The 'Spiritual Battle' To Preserve Venice's Historic Black Church

VENICE, CA — A mysterious, unmarked trailer and racing car hauler appeared over the weekend at the First Baptist Church of Venice, which just received a Black Lives Matter street art mural installation from the city of Los Angeles last week.

Now, community members and activists want to know: Do these trailers belong to media mogul and championship racing team owner Jay Penske? And why is the parking lot now closed?

The church properties are just blocks from the beach, locked in legal limbo as a resistance movement to stop developing the property continues.

The church at 685 Westminster Ave. opened to the community in 1927. It's the oldest Black church in Venice. Bishop Horace Allen sold it in January 2017, the last month the church was open to the public. Allen died in December 2020.

Former church members sued Allen, saying the $6.3 million real estate deal with Penske of Penske Media Corp. — publisher of Rolling Stone and Variety — and his wife, former supermodel Elaine Irwin, was fraudulent. Penske is the son of automotive billionaire Roger Penske. Irwin was previously married to musician John Mellencamp.

A judge ruled the deal was fraudulent, saying Allen violated his fiduciary duty to the church and committed fraud. But the sale to Penske was still considered a done deal at that point.

Patch reached out to Penske for comment.

The church as an organization is still owned by Allen, who moved the congregation to Westchester. Allen said in 2018 that the Black community was shrinking in Venice and the church was in debt. It's now the same church but operates under another name: F.B.C.V. Worship Center.

Penske sold the church property to Lee Polster and Robert Thibodeau in 2020. In October of that year, just as the sale was finalized, someone set fire to the church. It's unclear if it was connected to the sale.

Patch reached out to Polster and Thibodeau for comment.

But activists questioned the timing. "The same day the sale went through the fire happened," activist Mike Bravo told Patch.

Polster is a real estate agent who has represented Weinstein Co., Lionsgate. Thibodeau is a member of the Venice Neighborhood Council, which approved Penske's plan. Thibodeau is an architect at DU Architects.

Community members have called on city leaders to help protect the community and preserve the church, demanding it's time to recognize displaced Black and brown residents in Venice.

“They’ve totally been neglecting the property,” Bravo said. “They’ve argued that they want to secure the space as their family’s property. No one’s seen Penske."

When the trailers suddenly arrived Saturday afternoon following the Black History Month celebration with Councilmember Mike Bonin, and the parking lot gate closed, community members and activists were shocked.

They claimed that someone from Penske's company dropped off the trailers Saturday afternoon on the property that they have continued to clean up and protect.

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"Ever since that sale is when all those things they’ve been happening," Bravo said.

People have broken into the church over the last few months, defecating on the property and damaging it, he said.

"Literally, the billion-dollar question is why do the Penskes want to live in this property in this historic Black place, in a historic Black place where a lot of people of color hang out? For some reason, they really want it," Bravo said. "They still want this property. They’re still fighting for it." They also haven't reached out to the Black and brown elders, he said.

"There’s no sense of remorse or humility to do the right thing," Bravo said.

The church is still far from development. The L.A. Office of Historic Resources is reviewing a proposal to give the church historic designation status.

The new art installation was added during Black History Month in Los Angeles and recognizes the Black community and history in Venice. Bonin joined the neighborhood at the church corner last week to honor the Black community and history in Venice.

Patch reached out to Bonin for comment on the property's status.

The moment was an important one for the community following recent racial justice protests and initiatives in the wake of George Floyd's death in 2020. The installation's timing also coincided with the birthday celebration of beloved community elder Jataun Valentine.

"The Black Lives Matter street mural is a great visible statement and recognition of the history of Black people in the Venice community," said Naomi Nightingale of SaveVenice, a community organization of Black and Indigenous residents spearheading the fight for the First Baptist Church of Venice and social justice imperatives in Venice.

"Its placement on Westminster Avenue, the location of the original church and the historically designated home of Irving Tabor, is so appropriate," Nightingale said.

By the 1920s Black people were pushed into Oakwood, near Brooks and Electric avenues, just blocks from where real estate developer Abbot Kinney built his European-imagined empire in the swampy marshlands that became Venice Beach. Kinney was known as progressive and left his home to his longtime friend Irving Tabor, a Black man who left Louisiana for Los Angeles in 1910. But segregation persisted.

It's no secret that Venice has a long history rooted in segregation in its current gentrification reckoning. In the early days of Venice, Black people were not allowed to ride the gondolas along the historic canals. They could not own homes along the canals, which were reserved for white families. Even though they helped build Venice, they were not welcome to all parts of it.

As gentrification crept into the neighborhood, and a wave of homelessness hit the region, rents around Oakwood started to climb, and the divide among rich and poor grew even greater. As writer Beth Miller described on a drive around the neighborhood in 1988, "It seems to me that there really are two Venices in sight here."

To Bravo and other community members, the movement to keep the church isn't over yet. It's been home to generations of Black and Latino people living in the Oakwood neighborhood.

"It’s a 100-year-old spot of prayers, energy, past and present," Bravo said. "It’s a spiritual battle."