The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department (LASD) operates the Los Angeles County Jail system. Comprised of one processing facility (Inmate Reception Center), three men’s jails (Men’s Central Jail, Twin Towers Correctional Facility, Pitchess Detention Center – East, North, South and North County Correctional Facility) and one women’s jail (Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood), the L.A. County Jail holds detained adults charged with criminal law violations while awaiting trial or sentenced adult criminal offenders (less than one year). Since the passage of AB 109 (Realignment), persons with prison sentences for non-serious, non-violent or non-sex offenses are also serving time in the L.A. County Jail system.
Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) incarcerate persons between arrest and arraignment. After arraignment, persons arrested by LAPD must be released or transferred. The majority of transfers are sent to the L.A. County Jail, which is the central jailing system for L.A. County and most municipalities within the County.
Million Dollar Hoods maps the neighborhoods where LASD and LAPD spent the most on incarceration between 2012 to 2017. The first layer of the map highlights in red all communities where the LASD spent at least $1 million annually to jail residents, amounting to a minimum $6 million investment in incarceration over the study’s six-year period. The second layer of the map highlights the communities where the LAPD spent at least $1 million annually on detention during these same years. The millions of dollars committed to incarceration in the highlighted neighborhoods makes them “Million Dollar Hoods.”
The neighborhood boundaries used on the Million Dollar Hoods Map are based upon the Los Angeles Times Neighborhood List. These boundaries do not align with LAPD and LASD patrol districts nor do they reflect the many ways residents define their own community. But the Los Angeles Times Neighborhood List covers all of L.A. County and is one of the most highly-researched, regularly updated, and widely-used set of maps of L.A. neighborhoods.
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