City of Burbank is Complicit in Anti-Armenian Racism
Truth And Accountability League (TAAL) Condemns the City of Burbank for its Complicity to Address Institutionalized Anti-Armenian Racism and Armenophobia in the Media Capital of the World
The Lynch Mob that Has Tried to Obstruct the Butterfly Gardens Developments and the Most Recent Hate Email is Only the Latest Example of Unchecked Armenophobia in the City of Burbank
A recent lesson in ‘repeated history’ has unfolded in Burbank, California. Anyone who has wondered how crimes against humanity and genocides could have happened, just pay very close attention to the deeply rooted culture of racism that has been simmering and growing in this thriving community of our Golden State. A type of racism that stems from faulty ideologies of supremacy, ‘we are better than those people,’ then evolves into verbal attacks and threats, and if not addressed in a promptly decisive manner by the community and law enforcement, inevitably escalates to physical manifestations of violence against those that racists don’t consider worthy of existence within their towns and neighborhoods.
Law professor Stanton identified ten stages of Genocide. Burbank City Council, residents of the equestrian community and law enforcement can wear 5 of them as ‘badges of dishonor’ today:
· Classification, dividing communities into 'them and us'
· Discrimination - excluding groups from participation in civil society
· Dehumanization - denying specific groups their human rights within the community
· Polarization - using speech/propaganda to create distance and polarize
· Persecution - using intimidation/persecution to displace/drive away targeted groups
Let us take a look at how Burbank has devolved into a city with such a dishonorable climate of blatant hate, prejudice, and Armenophobia.
Background
Butterfly Gardens is a development company operated by two Armenian-American partners, Garen Gozumian and Hrach Boyajian. They were granted entitlement approval to build a mixed-income condominium project in the upscale Rancho neighborhood in Burbank. They had worked on various aspects of the project to this point for over three years and had overcome almost insurmountable hurdles from the city and community members.
The partners have gone out of their way to meet and exceed city and state laws and Rancho residents' expectations.
Responsible Development and Community Outreach
In preparation for the project, the partners conducted a comprehensive campaign to understand the community and its needs, get to know and receive input from its leaders, and stay true to the neighborhood's essence. They met with neighborhood representatives Emily Gabel-Luddy and Ms. Nori Walla to receive their input.
Leading the Pack
Although several people have targeted this project, the leader of the pack is Burbank’s former Mayor, Emily Gabel-Luddy, who happens to be a resident of Rancho. Gabel-Luddy, Nori Walla, and Darcy Conkle, representatives of Friends of the Equestrian Bridge, a group involved in litigation against Butterfly Gardens’ development, are suing the development.
Ironically, as Councilmember in 2013, Gabel-Luddy approved a general plan that allowed projects like the Butterfly Gardens to be developed in Burbank. She should have added a clause that says, ‘Low-income people are welcome to live in Burbank if they are not on my turf.’ A multi-family project like this has not been built in Rancho for almost thirty years, so this is the first time people from the wrong side of the track will be in Gabel-Luddy’s pristine equestrian neighborhood. Gabel-Luddy made an exception when she flip-flopped on a townhouse project, Pickwick, from being against it to being for it in a shady move that included her being an intervener and involved in the settlement of the lawsuit the builders brought against the city.
Although Gabel-Luddy issued a short and lackluster statement condemning the hate mail, it reads like a public relations damage control for optics. She has a bad reputation for anti-Armenian racism, Armenophobia, and mistreatment of Armenians, both as a Burbank Councilmember and a private citizen.
Racist Racho Resident
On Sunday, December 1, following the approval of the project, the partners received a racist email from a person who lives in the Rancho community, attacking Gozumian and Boyajian personally, adding, ‘You aren’t welcome here. This is why the fucking Turks killed your families.’ Gozumian, who wrote an open letter to the editor of My Burbank, chooses not to release the person’s name. The Burbank Police Department is investigating the incident.
Embolden Residents and Lack of Accountability
Rancho leaders and members have been searching for ways to stop the project for almost three years, even though they had the opportunity to purchase the property when it was on the public market for two years before Butterfly Gardens came into the picture. First, they asked the city to invoke eminent domain and take their property. Then, they solicited state officials to use taxpayer funds to buy them out but failed. They left no stone unturned in search of a reason to have the City Council deny the project. A project scrutinized more than any other plan in the city, leading the partners to be hypervigilant on compliance and cross their Ts and dot their Is.
The partners have experienced anti-Armenian hate acts and incidents for the last three years, including Armenophobic verbal harassment from Rancho residents. Neighbors have stopped their cars in the middle of the road to get out and criticize them with profanity-laced tirades. Others scream at them during business hours while riding or walking by the property.
A great deal of disinformation, misinformation, and propaganda have attributed to Emily Gabel-Luddy, who makes sure to keep her lynch mob hostile and ready to strike. When the former Mayor is behind a racist bigotry-fueled attack on a small developer and the City Council is complicit at best, racists are emboldened to send hate mail without a bother to conceal their name.
The partners haven’t even been safe at Burbank City Hall. Rancho residents flocked to City Council meetings when the Butterfly Gardens projects were being discussed only to shout obscenities, threats, and insults at the partners while Councilmembers sat in deafening silence. Burbank City Council has a double standard when it comes to its handling of racism and inappropriate behavior. The Councilmembers would not have been as cavalier if other larger minority groups were the target of racism. But Armenophobia in the Council Chambers, where Rancho residents acted like thugs, hurling racially-laced insults at Gozumian and Boyajian, was met with a Councilmember apologizing to a resident for not being able to stop the project’s approval.
Background on Racism in Burbank
Burbank is still grappling with its racism problem in 2024. The city was a Sundown Town in the 20th century because it used racially restrictive covenants and deed restrictions to prevent black people and people of color from living in some regions of the city. It wasn’t until December 2020 that the City of Burbank adopted a resolution acknowledging its history as a Sundown Town. Many real estate subdivisions created in Burbank adopted and enforced racially restrictive covenants and deed restrictions that kept people of color from purchasing property and living in those subdivisions for several decades in the 20th century. Not much has changed. It has simply evolved.
In 2021, Emily Weisberg, the president of the Burbank Democratic Club, belligerently refused a simple request to show solidarity with Armenians at the height of the Artsakh Genocide.
Speak to Armenian-American residents of Burbank, and most have stories of being mistreated by the Burbank Police Department due to their ethnic origin.
Taking the High Road
Despite being threatened by a Rancho resident who justified the Armenian Genocide by writing, ‘You aren’t welcome here. This is why the fucking Turks killed your families,’ the two partners refuse to disclose the person’s name to the public.
In his open letter in My Burbank, Gozumian took the high road and stayed in the solution. He wrote, ‘To those that say that this is an isolated incident and not representative of a larger portion of the Rancho community, I say that they are a huge part of the problem.’ He continued, ‘In fact, that’s exactly the kind of approach that allows for these kinds of harmful and hateful attitudes to fester. Hate like this doesn’t just show up one day and then go away. It simmers and spreads and then boils over in the way that it did. He added, ‘A community-wide conversation on hate is in order if the Rancho is to dispel hateful attitudes.’
Conclusion
The Armenian community of Burbank has contributed economically, educationally, socially, spiritually, and professionally to their home-town at levels worthy of recognition and appreciation, but the city council, a notable number of residents, and police forces have turned to primitive, turf-hoarding tactics to demean, intimidate, patronize, beat down and drive away 11% of the American residents of Burbank who happen to be of Armenian ancestry. Let's remember, except for Native Americans, all those who are screaming ‘you aren't welcome here’ and are validating the Armenian Genocide (and technically threatening Armenians with massacres for erecting a building) are children of immigrants who hopefully did not have to face the same treatment when they tried to settle in their adopted towns.
It appears that Armenophobia is disturbingly pervasive among those entrusted with city governance and protection. Can it be eradicated from these individuals’ deep-set values and beliefs, or is there a dire need to consider replacing such individuals’ seats and positions with more worthy candidates and staff?
About TAAL
TAAL is a 501©3 non-profit advocacy organization founded in 2020 due to a significant increase in anti-Armenian racism, defamation, hate crimes, and Armenophobia. We monitor and confront bias, disinformation, propaganda, and slander of the Armenian people and culture at the media level, including social media, academics, intelligentsia, and public policy.
Contact
Vic Gerami
Founder + Chair
Truth And Accountability League
TruthAndAccountabilityLeague.org
310.880.8563
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