Long Beach 'Cambodia Town' Approved

Nuch Sarita, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
20 July 2007

Long Beach, Calif., is now officially home of Cambodia Town: a 1.6-kilometer strip of American street that planners hope will leave the permanent stamp of Cambodians living there.

Long Beach city council approved the designation in a meeting July 3. From now on, the stretch of Anaheim Street between Junipero Avenue and Atlantic Boulevard will now be known as Cambodian Town.

"The opportunity to have Cambodia Town allows us, both the older and younger generations, to work together to preserve our culture," said Sithea San, chairwoman of Cambodia Town, Inc. "I'm really grateful to have worked with everyone in making Cambodia Town happen. This will go down in the history of all Cambodian Americans." Cambodia Town's inception did not come without struggle.

Cambodia Town, Inc.'s Web site acknowledged some protest from others in the Long Beach community who were not Cambodian.

"While we understand these concerns, we do not see how honoring one group's contributions dishonors anyone else's," the group said on its Web site. "Ethnic districts can benefit everyone in a neighborhood by drawing tourists and diners, something that worn-out stretch of Anaheim Street could use."

City Councilwoman Suja Lowenthal said the vote recognized the "dedication and commitment of the Cambodian-American community" to the Anaheim Street corridor.

"This effort really was to strengthen businesses on Anaheim [Street] to find a unified way to ensure that Anaheim is rehabilitated and improved through the facade improvement process and also to recruit very viable businesses to the streets," she said.

A fresh start: New UCC director is best of both worlds

Sara Pol-Lim, the new executive director of the United Cambodian Community, discusses the challenges and opportunities facing the Cambodian community. (Steven Georges / Press-Telegram)

03/23/2007
By Greg Mellen, Associated Press
Long Beach Press Telegram (Long Beach, USA)

LONG BEACH - As the new executive director of the United Cambodian Community, Sara Pol-Lim may just bring the right blend of East meets West sensibility to succeed at the helm of the star-crossed nonprofit organization.

The first Cambodian woman to head the UCC, she also brings a singular perspective.

A survivor of the Cambodian genocide who three times escaped execution lines, the 40-year-old mother of two has first-hand understanding of the struggles and psychological scars of the Cambodian community.

Schooled in the United States, she brings Western education and a can-do American spirit to the post.

"We as a culture, we Cambodians tend to carry everything based on the past," Pol-Lim says. "Granted, we lived through (the Killing Fields), but we don't have to live in the past. When we live in the past we tend to live reactively instead of being proactive."

Pol-Lim will need to unleash that proactive spirit to lift the UCC out of its malaise.

UCC's rise and fall have been well documented, from its ascension to the dominant local Cambodian social service provider, with a $3 million income and 60 employees, to its current precarious position, where it can only afford to pay its executive director to work 25 hours a week.

Pol-Lim is the third director of UCC in just over a year. She replaces Dianne McNinch, who resigned in February.

When Pol-Lim accepted the job, her family asked her why she joined that "crazy" organization. But Pol-Lim says an organization is only a reflection of the people who run it. She plans to turn things around.

"There's nothing we can do to control what other people say," Pol-Lim says. "All we can do is project a positive attitude that we're here as a public service organization."

In a sense, Pol-Lim is coming full circle. In 1998, after earning her master's degree in human resources from Chapman University, she became the director of a youth program at UCC that had a $600,000 budget and seven staffers. She left shortly after, she says, because of philosophical differences.

Most recently, Pol-Lim worked for the Los Angeles County Registrar's Office, specializing in Cambodian voter registration.

Pol-Lim says "never in my imagination" did she consider returning to UCC, that is, until she heard about the latest opening.

Since taking the job early this month, Pol-Lim has been trying to mend relationships and reach out to diverse groups. She says she has also recruited graduate students from UCLA and other colleges to work at UCC. One is in the process of helping her write grant proposals.

Pol-Lim is also using connections at Verizon and the Department of Public Social Services to develop income streams and clients for UCC programs.

Pol-Lim hopes that as a younger survivor of the Khmer Rouge atrocities, she can bridge the gap between the older survivors and younger Cambodians who know of Pol Pot only from history books.

On Friday morning, the UCC offices reflect a youthful vibe as several volunteers chat and munch on doughnuts, while an older couple drops in for help with paperwork.

Whether it will be enough to save the foundering organization remains to be seen. The organization is still trying to recover from a 2005 business agreement with a convicted felon, John Durocher, to own part of a medical spa that resulted in a $500,000 loss. Durocher is in Orange County Jail awaiting trial on multiple fraud charges.

That business deal forced the organization to sell its only tangible asset - an apartment building on Temple Avenue - but cleared much of UCC's debt.

Pol-Lim won't say what her salary is or how much funding the organization is pulling in, and still being resolved is an issue over missing financial records from when James Dok was executive director in 2005.

In the wake of the seismic shake-ups at the UCC in recent years, Pol-Lim is creating a marketing plan to reach out to a doubtful community.

"There are so many skeptics," Pol-Lim says. "There are so many spectators waiting to see what we'll put in. I think as Cambodians, you should take pride in the organization and step up a notch."

Greg Mellen can be reached at greg.mellen@presstelegram.com or (562) 499-1291