Title: Battle of Chavez Ravine - Wikipedia
Headings: Battle of Chavez Ravine
Battle of Chavez Ravine
Contents
History of the community
Acquisition for public housing
Walter O'Malley and the Dodgers
Resistance to development
Resistance to final evictions
Notes
Sources
External links

Content: Many did not believe that a professional baseball team was a "public use" required by the Constitution as a limit on the use of eminent domain. Some Los Angeles officials argued that the area should be used to establish a zoo, citing that a zoo would provide “public recreation” to the city. In 1957, the Los Angeles City Council approved the transfer of the land to the Dodgers. This process was halted by a successful petition that established the need for a public vote to decide whether or not the Dodgers could obtain the land. The referendum to stop the land transfer, in June 1958, failed by 25,000 out of 677,000 votes. The city ended up conveying the Chavez Ravine site to the Dodgers for small consideration. Dodger Stadium was then constructed with private funds and remains privately owned. Resistance to final evictions
There was significant resistance to the eviction by the residents. After nearly 10 years, by 1959 Manuel and Abrana Arechiga (often cited as "Avrana"), with their daughter Aurora Vargas (a war widow, later surnamed Fernandez), were among the last of the tiny number of residents to hold out against the government land acquisition effort undertaken for the original public housing project. Forced removal by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) on May 9, 1959, resulted in Vargas' arrest.