Both Mayor Beverly O'Neil's name and life story would focus and elevate the homeless crisis our City faces.
OPINION- Tuesday February 16th, a committee requested renaming the City’s Performing Arts Center in honor of former Mayor Beverly O’Neil. Given Mayor O'Neil's local celebrity, renaming the center would elevate its profile and honor a deserving public figure.
However, given the enormous social, health and environmental challenges our city faces the request seems a bit tone def. Researching the life and legacy of Mayor Beverly O'Neil, our editorial staff stumbled upon a way to honor our beloved former Mayor and do the most good.
“Mayor Beverly O'Neil's childhood trauma is at the root of our City's homelessness crisis and why we might think about a better home to honor her name.”
Our premise is simple. What if we put the name of Long Beach's favorite Mayor to the task of tackling our City's greatest need? That need is Homelessness. The place is the Atlantic Farms Bridge Housing Community in North Long Beach.
Here's a portion of what supporters intend on forwarding to City officials reviewing the renaming in the weeks to come:
Mayor O’Neil’s Early Life
Looking at the totality of Mayor O’Neil’s personal and civic life, it is clear that it bares a far closer relationship to servicing the needs of the homeless than to performing arts. During her formative years, she endured the shame of her father’s drunkenness. A shame that according to an LA Times article, “The Pioneers of Family Recovery” drove her to thoughts of running away.
Decades later, this is a choice still pondered by many homeless youth in Long Beach.
Overcoming this experience, Mayor O’Neill’s mother took it upon herself to create one of the first support groups for families of alcoholics. It was in fact a forerunner to Al-Anon.
Similarly, the Atlantic Farms Bridge Housing Community is a first-of-its-kind project in Long Beach that addresses homelessness and propels those most in need on a path to permanent housing and long-term stability.
Thus, our beloved Mayor’s own family experience and the mission of Atlantic Farms are mirror images. Furthermore, she and her mother’s trailblazing effort to bring resources to help similarly situated families is the exact aim of the Bridge Housing Community in North Long Beach.
Mayor O’Neil’s Civic Legacy
It isn’t only Mayor O'Neil’s early and family life that best reflect the homeless crisis in Long Beach, but her legacy as a three term Mayor was far more related to community service than performing arts.
The LB Report published a list of Mayor O’Neill’s achievements which included opening the Multi-Service Center. At the time, the center was touted as a national model for addressing homelessness. In fact, the Multi-Service Center and the newly built Atlantic Farms Bridge Housing Community in North Long Beach are intrinsically related because access to Atlantic Farms requires a referral from the Multi-Service Center.
Mayor O’Neil also established “Empower Long Beach” which was credited with bringing programs and support to central Long Beach residents. Additionally, Mayor O’Neil increased volunteers around the city by as much as 10,000. She was even the first to form a Volunteer Ordinance that formally structured volunteerism city-wide.
Moreover, the very Committee requesting to rename the Performing Arts Center actually remind us why Atlantic Farms is the better choice to honor Mayor O’Neill. In their own words, they recall that she “led the city through our most challenging economic downturn”.
Were she holding office today, Mayor O'Neil would face the pressing challenge that housing and homelessness bare on our quality of life, economic slump and moral fabric. Whether you reside in North, South, East or West Long Beach homelessness is at your doorstep. If you recall, this crisis is so prominent that even at the height of COVID-19 deaths it encompassed much of Mayor Garcia’s 2021 State of the City address.
City Charter
Under the City Charter, it is “not appropriate” to name a building after a person who has been “overly recognized in the past.” It’s worth noting, that Mayor O’Neil’s name already rests on a theatre inside the very building which the ad hoc committee now seeks to name entirely after her. If ever there was a definition of “overly recognized” it would be to use the same name twice for a single building.
On the other hand, Mayor O’Neill has yet to be recognized for her more substantial and impactful accomplishments related to homelessness.
Conclusion
Currently, the Michelle Obama Library is little more than a mile away from the Atlantic Farms
Bridge Housing Community in North Long Beach. To join the celebrated profiles of two beloved national and local matriarchs sends a powerful message of unity. It also underscores the need to bridge Downtown resources with the whole of the city instead of deepening the line in the sand between the tale of two cities.
The fact is that Mayor O’Neil is a significant figure. This is precisely why her name and likeness should not be reduced to redundancy or passed over for the most rewarding challenge facing our City leadership today.
Perhaps we have a moral duty to put our City’s greatest name to the task of shoring up our City’s greatest need.
Therefore, with respect and admiration, the undersigned wholeheartedly recommend to the Mayor and City Council that Beverly O’Neill be commended and recognized for her enumerable contributions to the betterment of Long Beach residents. And, therefore recommend renaming the Atlantic Farms Bridge Housing Community to the “Beverly O’Neill Bridge Housing Community.”
If you would like to join us in a letter of request to the City please contact us.
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