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The porn area is mostly in Chatsworth which is the far end of the west valley. If you go on any other site, everyone is complaining about some part or parts of their state/city. Everyone. There is no perfect mecca anywhere. There is always going to be areas that are lousy and run down which unfortunetly the less fortunate and gangs have to co-mingle. People that have no idea how expensive it is to buy here complain about their own prices being very expensive in their states and to us it would be a deal!
My husband and I do not make a great living, in fact barely getting by but we live in a beautiful community that is as safe as you can get with great schools, no graffiti,very little smog,clean with several parks and hiking trails, Moms clubs, Newcomer clubs, any club you could want, one of the best high schools in the country voted by Newsweek Magazine, etc, etc. It is about 20 minutes to the 405 and the 101 fwy., 15 minutes to Malibu, 45 minutes to Santa Barbara, one hour to skiing. It's those that are too lazy to get out of their "hell hole" or will never make the money to get out so they are amazingly bitter and everything is negative. It is not all black and white living in So. Cal. I hope people from other areas and states do much more than look to this site as their determining factor on moving here or not. That would be very foolish. You have no idea what kind of life the people that respond to your questions have led or what personal issues they may have that taint their answers to the uninformed about the greater Los Angeles area.
Talk to school prinicipals, local churches and synagoges, read local crime reports and real estate sections of local papers. Just get a well-rounded view of where you are interested in moving to....not just this site.
Puffle, although the last paragraph of your post was wondrously insightful, and carried wisdom that should be permanently posted in huge golden letters at the beginning of this and every forum, one would have to take exception to its previous statement:
Quote:
Originally Posted by puffle
There is always going to be areas that are lousy and run down which unfortunetly the less fortunate and gangs have to co-mingle... It's those that are too lazy to get out of their "hell hole" or will never make the money to get out so they are amazingly bitter
I think the point that many of us make is that an inordinately huge amount of middle class areas have osmosed into exactly what you characterize as the ganglands of the unfortunate. This is singular to L.A. ("bad areas" are more clearly defined in most other urban centers) and perhaps baffling to relocators here, insofar as Los Angeles is so very spread out, and that there could be so many ganglands at all. This is also a recent phenomenon within the last 25 years, and probably is the increasing trend forever.
A consensus also exists here, even as posters dispute the causes, is that L.A. remains not a good destination for those with middle class incomes, particularly families. My husband is an elementary school teacher, and he would never in a million years have been able to afford home ownership here in L.A. He, even after rising in the pitiful pay ranks afforded teachers, and every other teacher we've ever met, must combine with another income to put a roof over his head. Again, not exactly universal throughout the U.S.A.
Lastly, to blame your fellow Americans for not making enough money to leave is perchance a tad... I don't know, uncompassionate? Teachers, and all other middle class workers are not lazy. It's the city that's gotten beyond the realm of the middle classes to afford in a relatively safe place. Everyone I know who's not rich is working and planning their future move away from here, self included. Even middle class people I know who've managed a small sideways move to Ventura County endlessly rhapsodize about leaving L.A. myriad problematic obstacles behind.
Puffle, although the last paragraph of your post was wondrously insightful, and carried wisdom that should be permanently posted in huge golden letters at the beginning of this and every forum, one would have to take exception to its previous statement:
I think the point that many of us make is that an inordinately huge amount of middle class areas have osmosed into exactly what you characterize as the ganglands of the unfortunate. This is singular to L.A. ("bad areas" are more clearly defined in most other urban centers) and perhaps baffling to relocators here, insofar as Los Angeles is so very spread out, and that there could be so many ganglands at all. This is also a recent phenomenon within the last 25 years, and probably is the increasing trend forever.
A consensus also exists here, even as posters dispute the causes, is that L.A. remains not a good destination for those with middle class incomes, particularly families. My husband is an elementary school teacher, and he would never in a million years have been able to afford home ownership here in L.A. He, even after rising in the pitiful pay ranks afforded teachers, and every other teacher we've ever met, must combine with another income to put a roof over his head. Again, not exactly universal throughout the U.S.A.
Lastly, to blame your fellow Americans for not making enough money to leave is perchance a tad... I don't know, uncompassionate? Teachers, and all other middle class workers are not lazy. It's the city that's gotten beyond the realm of the middle classes to afford in a relatively safe place. Everyone I know who's not rich is working and planning their future move away from here, self included. Even middle class people I know who've managed a small sideways move to Ventura County endlessly rhapsodize about leaving L.A. myriad problematic obstacles behind.
I would never suggest that all of anything is *****. If you read the beginning of my post, my husband and I are struggling to make ends meet being self-employed and depending on the month, middle, lower or upper class. My point was that in every state there are people less than satisfied with their living conditions, some that can make more of an effort to improve their life and move if they choose and those that just complain and do nothing to cause change either in their city or personal situation. I wonder how many of the posters that complain about L.A. are pro-active in trying to make a change in what they find intolerable by becoming more political, voting,petitioning, any kind of positive movement to create change? What is the saying, "If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem." I have two teachers in my family and live where they choose to live and work where they have to work and are very happy people. Some are never happy to begin with.
A consensus also exists here, even as posters dispute the causes, is that L.A. remains not a good destination for those with middle class incomes, particularly families. My husband is an elementary school teacher, and he would never in a million years have been able to afford home ownership here in L.A. He, even after rising in the pitiful pay ranks afforded teachers, and every other teacher we've ever met, must combine with another income to put a roof over his head. Again, not exactly universal throughout the U.S.A.
Lastly, to blame your fellow Americans for not making enough money to leave is perchance a tad... I don't know, uncompassionate? Teachers, and all other middle class workers are not lazy. It's the city that's gotten beyond the realm of the middle classes to afford in a relatively safe place. Everyone I know who's not rich is working and planning their future move away from here, self included. Even middle class people I know who've managed a small sideways move to Ventura County endlessly rhapsodize about leaving L.A. myriad problematic obstacles behind.
So THAT's why you have consistently made excuses for the LAUSD (which does more to bring LA down than any other government body). I understand now. The only people in LA who deny this are SOME people who work for the LAUSD (not all)
I'm not exactly planning my future away from here YET, but the way that prices are continuing to skyrocket I may have to at some point in the future.
However, "fastfilm", the problems of L.A. are not so unique as you think they are. They do not differ in kind from those of the US as a whole - only in intensity.
So THAT's why you have consistently made excuses for the LAUSD (which does more to bring LA down than any other government body). I understand now. The only people in LA who deny this are SOME people who work for the LAUSD (not all)
I'm not exactly planning my future away from here YET, but the way that prices are continuing to skyrocket I may have to at some point in the future.
However, "fastfilm", the problems of L.A. are not so unique as you think they are. They do not differ in kind from those of the US as a whole - only in intensity.
I'm well aware that Fastfilm can answer for herself, but I am wondering why you automatically assume that her husband works for LAUDSD? I'm not saying he doesn't, but there are many private schools in L.A., plus various municipalities (Burbank, Glendale, San Fernando, etc.) that have their own school districts.
I'm well aware that Fastfilm can answer for herself, but I am wondering why you automatically assume that her husband works for LAUDSD? I'm not saying he doesn't, but there are many private schools in L.A., plus various municipalities (Burbank, Glendale, San Fernando, etc.) that have their own school districts.
Because Fastfilm has tried to shift the blame away from the LAUSD in previous discussions of LA's problems.
And as I live in a municipality with its own school district, I know very well about how most of LA County is non-LAUSD.
I just wanted to add that I had lived in the Valley since I was five for a total of 33 years and had a totally different outlook than most of the negativity you read about and did not grow up in a rich area but Van Nuys. My brother went to Van Nuys High and I graduated from Grant, quite awhile ago. My parents live in the same house I grew up in as do most of the parents on their block. My mother is 83 and still goes grocery shopping after 10 p.m. and never has had anything happen to her. Oh, some of the kids on our block did break into our house in the sixties, regular white kids. So, you can keep singing a sad song or change your tune. You are in control of your life....stop acting like victims.
This seems like as good a place as any to list one what anyone can do in the San Fernando Valley to improve his or her area. These are the most pertinent numbers I've gleaned in our Neighborhood Watch:
(which I hand out regularly to all around me along with Police Dept. newsletters citing recent crime trends):
L.A.P.D. non-emergencies: 877 275 5273
Van Nuys police dept: 818 758 8343
Abandoned cars: 900 222 6366
Parking Enforcement: 818 752 5100
Building & Safety code enforcement: 888 524 2845
Bulky item pick up: 773 2489
To find any L.A. city government dept. 24 hours a day, call 311, just these three digits. The city has acknowledged that it's practically impossible for the average citizen to find the right department, so the 311 operators will do it for you, based upon your question or complaint.
(I handle graffiti removal via sandblasters [needed for sidewalks] with a private service that contracts with Community Service for parolees. There's just too much of it, and I don't want to overburden them listing their number. The city of L.A., call 311, will also remove graffiti but unless it's an obscenity it takes too long. Graffiti left that long will "inspire" tons of new vandalism.)
My neighborhood was very much like the one puffle describes as her mother's area (an assumption, but I think you mean a modest neighborhood as opposed to a blighted one), but it changed practically overnight after the '94 earthquake (which killed 2 of my friends across the street.) We lost all of our professionals who scedaddled as fast as they could to any job relocation, and the foreclosures (due to damages even FEMA help couldn't overcome) went to people with grants, who then rented out to many unsavory people. Voila, blight and crime in a heretofore nice, modest neighborhood in the Valley.
When this occurred along with the demographic changing, I preferred to complain and do something as opposed to just complain. Therefore when we learned that an elderly woman one year younger than Puffle's mother had been raped in her house a block away this last New Year's Eve, I distributed the police flyers with the suspect's description on it in case he returns.
When lovely, well-kept Craftsman houses, similar to the kind that makes Pasadena desirable, were being levelled to build same size, featureless boxes, we instigated a Historic Overlay Preservation Zone, so that the neighborhood people bought into could remain visible as such, and to discourage highest density in a single-family house neighborhood. This took seven years, and it's the Valley's first.
When an absentee landlord tried to squeeze by the law and build massive "storage" connected to a planned guest house in order to maximize profits on a giant rental, we appealed and won: he's allowed to do what everyone else with his size property can do, which is build a granny flat as rental, not a gigantic (bigger than the house in front) de facto duplex in an area that doesn't allow same.
The Valley has so many areas that vary in crime versus safety, not just economic strata. Puffle's mother lives in one, I live in another. Sometimes it's just a matter of being aware. I once was approached by our local police who informed that, unbeknownst to me, our next door neighbors' foreign national relatives were running a car theft ring, and had I seen him? I had no idea, since the neighbors themselves were a nice, normal, foreign-born family (but apparently with nasty relatives that they let stay there.) Another elderly couple on our block was savagely beaten by robbing intruders last year. I want to help people right here find the means to keep themselves safer with my neighborhood activist stuff, which overall will help us until we can flee upon husband's LAUSD retirement. It's called making the best of a bad situation.
I agree..that is all any and all of us should do. I applaude your activism and social consciousness. I hope your husband's retirement comes as soon as possible. I am sure if you could have you would have moved elsewhere that was cleaner and safer even if you had to rent instead of own and that your husband would have transferred to another LAUSD school. That's what I would have done and did for our 13 year old son. Good luck to you and just remember the Monty Python song from The Meaning of Life and sing it when living here gets you down, which hopefully isn't on a daily basis, for you and your husband's sake. It's hard enough to be a long term teacher.
Last edited by puffle; 02-01-2007 at 10:01 AM..
Reason: spelling
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The porn area is mostly in Chatsworth which is the far end of the west valley. If you go on any other site, everyone is complaining about some part or parts of their state/city. Everyone. There is no perfect mecca anywhere. There is always going to be areas that are lousy and run down which unfortunetly the less fortunate and gangs have to co-mingle. People that have no idea how expensive it is to buy here complain about their own prices being very expensive in their states and to us it would be a deal! 
