With the City’s Housing Prices Out of Control, South L.A. Could Be the Next Big Thing

Longtime Residents Need to Stay One Step Ahead of Developers to Benefit From the Area’s Rise

The 1992 riots are what first drew me to work in South Los Angeles. I was a civically minded college kid back then, with an attraction to social and economic justice issues. At that time, South L.A. was brimming with newly formed organizations aimed at ameliorating the tensions behind that year’s explosion of civil unrest sparked by the acquittal of officers in the Rodney King beating.

My first job down here was as a community organizer, working with local residents to build their skills to demand improvements to their neighborhoods. …