Robert Santilli: Helping Hands

   DRESSED IN  a perfectly ironed, striped American Eagle collared shirt, spotless dark blue jeans, with matching and immaculate shoes, Robert Santilli hands a bag of a weeks worth of groceries to an impoverished woman in a dress that she has probably worn three times that week. Though he may look  wildly out of place Santilli can be found at the Blessed Sacrament Church in Hollywood every Saturday morning helping the impoverished and homeless.

Santilli, a Senior Business Major at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, wasn’t always so hands-on or involved in giving to others, though he always had an “underlying passion to serve”. As a student “that passion become an active service”. He is now in love with helping others. Santilli praises the campus’ ability to make service accessible. “I always had a small desire to do service, but never had a great opportunity”. Now that Santilli lives within Los Angeles, there are plenty of opportunities, and several different neighboring communities that need his help, two of which he has dedicated his college years to. Not only did Santilli not have an opportunity before LMU, he was secretly scared to serve the homeless population.

photo via Blessed Sacrament Hollywood

Santilli grew up in a wealthy family in Valencia, and he feared that the homeless would be “angry with me for what I had or that they wouldn’t accept my service”. He feared their reaction and possible hostility towards someone from wealth trying to help them. Therefore he kept his contact with the homeless population very scarce and the thought of being immersed in their environment was overwhelming. He did have a desire to help, but his fear overcome that desire and kept him from fulfilling those needs. Santilli was and is all too familiar with the stereotypes that surround homeless people. They are thought of as drug or alcohol addicts, possibly crazed, dangerous, hostile and some believe that they are not worth helping. Those stereotypes are part of what kept Santilli away and fed his fears, but they are now what Santilli is fighting against when trying to get other people involved.

            Santilli started helping the homeless slowly with the “Feed the Hungry” program at LMU. He helped make bagged lunches for the people at a homeless shelter in Santa Monica every Tuesday. Though he helped make the lunches, it took him several months before he actually went to the homeless shelter. When he got there he felt even more rewarded for his hard work when seeing the gratefulness of the people receiving the lunches. He observed that at that shelter the people were “chronically homeless. You will see the same people there every week for months or even years at a time”. He even became fast friends with one of the regulars at the shelter, a man who served in the Vietnam, a population that seemed to overrun that particular shelter.           

            Santilli left “Feed the Hungry” due to a conflict of scheduling, but that did not stop his service. He found the Blessed Sacrament Church, and since it is located in Hollywood, it brings a very different clientele from his previous place of service. “Mostly European and not necessarily homeless, they have homes, they just don’t have a lot of money, it gets really crazy in there. People steal and barter…” If one drives by this church on a Saturday morning between ten and noon they will see a line around the block of people waiting for their bags of groceries. Santilli notes that the lines are longer in Hollywood and you do not always see the same amount of people. He attributes this to the area, “it’s further from the beach so there are not as many homeless”.  After working at both locations for two years, Santilli has decided he prefers Hollywood, “I love it and I hope to continue volunteering there after I graduate in May”. Seeing that he is close to the Church’s Program Director and that he currently goes there every Saturday, it is hard to imagine that he will not continue to go there.

            What Santilli likes most about volunteering in Hollywood as opposed to Santa Monica is that “with the chronically homeless it is easy to spot them, the clients at this location (Hollywood) look just like you or me”. To him this point is an important one. He knows that with living in Los Angeles there are thousands of people with different lives, different situations and that you cannot really know anyone just by the way they look. Los Angeles is an eclectic city and one that cannot be judged by the appearance only, and neither can the people. 

-- Mickala Jauegui 

Charles Lummis: L.A. Booster

YESTERDAY was L.A.'s uber-booster Charles Lummis' birthday. You all read a little bit about him in David Fine's piece early in the semester -- Lummis and his brave long walk 3,507 miles from Cincinnati to Los Angeles.  Check out this link: http://lahistory.tumblr.com/post/18551953575/happy-birthday-charles-lummis-born-march-1-1859 and you'll find more.

Also, this Tumblr is  actually a really wonderful treasure trove of L.A. history in photographs, a rabbit hole for sure.

Enjoy!

-- L.G.

L.A. "Booster": Blogroll

Here is the formal list of works-in-progress our L.A. Scribes are hard at work on:

Derek Dellovo:

Roy Choi, the mastermind behind Kogi BBQ, has created an expanding business and become one of the most popular food truck franchises in Los Angeles. His fusion of Asian/Hispanic cuisine is representative of the city from which he resides; modern, exciting and desired. He has turned a simple idea into a Los Angeles icon, and cemented his importance in the city.

Allie Flinn:

Ani Phyo is a raw food chef and author. She co-founded SmartMonkey Foods in Los Angeles in 1999, but moved it to Portland, Oregon from 2003-2006 when Phyo moved there to get away from her hectic Los Angeles lifestyle, but she couldn’t stay away for long. Inspired by the organic farm she and her family had growing up, along with discovering eating raw foods helped with her mental clarity and general well-being, led Phyo to be involved with the Pedal Patch Community. This organization taught at risk youth how to garden and make food in urban areas.

Art Flores:

I am going to be covering Fr. Greg Boyle’s journey as the founder of Homeboy Industries.  I am going to gathering information about where he was during the 1992 riots, and how that led him to create his non-profit.  I am going to ask Fr. Boyle about the sustainability of Homeboy Industries.  Lastly, I want to get his opinion on Homeboy Industries after he’s gone, and how it will favor in his absence.

Michael Flores:

A profile on Edward Ruscha  and how Los Angeles influences his art, but also how his art may influence LA. I would like to know how the changing landscape of our city and the impact of American expressionism acts as a muse for his art. 

Elise Fornaca:

 Larry Welk III has lived his entire life in the heart of LA’s television.  His grandfather, Lawrence Welk, started the Lawrence Welk Show in 1951.  This was the place where his mother, Tanya Welk, got her start as a cast member, and met and fell in love with his father Lawrence Welk Jr. Being a native Angelo, Larry has seen the rise and fall of LA’s television industry throughout the years.  As such, he has always been fascinated with capturing the true essence of Los Angeles. Because of this passion, Larry started the Little Angel Air company, in which he runs all of the helicopters for news and radio stations in the Los Angeles area.  He covers anything from the terrible LA traffic to car speed cases and fires. Throughout his career, Larry has seen the true landscape of LA and has exposed the cracks beneath the surface.  In this profile is want to expose Larry’s passion for what he does, as well as, why he has chosen LA to fly over every day.   

 

 Nastassja Habers:
For my L.A. Booster piece I will be writing on Alli Beckman. Her family owns BRS, a rigging company for the entertainment industry. BRS has worked on movies such as Spider Man, Men in Black, and The Green Lantern, and has also set up stages for the rave EDC, Rock the Bells, and Lil’ Wayne. Alli Beckman has even done a few stunts and played extra roles in some of the movies her family business works on. She is connected to L.A because she is connected to L.A’s most notorious industry, the entertainment industry. Alli Beckman’s heart resides in Los Angeles.

Mickala Jauregui

Robert Santilli always had an inner desire to work with the homeless, to help make a difference in their lives, there was only one problem he was afraid of coming face to face with them and he was ashamed to admit it. Now, Santilli volunteers weekly at the Blessed Sacrament Church in Hollywood. He is the correspondence between his Service Organization, Magis and the church. This food pantry in Hollywood has helped Santilli follow his passion and for that he is more than thankful, he is devoted.

Jennifer   Pellerito:

Lorena Chavez is a Los Angeles native who currently works at Loyola Marymount’s Center for Service and Action. She is a liaison between LMU and the communities that the university supports. Not only does she work for social justice, she also provides mentorship and guidance for many individual LMU students. Lorena is oriented toward helping others and changing the world around her. 

Julian Portera:

A ten-time champion youth basketball coach, Vice Principal Cornelius has taught and coached at over 5 different high schools over the course of his career, and oh yeah…he’s only 25. Vice Principal Cornelius is also Officer Cornelius when he enters Staples Center. In my piece, I plan to delve into Mr. Cornelius’s life in Los Angeles and the parallels between being a teacher, coach, and Department of Homeland Security Officer. 

Caroline Queen: 

Lindsay William-Ross, writer for the "hippest" Los Angeles blog, LAist. My angle is to uncover what exactly separates this blog from all of the other L.A. Blogs out there and why, if it is actually, the hippest Los Angeles blog. I will discuss the history and idea behind the blog, as well as lindsay's unique perspective on and love for Los Angeles. I am also going to delve Into An exploration of the idea that as a blogger, the entirety of Los Angeles is your office.

Carey Uhl:

 Paul Harris serves as a prime example of an Angeleno because of his diverse interests.  Not only is he an educator, a critic, Chair of the English Department, a scholar of time, and free thinker, he also is a servant of his city who actively pursues social justice.  Last year, he initiated a community based learning course that studied homelessness in LA and forced students to volunteer at homeless shelters and food banks.  He's a true Angelenohat actively tries to better his city by community involvement and education, which makes him a great candidate for a booster profile.

Jordan Younger:
Chuck Rosenthal is an American novelist and short story writer who has published seven novels and a memoir since the 1980s. He teaches English at Loyola Marymount University (and specifically he is my Fiction Writing Workshop professor). He is connected to Los Angeles because he is a part of the L.A. literary world in the writing and publishing aspects, and he is also married to poet Gail Wronsky.


Looking forward to the final project!

-- L.G.

image: Land of Sunshine via KCET

In Response to Lautner: Ice Cube on Eames

WE SPOKE  a little bit about Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980, the sprawling art exhibition that stretches across the basin, finally joining L.A.'s art institutions like sturdy links on a chain (More on that later).  Part of the exhibition, however, includes this video of rapepr/actor Ice Cube musing on his city.

He is echoing many of the observations, concerns we've been discussing thus far and he's doing more than a bit of myth busting himself -- but as a booster in the very sense you all will be talking and writing about -- someone who lives, works and understands L.A. and its all its complexity.

This from L.A.-ist:

"so what" to people deeming L.A. "eyesore after eyesore," claiming, "They don't know the L.A. I know. The good, the bad and the ugly about L.A." His main stop is the Eames House in the Pacific Palisades, where he reveals his solid knowledge of architecture and design.

Check out the rest of the L.A.ist post here.

Now, I'm off to "go get lost"
-- L.G.