{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/445h99158h/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["LAPL Community Histories - Chaz Perea (L.A. Dodgers Landscape Manager)"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/200/original/lapl_logo.png?1628076950","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Chaz Perea","Kelly Wallace"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2024-08-30"]}},{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["Chaz Perea, Landscape Manager for the Los Angeles Dodgers, is interviewed by Kelly Wallace, California History Librarian. Dodger Stadium is the first and only sports stadium in the country to be an officially accredited botanic garden. This interview was conducted on August 26, 2024 in the Octavia Lab at Central Library."]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["MPEG-4"]}},{"label":{"en":["Type"]},"value":{"en":["TheirStory"]}}],"summary":{"en":["Chaz Perea, Landscape Manager for the Los Angeles Dodgers, is interviewed by Kelly Wallace, California History Librarian. Dodger Stadium is the first and only sports stadium in the country to be an officially accredited botanic garden. This interview was conducted on August 26, 2024 in the Octavia Lab at Central Library."]},"provider":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Los Angeles Public Library"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Los Angeles Public Library"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/200/original/lapl_logo.png?1628076950","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/266/469/small/Chaz_and_Landscape_Team_with_Library_Card.jpg?1740766526","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - open-uri20250228-551345-4689wt.mpga"]},"duration":3382.36094,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/266/469/small/Chaz_and_Landscape_Team_with_Library_Card.jpg?1740766526","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-lapl.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/266/469/original/open-uri20250228-551345-4689wt.mpga?1740766186","type":"Audio","format":"audio/mpeg","duration":3382.36094,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["TheirStory Transcript (Paragraphs with Speakers) [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Hello, my name is Kelly Wallace, and I'm the California history librarian at Los Angeles Public Library. Today, it is my great pleasure to interview Chaz Perea, landscape manager for the Los Angeles Dodgers, professor of horticulture at Mount San Antonio College and a passionate ambassador for native plants. He spearheaded the successful effort to make Dodger Stadium an accredited botanical garden. Today is August 26th, 2024, and we are recording in the Octavia Lab at Central Library. Hello, Chaz. Thank you for being here.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=11.15,44.33"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Hi, Kelly. Thank you for having me.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=44.36,45.98"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, let's get started. Let's talk just a little bit about your childhood. Where did you grow up and what was your first experience with plants? Did you mow lawns?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=46.01,59.077"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e You know what's funny is I get this question quite a bit. I did not have any experience with plants whatsoever. This started in 2004. I needed a full time job. I particularly needed a full time job that let me work another job at night to pay rent. So I started off working at a golf course in 2004. Minimum wage labor $6.75 an hour. I think like federal minimum wage went to $7.25 while I was still under my first year at work, something like that. It was around that time, but, and I started off at a golf course, I was mowing the areas on the golf course that were too steep or too narrow for riding mowers. So I was pushing it more up a hill or pushing it between tight spots, and then I would muck all of the the duck fecal matter out of the lake with a rake. And that's how I started. And then, you know, 18 months into that, I thought, this is for me. And not, and not so succinctly. So I had other jobs at night and I was working in retail, right? I still had no idea what I wanted to do. Like a lot of young people. How","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=60.07,126.99"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e old were you at this point?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=126.99,128.681"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e 18. I was, yeah, I was 18 and I was working at Ross Dress For Less in the evenings, other retail stuff. And I, what I realized was I didn't necessarily know what I wanted to do, but here's what I did know. I wanted to be outdoors more. I didn't want to be indoors, and I definitely preferred to work with my hands than customers. So that was just like this very rough start into, and I had no idea this was where it was going to go. And I was really just looking for the most successful route to work outdoors with my hands, with the elements on a day to day basis and make enough money to keep the roof over my head. And","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=134.07,163.746"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e you took, at the golf course you met players and started servicing them and built on that.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=163.746,169.167"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yes, yes, yes. So I was, so after I was doing the mowing and the mucking of the lake, I would do the flowerbeds. So when you'd retill the flower beds, you'd pull all the annuals, color out the classic spring, fall, winter annual color. And then I would hack the beds up by hand, hold them up, get them, rototill them up and then replant the flower bed. And whatever I was doing, it was getting some attention from some of the members. And then I had someone ask me, do you do moonlighting? To which I said, I don't know. I don't think so. I had to go ask my boss what that meant. And they said, hey, they want you to do some work for them. And I was like, oh, there's some business here. So I did this. So after many of those requests, I was working at the time. My second job was at Albertson's at night, and I was in the meat department, and I had come in just after the large grocery store strike. I don't know if you remember that in oh four and oh five. And I was I was like second tier union and I was making $8.50 an hour, which is a pretty big bump from my normal pay, right? 25 dollars a night during the weekdays and weekends. And I was doing the math. I was asking members how many, how much they were paying their current gardener. And then I was doing the math on how many people's homes I would need to have in order to compensate for my night income. Right. And then I was doing all the money for a used truck, lawnmower, the whole shebang. And then that eventually happened, and I didn't commit until I had that number. And. And then I started with one. So actually it was that I started with six. So I had six people that ended up equating to the amount that my Albertson's income was at night. And six turned to 12 turned to 18 turned to 24 to. It was like me Fredo and Maca, like working until sundown every night. And I made a lot of cash that way. Yeah. Yeah. And that financed like my education largely. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=178.53,283.34"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e And when did you start college?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=284.21,287.81"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Ooh, that's, yeah. So there were some pretty failed attempts at education all through my teenage years into my early adulthood when I was 24. You know, one of the reasons I'm so fond of the library is, first of all, library has air conditioning in the summer, and and it's a place to kill some time, and there's usually a water fountain. Anyways, so besides those selfish reasons, when I was, I was trying to figure out how to make more money at the golf course, and I was, I went to the library. I would go to the library, you know, in 2004, three, two, you could use a computer for 30 minutes for internet access. Right. And you would stand at one of the stations and you'd be on a timer. And and I was looking up, I was googling chemical applicator license, golf courses. And there's in the industry there's. So the state of California regulates pesticides to a level that is not really comparable to the rest of the states, except for New York. So that's the reason is for that is that California has the biggest \"ag\" industry in the United States. We dwarf most countries just in California. In addition to like us dwarfing most countries, we have more micro-climates, which means we have different types of soils, water issues, and pests, which means there are more products used here, which means higher level regulations. So if you want to spray pesticides legally in California, you go through a lengthy testing process that's difficult and not cheap. So that when you have that license in the industry, that allows that, that's usually a bump in pay and more responsibility. So I was looking for that. And then I looked up classes for golf course, and I stumbled across Mount San Antonio College. And then so in addition to this librarian helping me get on the computer and Google, when I printed out my application to, for the qualified applicators license and the college, you can only print out like ten pages at a time. And I was I was like 12 pages for the app, and I needed the last two pages, and she did me the solid and then like, even went over helping me filling that stuff out. Total stranger in a library. And then I came back a couple times to finish that up through that process, through the library. When I went to college in 2000. I was, sorry, I was 24. Um, was 2008 or so, something like that. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. And at the time, I was actually pretty bitter about doing it because I had to rearrange three clients. Normally I'd have 3 or 4 clients. I would do their yard from 4:30 to 8:30, right until sundown. And after I got out of the full time course of the full time job at the golf course. Now, in order for me to do that, I'd have to come to say, Kelly, I know you really prefer I do work on Tuesday nights, but can I change that to Thursday when you're doing your family thing, which is not, you know, and then also, it's like a lot of times your maintenance ties in with their trash day and you're hauling out their trash and stuff like that. So, needless to say, I disturbed some of my current income to pay to take those courses. And when you make, when you have two jobs and you work 70 hours a week at a low wage, you're just above what the college will give you for letting you get a break on classes for the Board of Governors waivers fee at the time. So if you're working 70 hours a week, minimum wage, putting a roof over my head, I didn't meet the exception to get my classes taken care of financially, so I had to pay out of pocket. It made me even more bitter. I walked into my first class and I was like, what am I doing in here? I never even used, I barely used, a computer. And the people in the classroom at Mount SAC were, you know, it wasn't like an 18 year-old crowd that looked fresh out of high school. There was some of that, but there was other people I could tell who were just getting off a ten hour workday, like me. And I walked out of my first class and I, and like I walked out to the parking lot, and it was probably one of the surest feelings I ever had. I said, this is for me, I can do this. I took two classes my first semester, and then I took 4 to 7 every spring and fall. And then every summer I took the max amount of units I was allowed to for summer and winter, and I did that for about 13 years. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=287.84,517.73"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e 13 years.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=518.27,519.38"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. So through my associate's, two associate's bachelor's, two master's and a PhD.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=519.409,525.35"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e My goodness.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=526.0,526.6"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=526.63,527.29"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, so, where in this process did you start working at Dodger Stadium?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=527.44,532.84"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e 2009? I was, a teacher had invited me to an academic competition, and I thought the person was crazy for asking me to do it, but I went anyways. And at that academic competition, we beat Penn State by half a point for first place, in the two year competition. And so I was with Mount SAC and you take this large test. So we, I, coached this test. Currently I'm the academic, I'm the coach for this process. So all the colleges with like a turfgrass program will send their students out to what is the national turf sports, Sports Field Management Association is a national organization. We have a bunch of individual chapters within states and then schools that will send their kids out to take a test. And if if we're on a team, it'd be four of us. It's a giant test. You have 2.5 hours to complete it, and you're in the same room with 24 other teams from other colleges to 30 or 30 other teams, something along those lines. And then they put your scores up on the wall, and you feel really good or really bad about yourself at the end. So we did that. And then we're like one of the two community colleges that actually competes in that thing. And anyways, so I did that. At that, at that in January of 2009, one of Dodgers' administrators was there, and they were looking for someone to take over the landscape and they were like, hey, you speak Spanish, you got some school, you know how to do the labor. And I was like, c.c.c., I meet all those. Yeah. And, and I interviewed a few times. And that's how I ended up at the Dodgers in April of 2009.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=532.87,622.72"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e And when you started there, what were the grounds like? Were they—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=623.77,632.254"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e I know it was, it was different. It was a lot of what you would expect from SoCal landscape. So there was a lot of your basic ground covers. Ivy. Algerian ivy. English ivy. Lantana and African daisy. A lot of those ground covers. There's a lot of classic California trees around the jacarandas. Tons of palm trees, obviously. At that time, annual color was still a big deal. So this was before the drought really kicked in in like 2011 and then 2011 through 2015, the drought awareness, the messaging was extreme. When I got there, I already knew that was an issue because I was a student at Mount SAC and teachers were, you know, they've been preaching this for years. So I started doing those things immediately. That's how I come into the stadium.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=632.44,673.46"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e How soon did you start?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=673.67,674.21"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e I tried as soon as possible, as soon as, not native plants. So I started with drought tolerant plant material that I could take from cuttings for free. So we propagated. So a lot of the succulents you see around the stadium right now like Coppertone, Sedum, bluefinger, aloes, agaves, me and the guys, we took cuttings of those and propagated those out for free and stuck them and grew them out from the start. And then we cut our water by like, you know. So basically we went from watering something 3 to 4 times a week to once a month. And so we have a lot of planters like that. So I started taking advantage of these small spaces. 3 to 4 full planters took cuttings to turn into 12 planters. And that just scaled out into hundreds over time.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=674.24,710.86"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e And when you started your team, they had been working there.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=711.4,719.59"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah, yeah. For","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=719.62,720.46"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e a long time. They were a lot older than you. And so you had to try to build.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=720.46,725.98"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e That was a very difficult situation. So, yeah, when I started there, most of the guys had been working there longer than I've been alive.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=726.01,732.79"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh, wow.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=732.82,733.36"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah, yeah. And most of them are. And so I'm born here. All right. And so, like so being pocho un pocho means I'm Americanized. So I'm Mexican, but I'm not. Yeah. So when I go to Mexico, Mexicano eres Americano. You're American. You're not Mexican. Don't get it mistaken, right. And so that's a really tough gap to cross in the culture is like when someone shows up who could be your grandkid or your child, and and I can speak Spanish, but there's just different levels of Spanish. And it's a, it's a gap, you know, between us. And I was and then, you know, I wasn't helping any because, like in general, I'd say, I don't want to say I was completely dumb, but what I've realized over time is that I really just shave off a little bit of ignorance every year is generally what happens. And some years you shave off more than others, right? So I still had a lot of learning to do about, you know, leadership, people, relationship building, like all the things that are really important to management, I generally was terrible at and have been in a really long process trying to get better at those things. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=733.39,799.15"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e I have read about the, what do you call it, the your shop. Yes","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=800.62,805.426"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e That you have and that when you started it was—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=805.66,809.62"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e It was a waste facility basically. Yeah. Yeah, it was where we stored the waste. Yeah, it was where we stored 40, 40 yard roll off bins, bins of used oil from the kitchen, waste materials, things from other departments they didn't need. It was because it's so separate from the stadium, it was just used as a different function. We had ownership changes, we had large construction projects during those ownership changes. There was a lot of leftover things from that. The new ownership group that's been in place now is, you know, that's for me, that's an obstacle they've overcome and completely changed and been great about. But it's just tough organization going through major ownership, going through ownership changes. And then with that leadership changes and construction. So when one ownership group does a construction project and then the next ownership group does another one, that doesn't translate very well. Sometimes it can be foreign languages in terms of what's underneath the ground. So that that made things very difficult. So the shop was, now the shop is like representative of what a typical landscape shop looks like. If you walk into a landscape shop, if you find wherever your maintenance folks are at here, if you go to the nearest LA City County Rec's park, if you go to Mount San Antonio College. What is it? It's big metal walls and asphalt. And that you show up to that every day. It doesn't have air conditioning. It's typically, you know, you're very, and also maintenance facilities generally, where the maintenance facility people work out of, it's generally not taken care of by custodial as well as the rest of the places, because it's not the same. It's not in the public eye as much. So we, and that's this internal issue that I've been working on for a long time, is how do we manage our own space and how do we. And that really reflects how we perceive ourselves. And then how we perceive ourselves is really primary to how we interact with others. So yeah, it was, it was very different. And I made a very intentional effort to to change that and to beautify it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=811.69,918.41"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e That's why I wanted you to talk about some of the, how you have beautiful, you have art.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=918.86,924.05"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah, yeah. And it's quite bizarre, you know, for for a landscape facility, we're like part landscape facility, part museum is what's going on over there.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=924.8,932.15"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Para Los Ninos.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=932.39,935.277"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. So so we have, so we did some work for from Para Los Ninos, the charter school here in LA. And the guys and I were in there. We're pulling out some of their old planters and we were fixing some of the irrigation. We tightened up some of their hedges and then we planted some veggies for them, some tomatoes and chilies. I used the restroom in there, and, I walked out through the cafeteria through the front, and there was these stunning paintings on the wall. Golden barrel cactus plants, multicolored, textured, six by eight, four by four. Big on the wall, just beautiful colors. And I went to them and said, hey, can I buy these? I'll buy these right now. And they were like, you can't have those, they said, but our kids have been doing these for years. We have stacks of them from previous years. And so I made a cash donation. Hey, take this. And then we went, we came back in the big truck and we pulled out like 8 or 9 of those paintings. And so we put those on the wall. On the wall we also have some local local artists. We have Pablo Montano, Jena Montaya, Obed Silva is in there from Homeboy Art. He's a teacher at East L.A. Community College. Good friend, incredible author. And then I have some Caravaggio replicas and some other fun stuff. But I wanted to try to make that thing beautiful and, like I was honestly pretty scared of that when I started that. So, something about the idea of saying, hey, I want to make this place beautiful is, was almost like, just in my head at least, there was no coming back from it. Like there's no way I could hide from myself if I failed. Now that I knew that I really wanted it. And it was a long, weird task. Like one painting at a time, one sculpture at a time. So I'd say it took like seven years till we really cleaned the place out, and it took us another couple of years to get the shelving and organize everything. And then it took like another, you know, five years really to beautify it. And it's been a it's been a long process and I hope it keeps developing. Like I hope this I hope to keep this thing growing a little, a little better every year.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=935.86,1045.03"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/34","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, I'm sure it means a lot to the people that work for you. That I mean, doesn't it just.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1045.06,1050.54"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/35","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. It's it's it changes the environment altogether. When you walk into a shop now and you see the colors like, and I intentionally go out of my way to decorate for the holidays like we have 4th of July stuff hanging up still that's left over the Los Muertos. Halloween stuff will go up soon. Those are small things change in the tablecloths, on the cover, on the on the tables, to to the to the month decor, whatever. Those small things count. And you know, it's funny is I was so utilitarian in general when I started in the industry, when I started working out of my own truck, everything was, how many lawns can I mow before the sun comes down every time of year to make the most amount of money, right? How many times do I need to sharpen my mower blades? How many trips to the greenwaste dump till I can do this? So I had no real passion for like the the plants per se. Like I never had a garden, never had a yard, never tended vegetables. Right? This was a this was a way to make money for me that I, that I could do while keeping same. And so to, to to make the transition was um, it was, it was gradual difficult and like beautiful at the same time. And then slowly the the effect of like, you know, the, the general attitude if you. So I was I'd be willing to bet if you had an audio device and you took the audio from not even what they were saying, just from the pitch of voice from what it used to be in there, from the amount of sharp tones that would come out versus the amount of mellow tones that would come out, you would find that there's a different wavelengths in there consistently. It would be night and day like, that can't be the same building or the same people put it like that. Yeah. It's","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1050.99,1134.56"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/36","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e amazing when you talk about transition. So, uh. Let's talk about the inspiration or you got the idea to become an accredited botanical garden.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1134.56,1149.98"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/37","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah, a trip to Versailles. There was a lot. Yeah. So there was a real, uh. So I had had the idea for years, and I really just didn't know if we could do it. And so there was a couple main sources. One was I started teaching at Mount SAC. It takes years to get a course through approved, right? At a college. So when they did, I just I think I just started full time and it was about two and they got this class through that. They knew that being able to identify California native plants was a big deal. We have several plant ID courses, but California natives and plant material was a big deal. So in a plant ID class, you're going to have 14 weeks of the year where you need to memorize 14 plants. So you need to spell the funny old Latin name and know the common name. You need to know them by sight and be able to write them both out. Like plant ID is an absolutely necessary horticulture skill, right? Okay, this class came out and they're like, hey new guy, you're the one out there playing with all the toilet material. This is yours. Good luck. And I was like, dang. Okay, so the tricky part about California teaching a plant ID class for California natives is tricky because at the college we have many, many hundreds of plant species, but not a lot of California did not at the time have a lot of California natives. Who has the California natives. The commercial industry is not producing them to that scale. They're producing very few. It's more now, but at the time it was really California Botanic Garden off the Ten in Montclair. Right. And then a couple other gardens that had them featured, but they weren't really obvious, so I had to. So this is probably the most embarrassing thing I've done in a classroom. I'm sure I've done many embarrassing things, but I started teaching this class and there's like a list of 200 plants. I probably knew 30 of them. And I'm sitting in front of you and it's supposed to be teaching and evaluating you, right? So I went on this massive learning curve like I was just failing miserably in front of my students for years. Okay. So so it also so in order to do that, I had to take them to the Botanic Gardens for classes. So we weren't holding class at Mount SAC. A lot of classes were held at California Botanic Garden. Um, and it just didn't take long until you got seduced by the character of the plant material. It did not take long. Like there's that's that's a fair enough statement. So there was a botanic gardens like that. Due to the planted class, I was traveling for the first time, so I had saved up some money. I paid off all my school and I had some friends and, um, you know, I was waking up at 4 a.m. and driving, you know, 100 miles across France to the Palace of Versailles, to the coast, and seeing Mont Saint-Michel and then the Palace of Versailles was out there. And I had heard that Palace of Versailles had golf carts that you can rent golf carts. And I was like, say what? So we we if you. Yeah. So if you get to the Palace of Versailles, you gotta get there 2.5 hours early to be towards the front of the line, and you're sitting outside this ridiculous place. Opulence is is just hard to wrap. You know, it's hard to take in. And we just blow through the museum and at the. And there's a restaurant on top where I think I had the best French onion soup in my life. And the golf cart guys weren't set up yet. So I'm looking out this window and I see them. There's a I see a golf cart. So the class, when you step out of the back of Palace of the Museum, there's that garden out back. But then there's just like, Lord knows how many acres of giant hedge rows of, like, those look like hidden paths back there. What is going on? No one's going over there, and it's just empty space. So we go down, we rent a golf cart and we start driving like, I mean, I'm driving. Friends are here and in the back, and it starts playing music while you're driving around. And it's like they told you, hey, go this way. So we go through a pair of hedges, these long hedges, and I'm just looking at this place and and it gives you a little narrative. It's like, hey, here's Hercules beating up a lion, you know, just gives you the type of stuff. And you drive through and I see some of the, the, the maintenance, there's some maintenance people back like they just came out of the kitchen, but all all plants are around and I'm like, hey, what's going on? Is there food over here? Oh yeah. There's a restaurant over here. Um, so we make a few more rounds and here's a restaurant. It's €2. Stella's just boom. Right. And so then there's like, five restaurants tucked in the back of that place. So I spent whatever, four hours on this golf cart drinking. Stella's going restaurant to restaurant. Dee dee dee dee dee dee dee. Listen to, you know, these stories in this audio in the golf cart, and it stops. So if you run into a feature, it'll tell you, hey, here's here's the older version of Neptune, right? Coming out of the sea with the horses, and they'll tell you about those little play plays on there. And as and as I looked around like I at that point in time, I was just overwhelmed by the pilgrimage people were making just to come look at things. So the idea of packing yourself into a tiny, uncomfortable seat for nine hours, plus the check in and get off, and then the time change sleep issue, and then traveling in a foreign place to get up early and go stare at something. You know, there is something about that that is, you know, I don't even know what that says about humans, right? But I just couldn't believe it. You know, I just could not believe it, that that was real. And I had done that at several locations. And the fact that people were doing it at gardens, right, really, really knocked my socks off. And then I looked around and I saw the work and I was like, there's nothing here my guys couldn't do with way less and less time. There's nothing they couldn't do. My guys can do way more than this. I was like, this is doable. Like and I really felt it was doable. So it was the teaching, the classes, visiting the library. And then it was reaching out to Abby at the Botanic Garden Conservation International. So international organization. Lucky for us, the president, the US president executive was at the Huntington Library. Right. And so I reached out to her and she came out and was like, yeah, this is doable. And then that's those are kind of the three main impetus there. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1152.11,1472.88"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/38","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Um, so you begin the process. I mean, what did you have to do? I mean, you don't apply right away, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1474.08,1480.74"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/39","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So when, I yeah. So there was a general application process and while I was getting our plant list. So you're generally trying to say hey, how many plants do you have. Species name. Common name. Where are they located? What conditions are they in? How are you providing some form of public education? There's there's four broad requirements as I get through this process. Slowly. Um, they change the process, they change it, and they make it a little more rigid and a little more clear. So I kind of restart and think a little deeper and go back and that. So I had to figure out my plant labels. Right. I had to figure out the theme of the plants, like what are we doing here? How are we going to provide this public education. And they have these eight criteria. They're looking for your horticultural capacity, looking for your leadership and industry connection to looking for your sustainability plan, your conservation plan, how you're managing your process, the plant signage, and then the criteria set such that any garden around the world could technically apply to this. You don't have to have X number of acres, right? Or you don't have to be driving revenue. Okay. So it's brilliant in that sense, but it also is within each category. You still have to do your diligence to make sure you're doing them. So it was a really nice balance and it really challenged me. So it's funny because the BGCI really challenged me to think about what the heck we're doing out there in the landscape, which is a big issue with landscape departments in general, is what are we doing here long term? Like what are we striving for? What is our purpose here? And the botanic garden conservation? Ultimately, their criteria create a set of goals that's more important than you, right? It's like it's like, here's the overarching goals. Is it conservation, sustainability? Here's the stuff. How are you going to go about them? Connect with the other people in your area and make sure you all are working together, right? So when we were the last one that we did, the last criteria we needed to meet was the public education component. And we I had had to go to our tours department. Right. Imagine this. So I go to tours and it's like, hey, I want to do a landscape tour and like, excuse me, I don't understand. Like, what do you what are you talking about? And so I explained, hey, I'm a teacher. I do this here. I think we have something here. We have this potential to do this. They said, okay, all right. They worked out. They did it. All right. So, uh, at this time, we hadn't got our official accreditation. It was the pandemic was just like, we were just opening up outdoor activities so we could do an outside tour. We couldn't do indoor tours, right. So we had set these tours up and no one knew about them. And I didn't have any way to market them. Right. And no one, no one came. But the BGCI was like BGCI said, look, you can say you're going to do tours when the pandemic is done, but you're not doing them, so it doesn't count towards public education. Oh, so you need to actually run them, right? And so what I did is I just invited a bunch of students, right. I had to invite my students to hope for a couple of people to show up. And we had some other. We did have some people show up, but that was the last one, right? And then after that, that article in the LA times came out. Obviously, we had plenty of people coming. Yeah, but that's something that the garden tours end up are the like kind of the foundation of the public education component, which I think the facility is really set up for. You know, the infrastructure already exists for it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1482.18,1664.95"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/40","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, let's backtrack just a little bit. When you came up with this idea, what did the Dodgers, not the tours, just the idea of going for the garden. Like what was the Dodgers reaction? And what was your team's reaction?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1665.19,1678.72"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/41","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So, my guys, the look on their face was like, was this guy talking about what? What do you mean? It's like people are paying to go to see gardens, right? And then I realized I was like, oh, I was like, I've been going to these gardens a lot because I've been teaching these classes, but like, I'm the only Mexican out there. Obviously this is not, you know, it's like, why would these guys ever go to a garden? Why would they even know that that niche is there.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1679.47,1705.911"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/42","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Why go to a garden when they're working in the garden.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1706.59,1708.39"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/43","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So I just said I need to take them. And so I just took them on the clock, everybody on the clock. And we went to all the local botanic gardens. And I said,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1708.87,1717.18"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/44","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Field trip.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1717.24,1717.72"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/45","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah, we field trip them all. So look at what they're doing. It's like, we can do, every garden is unique, we can do our own thing. There's nothing here you couldn't do. You can mop the floor with anything those guys are doing. Like, so what something is interesting is the guys have, my guys are all from local 300 Laborers Union. Shout out Tony and Sergio, but they have an incredible set of hardscape skills and building skills that, that most landscape people don't have, right? So they can do infrastructure and plants. So anyways, that was their reaction. That's how I dealt with it. And the Dodgers, it was like I'm in my budget meetings and I'm and like, hey, I would like to be an accredited botanic garden. And they're like, excuse me, that sounds nice, I just don't know. I just, we're a baseball team. I'm not sure what you mean here. Right. So there was this gap, and I said, I can do this. I can do this for no cost. I can do this with our operating budget just by changing the basic way we operate basic fundamentals. I can do this in house for you. And it was, go ahead. You know, and this was like one of the many times on this journey where I came to leadership with an idea that sounded absurd and they were like, all right, let's see what you got, you know? Which was pretty miraculous. So there was many moments along the way where I presented something that was completely off the wall, and they were incredibly respectful about the whole thing. Yeah. I'm very fortunate. Yeah, yeah, yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1717.75,1793.99"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/46","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e When you talk about the construction skills, the hardscape skills of your team, because, um, one of the projects they've done is the martini planters, which are a part of Dodger Stadium. And they had you had to figure out a way to rebuild those. And then one of your team members said he—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1794.71,1815.556"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/47","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yes, they had the skills, They had the touch for it. So doing like fine surfacing of odd shaped structures is not something everybody can do. Right. And so the martini planters, we didn't even know how they were built necessarily. We knew their bases went deep into the hillside, but we didn't know if they were necessarily poured in place. We didn't know what that frame looked like. What we had was concrete that's been sitting out in the sun since 1958, 59, 60. Right. And so it's been exposed to the elements and water for 60 years. And it's like they were cracking off the edges. So basically the edges of the martini planters weren't rebar. So there's these four inch lips that were just shattering off. And it was not the best thing aesthetically. And this was one of the early things that we figured out was something that we could do in-house for a much better price than the contractor. That was good for us. And then, so many, so collectively in the stadium, there's 149 martini planters.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1815.85,1866.5"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/48","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh my God.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1866.53,1867.01"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/49","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So there are there are ten foot diameter and a six foot diameter. Two sizes. Very few of them were in great condition from the original building. And we had a contractor come in and do a great job on a couple of them, realized, hey, we could do this for on our own pace at a better cost. But seeing the martini planters finished and healthy was like, wow, I see what they were going for. 60 years ago, you guys were really on to something. Whoever figured this out, this is really cool. The trickiest part about the martini planters was like figuring out how to keep it stable on the lip, the edge that wraps around. And then it was the martini planters were designed with one half inch drainage hole, and there's about, at the deepest point, it's like 12in deep. And then it tapers out quickly to nothing towards the edges. So what do you do. You need a plant you can plant in there that has, that handles poor drainage and has shallow roots and reflective heat from the concrete. And that's it. That's a really tough, tough fit. So after we started fixing some, after we kind of got the process down, which was a long one, I was very fortunate. One guy actually went and banged frames out, metal frames on the old, old martini planters to match the exact size of the lips, to restore them how they were. And then we had to build custom frames and clamps to suit the massive size of them and to be able to pour appropriately. And then we drilled more holes in there for drainage. So we had to add drainage in. So we had to drill all the way through the base, change some of the mesh at the bottom so the water didn't leak onto the base, and then replant with something that was tough. And that's where a lot of our cuttings came into play. So earlier I mentioned a lot of what you see, is the same stuff the guys took cuttings of, we took cuttings of 12, 14 years ago and those, those are things that did well there. Those martini planters, there's still some martini planters we'll water like that, we'll get water a couple times a year that are perfectly happy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1867.82,1976.05"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/50","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. So then let's also talk about how many species of plants do you have now.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1976.5,1980.97"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/51","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh, a number I've lost count of. So, when we started, you know, the the big clusters, right? So we're, at least 50 drought tolerant plant, you know, like, so stuff from South Africa. Stuff from the desert, stuff from Mexico. Right. And then we have about 35 different species of agave. And then we had about 48 or 49 species of trees on the property prior to, and then Huntington Library. So I'm friends with some of the folks at the Huntington. Big shout out to Alicia and Karen at the nursery. I wanted I'm in love with this. So have you been to the desert section of the Huntington Library? I just absolutely love, it just feels like you walked into a Doctor Seuss book, right? Like, who would do something like this? This is outrageous. So I love that place. So they take cuttings in their plant material and they sell that at their nursery. So I went to them and said, hey, I would love a selection of succulents from your guys's cuttings. Just you guys pick it. They're going to go in this type of planter. Here's the specs. And they gave us like 45 species, right? So we bought them and we now we have, we have like these little Huntington martinis at the stadium. So there was a big cluster and then, gosh, planted, I don't know, at least we've done another 50 or so species of California native plant material. Probably more than that. And then, of those there's like 15 to 20 that do really well at our site that we keep repeating. So overall it's probably it's a couple hundred new species.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1982.02,2065.54"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/52","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e You mentioned the Huntington Library, and I've heard you talk about how many great resources there are in Southern California. Talk to us a little bit about that.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2067.58,2076.489"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/53","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh, it's ridiculous. So you look at the California Botanic Garden, right? And that's that's the largest collection of California native plants in the world, I believe. I think Santa Barbara's is a close second. It's also stunning. I still need to visit that. And then we have the LA Arboretum, which is a way underrated facility, right? LA Arboretum is stunning. And then you have Descanso Gardens, right? Just north of us in LA. And then you have the Huntington Library. Then you have the Getty. Like, are you kidding me? Like, these places are dang near free. Right. So we have, like, the richest botanic garden content in the world. And it's like, yeah, I went, I went intentionally looking for them in other places. Right. You know, it's like, I know, like, we have a really incredible thing here. And that's a, you know, we have the weather for it and the population for it. So that it's interesting because I generally think of the stadium relative to other gardens. Right. That's that's how my head, that's how it sits. And I always have this, like, little imposter syndrome, just because I'm always in such awe of all the other gardens. Like, man, we're not even close to these other gardens like, but it also gives me a really long term goal to really think critically about the plant material and what it's doing there and what's best for it long term.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2077.36,2148.34"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/54","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Next, we talked about the Dodgers' reaction and your team's reaction. But how was the fans, the public. You said there's tours, but I mean, have you gotten a lot of feedback about the.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2149.78,2163.12"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/55","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e We do. And it's, you know, first it was like, yes, yes. So we do get feedback. So we do the tours. We we have a bunch of private tours. We've seem to be carving out quite a little niche for elementary and high school. Right. Who can get out for field trips. And then they can really get their hands on and see like, hey, what does one point you know, what does half gallon an hour per look like versus a half gallon per minute? What does this mean when there's ten of these coming on at the same time in your yard? And what does that mean when you scale it out to 10,000 homes in this area? Right. So you can really help them get perspective on what water use looks like. And then taking them to our shop is like, hey, here's here's what a landscape team can do, right? And so every facility is going to have one of these. It helps for general awareness and appreciation for labor in general. So we have that. The tours are going well and yes, we do. And a lot of the feedback I noticed early on tend to come from season ticket holders. Like I got a lot of season ticket holders that reached out or reached out to the front desk or to stadium ops like, hey, this there's a I notice a big difference here, right? And that meant a lot. And then it started coming from then it just started coming from garden enthusiasts, right? People just soak out people. And that feedback still kind of continues to amaze me. I'm still kind of in disbelief that it's that we're still getting it. Yeah, it's pretty cool.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2163.15,2238.24"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/56","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e And people are taking the plant signs. Is that—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2238.27,2241.546"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/57","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e That's happened. That's happened. So I think the first time I, I, I knew we were really on to something was when I saw someone carrying a double handful of Coppertone sedum succulents out of a planter to the parking lot. And I was like, oh, yes, we're on to something like, this is good. It was probably one of the best signs I've ever had. Right. So you could you could probably take like the, the willingness for for leadership to listen to my idea to do this in the first place and to let me run, and then like, seeing these people run off with plant material, right? It was like, oh, we're really on to something here. Like, this is really doable. But that was a big one. And the plant signs? Yes. We've lost a couple plant signs wherever that I hope they put them on the correct species. I hope they're appropriately. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2243.19,2290.18"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/58","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e But you're doing all this work at Dodger Stadium while you're also full time teaching at Mount San Antonio College. Correct.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2290.36,2301.19"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/59","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So I'm a full time professor of horticulture at Mount SAC.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2301.19,2303.68"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/60","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e So what's like a typical day?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2305.0,2306.35"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/61","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So like today, today's is the 26th right of August. It's the first week of the fall semester. So I will work a very typical landscape schedule for the industry is, you know, landscape crews will start between 4:30 and 6 a.m.. Right. We start at 530 generally almost, almost all year round. And I'll do 5:30 to 2 at the stadium. I'll make my way across the ten to Mount SAC, and then I'll be at SAC from probably like 3:30 to 9:30, and then I'll be back home around ten-ish and then back up for the same thing. And I'll do that a lot. So I teach in person, I teach online, and I participate in a bunch of committees at the college, and I'm the co-chair of the department for horticulture.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2306.5,2347.35"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/62","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e I think this might be a good point to ask you about your fitness routines, because I feel like that ties into how you're able to do this schedule.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2349.03,2359.95"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/63","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. So I, so kind of related to me understanding, this is just basically a further understanding of myself as what it really boils down to is many years ago, I identified that I just didn't want to work indoors, and I wanted to work with my hands. Right. And that has an overall like it's just this aligns to my personality and what's needed for my body to feel okay on a regular basis. I'll get anxiety and I'll feel and I'll have increasing negative emotion if I don't exercise rigorously. And I knew, I noticed, and I also read quite deeply on nutrition, fitness, neuroscience and a bunch of other stuff. So I'm kind of generally very interested in human performance. Like, what does it take to perform at a very high capacity, sleep as well? So yeah, I've always worked out. So what, you know it's funny is I was working worse, much worse hours than this when I was all labor, before I was in a management role. Right. So now I'm in a management role, in a teacher role. Before I was performing the manual labor. There's more hours in this a week, right. And I had much worse food and I had much less sleep and and I had a much, I lived in a much smaller, louder, dangerous place. Right. And so now I really feel like I'm just cheating the system. Like I live in a nicer neighborhood. I'm management and I'm teaching, right? It's like, this is. Yeah, you got to be kidding me all day. But the fitness stuff is I started, uh, boy, what was, you know, okay, so we had someone who was doing a half marathon, and I did it just because I couldn't. I thought if that person is doing it, I can do it. And I did it. We signed up and did it. And I was not a runner. I was primarily all weights, all weights, all heavy bag, speed bag, you know. And I had terrible running form, and I would get terrible shin splints, and I got, it took me probably two and a half to three years to get decent at running, where I wasn't in pain all the time. And the half marathon turned into a trail run, turned into like, a Tough Mudder, right. And so the typical Tough Mudder course back in the day, I think they have shorter courses available now, but it's ten miles with about 22 obstacles. And half of those obstacles you're going to get wet and be in the mud, something along those lines. And at the end you're going to run through an electroshock therapy thing where it's like, you run through, it's a muddy pit, and there'll be all these little cords hanging down, hundreds of them so that you're you're literally swimming through them. They're every 12in or so all the way around you. You're going to go through this 15 foot stretch and some of them have power in them, some don't, and you're just going to get zapped. Bam! You might just get dropped on the way through like that was your finish. So the other stuff you'd be doing, you'd be like jumping off a ledge over over a body of water, reaching out for a handle, and then swinging on the handle to catch something at the end. Big wall climb, stuff like that. So that Tough Mudder thing, it really started a cascade of like masochist races, right? So tough. So I did a lot of Tough Mudders. And I and while I was at one I ran into an old friend who was a former teacher of mine. Very fit guy. Really really good close friend to the day. Rod. Deeply grateful for him. He told me I'm competing in. So I hadn't seen him in like ten years. And I heard him behind me and I was like, Rod. He's like, yeah. So we we were on this trail. So typically at the start of the race, everybody's gung ho, but once you get the first two uphills, everybody's gasping out and there's like this kind of pack of people whose cardio is a little more established. I turn around. So it's like five of us up there and he's like, oh my gosh, man, ten years. And so he says, I'm doing World's Toughest Mudder in November. And this was like six weeks away. I said what's World's Toughest Mudder. He's like oh you don't know. I said I don't know. It's a 24 hour race. You show up to Henderson, by Vegas. You set up a camp. You get a ten by ten spot, ten by ten spot with a tent. And you bring your supplies and you start at like 2 p.m. on a Saturday and it ends at 2 p.m. on a Sunday. It's a five mile course with 22 obstacles with 700ft of elevation change. Half of them are wet, some of them are freezing and some are electric, you know, electrical charge. And then there's, and so you do that five mile course as many times as you can in 24 hours. At the end of every five mile lap you can go and get, you can change, you can go to your tent, you can change. So most people, so when the race starts, it's like, you know, 40, 50 degrees out, but when it gets cold, you're soaking wet and there's wind and you're about 30 to 40 degrees. So a lot of people it's a hypothermia issue. So, so most people are ice bathing regularly. Their cold tolerance is through the roof. So I said, you know what, I'll do this. And he was like, yeah, right. That's cute. Here's my email. Email me if you're really in, and I did it and I went and I bonked out after 35 miles, completely crashed after 35 miles. And the second year I came back. And so what I asked all the the guys who were doing really good is they said, you have to start taking cold showers. This warm stuff's got to go. You need cold showers every day. So I said, fine. So I started cold showering. I've been cold showering since then. I haven't taken, yeah, I've been cold showering every morning, you know. Sit ups, push ups. Clean my toilet. Cold shower, every morning. That's how, I, that's before I— Yeah. So, so I, started doing cold showers and then I get into some ice baths. And so then I'm like going to 7-Eleven buying 40, 40 pounds of ice, dump it in my tub, right. And so I'm doing this. I'm prepping for next year so I can get the 50 mile mark right. And so this so first of all, I'm paying for this race. Right. And then I'm coming back to work half dead. But you pay, if you get to 50 miles, that's like you get, you know what they give you? They give you a, a cheaply made bib, brown dirt colored bib with your name on it. And that's your like your big, your big finish. Okay, so I did it. So we hit 50 miles the following year, and then I strained a muscle in the back of my knee. Papa. Papa. Papa. Something or other. Anyways, I made it through comfortably 50 miles the following year and the third year I did it, I was the leanest I'd been and I had the most cold, cold, tolerance, stress work that I'd done. I was ice bathing four times a week, I bonked, I got hypothermia in 20 miles, and it was. It was my fittest. I was in incredible shape. I still have not been in that good of shape ever again. I don't know why, it was a weird thing, but anyways, those those went. And then then it was like after Tough Mudder, it was the Spartan races and it was a Spartan World Championships in Tahoe. And you start at 6000ft of elevation. It's a 17 mile brutal course. It takes you to 10,000 where you're swimming in an ice lake at the top. And then you're like carrying a heavy boulder. So basically what they'll do is they'll freeze you and then challenge your grip strength after that. So anyways. Just to see if you can,right? So a lot, a lot of it's like, man, I just I want to know if I can do it. Like if I when I see something like, I just want to know if I, if I can do that, like, I just, I want to know I want to find out what's inside. I want to see where the breaking point is.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2359.98,2747.69"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/64","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. It tells us a lot about you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2750.18,2752.31"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/65","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. That's okay. And just note that I'm at these events, I'm the I'm like a novice. I'm like, physically one of the least impressive people like visually. And then also, I'm also one of the lower performers at these events. I'm easily on the lower end of performers. There's guys and gals in there smoking me at all those races, you know, and it's I just I admire the hell out of it. I just love to see someone kicking ass. Like, I just, I really enjoy that. When I see someone, like, scaling up, I'm scaling, so you'd be like scaling a wall with pegs, right? So you have a ten foot wall, there's holes in it and you got to stick a peg in it. Peg yourself up. Right. And then someone's just smoking me like just flying over. You know, they're like one hand in it, slinging a leg over, like, man, I just, I just I really dig it, man. Yeah. Hats off. So anyway, so I am doing these events, but I am by no means a high performer in these events. You know, I'm really just falling forward. It's probably a good way.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2755.04,2802.84"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/66","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, there's one other thing I wanted to make sure we talk about, and that is, you can, I'm sure you can describe this better than I, but your efforts to change the perception of the landscape industry and the labor, and the, how we view it, and I just find this fascinating.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2806.53,2824.59"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/67","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. Yeah. So we, something I noticed early on in landscape was that most landscapers, or not, some, that's unfair statement because I don't have data on it. But I noticed a lot of people who weren't savvy of the business practices, like when it was appropriate to lease versus rent, or how much money is too much money to sink into a piece of equipment. How many people you needed on a job for a given job? How do you, how many trucks do you really need? What's an appropriate amount of time to get this equipment ready to set up and break down. There's there's all these small things. I noticed those things weren't being done well. And then over the years, it's like, if you've ever worked in a landscape crew and you're saying, hey, I need more money. And I'm sitting across the desk from someone whose job revolves around an office with spreadsheets and two screens on their computer and an ergonomic keyboard. How do, I how are we ever going to speak the same language? And we're not 99.9% of time we're not. We're absolutely not speaking the same language. There's no value interpretation there. There's no interpretation of why it's necessary. And. And I really think that the way we perceive our, so also, you know, when you're on a maintenance crew for any facility, you're a red number on the spreadsheet, you're an expense. There's no revenue generated. This is an expense. Now, it's a necessary expense because you just can't let your front yard go to crap. Right. And then when you will spend money is when you need to sell your home or do a transition, and you want to increase your property value. But once the, once that's established, it's like, what is the maintenance of it look like? How does this, how does the landscape in your front yard continue to provide value to your home in such a way you feel good about spending that money on it. And what I've really boiled down to is, you know, from my PhD, I did a PhD in business management and strategy and innovation is like the subcategory. And I looked at business model innovation, which really revolves around your value proposition to the customer. Why are you, what value is it? What are you deriving out of this and how does that and how is it delivered to you? It's like probably the second biggest component. And then the following be how do I keep that going. Keep the cycle going. But how to tell someone this expense should increase. For what. Why. Why should you continue to spend more money here? That's a problem we're always going to have in our industry. And then our inability to do that doesn't necessarily make us feel good about ourselves, but that's our own responsibility. No one else's. No one else can translate that value but us. So what do you expect to happen about it? It's like, you know, no one's coming to save you. It's like, you better get it together, man, and figure out how to make ourselves more valuable to an organization. And once you do that, once you become more integrated into the organization, it makes your job so much better. Like, it just makes life better.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2824.62,2978.74"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/68","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, that's another thing, I guess, because the Dodgers have, have recognized you as a department, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2978.95,2986.96"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/69","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. Oh heck yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2987.47,2988.34"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/70","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Because you're not just, you know, mowing the lawn, whatever. You're part of the fan experience and marketing, really. And beautification. And it's so important to, you know, place value on these things. So,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2988.37,3008.32"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/71","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e yeah, they recognize. So I guess, you know, part of it is like, I'm really fortunate that they're aware of that, right? So when you when I go back to those initial conversations like, hey, we need to be a botanic garden, right? The fact that they weren't dismissive of that, like, if you asked the average executive and your landscape guy comes to you in a safety vest in his boots, dragging dirt into your office and goes, hey, you guys need to be an accredited botanic garden you know. It's like, you should leave my office and clean your shoes when you come back in here again, right? That's not the normal answer, but the other answer. But what I got was the opposite of that. Like, it was like, I don't know what that means, but talk to me like, what are we talking here? Cost, what's your what's your goal here. Right. So like the fact that that happened at this organization. Right. Is a, is I don't know. It's also I'm kind of the only one crazy enough to try to do it right. So so there's some of that. But, but they have to be, they have to be open enough to willing to accept it. Otherwise I probably would have just given it up. Right.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3008.35,3055.78"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/72","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Right.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3055.99,3056.41"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/73","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e So yeah, it's a, it's a very like complex issue that I'm still working out. So something I'm still working out is what it means to the employees, what it means to all the other employees. And I'm trying to build, build a bridge in that, not just with the fans, but within the organization. And that's, and I think we are headed in the right direction. But it's a big problem for anyone who's working in a maintenance facility. If you're at LA city,right? What it costs. So. Okay. You ever go to the park and you see a big red mower mowing through the park, right? Okay, that five reel plex is like an $80 to $90,000 mower. Okay. Getting capital on that, you need a dozen of those to run around the parks. Okay. So, you know, and then the maintenance on it is not cheap. Sharpening the reels, and then the little golf carts. So you see the average golf cart that someone's driving around in, that they have their tools in the back. Those average utility carts are in the mid 20s, mid 20 thousands. It's a used car. If you see someone on a utility cart that's towing any weight you're in the mid 30s, okay. So it's like this thing is expensive right? It's an expense. And then we we need to figure out how to translate that value more effectively. Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3056.44,3127.64"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/74","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Another thing I want to run back on. You said someone, you know, had an arm full of plants. But I heard you once talk about that maybe, you had the idea of maybe donating plants that have been propagated at Dodger Stadium.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3128.48,3146.6"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/75","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e We have.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3146.63,3147.02"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/76","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e You have done that. So","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3147.05,3147.83"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/77","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e we have. I","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3148.48,3148.818"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/78","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e actually think that would be so popular. So","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3148.818,3150.7"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/79","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e yeah. Nacido en Dodger Stadium. Hecho En Dodger Stadium. So yeah. Born in Dodger Stadium. So like I'm a, I'm an agave fan, I love agaves, I love the manga, I love, I love every species. I there's very few plants that like, so when I see a beautiful piece of art and I get a little feeling in my chest, you know, I get that with agaves, I don't get that with a lot of other plants. Agaves have a really interesting reproduction cycle, but the ones that bulbil bulbil come off as they born as many agaves on the stem. All right. And I was like, we should root these things and then throw them out there for ten, 20 bucks or whatever and have them as donations to the Dodgers Foundation. Right. And also something else I've realized through the years is how deep, massive and impactful that the Dodgers Foundation is. Like. I didn't realize my little sisters were playing on Dodger Fields in South Central. I didn't realize that, but it was like the footprints everywhere. And I was like, gosh dang it. Anyway, so the, the that's we did that, we've done that. And it was very successful. It's something I like to do more of, plants that were born at Dodger Stadium, and it needs to be tough, drought tolerant material that you can carry around with you for a while before it needs water. But we're working on that. That's in progress. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3150.7,3213.66"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/80","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e great. What do you envision? What do you have future plans for, Dodger Stadium or—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3213.66,3222.666"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/81","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Plans right now? I would say that the two years of unprecedented rainfall is taken up all of our plans. So the unprecedented rainfall in Los Angeles in general is introducing new weed species. We've had new weed species germinate we've never seen before. We have purple vetch, asters, other thistles that are coming in, we've never seen coming in at huge numbers. We have some erosion issues. And then Los Angeles, in general, is like over the next few years, will be seeing the hardscape issues as well. So asphalt, concrete, like the the long term issues of the amount of the the soil that's wet underneath the hardscape and then the traffic, it's like some of these things won't rear their head right away, but they're going to continue to rear their head at a higher rate for a long time. Right. And so we have these underlying maintenance issues that come from it. The basics are continue to improve our irrigation efficiency and continue to plant more natives, to continue to stabilize the hillsides and continue the public education component. I'm trying to figure out how to talk about plants to more people in a way that's free and accessible and easy, and a lot of that's going on through the Instagram, the Instagram. But I need to figure out how to do a better job at that. Yeah, I'm working on all those things.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3223.38,3289.62"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/82","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Yeah. It's interesting idea. Is there anything you want to say before we—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3291.15,3296.016"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/83","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e Man, God bless the library. You know, you have these two books here, \"Spine,\" that discusses the architectural layout and the plan here. And I read, so I read books for us. So at Mount SAC, I have these, I read some books to students from time to time. I try to keep it related to arts or plants. Right. So something that's so. In general, I feel like students should be reading a lot of books, or at least learning about a lot of books. If they don't read about them, they should learn about a lot of different books they should be exposed to, you know. So I read, I read that book to my class pretty regularly to talk about. Because horticulture, you know, generally in the California Master Gardener handbook they'll describe it as an art and a science. Right? Here's the art factors using, here's the science factors. And there's a lot of that going on in this building, too. And then just the history of it, and it was the 150 year anniversary not too long ago.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3296.58,3344.79"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/84","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e Yes.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3344.82,3345.54"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/85","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eChaz Perea:\u003c/strong\u003e And then the Centro de Pueblo, like the original library that started here. So the original library here, if you read that, they started because the Mexican community that didn't even speak English thought it was important to have a place where we had all of our written materials together and could come together and learn, like that's what they started. They were renting a small place for that, right? And then had to move out of that salon to another one. But the fact that that would happen, right. And it still continues today and we're all here to witness it is just stunning. So I'm happy to be part of it. Thank you, Kelly.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3345.75,3373.41"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/transcript/76804/annotation/86","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eKelly Wallace:\u003c/strong\u003e W","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3373.44,3374.64"}]},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Auto-generated Index (2024-08-30 23:07:17) [Index]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/87","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Introduction to Chaz Pereira and His Role","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=0.0,164.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/88","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Kelly Wallace introduces herself and her guest, Chaz Pereira, who holds multiple roles related to horticulture and landscape management. Chaz is a landscape manager for the Los Angeles Dodgers, a professor, and an advocate for native plants. The interview is being recorded at the Los Angeles Public Library.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=0.0,164.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/89","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz's Early Experience with Plants and Landscaping","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=164.0,284.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/90","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"The speaker recounts his initial foray into the world of plants and landscaping, which began with a job at a golf course. This job led to opportunities for moonlighting in landscaping, which eventually financed his education. The speaker's journey into horticulture was driven by a desire to work outdoors and with his hands.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=164.0,284.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/91","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz's Educational Path and Motivation","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=284.0,527.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/92","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz describes his educational journey, which was marked by early struggles and a late start at the age of 24. His pursuit of higher education was motivated by a desire to advance his career in the golf course industry, leading him to Mount San Antonio College. His academic pursuits were supported by his landscaping work and were fueled by a newfound passion for the field.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=284.0,527.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/93","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Beginning Work at Dodger Stadium","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=527.0,1134.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/94","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"The speaker details his start at Dodger Stadium in 2009, where he was tasked with managing the landscape. He describes the original state of the grounds, which featured typical Southern California plant species, and his efforts to introduce drought-tolerant plants and reduce water usage.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=527.0,1134.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/95","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Inspiration for Botanical Garden Accreditation","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1134.0,1474.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/96","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz shares the inspiration behind his successful effort to have Dodger Stadium recognized as an accredited botanical garden. His experiences teaching a California native plants class, visiting various gardens, and a trip to the Palace of Versailles played significant roles in shaping his vision for the stadium's landscape.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1134.0,1474.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/97","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Reactions to the Botanical Garden Initiative","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1474.0,2348.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/98","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"The speaker discusses the process of gaining botanical garden accreditation and the reactions from the Dodgers organization, his landscaping team, and the public. He highlights the challenges and successes of the initiative, including the development of garden tours as a key component of public education.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=1474.0,2348.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/99","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz's Commitment to Fitness and Endurance Events","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2348.0,2806.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/100","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz delves into his rigorous fitness routine, which includes cold showers, ice baths, and participation in extreme endurance events like Tough Mudder and Spartan races. He describes the physical and mental challenges of these events and his motivation to push his limits.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2348.0,2806.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/101","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Elevating the Landscape Industry","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2806.0,3214.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/102","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"The speaker reflects on his efforts to change the perception of the landscape industry, emphasizing the importance of recognizing the value of labor and integrating landscaping into the broader organizational and public experience. He discusses the challenges of conveying the value of landscape maintenance and the need for industry workers to advocate for themselves.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=2806.0,3214.0"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/103","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Future Plans and Appreciation for the Library","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Title"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3214.0,3382.36094"},{"id":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469/index/88367/annotation/104","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":[{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Chaz outlines his future plans for Dodger Stadium, which include improving irrigation efficiency, planting more native species, and enhancing public education on plants. He also expresses his gratitude for the library and its role in his educational journey, as well as its historical significance in the community.","format":"text/plain","label":{"en":["Synopsis"]}}],"target":"https://lapl.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2367/collection_resources/144103/file/266469#t=3214.0,3382.36094"}]}]}]}