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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Louise Marquez Turned Mall Into Center of Community

Louise Marquez Turned Mall Into Center of Community By SHELLY GARCIA Senior Reporter About nine years ago, Diana Villafana, the principal at Chase Elementary School, came to the Panorama Mall to ask the center to adopt her school. Louise Marquez, who had just been named marketing manager, turned her down; one school would not be enough. The mall belonged to the whole community. For the next nine years, Panorama Mall sponsored citywide spelling bees and local job fairs. It held clothing drives because moms in the Welfare to Work program didn’t have business attire. It held immigration classes because many of the area’s newcomers couldn’t afford lawyers. There were craft days and reading days and visits with animals from the local wildlife station because some kids had never been to a zoo. Even as Marquez filled the mall’s calendar with these events, she never stopped building the economic engine that would make them all possible. Marquez took Panorama Mall from a property abandoned by many of its original merchants to a thriving business with sales per square foot among the highest of any shopping center. “She was a good businesswoman,” said James Grey, an account executive with KABC 790 Talk Radio. “But the people in the community loved her because (of) her desire to make things right.” Louise Marquez died March 10, just four months after her 50th birthday. To say she battled the lung cancer diagnosed five years earlier does not do her efforts justice. Marquez defied her cancer. She slotted chemotherapy sessions into her day the way others schedule dentist appointments. She didn’t take time off. She didn’t slow down. If you asked her how she managed to do it all, she’d answer with a knowing look and a wise-ass kind of chuckle. “What’s the alternative?” she’d ask. A single mother of three, Marquez worked for several Valley chambers of commerce before landing a job with then-Assemblyman Richard Katz. When he was termed out in 1993, she went to work for Panorama Mall as director of marketing, later adding general manager duties. Panorama City was changing. The middle-class suburb that had grown up around the General Motors plant was giving way to a diverse, inner-city neighborhood of working class Latinos. There was also poverty, the kind that breeds drugs, crime and gangs. The mall had fallen on hard times. Consolidations in the retail industry and the flight of the middle class led to an exodus of retailers like the Broadway. Vacancies skyrocketed. Panorama Mall, the center of the community when Marquez herself was growing up in the Northeast Valley, had become a ghost town. When Latin American retailer La Curacao came along, Marquez knew it would be an opportunity to reinvent the mall in a way that reflected the changes in the community. With its Spanish-speaking sales staff and signage, La Curacao was a place where new immigrants could feel welcome. It was also an opportunity to boost the fortunes of the mall. Instead of sending money home to Mexico and Central America, as was the practice of many Latinos, they could buy the goods relatives needed at La Curacao, and the store would ship the merchandise from its Latin American operations. Unlike money orders and cash stuffed into envelopes, the purchases would generate tax revenue and, in turn, more jobs and development. Many local residents were reluctant to accept the changing profile of the community. They feared the image of the Latino store; they believed it would bring outsiders, and crime. Marquez “worked tirelessly to convince not only the mall operators, but externally to get the community to understand how critical that bridge was,” said state Sen. Richard Alarcon. “I believe that if La Curacao had not come to the mall, it could have fallen under. I absolutely believe that, as the mall goes, so goes Panorama City.” Later, Marquez would doggedly pursue Wal-Mart, believing the community needed a place to buy bedding and kitchenware without traveling by bus to do it, and knowing that the store could help build the mall. But Wal-Mart officials were unwilling to move into the old Broadway building, a two-story structure better suited to a department store. When store executives told Marquez they only built stores from the ground up, she responded as if her child had just asked for permission to stay out late because his friend was allowed to. “So?” she deadpanned, and proceeded to win over the retailer with the mall’s demographics, its young families and a theme that she often returned to Panorama City was a hard-working community deserving of the resources other communities took for granted. Marquez was no bleeding heart liberal. She could stare you down and tell you how it was going to be. She could cuss like a sailor. But she also became a kind of conscience for the larger community. “You know how people always talk about reaching out to their communities and can we all get along?” said Alarcon. “Louise lived it.” She made sure Panorama City was represented in national marketing promotions and civic efforts. She made sure the Voices of America came to the mall so locals could record personal messages for the troops in Afghanistan. She got all the mall’s retailers and those in the surrounding area to ante up prizes for a citywide spelling bee. For the winner, Marquez wangled a trip to Washington, D.C. If she had to kick some butt to do it, so be it. She collected angels. Her wall was covered with certificates of recognition and appreciation. Doyle La Mountain, a Domino’s franchisee, said he’ll never forget the favors Marquez did for him. “I felt like I was special to her,” La Mountain said. “Perhaps that’s the way everybody felt.”

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