Parker Center
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Parker Center, initially named the Police Administration Building or Police Facilities Building, was the former headquarters of the
Los Angeles Police Department The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), officially known as the City of Los Angeles Police Department, is the municipal police department of Los Angeles, California. With 9,974 police officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the third-large ...
from 1955 until October 2009. It was located in
Downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business distric ...
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
at 150 North
Los Angeles Street Los Angeles Street, originally known as Calle de los Negros or Alley of the Black People, is a major thoroughfare in Downtown Los Angeles, California, dating back to the origins of the city as the Pueblo de Los Ángeles. Location The principal le ...
. Often nicknamed "The Glass House", the building was named for former LAPD chief William H. Parker in 1966. The LAPD moved to a different headquarters building in 2009 after the Parker Center became outdated. After the building was shifted to mostly secondary use, and attempts to preserve the building failed, the Los Angeles Bureau of Engineering recommended its demolition. Demolition and razing of the Parker Center was approved in 2017, and completed in 2019. Plans to replace the building with the Los Angeles Street Civic Building were scrapped in 2020 due to a lack of funds.


History

The location was previously home to the Olympic Hotel and other buildings of the city's 19th-century downtown. Groundbreaking for the center began on December 30, 1952, and construction was completed in 1955. On July 16, 1966, Parker suffered a fatal heart attack. Soon afterward, the
Los Angeles City Council The Los Angeles City Council is the legislative body of the Los Angeles, City of Los Angeles in California. The council is composed of 15 members elected from single-member districts for four-year terms. The President of the Los Angeles City Counc ...
renamed the building the "Parker Center". The architect was
Welton Becket Welton David Becket (August 8, 1902 – January 16, 1969) was an American modern architect who designed many buildings in Los Angeles, California. Biography Becket was born in Seattle, Washington and graduated from the University of Washingt ...
and Associates and J.E. Stanton, associated architect. Maynard Woodard was director of design and Francis Runcy was the project architect. The eight-story building was of reinforced concrete with aluminum sash windows covered by louvers. Ceramic tile by
Gladding, McBean Gladding, McBean is a ceramics company located in Lincoln, California. It is one of the oldest companies in California, a pioneer in ceramics technology, and a company which has "contributed immeasurably" to the state's industrialization. During ...
covered the west elevation. The building combined police facilities that had been located throughout the
Civic Center A civic center or civic centre is a prominent land area within a community that is constructed to be its focal point or center. It usually contains one or more dominant public buildings, which may also include a government building. Recently, the ...
area. The jail area was built without window bars, utilizing non-breakable tempered glass, and
neoprene Neoprene (also polychloroprene) is a family of synthetic rubbers that are produced by polymerization of chloroprene.Werner Obrecht, Jean-Pierre Lambert, Michael Happ, Christiane Oppenheimer-Stix, John Dunn and Ralf Krüger "Rubber, 4. Emulsion R ...
floors to reduce self-injuries. A special control board in the lineup room could simulate different lighting conditions and a wire screen that acted like a one-way mirror. The Statistical Unit made the LAPD the first police department to install IBM computer equipment. The laboratories of the Scientific Investigation Division took up the entire fourth floor and included early versions of a breath-based alcohol impairment test. The new building was called "ultramodern in all respects" and "the jail that modern science built" by ''
Popular Mechanics ''Popular Mechanics'' (sometimes PM or PopMech) is a magazine of popular science and technology, featuring automotive, home, outdoor, electronics, science, do-it-yourself, and technology topics. Military topics, aviation and transportation o ...
'' in 1956. Two prominent artworks were commissioned for the building, a large bronze modernist sculpture by Bernard Rosenthal mounted at the entrance titled "The American Family" and a mosaic work in the lobby depicting architectural landmarks of Los Angeles by Joseph Young. The mural, mounted a few feet off the ground, was six feet high and 36 feet long, was Young's first public work. ''American Artist'' magazine called it "six tons of steel, copper, aluminum and glass, fused into a monolithic mosaic panel of beauty and permanence that seems to float on air." Both artworks were removed in 2018. The building was one of the sites of unrest during the
1992 Los Angeles riots The 1992 Los Angeles riots, sometimes called the 1992 Los Angeles uprising and the Los Angeles Race Riots, were a series of riots and civil disturbances that occurred in Los Angeles County, California, in April and May 1992. Unrest began in S ...
that followed a not guilty verdict for the four police officers involved in the
Rodney King Rodney Glen King (April 2, 1965June 17, 2012) was an African American man who was a victim of police brutality. On March 3, 1991, he was beaten by Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers during his arrest after a pursuit for driving whi ...
incident.


Redevelopment

With time, the Parker Center became outdated and was in need of expensive seismic retrofits. After considering a number of downtown sites for a new facility, the city council selected a property directly south of
City Hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or a municipal building (in the Philippines), is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses ...
,
Caltrans The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) is an Executive (government), executive department of the U.S. state of California. The department is part of the Government of California#State agencies, cabinet-level California State Tran ...
' former Los Angeles headquarters. Ground was broken for the new building in January 2007, which was dedicated on October 24, 2009. Both the Old Parker Center and the new headquarters had heliports. The Old Parker Center heliport was marked with a number "5", while the new center is inscribed with an "H". The LAPD Robbery and Homicide Division still operated from an annex of the Old Parker Center. On January 15, 2013, the City of Los Angeles permanently closed Parker Center. In 2014, the City Department of Public Works and the Bureau of Engineering recommended razing the now vacant Parker Center in favor of building a 27-story tower in its place. The razing would proceed on a floor-by-floor process, eliminating the need for wrecking balls or dynamiting. Construction of the new building would start in 2016 and last 18–24 months, with completion anticipated in 2018.


Efforts to save Parker Center

On January 29, 2015, a city panel, The Cultural Heritage Commission, nominated Parker Center for historical status. A tentative date for the ruling was set for April 28, 2015. However, the ruling was postponed until May 5, 2015. During the council meeting held on May 5, 2015, the council claimed to have "lost jurisdiction over this item" due to not having acted within a 105-day time limit. Committee chairman and 14th District Councilman
José Huizar José Luis Huizar (born September 10, 1968) is a Mexican-American politician and a former member of the Los Angeles City Council. Huizar was arrested and indicted on June 23, 2020, on federal corruption charges. Huizar was elected on November 8, ...
presented a new motion, recommending against the razing of the building, instead preserving it and "build ngan adjacent tower taller than the one analyzed in the project's already complete environmental impact report". Following these developments, a group of civic leaders and land-use experts convened in May 2015 to discuss the future of Parker Center. They considered whether the building should be preserved, with some of the panel members suggesting that parts of the Parker Center could be preserved while other sections could be razed. In August 2015, it was reported that discussions had expanded and now involved not just the future of the building itself, but also what should be done with surrounding areas and the district as a whole. This suggested the possibility of an alternative location for the proposed office buildings intended to be erected on the plot currently inhabited by the Parker Center. Three options were considered for the Parker Center. # Updating the 319,000-square-foot edifice with improvements including seismic retrofitting and expanding the parking garage to provide another 137 spaces. # Rehabbing some of the building while tearing down the dilapidated Parker Center jail while creating more than 522,000 square feet of usable space. # Razing the building and replacing it with either one or two office structures with a total of about 750,000 square feet of space and 1,173 parking spaces.


Demolition

In August 2016, the Parker Center building was threatened by demolition once again. A report from the Bureau of Engineering revealed a proposal to build a new municipal office building on the existing site of Parker Center. Given the threat of demolition, the Cultural Heritage Commission quickly mobilized another attempt the following month to award the Parker Center with a landmark status, after having failed to meet the deadline to do so during the preceding year. However, in December 2016, the city Bureau of Engineering once again recommended razing the building, saying that tearing down the structure and creating the new high-rise would cost $514 million. The city Bureau of Engineering claimed that the preservation and smaller new edifice option would cost $621 million (both plans would have roughly the same amount of office space). The city Bureau of Engineering's timetable suggested securing approvals by February 2017. The Los Angeles City Council, on March 24, 2017, voted unanimously to approve a proposal to demolish Parker Center, and replace it with an office tower that would consolidate offices of city employees. The above-ground demolition of Parker Center was completed on July 15, 2019.


In popular culture

Parker Center appears in many episodes of the television drama '' Dragnet'', beginning with the fifth season of the 1955 TV series. It was most prominent in the 1966 TV series, where it appeared in a majority of episodes as the headquarters of most divisions except the Juvenile Division. The Parker Center appears in several establishing shots for the ''
Perry Mason Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a c ...
'' TV series between 1958 and 1966. It appeared in several episodes (seasons 3, 4 and 10) of ''
Columbo ''Columbo'' () is an American crime drama television series starring Peter Falk as Lieutenant Columbo, a homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. After two pilot episodes in 1968 and 1971, the show originally aired on NBC f ...
''. The
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
drama ''
Hunter Hunting is the human activity, human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, or killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to harvest food (i.e. meat) and useful animal products (fur/hide (skin), hide, ...
'' used the Parker Center in the sixth and seventh seasons. Parker Center is the location of the Priority Homicide Division, and later Major Crimes, on the television series ''
The Closer ''The Closer'' is an Television in the United States, American television police procedural starring Kyra Sedgwick as Brenda Leigh Johnson, a Los Angeles Police Department Chief of police#United States, deputy chief. A CIA-trained interrogator o ...
''. The building is featured as one of the main locations in the 1993 video game '' Police Quest: Open Season'', the fourth installment of the ''
Police Quest ''Police Quest'' (or ''SWAT'') is a series of police simulation video games produced and published by Sierra On-Line between 1987 and 1998. The first five were adventure simulation games, the first three of which were designed by former police ...
'' series. Parker Center was featured in the 1970-set 2014 film ''
Inherent Vice ''Inherent Vice'' is a novel by American author Thomas Pynchon, originally published in August 2009. A darkly comic detective novel set in 1970s California, the plot follows sleuth Larry "Doc" Sportello whose ex-girlfriend asks him to investigat ...
''. Parker Center is often mentioned in the novels of the ''
Harry Bosch Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch is a fictional character created by American author Michael Connelly. Bosch debuted as the lead character in the 1992 novel '' The Black Echo'', the first in a best-selling police procedural series now number ...
'' series written by
Michael Connelly Michael Joseph Connelly (born July 21, 1956) is an American author of detective novels and other crime fiction, notably those featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch and criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller. Connelly is the bes ...
and the
Shane Scully Shane Scully is a fictional character who has appeared in eleven detective stories by novelist and television producer Stephen J. Cannell. List of novels # '' The Tin Collectors'' ( 2001) # '' The Viking Funeral'' ( 2002) # '' Hollywood Tough'' ...
series written by Stephen J. Cannell. Parker Center appears in the 1983 movie ''
Blue Thunder ''Blue Thunder'' is a 1983 American action thriller film from Columbia Pictures, produced by Gordon Carroll, Phil Feldman, and Andrew Fogelson and directed by John Badham. The Blue Thunder helicopter itself did exist as two copies of modifie ...
'' and the 1992 movie ''
One False Move ''One False Move'' is a 1992 American crime thriller film directed by Carl Franklin and co-written by Billy Bob Thornton. The film stars Thornton alongside Bill Paxton and Cynda Williams. The low-budget production was about to be released strai ...
''. Parker Center was referred to in the 1997 film ''
L.A. Confidential ''L.A. Confidential'' (1990) is a neo-noir novel by James Ellroy and the third of his L.A. Quartet series. It is dedicated to Mary Doherty Ellroy. The epigraph is "A glory that costs everything and means nothing"— Steve Erickson. Plot The s ...
''.


References


External links


LAPD History of Parker Center
{{Los Angeles Police Department Los Angeles Police Department Civic Center, Los Angeles Buildings and structures in Downtown Los Angeles Office buildings in Los Angeles Government of Los Angeles Headquarters in the United States Government buildings completed in 1955 1955 establishments in California 1950s architecture in the United States Government buildings completed in 2009 Landmarks in Los Angeles Welton Becket buildings Modernist architecture in California Buildings and structures demolished in 2019 Demolished buildings and structures in Los Angeles