Editing Westmont, California (section)

==History==

In 2009, Westmont was the subject of a [[feature story]] by [[Hector Tobar]] in the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' who wrote that the community was "officially (but rarely) called Westmont" but that it had "no "'mont,' not even a hill. It got its name, it seems, from being west of [[Vermont Avenue]]." Tobar noted that Westmont's [[unemployment rate]] was at the time "a staggering 23.6%, the highest in Los Angeles County."<ref name=HopeEndures>[https://www.newspapers.com/image/193433781/?terms=Westmont&match=1 "Hope Endures in Hard Times," ''Los Angeles Times,'' September 15, 2009, image 2]</ref>

Five years later, the strip of [[Vermont Avenue]] which is shared between Westmont and Vermont Vista was called "death alley" by the newspaper because during the past seven years sixty people had been killed by violence on that two-mile stretch. It remained at the highest rate of killings of any neighborhood in Los Angeles County.<ref name=TinyWestmont>[https://www.newspapers.com/image/203412855/ Nicole Santa Cruz and Ken Schwencke, "Tiny Westmont Has L.A. County's Top Homicide Rate," ''Los Angeles Times,'' January 19, 2014, image 1 (with map of the area)]</ref>

The 2014 article stated that "The area was long been controlled by a [[street gang|gang]] named the [[Gangs in the United States|Underground Crips]], whose members would, in more violent days, walk across [[Normandie Avenue]] to shoot at rivals."<ref>[https://www.newspapers.com/image/203413014/?terms=Westmont&match=1 "Westmont's Tide of Violence," ''Los Angeles Times,'' January 19, 2014, image 18]</ref>