#pacoima

A 54 year old tamale vendor was arrested by ICE in Pacoima.

She kept saying “I can’t breathe” as they tackled her. She had a heart attack right there on the street.

All for selling tamales and she’s been living here for 20 years.

She’s not a threat. She’s not a criminal. She’s a mom trying to survive.

Steven Martinez/ Espiritu Chicano

Baseball Fans - meet Las Aztecas!

Usually, when you think of baseball in Los Angeles, you think of the Dodgers. But, baseball in southern California goes way back before the Dodgers even arrived in Califas!

The cult classic, "A League Of Their Own" (a great movie!), tells a fictionalized version of the women who played in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League in the 40's and 50's. But before those women hit the field, L.A. already had female baseball teams stepping up to the plate, paving the way!

Meet "The Aztecas", an all-women Chicana team from Pacoima, Ca. that played ball before crowds of community fans in the 1930's! The team was formed by sisters, Della Ortega and Ramona Frias. Their maiden name was Fonseca.

The women were playing at a time when People of Color were not welcome in all of the parks in L.A. Racism was rampant, but, they didn't let that stop them!

The top picture is a picture of the team with their manager. Della Ortega is standing, second from the right.

Pacoima Sunset.

It is a coating that can be applied to the surface of asphalt streets that can reflect solar radiation, rather than absorb it. Pacoima is one of the hottest neighborhoods in metro L.A. And last year, they decided to test this technology. Ten square blocks of streets, an elementary school yard and a basketball court were covered with “cool paint."

As temperatures climbed to 95 degrees on a recent afternoon in Pacoima, the surfaces with “reflective paint” were 10 degrees cooler than regular old asphalt. Preliminary research by the company that installed the paint, GAF Roofing, shows the pavement is helping to cool the ambient temperature of the whole 10-block area — and sometimes beyond — by as much as 3 degrees, possibly more.

‘Decolonized’