Jordan Downs Housing Project

Jordan Downs housing project residents, elected officials and police will meet today to discuss how to curb the escalating tensions in and around South Los Angeles housing projects between residents and police. The 3 p.m. meeting will be at the Jordan Downs Community Center at 2101 E. 101st St., authorities said. The most recent incident occurred Wednesday, soon after four people were shot in a drive-by attack near 103rd Street and Lou Dillon Avenue.

Los Angeles police Thursday identified a 56-year-old grandmother who was killed by officers in Watts after she allegedly tried to shoot relatives and failed to drop her weapon. Brenda Williams was struck by rounds fired by three Los Angeles Police Department officers Wednesday night near the Jordan Downs housing project. She was one of three people in officer-involved shootings — two of them deadly — in less than 24 hours. Neighbors said Williams recently moved into the neighborhood in the 10000 block of Anzac Avenue.

The gymnasium at the Jordan Downs housing project in Watts will be expanded and renovated this year with $300,000 in voter-approved recreation funds, authorities said. Work on the 40-year-old gym, which serves more than 1,000 youngsters, could start by summer, said Don Smith, executive director of the Los Angeles Housing Authority. Some of the renovation work will be done by public housing residents who work for the authority's Kumbaya Construction Co., Smith said.

About 40 tenants at the Jordan Downs public housing project gathered Saturday to hear about city plans that could dramatically change their lives -- a proposal to tear down the tarnished Watts complex and replace it with a modern "urban village" with apartments, stores and restaurants. Residents met at the Jordan Downs recreation center to hear about the ambitious, $1-billion proposal that could include as many as 2,100 units, with both low-income and market-rate housing.

Alberta King finally got the call she was waiting for after nearly 13 years at the Jordan Downs housing project. King, 39, was among the first residents of the housing development to learn that it will undergo a massive modernization project. "I'm so happy, you can't imagine how happy I am," King said. "We don't have showers, and the roaches are so bad here." The modernization plan will involve moving 40 families out of two buildings in the housing project.

As word spread that a Latino toddler had become the fifth victim of an arson blaze at the Jordan Downs housing project in Watts, some Latino residents demanded Monday that segregated buildings be set aside for them within the predominantly African-American complex. Standing in front of the charred apartment, Alma Ortega acknowledged that such a move might exacerbate racial tensions between her and her black neighbors.

As the federal government began spending $35 million to refurbish the huge Jordan Downs housing project in Watts, a nagging question began to trouble longtime residents, people like Martha Clark: Why, she asked, was Los Angeles' city housing authority paying so much money to outside contractors to modernize the 700 units when there were so many able-bodied people inside the project looking for work?

Los Angeles officials are embarking on a $1-billion plan to tear down the notorious Jordan Downs housing project and turn it into a "new urban village" -- an effort aimed at transforming the Watts neighborhood that would be one of the city's largest public works projects. The city wants to replace the project's 700 dilapidated units, which were built more than half a century ago, with taller "mixed-use" buildings that would house not just low-income residents but also those paying market rates.

Los Angeles city leaders Friday touted the installation of seven surveillance cameras at the Jordan Downs housing project, saying the high-tech equipment already has played a role in making the Watts complex safer. The cameras, mounted on utility polls, beam images to three police units in the area, allowing officers to keep a constant eye on activity and respond more quickly to incidents, police said.

The Jordan Downs housing project is one of Los Angeles' most dangerous and blighted communities, with a high crime rate and residents too poor to purchase computers, let alone Internet service. Los Angeles police have a plan to attack both the digital divide and the violence. By year's end, the Los Angeles Police Department intends to place at least a dozen surveillance cameras inside the 700-unit, World War II-era complex and along connecting streets to Jordan High School.

Los Angeles officials are embarking on a $1-billion plan to tear down the notorious Jordan Downs housing project and turn it into a "new urban village" -- an effort aimed at transforming the Watts neighborhood that would be one of the city's largest public works projects. The city wants to replace the project's 700 dilapidated units, which were built more than half a century ago, with taller "mixed-use" buildings that would house not just low-income residents but also those paying market rates.

Bobby Wilson, a.k.a. Kill Kill, is a roller pigeon fancier -- has been since he was a little boy in the projects in Watts. He was walking his dog down Holmes Avenue when he first spotted the birds flying above Eddie Scott's house. He watched in wonder as they whirled and somersaulted through the sky. Bobby was 9 years old and a serial collector of animals -- spiders, red ants, hamsters, lizards. But he'd never seen this. "You better not come in my yard!" Mr. Scott barked. Someone had just stolen a few of his top rollers and he was not happy.

City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo is asking a judge for authority to close a house in Watts allegedly used by members of the Grape Street Crips to cook PCP. The house in the 10300 block of Lou Dillon Avenue "has been used as a flophouse or safe house in addition to a place where PCP was cooked up," said Frank Mateljan, a spokesman for Delgadillo's office. Police have been called several times to the property in the last two years. Last summer, they searched the house and another property and found 15 gallons of hazardous waste, a byproduct of cooking PCP. The house is owned by Lillian Foster, mother of Alphonso Foster, who is in jail facing federal drug charges and whom police allege is an influential member of the Grape Street Crips, city attorney officials said.

Los Angeles city leaders Friday touted the installation of seven surveillance cameras at the Jordan Downs housing project, saying the high-tech equipment already has played a role in making the Watts complex safer. The cameras, mounted on utility polls, beam images to three police units in the area, allowing officers to keep a constant eye on activity and respond more quickly to incidents, police said.

Responding to a spate of gang violence at Los Angeles' Jordan Downs housing project, city officials are launching an unusual program that links surveillance cameras to stepped-up police patrols, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced Thursday.

The Jordan Downs housing project is one of Los Angeles' most dangerous and blighted communities, with a high crime rate and residents too poor to purchase computers, let alone Internet service. Los Angeles police have a plan to attack both the digital divide and the violence. By year's end, the Los Angeles Police Department intends to place at least a dozen surveillance cameras inside the 700-unit, World War II-era complex and along connecting streets to Jordan High School.

Rejecting the death penalty, a jury recommended that two men serve life terms without the possibility of parole for setting a fire that killed a great-grandmother, her granddaughter and the granddaughter's three small children. The prosecutor had argued passionately for the death penalty against Harold Mangram, 48, and Victor Spencer, 38, in the arson two years ago at the Jordan Downs housing project in Watts.

Los Angeles police Thursday identified a 56-year-old grandmother who was killed by officers in Watts after she allegedly tried to shoot relatives and failed to drop her weapon. Brenda Williams was struck by rounds fired by three Los Angeles Police Department officers Wednesday night near the Jordan Downs housing project. She was one of three people in officer-involved shootings — two of them deadly — in less than 24 hours. Neighbors said Williams recently moved into the neighborhood in the 10000 block of Anzac Avenue.

After a week and a half of clashes in and around South Los Angeles housing projects that have left seven police officers injured, residents and police got together at a meeting Thursday and agreed on some steps to ease tensions. Although the meeting at the Jordan Downs gymnasium was heated at times, police, residents and politicians agreed to increased foot patrols, to hold monthly meetings and to try to bring back federal funding for a once-popular community policing program.

Jordan Downs housing project residents, elected officials and police will meet today to discuss how to curb the escalating tensions in and around South Los Angeles housing projects between residents and police. The 3 p.m. meeting will be at the Jordan Downs Community Center at 2101 E. 101st St., authorities said. The most recent incident occurred Wednesday, soon after four people were shot in a drive-by attack near 103rd Street and Lou Dillon Avenue.