel. We’ll call it a win.

Westwood Memorial Park seeks to demolish the much altered 1924 office building next to the chapel to free up more room for burials. How about moving it to Altadena?The matter will be heard by the Cultural Heritage Commission on 10/16.

Los Angeles is lousy with derelict, vacant buildings and City Hall knows it. Here’s a motion, not to compel owners to fix and lease them, but to find ways to wrap them in giant billboards. Empty Los Angeles writes “This is so dystopian that no amateur could make it up.”

The good houses are all being snapped up for more than they’re worth to be upzoned and demolished, this one by Lindon Shiao of unsecured, burned down Hollywood cottage infamy. 2219 Wellesley is a great candidate to move to Altadena.

A thrilling gift of Viennese Expressionist art from the family of refugee gallerist Otto Kallir just announced by LACMA. The Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele paintings will get the headlines, but ten works by the sublimely weird Alfred Kubin is also a score.

From Rev. Dylan Littlefield: RIP to Fr. Chris Ponnet, who many of you know from the annual memorial service for L.A.’s unclaimed dead at the County cemetery in Boyle Heights. His kind constancy will be missed this year and always.

A decade after we wrote this post chronicling the sad state of the empty El Mirador Apartments, there are now (very expensive, less lovely than they used to be) units available for lease. Thanks to Janet “Houses of Hollywood” Grey for taking the tour and breaking the news.

Just in time for Hallowe’en, there is a terrifying (yet strangely alluring) new attraction at the Elmer McCurdy Museum: half lady / half spider hybrid of horrors SPIDORA! Meet her if you dare when you visit.

The spec affordable projects are falling fast, and our blighted, ruined historic apartment districts will never recover. RIP Normandie/James M. Woods charmers, 8 households Ellised, lot scraped clean, selling for peanuts, if it sells at all. Mini golf?

For sale: Wetzel’s Spartan Market, the red corner store with a 5-room grocer’s flat above that’s been serving Hollywoodians since 1912. It is actually perfect, so please don’t buy if you want to “fix” it, and especially don’t paint the awning!

It’s working! The Earl Carroll Theatre is back on the market at $12M, with the to-be restored neon sign highlighted. Failure to complete this legally binding condition of Essex’ new development next door is why we sent out this newsletter in January 2024. This blighted mess of a block could be the new beating heart of Hollywood’s entertainment zone, with an owner who cares. Essex just wanted entitlements for the huge apt. tower, branded with Beryl Wallace’s holy name. They got it—we got nothing. Fix this!

As City Council signs off on the 4th and Central mega project that would take down George Wyman’s lovely ice house (why no adaptive reuse?), we’re beating the drum for locating, preserving and activating the service tunnels. If Cleveland can do it...

We were there as work finished up replacing the red sandstone “Y” on the Bradbury Building facade that sloughed off last week, and a kind artisan from Spectra gave us some real sandstone relics to keep!

Mike Callahan on The Dusty Archive seeks to reverse engineer deliberately opaque RHNA numbers to find an apparent statistical fraud in the 6th cycle allocation. Why are government workers misrepresenting the population data, displacing families for tiny units with no green space?

A special treat on Saturday’s Know Your Downtown L.A tour: Paul welcomed the group into his pskaufman showroom in the beautiful F&W Grand Silver Store Building (Walker and Eisen, 1931) at 537 South Broadway. If you’re looking for cool boots, stop on by.

Bunker Hill historian Nathan Marsak made a new friend in an Angels Flight Facebook thread whose grandfather managed the lovely Astoria Hotel and Apartments on Olive Street, and he’s shared some family photos and lore for Nathan’s blog.

A feminist landmark, the Woman’s Building, is part of a huge industrial compound just listed in a bankruptcy sale. What an incredible opportunity to reactivate a place of creativity and cultural transformation. Bring her back! Fun fact: it is also where the very early, recently landmarked Standard Service Station in Eagle Rock was constructed.

Onni Group tells the Wall Street Journal what we predicted after they sued Nexstar to get out of the 222 W. 2nd St deal last August: the Times Mirror Square project is DOA.

In case you missed all the drama, buckle up. This was the only landmark designation we ever took on ourselves, at the request of the city’s Office of Historic Resources. We only wanted to nominate the Art Deco building, but the city refused to accept a nomination that didn’t include the Mirror tower and William Pereira’s modernist addition. So we put a dream team together to work on the expanded nomination—then hit the pause button after a threat was conveyed to the group. Finally the nomination was submitted and accepted by the Cultural Heritage Commission, only to be rewritten before the PLUM Committee vote by confessed racketeer councilmember Jose Huizar, to make it possible to demolish the Pereira addition for one of two towers. Now the project is on ice, and these beautiful and important buildings remain mostly vacant, with no plan for redevelopment. The Civic Center would be much improved if they were rented out—or sold to a local owner who cared about them and about Los Angeles.