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MN: Now, with Merit Savings you're back working in Little Tokyo, and in the meantime (L.A.) City Hall is trying to take parts of Little Tokyo away, and so I have on one of the records that on May 20, 1963 you attended a meeting at the Daruma Cafe organized by the Reverend Howard Toriumi. Can you share with us what this historic meeting started?

BK: Yes, Reverend Howard Toriumi was in charge of the church on return from camp and he was doing a good job, and he was full. He went up to the city hall and asking them how he could enlarge his property so he could accommodate more of the people that were coming to church on Sundays and in between, and they told him that that particular building was maxed out and he couldn't add anything to it, and while he was there he happened to be talking to one of the main city planners and his name was (Reuben Lovret). And he advised the reverend, he says, "Why don't you organize the people in Little Tokyo and come up with a plan so you could develop the area?" And Reverend Toriumi thought that was a good idea, so he went over to the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and said that, that the city planner would be very happy to come and talk to Little Tokyo people about a plan to redevelop the area. And so Mr. Mukaeda, (President), and Frank Hirata, the secretary, thought that that would be an interesting meeting, and so we went to the Daruma (Cafe) and set up a date and let the membership and then put up a notice in the paper, those interested in listening to the city planner, what was his name now?

MN: Reuben Lovret?

BK: Yeah, Reuben, and (his) assistant was Jim (Yoshinaga), would come down and explain what he had in mind. As the meeting opened up and people were being informed by Reuben, he says that Little Tokyo has an opportunity to develop a master plan if they want to redevelop the area. It would be better for them to have a master plan, to get it approved by the city so then they could go ahead and do what they planned to do in an organized manner. And everybody thought that would be a good idea. And I says, "The first time anybody's approached us from the city hall, and up to now they took parts of Little Tokyo away from us and they really haven't helped us. They chased us out of the, here, not the city but the government and we're trying to come back and reestablish it." So there was a consensus that we ought to go ahead, so then we formed the Little Tokyo Redevelopment Association and we got Tets Nakamura, the attorney, to form it and he formed a nonprofit corporation and the membership made up of property owners and businessmen to contribute funds so we could then develop a master plan for Little Tokyo. And so I was elected as a chairman for that effort and we got started, and we were fortunate enough to have people who were interested. We had Mr. Uyeda, of Ueda Five and Dime (store). We had the chamber of commerce people that were interested because that would bring more business and their association would prosper. There were others that felt that it was time for us to do something so the city would not take more property away from us, and so we formed a nonprofit corporation (...) by Tets Nakamura, the attorney, and got it formed and got the membership of property owners and businesses to join and assembled enough money to put together a master plan to submit to the city planning commission. Mr. Lovret and Jim Yoshinaga were very instrumental in helping us and Tom Kamei, the structural engineer, he helped us investigate all the buildings for structural strength, and Tosh Terusawa and everyone in the community was really very positive about preserving Little Tokyo. And so we got the plan put together, submitted to the city planning. The city planning approved it, then it went to the city council. The city council with Councilman "Gil Lindsay Baby" (introducing the effort of Little Tokyo). [Laughs]

MN: Tell us the story of how you met Gil Lindsay and how you were able to win him over.

BK: Well, I don't know about how I got him to, to really help us, but he was a very outgoing person and one day I heard that he and his, his wife were headed for Hawaii, and I had some contacts in Gardena with Frank Yamamoto, who was selling lots on the Big Island, lots in the aftermath of the lava. He was selling lava rock, but he was selling and people were buying. It was very cheap. It was cheap because no one else was buying. But he was selling that in Gardena and I got to know Frank, and he moved back to Hawaii after he sold all the lots, and so I got to know him and since he was going to Hawaii, I didn't know anybody else except Frank. So I called Frank, I says, "Frank, you won't believe this, but I need your help. I'm not gonna ask for money. If you spend money for me I will reimburse you, but I have this councilman coming over with his wife for their first time in Hawaii." I says, "Could you take care of him?" He says, "Oh yeah, I'll take care of him." And when councilman landed there I says you can't mistake who he is. He's gonna be the only black person with his wife who's a, is rotund. [Laughs] Teresa. And he took care of them and they had such a fabulous time. Frank took them around and they couldn't believe Hawaii was the way it was, and it was mixed 'cause the Hawaiians were dark also and there was no discrimination, and they came back just bubbling. And he called me on the phone, he says, "Hey, Bruce." He says, "I had a good time. Teresa had a great time." Says, "I don't how to thank you." I says, "You don't have to thank me, I'm just glad you had a good time." And so he naturally was supporting everything we did. Eventually he paid back Frank, because I think the following year Los Angeles was hosting the Olympics and he called Frank and he says, "Frank, come over here." He says, "Bring your wife." He says, "I got tickets for you for the Olympics," through his connection. And he didn't bring his wife but he brought a friend and they had tickets to everything of the Olympics, and I couldn't see Frank because he was too busy. But that was a payback because Gil was so appreciative. But through that connection, everything that I asked him to do, he was very cooperative, and also he knew that Little Tokyo needed help and since it was in his district he was more than willing to go out and do the things for us. So we had a very good, just relationship. It didn't involve money to speak of. It's just good PR. Yeah.

MN: Now, you make it really sound easy about this redevelopment, but you were the president for six years after Little Tokyo Redevelopment Association was in existence, and when I read those minutes, you guys were having meetings two or three every week.

BK: Yeah.

MN: And how did you juggle the, and this is all volunteer.

BK: It's all volunteer.

MN: And you were president of Merit Savings.

BK: Right.

MN: And you had a family. I mean, how were you juggling all of this?

BK: We met with the, Reuben Lovret and Jim Yoshinaga during their lunch hour because they were employees of the city and they could not work during their official time for the city. They had to do it during their lunch hour, so they gave up their lunch hour. We'd meet at the chamber office and go through all the things that we had to do to get the application for this master plan done. So there was no conflict on their part. They were doing it as a interested citizen in their off hours, and so we were fortunate to find people like that, otherwise Little Tokyo would not have been formed.

MN: Well, Mr. Lovret, before he passed away, he was really impressed that the LTRA was able to come up with a general land use plan within, within a year, and he gave a lot of that credit to your leadership.

BK: He was, he was a nice guy. Well, I think it's, I think Little Tokyo was in a situation where they needed to revive the area, and this redevelopment master plan that was created was a way to do it. And it was fortuitous that we ran into Reuben Lovret because he gave us a key, and the consultation was free and the method by which we went through various steps was the logical step to get the city to agree to what we wanted to do. And once we had the master plan approved by the city council, it was their plan, not ours anymore. It was their plan that they approved, so everything that we would then apply to do in Little Tokyo they had to listen to because it, it was actually approved by them for the whole plan. So I credit Mr. Lovret in giving us the right formula so that we could go ahead and develop. Now you look at it and there's no piece of property to develop. Everything's spoken for. But the method by which you could apply, because we had a master plan, it was already set up. There was no difficulty in applying for a high rise or whatever. If it met the requirements for zoning they would have to approve it. It didn't have to go through extra steps.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.