LOS ANGELES — It was 1971, and just as a 3-year-old Mexican immigrant named José Huizar arrived in Boyle Heights, neighborhood restaurant Zamora Brothers opened its doors. Fifty years later, Raquel Zamora says her family’s secret to longevity is more than just great food.
It’s owning the land beneath their feet.
“That’s the blessing of our family business,” Zamora said as she sat outside on a shaded patio off busy East Cesar E. Chavez Ave, “owning the building.”
From her family restaurant, Zamora watched other family businesses close and customers move away amid rising rents in her East LA neighborhood. It was a result of gentrification that accelerated after one of their own, José Huizar, was elected to LA’s powerful City Council.
“It’s irreversible, the displacement,” Zamora said. “The property values aren’t going to come down. It’s inevitable that change will continue and continue and continue.”
Huizar is scheduled to go to trial in May on federal corruption charges, accused of accepting $1.5 million in bribes from developers. His lawyer declined to comment for this story, but in a motion to dismiss the case they argued Huizar’s actions were “lawful, long-accepted and constitutionally-protected conduct.”
“One of the loosely-stated upshots of the Supreme Court’s recent corruption cases is that federal prosecutors are not the hall monitors for local government,” the motion states.
Huizar’s roots in Boyle Heights and eventual indictment are the focus of a new podcast from L.A. Taco and Neon Hum titled “The Sellout.” Producers Carla Green and Liz Sanchez explore how the alleged corruption changed downtown and Boyle Heights forever.
“It was certainly not a victimless crime,” Green said.
To understand the impact, Green decided to go beyond the developments Huizar championed and look at how they uprooted the very community that shaped Huizar’s political ascent from the working class community to college at UC Berkeley, Princeton and UCLA School of Law.
“To me at least, there is a clear difference in the Huizar I see in the pages of the Daily Californian and the Huizar in the FBI indictment,” Green said. “That was absolutely something we were talking about as a team. Was there a moment when Huizar changed? I don’t have an answer to that.”
To Zamora, watching Huizar’s rise and fall was emotional.
“It was heartbreaking,” she said.
To her, the neighborhood is still reeling from the councilman’s downfall and still waiting for a champion.