Community Matters

In this Community Matters series, we spotlight a remarkable initiative in Long Beach’s East Village Arts District. Meet Orsa Modica, a key figure behind the East Village Arts District Community Watch Group (CWG), an inspiring example of how residents are coming together to address crime and enhance community safety.

Orsa Modica, known as Modica’s Restaurant and Deli, has ... read more >>

Community Matters is a series highlighting people who make a difference in our Long Beach community. We hope providing this well-deserved recognition will inspire others to take action.  These people are the secret ingredient that makes our communities work. 

Check out our Community Matters series and if you see something or someone you like, please share the story. If you have ... read more >>

As part of our Community Matters series, we’re always looking for new ways to give back to the community, and there’s no better example of people making a difference than the annual Christmas Store right here in Long Beach, CA put on by New Image Emergency Shelter for the Homeless.  

Founded 34 years ago by sisters Bren... read more >>

On Long Beach’s Pine Avenue, a group of locals is up to something different. They are not waiting for someone or something to solve their problems.  

This gang of proactive citizens is the Pine Beautification Posse. They are taking some matters into their own hands. You can find them on the streets every Sunday morning.

Their leader, Carole Sergy, tells u... read more >>

In 1906, a banker named Stephen Green and his wife Josephine moved from Seattle and built an ornate Queen Anne Victorian residence in their new hometown of Long Beach, California. Now known as the Bembridge House, it sets on the National Register of Historic Places and the California Register of Historic Resources.

Walking through it today you can feel what they must have been like. This ... read more >>

In Long Beach, ORCA stands for Ocean Residents Community Association. It’s the neighborhood association that runs along Ocean Blvd.

One of the most meaningful changes we have seen in local communities over the last couple of decades is the growing popularity of neighborhood associations.

Downtown Long Beach has a group of neighborhood associations, including ORCA, members of a... read more >>

What do an open bar, taco trucks, community building, and closing costs on a real estate transaction have in common?

They all help build a community within the AQUA condominium, one of the biggest complexes along the ocean corridor in downtown Long Beach.

How does it work? AQUA unit owners have a mandatory private transfer fee. When a property sells at the complex, the buyer pays &f... read more >>

If you think condominiums are somehow cold and uncaring places to live, we have a story for you.

At West Ocean, a condominium complex along the Ocean Corridor in Downtown Long Beach, they do something unique and special every holiday season.

It’s called the Giving Tree.

Back in 2010, a group of West Ocean residents organized by Rola Karam formed a social club to do somet... read more >>