Wave of Wealth Could Wash the Grit and Diversity Out of Venice

Elizabeta Betinski came to Venice straight out of art school last year, picturing herself as a modern heir to 1960s avant-garde artists like Billy Al Bengston, Ed Moses and Robert Irwin.

That generation is still here. But Betinski, 26, is gone. She couldn’t afford a loft. And she was turned off by the new crew of casting agents, producers and models. Like other young artists, she moved beyond the 405.

“Venice has become too wealthy. It’s just too rich,” Betinski said. “You lose some of the creativity. None of the young artists can afford it. It’s being taken up by people who want to be hip. It’s all going Hollywood. When you introduce a lot of money, it’s hard to keep it real.”

In a booming real estate market buoyed by Hollywood, dot-coms and the stock market, Venetians, who have worried for years about violent crime and plummeting property values, now fear that prosperity is threatening the richness of this world-class Bohemian mecca--and undermining its historic African American community.

The average value of Venice homes has rebounded 74% from the 1995 market low, exceeding the 1991 high by 9%.

Nationwide, gentrification has already reshaped other formerly funky artist enclaves--including SoHo, South Beach and South of Market--into expensive magnets for stockbrokers, young professionals and celebrities.

For now, though, Venice is still a gritty and sometimes violent place.

Some believe gang violence and street crime will prevent the ‘hood that gave a home to Easy Rider Dennis Hopper from losing its reputation as a tough and even dangerous part of town.

Just before dawn Wednesday, anti-crime activist James Richards, 55, was gunned down in front of his home in Venice’s Oakwood district, where rapid gentrification is fueling tension. City officials characterized the shooting as an assassination. The investigation is continuing.

Susan Payne, who works at ReMax Beach Cities Realty, said there is so much market pressure for beach-adjacent homes that the shooting may inspire only temporary caution--or none at all.

“There’s just such a big demand,” she said. “People have short memories.”

Nick Mele, a screenwriter and actor (“NYPD Blue,” “Seinfeld”) who lives in Oakwood, acknowledged that “some people still don’t feel safe” there.

Many say Venice is being altered by the same economic forces that are redefining California and the nation. Home prices on the canals have passed the $1-million mark, and the grandest houses on the coveted “walk streets” are not far behind.

Young Venice aesthetes say they’re being priced out by a new “hipoisie”--hip bourgeoisie--that revels in the counterculture cachet of the Venice brand name while pursuing more lucrative livelihoods, such as directing commercials. They say production companies and “dot-commies” are invading the lofts and filling unassuming dives on Abbot Kinney Boulevard with the latte elite.

“It would be a real shame if Los Angeles lost Venice and everything just became this bland Westside,” said Babak Naficy, 37, a Venice attorney. “If Abbot Kinney becomes [trendy] Montana [Avenue] it would be a real shame.”

Although the shooting has shaken the community, violence is hardly uncommon. Clifton Smith was shot to death in broad daylight in September. At least half a dozen others were injured in drive-by shootings in Oakwood this year.

“But compared to a decade ago, there’s been few,” said Lt. Thomas Kirk.

Overall, crime is either up or down, depending on what time period is examined. Gangs had shooting wars in 1994 and 1997. Violent crime was down in 1998 and 1999, but is up again this year.

Gang violence has pinned down values here for years. As recently as 1997, buyers could get homes in the low $100,000s. Now Oakwood houses go for three times that much. One just sold for $695,000.

“You’ve got a lot of artsy, eclectic people, entertainment people,” said Sharon Rifelli, a Westside ReMax agent. “They don’t want Leave-It-to-Beaver-Land. [They] see Oakwood as the last bargain by the beach.”

Indeed, said Tony Yollin, an assistant manager with ReMax Beach Cities, “Venice is at an all-time high. When prices go up, you attract whole different groups of buyers. I sell to a lot of people in the movie business: writers, directors, producers and some very well-known actors.”

With Yuppies Comes a Wave of City Inspectors

Longtime residents say the invasion has laid siege to the laid-back Venice vibe.

Ceramic artist Gary Steinborne, 40, said city inspectors forced him to tear down an “illegal building”--one of the Westside’s ubiquitous non-permitted home offices--and told him to stop making ceramics at home. He informed them of his right to a “home occupation.” Then they made him fix his garage door.

But now his terminally hip neighbors are terminally wealthy and in some cases, terminally famous. His favorite “groovy, funky coffee shop is, like, trendy.” He runs into actor John Cusack at his favorite pizza place.

“A lot of people, instead of drawing or painting, are designing Web sites,” he said.

People in real estate say the mixed media have made Venice a cool getaway for nouveau economy millionaires who find discreet boho pieds-a-terre a welcome respite from stuffy Brentwood mansions and life in the Armani national guard.

Such weekend dabbling is a far cry from when established painter and sculptor Laddie John Dill, 57, came in 1969. The hippie movement was in full flower and Venice was so down on its luck that his friends called it “Appalachia by the sea.”

A few years ago, DreamWorks announced plans for a studio in the nearby Playa Vista, and “all the production companies came like lemmings,” he said.

The studio fizzled. But the SUVs kept coming. Now a luxury auto detailer works his block.

Is nothing sacred?

“There goes the neighborhood,” Dill said, lamenting:”It’s never going to go back to the way it was.”

Painter Billy Al Bengston, 66, ardently denied that Venice is losing its cool, but conceded that in the current market, “I would never move down here if I was a young artist.”

The Venice boom is fueling a dizzying run-up in the Oakwood district, the home of a community of black families that began arriving from the South in the 1920s.

The change is bittersweet for African American seniors who bought their houses for less than $10,000 in the days when the neighborhood was a haven from housing covenants that barred blacks from many coveted Westside communities.

Some of their friends have taken their profits and moved away, breaking up tightly knit circles.

Friendships with newcomers are common: A French filmmaker treated one senior to a one-week vacation in Paris. But many new yuppies build 6-foot front fences--though the city limit is generally 42 inches--and disappear behind them.

Some newcomers also perceive slights, feeling singled out even when they experience problems that longtime residents also endure.

“When I first moved in here, they broke the windows in my car,” said one recent arrival. “It’s like: ‘Here’s the new white family.’ Here, we’re the minority.”

Adding to unease is a 2-month-old drive by the city that has targeted visual blight in Oakwood. Some people are glad to see trash and rusting cars hauled away, but others are irate over citations for peeling paint and overgrown morning glories.

“They were put up to this by real estate speculators,” said Oakwood activist Laddie Williams. “They’re systematically trying to shove us out. They’re not calling it gentrification, but that’s what it is.”

Anna Carson, 78, who came here from Hope, Ark., said inspectors told her to take down her Christmas lights, which she put up in 1973.

“I am so disgusted with this stuff,” she said. “I’m gonna call somebody and tell them to get out of my face.”

They say the city drive ignores the high yuppie walls. Oakwood residents fume--saying they had to lower their front fences to three feet in the 1980s because police said drug dealers hid behind them.

Susan Wagner, a community resources specialist at the city attorney’s office, said the over-high fences--common in wealthy neighborhoods--are something the Department of Building and Safety “has decided basically not to enforce citywide.”

Department spokesman Bob Steinbach said Oakwood is the focus of a campaign that has successfully targeted quality-of-life and safety issues in 15 other neighborhoods. He said the office of Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, who represents Venice, requested the program for the area. Galanter declined to discuss the matter with The Times.

“In some cases, some of the inspectors were overzealous, and they may need to revisit some of the places they inspected,” said Mike Bonin, Galanter’s deputy chief of staff.

People laugh out loud at the “excessive vegetation” warnings. Natural-looking wildflower lawns are the latest status symbol of Westside yuppiedom.

Haven’t bureaucrats ever seen the home of new wave architect Frank Gehry?

“The irony is that Frank Gehry’s whole shtick is found materials and unpainted wood,” said Oakwood newcomer Jeff Carson, an investment banker. “So the deal is, you have to do it expensively, but if your house is naturally distressed you get cited.”

Rosie Lodge, 68, whose father organized Venice’s Friendship Baptist Church, said inspectors gave her 30 days to paint her home and make a garage door in her backyard shed or face a $100 fine. They want her to remove some mattresses from her backyard and take a blue tarp off a fence.

“I’m all for cleaning up Venice, but I don’t have the funds,” Lodge said. Medical supplies for her bedridden husband and household expenses eat up his monthly retirement check.

Her neighbor, Jana Gorum, a model who acts in television commercials, bought a house down the street last year with her husband, a NASA rocket scientist. The place had been a crack house where a man was murdered, and they had to rebuild the interior. They spent $1,000 on the frontyard fountain alone.

But Gorum got a citation ordering her to paint over a sooty shadow left behind when she ripped ivy off the house.

She could afford to repaint, “but I have to empathize with people who are retired and on Social Security,” she said. “They are in no position to paint their homes.”

Fertile Ground for Shady Lenders

Some people fear that the city improvement drive will make area seniors easy prey for unscrupulous lenders whose exorbitant interest rates could force them into foreclosure.

Henry Williams will turn 100 on Dec. 24, but he still mows his lawn. The family rose garden is a lush profusion of red and salmon. His backyard is filled with blooming lilies, vine-ripe bell peppers and mustard greens.

But inspectors faulted his well-kept home for peeling paint (you have to look under the eaves to find it) and cited a wood fence leaning under some ivy, the family said.

His daughter, Eva Jane Williams, fields constant calls from real estate agents. Her friend Jataun Valentine, 63, says brokers called two days after her aunt died in September as the family prepared her funeral. Henry’s granddaughter, Laddie Williams, says she got a call from a lender offering a $300,000 loan--at 21.9% interest.

“They figured I couldn’t do math,” she said.

She points to a place listed at $419,000, encircled by a fence that looks double the city-approved height limit.

“Drug dealers use that yard to serve their customers,” she said. “Why doesn’t the city cite them?”

Elizabeta Betinski now runs a gallery at a new loft east of Venice, but she already sees signs of gentrification spilling over the 405.

Many of her friends have joined a new artistic exodus--to Inglewood. Betinski is nervously eyeing a run-down place across the street that seems ripe for an upscale cafe.

“As soon as Starbucks pops up around us, we’re done,” she said.

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* VARIED VIEWS OF ACTIVIST

Slain Venice anti-crime activist James Richards was a hero to some, a zealot to others. B1