The Bruce family finally got their deed back.
In July 2022, Dean Logan, the register of deeds in L.A. County, handed members of the Bruce family the deed to two parcels of California Manhattan Beach property. The Bruces are all descendants of Charles and Willa Bruce, a Black couple from whom the land was seized a century ago.
Once Upon a Time…
The land was the site of Bruce’s Beach Lodge. The Bruces were entrepreneurs. Their seaside resort was unusual — a rare beachfront oasis open for Black guests during the early 20th century. The successes of the Bruce family would come to a sudden halt in the late 1920s.
Records show numerous eminent domain takings at the time, carried out by police to force Black people off the beachfront. And that’s how the California city of Manhattan Beach took the Bruce family’s ocean resort and held onto it for two decades.
Then Manhattan Beach transferred the parcels to California. The state held the beachfront parcels for another five decades, then passed the land to Los Angeles County in 1995. L.A. County held the former Bruce property as a public beach with a lifeguard post. The parcels came to the county with deed restrictions. The land would always have to belong to the county.
In April 2021, State Sen. Steven Bradford introduced California’s Senate Bill 796, designed as a legislative tool to override the deed restrictions. The idea was to tear down the obstacles to getting the deed into the hands of the Bruce descendants.
The plan drew support. By late 2021, Gov. Gavin Newsom had signed it into law.
Then, the ball was in L.A. County’s court.
“We’ve Set the Precedent”
The county assessed the value of the parcels and identified the Bruce family descendants. In a process that would take more than a year to complete, the L.A. County supervisors unanimously voted to convey the parcels to the Bruce family.
A key figure in the decision was activist Kavon Ward, who created a project called Justice for Bruce’s Beach. Activism kept pressing the work that culminated in the county supervisors’ June 2022 vote to relinquish the land to the family.
☛ U.S. real estate laws and policies are gradually shifting to level the playing field. Read more about what’s unfolding as… A Quest for Racial Fairness Gains Ground.
Under the agreement between the county and the family, the county can lease the land from the Bruces for a total of $826,000 over the coming 24 months. After that, the Bruces have the option to sell the land to L.A. County for $20 million.
The case might be a first in a trend for California — and, perhaps, other places where eminent domain was wielded as a tool of discrimination. As county supervisor Janice Hahn stated:
This work is no longer unprecedented; we’ve set the precedent in the pursuit of justice regaining stolen land for the first time, but it will not be the last.
The return of Bruce Beach restores land that was rightfully owned and unjustly seized by a government. Their recovered ownership rights will help the Bruce family rebuild the generational wealth and savings that property creates. That said, land recovery does not make up for all opportunities a family misses over the generations. But at least the descendants of Charles and Willa Bruce can move forward, and realize some of their dreams.
Derrick Bruce and his son Michael both aim to publish their writings. Anthony Bruce will pursue his vocation teaching English as a second language. And the family has a goal of “paying it forward” and making other lives better too.
Redfin CEO Outlines Racial History in Eminent Domain Land Seizures
In an email to real estate agents from Glenn Kelman, CEO of the brokerage Redfin, we can read about the role of eminent domain in a broader history. We learn:
- Santa Monica, now 4% Black, was 25% Black until the 1920s. Then city started banning Black-owned development plans and taking Black-owned land through eminent domain — destroying hundreds of homes and businesses in Belmar’s predominantly Black section. “Residents stood in front of bulldozers to no avail,” writes Kelman.
- In 1855, New York cleared land to build Central Park. As it happens, that land used to be home to the Black community of Seneca Village, with its school, churches, and cemeteries. Most of the African American land owners received no payment for their land.
And so it went, in the Black areas of New Orleans, Miami, Charlotte, Charlottesville, and other cities. In the mid-1900s, hundreds of cities wielded urban renewal plans, to remove hundreds of thousands of people — mainly Black and minority residents.
CEO’s Email to Agents Talks About Race Bias
How does that history connect with today’s real estate practices? Kelman reports that some home sellers part with their homes for a discount to “white families who send in baby photos with their offer letters.”
☛ In a survey of buyer tactics, Redfin found that writing a “home buyer’s love letter” increased buyer success. On the other hand, not all sellers appreciate such letters. Worse still, passing love letters between buyers and sellers can raise questions about an agent’s legal conduct under the Fair Housing Act.
In the email, which went out to the whole Redfin staff this year, Kelman listed a number of other ways agents and lenders can give unfair advantages to certain buyers:
- By sharing news about a home for sale to just a few of their own clients before creating a public listing.
- By urging some potential clients to apply for loans while delaying return phone calls to others.
- By selecting web designs and features without thinking about inclusivity.
Kelman puts these subtle actions into the context of history, writing:
We can’t possibly know how history will judge us, but if the past is any guide, we’ll wish we had paused for a moment before playing the game the way it has always been played, with…the same type of people winning generation after generation. We’ll wish each of us had done more to make housing fair. People of color shouldn’t have to do this alone.
“You’re More Powerful Than You Think.”
Most people have always gone along with the norms of their day. Along the way, they’ve welcomed beautiful beach resorts, parks, and neighborhoods at others’ expense. To this day, says Glenn Kelman, we operate banks and real estate companies based on the prevailing norms. And there are still plenty of interactions that make or break lives.
We can choose to exclude or uplift — especially when we hold positions of influence. Real estate professionals do hold such positions. As Redfin’s CEO writes, “I hope you also reflect on your individual commitment to fair housing… You’re more powerful than you think.”
Supporting References
Tyler Shaun Evains for The Mercury News: Bruce Family Gets Deed Back to Manhattan Beach Land Stolen From Black Entrepreneurs in 1920s (Jul. 21, 2022).
Email sent to all Redfin employees by Glenn Kelman, CEO of Redfin: Black History Month: Eminent Domains, Black Domains (updated Feb. 9, 2022).
And as linked.
Photo credits: Tima Miroshnichenko and Ron Lach, via Pexels.