The Brief

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Richard Choi spent much of the past nearly 37 years waking up at 3 a.m. to make it to Radio Korea in time to give the morning broadcast.

For years, Choi’s commute to the station on Wilshire Boulevard took only a few minutes from his home near Hancock Park, but when the station moved its main operations to La Palma in Orange County last December, he would have needed to wake up an hour earlier to make the drive.

“That just wasn’t realistic,” Choi said. “So I decided it was time to retire. If the office had stayed in Koreatown, I probably would have continued broadcasting.”

The move hasn’t sat well with some longtime listeners and former employees who saw the station as inseparable from Koreatown.

Choi, 78, added that several longtime employees left the news outlet rather than make the commute to Orange County.

By the time he retired last year, Choi was one of the station’s most recognizable voices, particularly during the 1992 L.A. civil unrest, when Korean immigrants across the city turned to Korean-language radio for updates and information.

When management first floated the idea of leaving Koreatown, Choi told them to reconsider. 

The station’s headquarters became such a fixture in the neighborhood that many in the Korean-speaking community referred to 3700 Wilshire Blvd as the “Radio Korea building,” and the area in front of it, the “Radio Korea lawn.”

Now, the large Radio Korea sign in big, white block letters are gone, with just a shadow of an imprint.

The company spent years searching for another space in Koreatown after landlord Jamison Properties notified tenants in the Wilshire building that they would eventually need to vacate, Radio Korea CEO Michael Kim said.

The developers plan to redevelop the commercial space into affordable housing.

Radio Korea looked at multiple sites, including one near Hancock Park, but repeatedly ran into issues involving parking and cost. 

“We wanted to stay in L.A. We really tried hard to stay, because of 1992 and all that,” Kim said. “If Jamison was going to renew our lease, we would’ve stayed.” 

He admitted, though, that he also believes the center of Southern California’s Korean community has been gradually shifting beyond L.A.

“I understand how people in L.A. might feel about this stuff,” Kim said. “But I noticed Koreatown was starting to become less and less Korean, and I started thinking, ‘Is Koreatown going to die?’ I certainly hope not, but what if it ends up like Chinatown, where all the Chinese people moved to the San Gabriel Valley?”

“We had to move. There is a good Korean community here,” he added.

Orange County now has two officially designated Koreatowns, one in Garden Grove that received city recognition in 2019, and another in Buena Park that was designated in 2023.

Radio Korea still operates a small satellite office in Koreatown, and Kim insists its reporting in L.A. remains the same.

“We’re not trying to abandon L.A.,” he said. “The only difference is that we are broadcasting from Orange County and not Los Angeles.”

The station’s role in 1992

For many Korean Americans, it is almost impossible to talk about Radio Korea without also talking about the 1992 unrest. The station became a critical source of information as chaos spread through Koreatown after the acquittal of the Los Angeles Police Department officers filmed beating Rodney King.

More than 2,000 Korean-owned businesses were damaged or destroyed during the unrest, according to some community estimates cited in the years since. 

Radio Korea executive director Richard Choi gestures at his Los Angeles studios in 1992.

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Nick Ut

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AP Photo

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“Radio Korea played a major role in helping the Korean community rebuild,” Choi said, “and the riots became the turning point that transformed the Korean community into true Korean Americans. Before that, people came here chasing the vague idea of the ‘American Dream.’ People suffered and worked endlessly, but after the riots, they realized that the lives they had been living in America were not truly immigrant lives in the full sense.”

At the time, many Korean immigrants spoke limited English and relied heavily on Korean-language media for information. The radio station became an emergency information network as Koreatown residents felt left without police protection during the unrest.

Choi and other broadcasters remained on air through the night taking calls from neighbors reporting everything unfolding across the city.

Younger staff members leaned on Choi, who had already spent nearly two decades living in L.A. by then. According to station accounts, Choi sometimes stayed on air for more than 20 hours a day during the height of the unrest.

Yong-ho Kim started working in Radio Korea’s advertising department a month after immigrating to the United States in February 1990, two years before the unrest. That time still remains vivid in his memory. 

“My oldest child was only two years old,” Kim said. “I heard helicopters overhead, saw fires everywhere, heard looting and gunshots through the night. I was terrified.” 

He remained hunkered down at the station for several days, which at the time operated out of a building near Alvarado Street and Olympic Boulevard. 

The advertising department was removed from the station’s editorial side, but he said everyone at Radio Korea pitched in during the unrest. He eventually left the station and went into the restaurant business, opening Arado Japanese Restaurant in 1995. 

“Radio Korea was my first real job in America. At the time, I didn’t speak English well, didn’t fully understand the culture, and they still gave me an opportunity,” he said. “That experience shaped my business career afterward. Even now, I feel like Radio Korea runs through my blood. I love that station deeply.” 

Kim admitted he misses the in-person interaction at the station.

“In the past, when I recorded radio ads for my restaurant, I would go directly into the studio,” he said. “Now everything gets sent by phone.”

He added L.A. remains the “emotional center” of Korean American life, even as more Korean families move to Orange County and other suburbs.

“That’s why there’s an attachment to keeping Korean-language media rooted in Koreatown,” he said.

Radio Korea leaves Koreatown

Jamison, the largest commercial office landlord in Koreatown and one of the neighborhood’s most prolific developers, declined to comment on several questions related to the future of the Wilshire building where Radio Korea called home. It’s unclear when the company notified tenants on when they would need to leave or the timeline for the planned residential conversion.

Radio Korea ultimately purchased a building in La Palma, where Kim said expenses were lower at a difficult moment for Korean-language media outlets already dealing with declining advertising revenue and lingering financial struggles following the pandemic. 

The move is a bittersweet moment for the Korean community.

Hyepin Im was a graduate student at the University of Southern California during the unrest in 1992. The destruction in Koreatown and the experience of watching Korean American business owners struggle in its aftermath helped shape her later work in community advocacy. 

Wilshire Park Place once played host to Radio Korea in Koreatown. The building’s owners plan to repurpose the site into housing.

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Brian Feinzimer

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The LA Local

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Ethnic media organizations depend heavily on physical relationships inside the communities they serve, Im said.

“The fact that they were here in 1992 made a difference,” Im said. “I think the lack of their presence here will be a loss to the community.” 

Im, whose nonprofit work with Faith and Community Empowerment has focused for decades on immigrant and underserved communities in LA, argued that L.A. still carries unique weight within Korean communities nationally, even as Korean populations continue growing in Orange County and elsewhere.

“I could recognize that perhaps in Orange County, some of the things that I could see why they may choose there is a lot more Korean leadership in politics,” she said. “And as such, just like the Chinese community moved to the San Gabriel Valley from Chinatown, perhaps there is going to be a shift that is happening.” 

“I think proximity is always important and I would say it’s still what happens in L.A. that impacts the rest of the country, especially the Korean community,” she added. 

For Choi, Koreatown is inseparable from Radio Korea and the station’s role during the unrest, which pushed many Korean immigrants to engage more deeply with American civic and political life.

“No matter how many Koreans move to Orange County,” Choi said, “the symbolic center of the Korean community is still Koreatown.” 

Los Angeles is in the midst of a pizza renaissance. Pizzaiolos across the city are slicing up unique takes on pies that pull from multiple influences — local, global, and everything in between, just like Los Angeles itself.

It's like that playlist you make for your friends — a little jazz, rock, hip-hop, country and pop. That's L.A.-style pizza. Because the region isn't beholden to any specific pizza standards, chefs can use all the best parts of what makes a great pie.

Which means I’m fully prepared to say that L.A. is currently making pizza better than any other city across the globe. Fighting talk, I know, but this is a hill I'm willing to die on.

With soccer fans from around the world descending on L.A. this summer, as well as passionate locals cheering on their favorite squad, there's a chance that many will work up an appetite. From the Eastside to Long Beach, the city is ready with inventive takes on crust and toppings, served up fresh to satisfy all your melty, cheesy cravings.

Westwood

Danny Boy's Famous Original

A spread of slices at Danny Boy's Famous Original in Westwood, including pepperoni, white with mushrooms, sausage, and cheese.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Chef Daniel Holzman has been told he's doing it wrong. His New York-style pizza at Danny Boy's Famous Original — with locations in DTLA, Westwood, and Woodland Hills — relies on a four- to five-day fermentation, well beyond what's customary for the style. But the proof is in the slice: buttery, flaky, soft and chewy, with a crust that develops a complex structure most pizza makers never bother to chase. Don't sleep on the sausage and mozzarella slice, made with freshly ground in-house meat, you can taste with every bite.

Silver Lake / Los Feliz

Hot Tongue Pizza

The best of both worlds : a cheese slice with arrabbiata sauce and a vegan slice made with spicy crushed tomatoes, cashew mozzarella, red pepper, white onion, almond parmesan and fresh basil.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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You'll find the quasi-vegan pizzeria called Hot Tongue Pizza in Silver Lake. I use the term quasi because they started as vegan only and then added meat options later. Each slice costs around $6, but Hot Tongue also offers a great combo lunch option: two slices and a canned soda for $10.

If you're an omnivore like yours truly, you can go both ways. Get one vegan slice, such as their Arrabbiata with cashew mozzarella, spicy tomato sauce, roasted red peppers, white onion, basil and almond parmesan. It's saucy, sweet, and filled with fresh flavors. Then get their cheese slice, with grated parmesan cheese and mozzarella. The vast, sizable slices hit the spot with their chewy, sweet crust. If you're dining in, douse your pizza slices with Zab's Hot Sauce for a bit more sweet heat.

LaSorted's

A slice of pepperoni pizza amongst slices of burrata and cheese and Adriana from La Sorted's Pizza.

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Brian Feinzimer

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LAist

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Tommy Brockert was an L.A. event photographer when his then-girlfriend, now wife, gave him an Ooni pizza oven. That led him to enroll in a one-day pizza-making class, where he was hooked and began stumbling down the rabbit hole of crafting his own naturally leavened sourdough pizza crusts. When his income dried up at the start of the pandemic, he had the crazy idea of selling his homemade pizzas off the front porch of his home in Echo Park. It was so successful that he now runs his own pizza shop, LaSorted's, in Silver Lake, just down the road from where he used to sell his porch pizzas — with a second sit-down location in Chinatown.

A good place to start is the Mamba, prepared as a regular cheese slice or with pepperoni. Its name comes from the late Laker great Kobe Bryant, who once said he ate a pepperoni pizza before scoring 81 points in a single game in 2006. The Upside Down Mamba is perhaps the most texturally interesting pie on the menu — their cheese pizza flipped, with a three-cheese blend serving as its base, then topped thoroughly with tomato sauce, sprinkled with flaky sea salt, and Sicilian oregano. Think about how a producer takes a snippet of a song and creates a new song based on it. Brockert accomplishes something similar with his pizza — it's both specifically Los Angeles and distinctly his own.

Old Gold Tomato Pies

A tray of slices at Old Gold Tomato Pies in Los Feliz, including the Crab Rangoon slice, the Godson with burrata, and the Moral High Ground vegan option.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Old Gold Tomato Pies feels like the older punk sibling who got really into the Grateful Dead — adorned with the kind of hippie-meets-hardcore energy that jives perfectly with its Los Feliz surroundings. The classic slice shop vibe is immediately welcoming, and the menu rewards the adventurous. The Crab Rangoon slice is the one to try. Premium lump crab from Indonesia — no imitation stuff here — tastes fresh and pairs well with a cream cheese topping for a rich dairy element. The party doesn't stop there: sweet chili sauce mingles with crispy wonton skins and fresh scallions in a combination that might sound like too much. But the Sicilian crust — light and airy on the inside, crispy on the outside — ties it all together and makes any apprehension about your choice go right out the window.

Mid-City 

Apollonia's Pizza

Some of the best pizza you can find in L.A., and it's sold by the slice at Apollonia's Pizzeria on Wilshire Boulevard.

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Brian Feinzimer

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LAist

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Justin De Leon, owner and head pizza maker at Apollonia's Pizza, grew up on pizza. His first job was working at a pizza restaurant when he was 13. The modest menu might make you wonder if this is really some of the best pizza in Los Angeles. But you'll quickly understand why after your first bite — or encountering the long lines outside his standing-room-only, cash-only pizzeria off Wilshire Boulevard.

De Leon has been a lifelong student who has broken down pizza into its fundamental elements. If you ask what defines his pizza craft, he'll say his job is to "simplify it." Start with a traditional slice of De Leon's cheese pie. "I was looking for something thin, light, and crispy," De Leon said. Well, he found it. Next, try the square slice — notice the crispy, frico cheese crust that rises along the sides, giving it a 3-D effect. De Leon describes L.A.-style pizza as a mixture of various styles. In his own words, "To me, L.A. pizza is a mix of everything." Now with a second location on Crenshaw.

Northeast LA

Bub and Grandma's Pizza

Bub and Grandma’s Pizza in Northeast Los Angeles offers East Coast–style slices on sourdough crust with fresh toppings.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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The newest kid on the block on York Boulevard in Highland Park, Bub and Grandma's offers East Coast-style pizza on a sourdough crust that's thin, but don't let that fool you — it's airy and chewy with light char marks throughout. The pepperoni slice is the one to get, with perfectly cupped edges that create a level of synergy with the crust's char you won't soon forget. The meatball onion slice is a close second, with perfectly seasoned meat working harmoniously with caramelized white onions. Does this pizza have any business being this good? Either way, we're all better for it.

Wallflour Pizza

The $10 lunch special at Wallflour Pizza in Eagle Rock comes with a drink and and house salad.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Brandon and Carolina Conaway started selling pizzas out of their backyard in Highland Park during the pandemic under the name Quarantine Pizza Co., drawing from their diverse backgrounds — Brandon is Asian and white, Carolina is Latina — to create inventive, sourdough-forward pies that developed a cult following on the pop-up circuit. Now brick-and-mortar for about a year on Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock, Wallflour is the next chapter. The naturally leavened, Neapolitan-inspired pies are the main event, but don't overlook the $10 lunch special — available daily from noon to 4 p.m. — which includes a focaccia square slice pepperoni and cheese options, a side of house salad, and a soda or sparkling water. And keep an eye on their seasonal specials, check their Instagram for before you go.

Secret Pizza

What happens when an East Coast transplant starts making pizza on the Eastside of L.A.? You get Secret Pizza, Sean Lango's New Jersey-style pizza, with a variety of options available daily.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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New Jersey-style pizza might be a product of the Garden State, but it's one of my favorite East Coast-style pies, New York or otherwise. Secret Pizza was founded by Sean Lango, who began cooking pizza out of his Hollywood apartment before opening his pizzeria in the foothills of Montecito Heights. He calls his pizza New Jersey-style because he's from there and wanted to protect himself from the wrath of purist New Yorkers, who weren't happy with outsiders laying claim to their turf. What makes his pizza so memorable? Its simplicity. The thin crust gives way to a stellar crispy underside, providing an excellent texture, topped off by a tangy sauce. Sure, you could add different toppings, but Lango's pie — crushed tomatoes, a small amount of mozzarella, topped with aged pecorino — is perfect as it is. Sometimes, when you rely on a good, uncomplicated formula, good things happen.

DTLA

Pizzeria Bianco

The red sauce and green sauce slices at Pizzeria Bianco are both bursting with flavor and textures.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Chris Bianco's temple of pizza cookery, Pizzeria Bianco at The Row near downtown is always worth seeking out. Plus, you can't beat free two-hour parking. Grab either their red or green slice: the red slice showcases their all-killer, no-filler approach with only house cheese blend and tomato sauce. The green contains caciocavallo, a soft Italian cheese, parmesan, and spinach cream sauce. Both slices come in a signature pizza crust that's well-cooked with a tight pull on each bite.

Long Beach

Milana's New York Pizzeria

The Sheepshead Bay slice from Long Beach's Milana's always hits.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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I could not make a pizza list without mentioning one of my favorites in my hometown of Long Beach, Milana's The New York-style pie joint specializes in a series of East Coast-style pies, but the standout for me is the Sheepshead Bay, made with house-made meatballs topped with pillow-soft dollops of ricotta and sprinkled with bits of basil. This exceptionally piled slice features a great combination of flavors — the soft creaminess of the cheese, with just a hint of sharpness that perfectly cuts through the fattiness of the sliced meatballs, and both soft and crispy elements that defy categorization and drive the whole thing home.

Despite the state’s redistricting efforts, California’s District 40 will likely be represented by a Republican congressperson. As of Thursday morning, Ken Calvert is about 15 percentage points ahead of Young Kim and both appear to make the November ballot in the race to represent the newly redrawn region.

Last year, California voters allowed the state to use new congressional maps for this year’s elections in response to the congressional redistricting in Texas powered by Republicans. Kim represented the old version of District 40.

California’s 40th District was originally made up mostly of Orange County cities. In the new maps, the district covers more communities in the Inland Empire, including Murrieta, Lake Elsinore and Menifee.

What do the early results say about the region?

Mike Moodian, a Chapman University lecturer and public policy analyst, said District 40 was always an uphill battle for Democrats because of registration numbers.

“The powers that be that drew those lines basically figured that … they would concede that more or less to a Republican, so that they could allow for comfortable margins. They could allow Democrats to pick up some seats elsewhere in the state,” Moodian told the LAist.

Moodian said Calvert’s significant lead ahead of Kim could be because more than half the District is Calvert’s old district.

The 40th was redrawn as a “Republican voter sink,” Christian Grose, USC professor of political science, told the LAist.

“I think it's the only Republican district remaining in all Southern California,” Grose said. “So, in some ways, it's not that surprising that two long-term impressive incumbents are fighting each other in the general.”

The person who comes in first in the primaries typically advances, but not always, Grose added.

“Kim will presumably try to get some of the Democratic and independent voters who didn't vote for either one of them,” Grose said. She might be better positioned for that.”

Is this a loss for Democrats?

Not quite, Moodian said. The two Republicans will now have to spend a significant amount of money to beat each other in November, he added.

“Obviously, local Democrats and Democrats in District 40 are certainly not excited about the fact that two Republicans have advanced, but to me this is what the statewide Democrats had in mind when they redrew the lines,” Moodian said. “This allows them to attempt to pick up more seats, and at the same time basically eliminate one Republican congressmember by having these two face off against each other.”

What do the candidates say?

In a statement, Calvert said Tuesday night’s early results show "that voters want an effective and consistent conservative who has been with President Trump from Day One.”

Chris Pack, spokesperson for Young Kim, said in a statement, “Despite being outspent 10 to 1, we are confident that Congresswoman Kim will be advancing to the November election and that she’ll put an end to Ken Calvert’s 30-plus years of failing to deliver for the people of Southern California."

What’s next?

The two top candidates will likely face off in the November election. It could take days for results to finalize in California. Keep up to date with the Primary Election results here.