Long Beach will relocate Alamitos Beach senior center; neighbors wonder what will happen when it’s gone
Those who live near the facility worry that existing crime and safety problems will get significantly worse once the old center is vacant.
After nearly a half-century in the Alamitos Beach area, Long Beach’s Fourth Street senior center will relocate in the next few years to a spot almost a mile away in the East Village.
The city wants to hear from residents about what they want to see in the new center, which will occupy the ground floor of an Elm Avenue building that will also house a new crime lab for the police department and some city offices. A public workshop is scheduled Thursday, and an online survey is available through Sept. 30.
But as city leaders plan for an upgraded senior center that’s expected to open in 2027, neighbors of the current facility say they’re worried that existing crime and safety problems will get significantly worse once the old center is vacant.
Over the past several years, condo owners in the Whitley Bay building on Third Street, which shares an alley with the senior center, have repeatedly called police about bike thefts, building break-ins and other issues, so when the center moves out, “it’s going to be like ‘Mad Max,’” Whitley Bay homeowners’ association vice president Mike Rocco said.
The Fourth Street senior center, one of several that serve Long Beach’s older adults, is in a building that dates to 1949; the city bought the property from the old telephone company GTE in 1978, according to information on the city website.
The building is outdated and deteriorating, with electrical wiring that predates computers, floors that are cracked and uneven, and poor ventilation that leaves visitors either freezing or too hot, said Karen Reside, president of the Long Beach Gray Panthers. The group, which advocates for older adults, has offices in the senior center.
The planned new location, on Elm Avenue just south of Broadway, is in a building the city bought from Southern California Edison in 2022, according to city information. The senior center will take over the 44,514-square-foot first floor, and city officials said organizations such as the senior-focused nonprofit Heart of Ida that use the Fourth Street center will be offered space in the new facility.
Reside said the relocation seems like a positive because it’s just blocks away from the downtown transit hub, and “the older adults deserve something better than what we have.”
But she hasn’t been told whether the Gray Panthers will be given office space at the new building, she said, and she hasn’t gotten answers to big-picture questions such as who the center and its programs will be designed to serve.
Older residents with varied cultural backgrounds and languages have different needs, as do disabled seniors, Reside said.
She wishes the city had asked about older residents’ needs earlier in the process, she said, but she’s “really happy that they are finally asking the seniors what they want.”
What will happen to the Fourth Street building once the senior center moves to Elm Avenue, currently projected for 2027, is unclear.
The city doesn’t have any plans for the site, city spokesperson Kevin Lee said in a text message, adding that the property may be sold. That uncertain future is a top-level concern for the center’s current neighbors, including those in Whitley Bay.
It’s already been an expensive and dangerous headache, said Rocco and homeowners’ association president Cyndi Saiza, who estimated the HOA has spent $15,000 over the past several years having paint over graffiti, repair outside doors that were pried open, relocate bike storage out of the garage after multiple thefts, and replace a bank of mailboxes someone ripped from the wall in the lobby.
People set up camp in the alley with bikes and shopping carts, and residents can see and hear drug deals, overdoses, prostitution and people screaming at all hours, even when the senior center is open, Rocco and Saiza said.
It can sometimes take the understaffed police department several hours to respond to a call, and while police will sometimes tell alley campers to move along, “I’ve never seen an arrest,” Rocco said.
“We love that they’re getting a new senior citizens center – that’s wonderful,” Saiza said, but “what’s going to happen when the senior citizens center moves and the lot is empty 24/7?”
Saiza is concerned that city leaders may take several years to figure out what to do with the building, so she’d at least like to see them put up gates to regulate who can get into the parking lot. In the long term, she hopes they’ll redevelop the property; Reside said building affordable senior housing would help fill a great need.
Long Beach will hold a workshop at 6 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 12, to share information about plans for the new senior center and get community input. It will be held at the current center, 1150 E. Fourth St.
Residents are also invited to fill out a survey regarding the senior center; click here to take the survey in English, or select Spanish or Khmer at the top right corner of the page.
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