Pueblo Del Rio is a

public housing Public housing, also known as social housing, refers to Subsidized housing, subsidized or affordable housing provided in buildings that are usually owned and managed by local government, central government, nonprofit organizations or a ...

project located in the Central-Alameda neighborhood of

South Los Angeles South Los Angeles, also known as South Central Los Angeles or simply South Central, is a region in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, lying mostly within the city limits of Los Angeles, south of Downtown Los Angeles, downtown. It is de ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. The address of Pueblo Del Rio is 1801 East 53rd Street, which is near the intersection of 55th and Alameda streets.

History

Constructed in 1941 under the auspices of the National Housing Administration, Pueblo Del Rio was originally designed to house low-income laborers at the factories south of

Downtown Los Angeles Downtown Los Angeles (DTLA) is the central business district of the city of Los Angeles. It is part of the Central Los Angeles region and covers a area. As of 2020, it contains over 500,000 jobs and has a population of roughly 85,000 residents ...

and military veterans. Like other housing projects of the era, Pueblo Del Rio's design was based on the " garden city" template. According to this design motif, clusters of two-story buildings would be situated around open grassy spaces where the children of the residents could play. Prominent architects such as Paul Revere Williams and

Richard Neutra Richard Joseph Neutra ( ; 8 April 1892 – 16 April 1970) was an Austrian-American architect. Living and building for most of his career in Southern California, he came to be considered a prominent and important modernist architect. His most ...

helped design the layout of Pueblo Del Rio.

Demographics

Throughout most of its history, Pueblo Del Rio housed primarily African American residents. One of its most notable former residents was Dr.

Shirley Weber Shirley Weber (née Nash; born September 20, 1948) is an American academic and politician serving as the secretary of state of California. She was previously a member of the California State Assembly for the 79th Assembly District, which includ ...

, who serves as the 31st

secretary of state of California The secretary of state of California is the chief clerk of the U.S. state of California, overseeing a department of 500 people. The secretary of state is elected for four year terms, like the state's other constitutional officers; the officeho ...

. Later in the 1990s, however, large numbers of Latinos began moving into the housing complex. Today, Blacks, Latinos, and

Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...

n immigrants call Pueblo Del Rio home. Some families have been living in Pueblo Del Rio for more than three generations. Almost fifty percent of the residents of Pueblo Del Rio are children or teenagers.

Parks and recreation

It is home to five parks and a recreation center, which were much improved through Los Angeles Councilwoman Jan Perry's initiative in 2012.

Education

Pueblo Del Rio is zoned into the

Los Angeles Unified School District Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) is a State school, public school district in Los Angeles County, California, United States of America. It is the largest public school system in California in terms of number of students and the List ...

. The public schools serving Pueblo Del Rio include Holmes Elementary School,

Edison Middle School Kern County is a county (United States), county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 909,235. Its county seat is Bakersfield, California, Bakersfield. Kern County compris ...

, Huntington Park High School, and

Maywood Academy High School Maywood Academy High School (MAHS) is an alternative high school of the Los Angeles Unified School District, located in Maywood, CA. All residents are zoned to Bell High School in Bell and Huntington Park High School in Huntington Park may app ...

Crime

During the 1970s, many of the factories which employed Pueblo Del Rio's residents were closed. This created a vacuum of opportunity in the area, and as a result, the crime rate skyrocketed. The Pueblo Del Rio was known for illegal activity in

. Shootings, stabbings, assaults, gang activity, narcotics trafficking, and vandalism are all frequent at Pueblo Del Rio. Much of the crime at Pueblo Del Rio is gang related;

Los Angeles Police Department The City of Los Angeles Police Department, commonly referred to as Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), is the primary law enforcement agency of Los Angeles, California, United States. With 8,832 officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the th ...

reported of 3 gangs that have been active in the Pueblo Housing Projects, The 52 Pueblo Bishop Bloods and E/S Oriental Boyz.

FBI Raids

On August 26, 2010, the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

and

raided the Pueblo Bishop Bloods through the

Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization. RICO was e ...

. Crime has since decreased in the area.

In Arts and Literature

The American painter Noah Davis produced a body of work which took Pueblo Del Rio as its subject. The Pueblo del Rio series is considered to be " rhaps the most lyrical of all Davis’s paintings..., set in aul RevereWilliams’s LA housing project for black defence workers in 1941. With low-rise buildings and shared green lawns, it should have been a garden city; but it quickly degenerated. Davis paints it back into beauty"

References

External links

LAPD - Newton Community Police Station
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