Dean Logan, Los Angeles County’s registrar-recorder, handed the deed to Bruce family members during a ceremony near Highland Avenue and 26th Street on Wednesday, July 20.
And it was a day, said state Sen. Steven Bradford, that was long overdue — and underscored the social justice work that remains.
The handover marked what public officials and the Bruce family have called the nation’s first apparent act of property-based reparations. A plaque telling the history of Bruce’s Beach was unveiled at the celebration and presentation of the deed for the historic return of land to the heirs of Charles and Willa Bruce, in Manhattan Beach on Wednesday, July 20, 2022.
Dean Logan, Director, Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder giving the presentation of the deed for the historic return of land to the heirs of Charles and Willa Bruce, in Manhattan Beach on Wednesday, July 20, 2022. But Manhattan Beach used eminent domain to repossess the land owned by Willa and Charles Bruce, along with other nearby properties. The city’s eminent domain effort in the late 1920s, historical records show, was motivated by a desire to force Black people out of Manhattan Beach.
The Bruces will lease the property back to the county for $413,000 annually for two years, according to the. At the end of the lease, the heirs can sell the land to the county for $20 million, if they so choose. It opened with the Inner City Youth Orchestra performing “Lift Every Voice and Sing” to the standing-room-only crowd and ended with the orchestra’s rendition of “Amazing Grace.”During the event, artist Shelley Bruce completed a painting based on Willa and Charles Bruce’s wedding photo, but with local activist Kavon Ward sitting in the bottom right corner looking toward the couple.
“This is returning property that was rightfully owned by a family,” Bradford, who is Black, said. “Reparations is what has been promised, what has still been denied and what is owed to the descendants of slaves.”“There are still some steps to justice that have to be taken,” Shepard said. “The people still benefiting from what was done to our family are still here should be obligated to pay restitution. All we got is the land back; the wealth that was lost hasn’t been replaced.
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