Valley Village

Valley Village is a neighborhood in the city of Los Angeles, located within the San Fernando Valley.HistoryFoundingAccording to Elke Garman, co-president of the Valley Village Homeowners Association in 1991, the history of Valley Village went back to the 1930s, when workers at nearby motion picture studios built houses there. The local post office on Magnolia Boulevard canceled all mail with a "Valley Village" postmark. It was, however, officially a section of North Hollywood.Separation from North HollywoodThe idea of separating Valley Village from North Hollywood was brought into public light with a meeting of about 300 homeowners at Colfax Avenue Elementary School in December 1985, yet it wasn't until 1991 that Valley Village got seven new blue reflective markers from the city of Los Angeles to mark its borders.Reporter James Quinn of the Los Angeles Times wrote that Valley Village no longer wanted to be associated with North Hollywood, "a community that has grown old, heavily Latino and crime-plagued," but, in the same article, Valley Village leader Tom Paterson was quoted as saying that the move "was more than an attempt to boost property values" and that it "had nothing to do with ethnic demographics." Rather, he said, "It was one economic level seeking to have its own identity." Quinn wrote that:Houses along Valley Village's lushly landscaped, graffiti-free streets cost up to $800,000, and a two-bedroom, two-bath entry-level house will run $300,000, residents say. Elsewhere in North Hollywood, that same size entry-level house can be purchased for as little as $150,000, real estate agents say. And the cheaper house is likely to have an overgrown, dusty yard and to be in a neighborhood reeling from crime, with gang graffiti splattered on block walls and street signs.