Non-a?tists committed to searching for truths would point out that there exist New World cycads such as*

https://gggp.org/plants/dioon-spinulosum/

Easier to let "California-washing Occidentalism" die a natural death than to find a purely new world mascot for LA, because that sounds like a wicked biotech+marketing problem to me

*Ironic that this page --- which has appropriated Irish-American branding --- comes from (more commercial) NorCal?