Board of Directors & Staff

Charlie is a published author and historic preservation activist who has successfully nominated more than 180 historic buildings as City of Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments, as well as designated historic buildings for the County of Ventura and in the cities of Glendale, Monrovia, Ojai and Sierra Madre. A native Angeleno, Charlie, together with other historical preservation advocates, founded the Highland Park Heritage Trust in 1982 to halt the demolition of pristine Craftsman and Mission Revival homes in favor of low-quality, high-density apartment structures. The Heritage Trust historic survey assessed hundreds of properties to create the Highland Park Historic Preservation Overlay Zone (Highland Park-Garvanza HPOZ), the largest HPOZ in the city of Los Angeles. 

Charlie has served three times as president of the Heritage Trust, and served for 25 years on the Highland Park-Garvanza HPOZ board. He wrote and published two books, Highland Park (2008) and Garvanza (2010), both published by Arcadia Press. He is currently working on a comprehensive book highlighting a history of each of the Los Angeles City Historic Cultural Monuments.

JJ is a native of North Carolina who relocated to Los Angeles in 1998 and served as the Admissions Director for the American Film Institute and the Southern California Institute of Architecture. He currently works for an association management firm located in West LA. JJ has worked with many small Los Angeles theaters, as a stage manager, writer and actor. He is the creator of Thorne Street Parlour, a play-reading salon, held in his historic home that he and his husband, Eric Magallon, purchased in 2010 and restored in 2014.

Eric

Anne Marie has served as President of the HPHT several times and has been in charge of membership for over a decade. A native Californian, born in Pasadena, she has worked with preservation issues for over 35 years, taking charge of several of the early Highland Park Heritage Trust walking tours. She and her husband, Charlie Fisher, have lived in the same historic Highland Park house since 1982.

As a fourth-generation Angeleno and a 20-year resident of Highland Park, Mark Forbes is thrilled to join the board of the Highland Park Heritage Trust. Mark originally moved to Los Angeles from Northern California to attend UCLA, where he received a B.A. in Psychology. After graduating, he began a long and successful career in the Internet industry as a content producer and project manager, working with the largest media companies, international brands, and high-end real estate developments.

With a desire to make a bigger difference in his community, Mark returned to college and has transitioned into a career in sustainability. He is now an accredited TRUE Advisor in zero waste, a certified Sustainability Technician, and has expertise in a number of sustainability issues, including climate change and conservation. He is currently a stakeholder on the Historical Highland Park Neighborhood Council Environmental Committee, a member of the Neighborhood Council Sustainability Alliance, and has become involved in a number of local environmental issues.

With a deep passion for preserving the environment, as well as local history, architecture, and culture, Mark is excited to use his skills as the latest editor-in-chief of Our Cornerstone. In his spare time, Mark enjoys gardening, photography, traveling, music, and writing.

Maggie is a lifelong resident of Glassell Park. She has a track record of activism that includes service on the Glassell Park Neighborhood Council for 11 years, and as one of its founders, she was appointed by Mayor Garcetti to serve on the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (D.O.N.E.) Commissioner Darett-Quiroz. She also served the Glassell Park Improvement Association as president for two years. She led her community’s fight to save its swimming pool from closing down and worked closely with Rec and Parks management, including City Councilmembers and the Mayor to put the pool expenses back into the Mayor’s budget.

Under her leadership, the funding was restored and the pool remains open. Maggie also played a key role in establishing both the Glassell Park Community Garden at 3304 Drew St., once the epicenter of drug and gang activity in the community that now teaches at-risk children how to grow food, and the Glassell Park backpack drive that collects new backpacks and school supplies for children in need. The garden has renewed the confidence of neighbors and has brought the small community closer through garden meetings, garden clean ups, potlucks and community harvesting. Among other roles, Maggie is the Founder of the Glassell Park Tree Lighting Event, which she has been running for the last 14 years. She is also a strong advocate for the Glassell Park Seniors, hosting numerous events for the Seniors since 2015.

Tina brings a wealth of experience to the HPHT Board. She first joined HPHT in 1997 when she and her husband Charles led a “Treasures of Garvanza Tour” to highlight the neighborhood’s unique historic resources, ultimately leading to its inclusion in the Highland Park/Garvanza HPOZ 12 years later. While serving simultaneously as HPHT board member and Co-Chair of the Garvanza Improvement Association (GIA), and with the help of local residents and historian Charlie Fisher, Tina completed a decade-long effort of getting Garvanza recorded as part of the Highland Park-Garvanza HPOZ with the City of Los Angeles. 

Tina has received numerous awards and recognition for her advocacies. She was a recipient of two HPHT awards: one for the exterior restoration of an 1886 home with ties to the U.S. Suffragist movement that she led as Co-Chair of the GIA, and one for the sensitive second-story addition to her own home that ended up exceeding historic guidelines. She won a local competition with a realtor to launch the “Paint the Town” effort where they successfully located and painted a neighborhood home in dire need of exterior restoration for a fixed-income resident. The L.A. Conservancy and the California Preservation Foundation (CPF) also granted her awards for preserving two historic homes while appropriately and accurately following the State of California’s model for adding infill housing within a historic neighborhood, the only grassroots community effort awarded that year amongst top architectural firm awardees for Union Station restoration and Google’s LA HQ adaptive reuse of the Hughes Hangar in Playa del Rey. 

In 2019, the LA Conservancy recognized her preservation of the 405 North Avenue 66 property while serving as co-chair of the GIA, stating, “This visionary project serves as a creative example of how we can balance the need for adding density to L.A.’s neighborhoods while still respecting a neighborhood’s historic character.” A fine arts graduate of Otis Art Institute/Parsons School of Design of the New School for Social Research Los Angeles Campus, she moved to California in 1977 while serving in the Navy as one of its first female volunteers post-WWII. She and her husband still own their home in Garvanza and now reside in San Miguel, CA, a small historic mission town.

Stephanie is a retired combat veteran, a widow, and most importantly, a mother to two young boys. She was born and raised in Highland Park, spending her formative years in this community before shipping off to serve in the U.S. military. She earned her BA in Management in order to learn how to become a better leader. Her passions include serving her community, spending time with her family, and learning new skills. She has done a great deal to contribute to the Heritage Trust through her personal lived experiences and to learn more about the community that multiple generations of Maynettos have called home.

You may know her as the producer of several of the Trust’s Conservation Awards or the creator of its Cypress Park Walking Tours. As an active member of the NELA community, she’s been exploring LA’s hyper-local histories since the 1990s when she produced and directed an Emmy-nominated documentary on Ocean Park, California. A native Angeleno, Anthea grew up on the Westside and still serves on the board of a historical society there. But she lives here now, and loves her neighborhood in Cypress Park and its complicated history. Her goal is to be a bridge between our community and the other Arroyo Seco neighborhoods as we join together to give our stories past and present voice.

John is a resident of Highland Park, living in NELA for 51 years and adjacent to Poppy Peak in HLP for the last 23 years. Professionally, he has been a proud Union Member and former Shop Stewart for the last 33 years in the Retail Drug Field. He is currently active to Save Poppy Peak, giving mutual aid to Save Paradise Hill Create Sal Castro Park, and a current member of the Historic Highland Park Neighborhood Council.

John joined HPHT to help preserve our deep and unique architectural, historical and cultural heritage. His love for history and its answers for our current challenges comes from the wonderful experience of studying with Mr. Sal Castro in Sycamore Park and the local library. Mr. Castro always explained that in a humanist study of history, we have all the answers for our current conditions. The story of the common person is our story, and to preserve the common person’s story, we must preserve and tell these stories to our community. Preservation of our architectural heritage, preservation of our common open spaces, and our unique cultural history will only preserve and enhance our common sense and purpose of living in Highland Park.