An annual UCLA survey that measures the quality of life satisfaction found that San Fernando Valley residents have the lowest satisfaction in the last nine years, and satisfaction is the lowest ever for residents across Los Angeles County.
Countywide, residents are concerned about the high cost of living and housing, according to the survey released on April 17.
The survey polled 1,686 Los Angeles County residents in February and March on 40 different aspects of life, including cost of living, education, environment and public safety. The poll is part of the Los Angeles Initiative at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, which has measured Los Angeles County residents’ quality of life satisfaction since 2016.
“We have two societies here in L.A.,” said Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the study at UCLA. “We have an incredible income gap and wealth gap, inequities from A to Z.”
In 2016, the overall rating for Los Angeles County was 59 on a scale from 10 to 100. But this year the overall rating of Los Angeles County residents’ satisfaction level had dropped to 53, or two points below last year. At 51, the overall satisfaction level for San Fernando Valley residents was even lower, according to Yaroslavsky.
Researchers say the ratings indicate that the majority of residents are unhappy with the overall quality of their lives.
On the issue of the cost of living, the overall rating countywide in 2016 was 50. This year it had tumbled down to 38.
“The thing that is driving the cost of living rating is the cost of housing,” Yaroslavsky said. “The cost of housing is still the number one issue.”
Jeff Bornstein, a Woodland Hills resident and president of the nonprofit West Valley Alliance for Optimal Living, who has lived in the Valley since 1961, said, “The Valley used to be a relatively quiet community and through the 2000s and 2010s the business interests in the Valley, especially in the West Valley, overdeveloped it. There are too many people here, too…
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