Racial Segregation Still a Problem in L.A.

FOR the past couple of years, Los Angeles city officials have loudly boasted that L.A. is a world-class showpiece of inter-ethnic harmony.

They cite the near-record-low jobless rate among blacks and Latinos, the surge in the number of minority-owned businesses, increased minority homeownership, and the economic rejuvenation of parts of East and South Central Los Angeles. They note with much relief that the O.J. Simpson trial, the L.A. riots, and the contentious battles over affirmative action are now faint memories.

But a new USC study reveals that ethnic balkanization is far from a faint memory. Latinos and blacks are more likely to live in racially isolated neighborhoods, plagued by gaping shortfalls in police and fire services, with their children attending pitifully under-funded schools, than they were in 1960. And things may get even worse. The continuing stampede of whites as well as middle-class blacks and Latinos to housing tracts in distant parts of L.A. County drains tax revenues, diminishes the city's political clout in Sacramento, and fuels secession movements. This leaves L.A.'s minorities even more racially and culturally removed from the middle-class suburbs than ever.

As an information services provider, I see the troubling effects of this growing ethnic balkanization in public agencies that I visit. There are no visible racial barriers, antagonisms or incidents between whites and minorities. They all have strict prohibitions against discrimination and actively enforce affirmative action programs. There are black, Asian and Latino supervisors in these agencies, and minorities hold many professional and skilled positions.

During the lunch and coffee breaks, however, it's a different story. The inter-ethnic mix abruptly halts. Each group stakes out its respective turf. Blacks sit at one table talking and eating, whites at another, Latinos and Asians at another. No one seems to give a second thought to this separate-but-equal clustering. It's just friends socializing with those they feel most comfortable with.

The same ethnic non-diversity is evident at my neighborhood school. With the exception of a small but growing number of Latinos, the students on the playground are all black. My neighbors are a good mix of professionals, businesspeople and skilled workers. But other than a couple of whites who are retired, they are all black. At the market, the shoppers are nearly all black. My son and daughter's social contacts and relations are exclusively black.

The report makes clear that the pattern is the same for young blacks and Latinos in South Central Los Angeles and young whites in the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys, and the Westside. They don't see and experience an America where people of different ethnic groups work, go to school, play and live together as friends and neighbors.

The tensions aren't just between blacks and whites. Many Latinos believe that blacks are out to exclude them from civil service jobs and prevent them from attaining greater political power. Many blacks engage in immigrant bashing and claim that Latinos are out to grab jobs and funds for welfare, heath and education services from them. Many Koreans whose stores suffered the brunt of the burning and looting regard blacks as lazy and crime-prone. And many blacks claim that Koreans are racist and accuse them of exploiting the black community.

There are some immediate things that L.A. city and county officials and business leaders can do to put a brake on L.A.'s disastrous slide toward near-permanent ethnic balkanization. They include:

* Increase access to minority home loans. State and federal officials must expand low-interest loan programs to ensure the availability of mortgage loans for prospective minority homebuyers. Federal regulators must vigorously enforce laws that strictly prohibit discriminatory lending policies and redlining practices by banks and S&Ls. In years past, home loan discrimination has been a major cause of segregated neighborhoods.

* Tighten fair housing enforcement. Studies repeatedly document the persistence of overt and subtle racial discrimination by apartment owners and managers in parts of Los Angeles. Local and state housing officials must toughen enforcement and increase penalties for proven discrimination by landlords.

* Conduct days of dialogue forums. They were initiated by the L.A. City Council a few years and then dropped. They should be reinstituted. They bring community leaders and residents in the San Fernando Valley and Westside together with black and Latino leaders and residents in East and South Central Los Angeles to discuss problems and needs. The forums helped bridge the racial and cultural divide and decrease ethnic tensions and misunderstandings.

The USC study should shatter any illusion that L.A. has dug its way out of the pit of ethnic and class division. The job for L.A. city officials and business leaders is to work even harder to make sure that the pit does not get any deeper.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is the author of "The Crisis in Black and White."