Goodbye to Persson's, a Local Institution (Dispatches)

Persson’s Nursery, located a stone’s throw away from Altadena on Sierra Madre Boulevard, caused a quite a stir–locally, anyway--several years ago.

It was David vs. Goliath. Southern California Edison, the owner of the property, wanted to convert the nursery space and surrounding land into a self-storage facility. Persson’s, a small, family-owned-and-operated business, appealed the decision. 

Soon, the open-space crowd got riled up, and they led a grassroots effort to keep the storage pods out.  After several years, in 2008, it seemed the little guy won. Not only would Persson’s stay put, SCE’s development partner promised, among other things, to add bike paths and public park spaces to the undeveloped areas near and under the powerlines.

A happy ending; like a nice little update of a Jimmy Stewart movie. It’s a wonderful life.

But a few short years after fighting the good fight, Persson’s has apparently closed. And not with a bang, and not with a whimper; we didn't even hear them shut the door. This summer, the gates were locked with no fanfare whatsoever, and row upon row of trees, bush, and  flowers  left to wither and die in the sun. 

I didn’t know Persson’s was no longer with us when I drove there on Saturday to pick up some supplies. But behind the locked gate, there were flora corpses everywhere, and no petitions or picketers could save it now. I figured I must have somehow missed all the news pieces about this. I was wrong.

A Victim  of the Financial Meltdown?

Since the financial meltdown, I’m not sure whether it’s our priorities or just our focus that has changed.

Near as I can tell, only one news source gave any mention to the closing of Persson’s, and that was the Mountain Views News. No local TV, no L.A. Times, no Pasadena Star-News, not this time.

According to the MV story, the nursery owners ran into some sad, sad luck of a personal nature, and fell behind on their bills.

I wonder if SCE will now, quietly, carry out its original plan and convert all the space to storage units. They won’t have to worry about running into all those bike paths and public parks they promised.

Had this happened in a pre-financial meltdown climate, what a local story this would have been, what drama.  A family battles to save their independent business, they win, then comes tragedy and defeat.

But it’s 2011, and foreclosures and lost businesses are just part of our daily landscape.

My dog and I take a long walk every day. The route varies, but we can’t avoid seeing a foreclosed house or two along the way.

If you wander around these abandoned houses, you’ll find the families have left a few things behind–a doll, a child’s ball, something that seems almost purposefully poignant.   You know those tearjerker movies that coldly calculate what will make us cry?  These are the props they’d choose.

But of course, whatever happened in the houses, it  wasn’t calculated. That’s the problem.  The people got caught in an accident, a smash-up.  And each one has a different story, it’s just the ending that’s the same. 

I haven’t a ghost of a solution for how to improve the current situation. I’m just saying, in these hard times, when families lose their home, or owners lose their family business, let’s acknowledge the loss.  At the very least, let’s say goodbye.  

This is one of a continuing series chronicling how we are dealing with the economic crisis. Tell us what issues and what stories in Altadena Patch go to the heart of your American Dream. Please contact editor Dan Abendschein at dan.abendschein@patch.com.

This article originally referred to the Mountain Views News as the Mountain View Observer.