Is it Safe? 2008 Final

"Is it safe?"

Despite a souring economy, fewer homicides were committed in Los Angeles in 2008, continuing the city's persistent and encouraging trend. The Daily News reported 380 homicides as of December 30th, fewer even than last year's nether numbers (396). The fewest, in fact, since 1969, when some guy named Manson inspired mayhem. Worth noting, the population of Los Angeles in 1969 was 2,292,400. The population today is an estimated 3,844,829.

Murder is but a single marker, admittedly--though it is the crime most feared. Many of the older neighborhoods North and West of downtown have changed dramatically since the violent apogee of the early 1990's. Those neighborhoods have become more diverse, both ethnically and socio-economically; historic districts have been christened; passenger rail criss-crosses the Arroyo, accompanies Wilshire and Vermont boulevards and will soon do so along Exposition; the residential population downtown has quadrupled linked with a dramatic service transformation; and, new school construction has re-purposed over a thousand acres.

Things change always, and some of those districts once over-looked and dismissed, sullied by throw away lines, accusations of lawlessness and iniquity, deserve re-appraisal.

Is it safe? Increasingly, the answer in 2008 was, 'yes'.