Neighborhoods

If you are a teacher in debt, there's good news and bad news. There are literally dozens of programs that could potentially help wipe out your student loans. But most of them have narrow requirements that may lock you out. Just ask Troy Dale, a high school counselor from Ellis, Kan. He and his wife have $23,000 in student loans that they've been paying down for nearly a decade. At their current rate, they'll still be paying off their student debts when their oldest child enrolls in college.

Crime reports are up significantly for the latest week in nine L.A. neighborhoods, according to an analysis of Los Angeles Police Department data by the Los Angeles Times' Crime L.A. database . Six neighborhoods reported a significant increase in violent crime. Valley Glen (A) was the most unusual, recording nine reports compared with a weekly average of 2.8 over the last three months. Rancho Park (G) topped the list of three neighborhoods with property crime alerts.

Nevermind where we're going. Question is: Where are we now? "We're in Woodland Hills," said Anthony Tholberg as he stood outside his home late last week and mulled over that question. Tholberg, 23, grew up in the mid-century modern house in the 19800 block of Friar Street. No wonder he was puzzled when he was handed a copy of a new map that labeled his 54-home enclave as being in the community of Winnetka. The Los Angeles Times is unveiling the new map of neighborhoods today on its website at http://projects.

Re "Accent on the saying power," Column One, May 7 Regarding the dispute over the proper way to pronounce neighborhood names in Los Angeles such as Los Feliz, in English there is a standard way to pronounce words from foreign languages. It is incorrect English to attempt to change the accent one is speaking in the middle of a sentence. Yet there is a deplorable tendency among some now to show off their language chops by referring to, say, Italy's former prime minister as "SEEL-vyoh Bairrr-la-SKOHNNN-ee.

Actress Jane Fonda bought a home in Beverly Hills last year with a feature that might seem counterintuitive for a fitness guru: an elevator. The Holmby Hills house that pop icon Michael Jackson leased has one within its 17,200 square feet of living space. So does the nearby 56,500-square-foot mansion heiress Petra Ecclestone bought from socialite Candy Spelling two years ago for $85 million. But home elevators aren't just for the super-rich anymore. Baby boomers looking to age in place are installing them to ease the burden of bad knees and growing girth.

Reincarnation is Kallu Khan's stock in trade. His workshop floor is a swamp of cardboard strips hacked from salvaged boxes. Laborers scoop them up, work them over and give them new life as smaller boxes, which Khan then sells to stationery and packing companies. In another warehouse a few doors down, dozens of rubber soles cut from discarded shoes also await a second chance. Next to these, a mountain of plastic castoffs -- toys, computer keyboards, car parts -- is separated by squatting workers, to be melted down into tiny pellets before being reborn in some new form.

CHAPTER 1 / Mary Lee's Vision She hopes the ferry won't come, but if it does, she'll climb aboard. She'll tremble as she steps off the landing because she can't swim, and she can't forget the many times she's crossed this ugly brown river only to meet more ugliness on the other side. But fear has never beaten Mary Lee Bendolph, and no river can stop her.

ANTIQUE STORES and thrift shops rule Magnolia Boulevard -- the main artery of Burbank's Magnolia Park neighborhood -- but that doesn't mean the area is stuck in a dusty past. Founded in 1923, the quarter roughly bounded by Hollywood Way on the west and Buena Vista Street on the east still has Eisenhower-era storefronts, ranch-style homes dating to the 1940s and a small-town feel unblemished by chains and big-box stores. Yet Magnolia Park has found a way to parlay this into retro cool without sacrificing its independent spirit.

Soon after moving to Silver Lake last year, Keith Farr realized the daytime serenity of his neighborhood was deceptive. Once he awoke to the sounds of police making an arrest in his yard. Another night, he came home to find two men engaged in sex on the stairs to his second-floor duplex. At 2 or 3 a.m. on the weekend his street was as noisy as an airport terminal during the holidays, rowdy with men driving back and forth, hanging out on the sidewalks.

It's no easy job, being the lungs of Los Angeles. But Griffith Park, the foremost green space in a city notorious for meager parkland and abundant smog, endures bravely, maybe even heroically. Venture into the park, or nearby Elysian Park, or one of the creative neighborhoods in between, and you'll find not only beloved landmarks such as Griffith Observatory and Dodger Stadium, but also happy surprises, such as the time-travel supply shop, or the cafe where cops dine daily to the sound of echoing gunfire, or the Korean greetings that echo at dawn every day atop Mt. Hollywood.

The two candidates for Los Angeles mayor courted Latino voters on Saturday, promising to help those seeking citizenship and to help clean up and enhance Latino neighborhoods like Boyle Heights and Pacoima. Latino voters account for as much as a third of the city electorate. At the Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools Cocoanut Grove Theater, Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti fielded questions at a forum sponsored by the education fund of the National Assn. of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, along with other local groups.

One look at omnipresent Camelback Mountain and you might think the northeast Phoenix neighborhood known as Arcadia is on the outskirts of town where tumbleweeds blow effortlessly. But you'd be wrong - very, very wrong. Arcadia is where you'll find twentysomethings hanging out at recently opened gastropubs, young families walking to nearby parks, mini-malls with pizzerias and dive bars featuring Skee ball and foosball. This might sound like Los Angeles, but one glimpse of a helmet-less biker cruising down Campbell Avenue and you'll know you aren't in California.

Dave Gold launched his 99 Cents Only Stores empire in Los Angeles at age 50 after mulling over the idea for over a decade. The thrifty entrepreneur took the dollar store concept and introduced it to middle-class and upscale neighborhoods. In the process, he created a chain that has become a mainstay for families squeezed during hard times or those who simply love a good bargain. Gold died Monday at his Mid-Wilshire home from an apparent heart attack, said his son, Jeff Gold. He was 80. Long before dollar stores dotted many street corners, Gold opened the first 99 Cents Only store in Los Angeles in 1982.

WATERTOWN, Mass. - With the Boston area jumpy from the deadly marathon bombings, a shooting that killed a police officer at MIT and a nearby carjacking triggered a massive police response. By early Friday, one suspect was in custody and police had cordoned off an area of the Boston suburb of Watertown, where witnesses reported loud explosions. Police followed the carjacked vehicle to Watertown, according to scanner traffic. It was unclear whether the incidents had anything to do with Monday's marathon bombings, but hours into the siege police issued an alert on the scanner for a white male wearing a gray hoodie, with black curly hair.

On the West Side of San Bernardino, most everyone knew Johnny and Gilbert Agudo. They'd grown up in the tight-knit barrio. Handsome and charismatic, they were the presidents of two cliques of the West Side Verdugo street gang: Johnny, 31, of 7th Street Locos and Gilbert, 27, of the Little Counts. United, they led their gangs in feuds with rivals from other parts of town. But then things took an unexpected turn.

A sign on the wall of the building on South Figueroa Street reads: "No entry without permission." The interior, apartment units abandoned by an owner facing foreclosure, reveals the warning's ineffectiveness. Inside one apartment, a kitchen wall is spray-painted with names--G Bone, K Dog and 8 Ball--an abbreviated roll call for a gang that has claimed it as a hideaway.