End to Derision of LAPD, Area Urged

In the wake of the Rodney King beating, article after article in the Los Angeles Times describes the northeastern San Fernando Valley as a tough area where gangs and crime are the norm.

As a resident of Shadow Hills, I take exception to this inaccurate portrayal.

I moved to this area three years ago after being a longtime resident of the Silver Lake/Echo Park area. During that time I was burglarized twice. Graffiti was common. The Times had almost daily reports of vicious crimes and gang activities.

Yet the area was continually referred to as “eclectic,” “bohemian” and an area on the way up.

Now, from my home in the Northeast Valley, which The Times describes as depressed and crime-ridden, I wonder at the irony of it all. I feel safe in my neighborhood, far from the maddening crowds of L.A.

Birds I’ve never seen before flock to our feeder, a horse whinnies at the back fence, the air is clear and a quiet peacefulness fills the neighborhood. I feel like I’m part of a great secret that no one ever reports, that there is a small part of Los Angeles where traffic jams and overcrowding do not yet exist.

The other day my husband wrote a check in West L.A. The clerk noticed our address and said, “Isn’t that where Rodney King got beat up?” He sadly said it was.

Perhaps someday, with the help of more accuracy in Times’ reporting, that same clerk will say, “Isn’t that where you can still go horseback riding through the streets as hawks and robins fly above you?”

SUSAN MICHAELS

Shadow Hills