There’s More Healthy Food in South L.A. Than You Think

And There’d Be Even More, If Elected Officials Supported Local Initiatives Instead of Trying to Attract Big Supermarkets

I moved to South Central Los Angeles almost 20 years ago with a 9-year-old and a baby, and, as I went about raising my two children, I was immediately struck by the scarcity of stores selling affordable, healthy food.

Fortunately, I had an alternative. I was able to buy produce in the neighborhood from a truck that stopped by once or twice a week and sold papayas, mangos, melons, cucumbers, coconuts, corn, and whatever else was in season in Mexico (where I understood the produce to be coming from). It was …

By Neelam Sharma | July 7, 2016

In South L.A., a More Approachable Police Force Has Led to a Safer Community

An LAPD Commander Returned to the Area Where He Was Born to Help Officers Get to Know the Neighbors

By Phillip Tingirides | July 7, 2016

Here’s one big lesson from the progress we’ve seen in South Los Angeles: effective policing requires building deep relationships and real personal connections with the people whom you’re charged with …

South L.A. Is a Story of Both Segregation and Desegregation

Homeownership in the Area Has Been Gaining Since the 1990s, Even as Prosperous Residents Move Out

By Eugene Turner and James P. Allen | July 7, 2016

The first big change in South Los Angeles over the last half-century has been the shift of concentrated black communities westward into newer and better housing. The second big change …

Teaching South L.A.’s Kids to Believe That They Are Scholars, Leaders, and Good Citizens

The Principal of Dolores Huerta Elementary Uses Her Own Struggles With Adversity to Inspire Her Students

By Susana Ansley-Gutierrez | July 7, 2016

Four years ago, when I was asked to be the summer principal at Florence Griffith Joyner Elementary in Watts, I was nervous about working in South Los Angeles.

I grew …

They Tried to Arrest Me for Planting Carrots

My South L.A. Neighborhood Didn’t Have Decent Fruits and Vegetables. So I Planted My Own.

by Ron Finley | February 10, 2015

In 2003, long before a warrant was issued for my arrest for the crime of planting vegetables, I remember going to a store in South Central L.A. and picking up …

Booze Deliveries and Pistol Whippings at 70 Cents an Hour

From 1944 to 1946 I Worked at a South Los Angeles Liquor Store. It Was No Place for a Kid, but I Saw a Lot.

By Manuel H. Rodriguez | December 19, 2013

A & J Liquor, on Vernon Avenue a few doors east of Wall Street in central Los Angeles, was where Mother purchased Father’s liquor. Ever on alert for business establishments …

Food Studies Is Not as Frivolous as You Might Think

A Growing Academic Field Seeks to Understand Labor Conditions and Trade Agreements That Bring Us Our Daily Bread

The South Los Angeles Future Will Be Shared

In a Stronghold of African Americans and Immigrant Integration, New Identities Emerge Rooted in a Sense of Place as Much as Race

South L.A. Doesn’t Need Saving

Instead, the Area Could Be a Savior to a California That’s Pushing out Its Working Class

How South L.A.’s Santee Education Complex’s Graduation Rate Jumped Nearly 60 Percent in 11 Years

Two Assistant Principals Learned Their High School Didn’t Need a Special Status to Be Academically Rigorous and Locally Respected

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