Optimism and Anxiety Neighbor Super Bowl Stadium in Inglewood


INGLEWOOD, California — Greg and Terry Dulan can’t wait for the Super Bowl.

They believe Dulan’s Soul Food Kitchen, which opened in 1999 and has since become a beloved landmark in the city, will be a dream come true for Inglewood and a boon for their small business.

“We expect things to be great with the big game coming,” said Greg Dulan, sitting next to his brother Terry in a new wing of the restaurant they plan to open in time for customers to flock to it during the Super Bowl. weekend. “But I joked with my brother: ‘Hey, maybe we should sell spots to fans who want to use our parking lot that day. We could have made so much money that we didn’t have to open up and we could actually watch the game.’”

That kind of optimism was palpable when I spoke to residents who were shaken by the arrival of SoFi Stadium, which was completed in 2020 at a cost of nearly $5 billion. It rises like a curved metal spaceship alongside the still-standing Forum, home to the Lakers of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson, and Wayne Gretzky’s Kings, before both teams relocated to downtown Los Angeles in 1999.

With the stadium came the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams and Chargers. Up next: the NBA’s Clippers, which are building a neighboring arena, will be completed in 2024. Professional sports have created an evolution and concern.

“Inglewood is a dynamic city on the move,” said Greg Dulan, 63.

Still, he admits to one concern that has hovered over all talk about Inglewood’s change: gentrification.

During the 20th century, Inglewood transformed from an almost all-white stronghold of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s to a town grappling with desegregation in the 1970s to a predominantly Black population in the 1990s. Through her portrayal in popular culture, Inglewood came to represent a Black Mecca through underage films such asWood,” and “Giving a stimulus” or as the home of the main character on HBO’s “Insecure” Latinos now make up just over 50 percent of the population.

But near Los Angeles International Airport, this city of nearly 110,000 was so congested that it had trouble providing basic services. In 2012, the State of California took over the school system. With a few distressed shops like Dulan’s and long-time valuables—customers waiting in long queues for staples like fried chicken, candied desserts, and slow-cooked oxtail—the city center felt like a ghost town.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next few years,” said Greg Dulan.

I’ve spent quite a bit of time in Inglewood reporting on the area over the years, but hadn’t been back since 2015 before hitting the streets again last week. The growth has been spectacular: not just the stadium but the soon-to-be-completed light rail line, the Frank Gehry-designed youth philharmonic building, newly built apartments and trendy cafes and restaurants that line the downtown corridor, and many shuttered businesses.

Here are some of the things I’ve heard from residents balancing their optimism about the Super Bowl with valid concern:

Educator and student, 54th and 20th Inglewood residents since 2008.

“In 2008, 2009, 2010, if I saw someone who wasn’t black or brown walking the streets, I’d say, ‘Hmm, they must be lost,'” said longtime educator Jennifer Tyler, who lives next to her daughter Madison. 20 years old in a flashy new cafe downtown, Hilltop Coffee + Kitchen.

“But not anymore. It’s much more diverse, which is great, but also, it’s pretty interesting to see. My downstairs neighbor was having an Airbnb and suddenly new people are using it and we see a white couple with their baby and a stroller taking a walk down the street and I , people don’t do that on Crenshaw Avenue!”

He voiced a complaint I often hear about how SoFi is changing his city: molasses—slow, bumper-to-bumper traffic rises, flowing into residential areas. On the other hand, he also noted a recent increase in new shopping options, multiple Starbucks and street beautifications.

“I’m a bit torn,” he said, “because yes, it’s great that all these things are in our neighborhood now, but it still drives me crazy that we can’t have them without the ghost of gentrification.”

Mayor of Inglewood, 68.

“People said nobody was going back to Inglewood,” said former Santa Monica police chief James T. Butts Jr., who became Inglewood’s mayor in 2011. If we didn’t do payroll in the first period, we would have gone bankrupt.”

Seen as a driving force in bringing in new arenas, teams, and other developments, Butts came across while walking down a street near City Hall.

“It’s different now,” he said. “The coaches came and the Chargers quickly joined them. Now the Clippers are coming.”

He looked around, smiling, gleaming with a kind of unbridled bail I’ve hardly heard from anyone else: “What you see is the beginning of Market Street’s rebirth!” he said, referring to one of the city’s most important boulevards. “And a city is changing for the better.

“We’re saying two things: the only thing that has changed in Inglewood is everything and the new Inglewood, but with the same people.”

Retired, 65. Inglewood resident since 1980.

When Carlton Futch moved into his four-bedroom, two-story home in 2007, he didn’t know he would soon be living next door to a massive stadium.

There’s no escaping it anymore. Futch’s home is so close to SoFi, he said, that during the Super Bowl it will sound like he’s inside the stadium—a bitter pill to swallow for any die-hard Raiders fan.

Futch, a retired real estate agent, said he is pleased with the way SoFi is helping to increase property value and help the city, but is not happy with the setbacks he and many others have endured along the way.

Rising rents and displacement. More nightmare traffic than ever before. A toll for long-term businesses and residences. “It’s the core of Inglewood’s story,” they said. “I think the city and the NFL could do a better job of providing care, comfort and relaxation for business owners and residents.”

During the long construction of the stadium, Futch endured drills, trucks, and dust clouds that were too loud to use his backyard comfortably. The developers built a nearly 50-foot wall to reduce the dust and noise that enveloped his neighborhood, which is now adjacent to his backyard. Huge steel beams covered in a thick beige fabric have a premonition of a prison wall.

“Restrictive,” Futch said. “I need a view that a resident can enjoy against something like this. It needs to be removed.”

Not sure when or if that will happen.

Owner, 42.

“I pray that the Holy Spirit of God will help me keep going,” said Joan Ty, owner of Joan La Fashion. Ty immigrated to the United States from the Philippines 17 years ago and is a big part of the community: a shopkeeper who wants to give more or less some of his store’s clothing.

“When I started my job, nobody was talking about the Rams or the Chargers or the stadium,” he said. “We are happy they are here, but there is concern,” he said.

He said he was doing everything he could to hold on throughout the pandemic and hoped that the rent for his little shop would not go up.

Like many locals, Ty has benefited from rising housing values. She recently sold her Inglewood home and moved to the remote but more affordable Riverside County, pocketing her savings even though it now means she spends up to four hours on her commute.

Ty said the move was great for him, but losing a resident he held dear didn’t bode well for a city trying to navigate change carefully.

“I know a few people who also sell their house for a good profit,” he said. “They’re moving away. One of my friends is moving to Arizona.”



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