Neighborhood Spotlight 

Paramount City Profile 

Paramount City sits between Compton and Bellflower, it has a long history, beginning as a sprawl of Spanish Rancheros then to a bustling dairy and hay farm industry, and now, a city with attractive features and a thriving local community. But the journey wasn’t easy. As the dairy and hay farms were crowded out in the 1960s/70s due to local development and rising land prices, the city suffered from loss of workers, businesses, and visually looked in disrepair. The farms were replaced by industry and suburb developments without any method to placement leading to an overdeveloped urban “disaster” area. 

Homes were built alongside auto repair and salvage yards, small business owners in Paramount closed up shop unable to compete with the neighboring city’s new malls, and other industrial businesses such as construction intermixed with the neighborhoods. In 1973 plans were made to refurbish Paramount and a collective effort of government officials, residents, the faith-based community, and businesses led to the city being named an “All-America City” by the National Civic League in 1988 for its innovative programs. The city also received a special commendation from The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors for its remarkable turnaround. 

The City provided funds for business relocations or redevelopment in their efforts to give their city a makeover. A new downtown was created with a public plaza called The Paramount Pond. The Civic Center Gardens was created to bring together City Hall, the County Library, and the Hospital in an epic design of Canary Island date palms, crisscrossing pathways, native Californian plants and shrubs, and a fountain cascading into a pond rich with koi and blooming lilies. Abandoned lots were negotiated with the owners to be turned into ‘pocket parks’ allowing the city to develop them and hold liability of the land while the owner retains the right to sell the property and is relieved of the upkeep of the lot. These and many more improvements contributed to Paramount’s national and even worldwide attention for its innovative thinking and hard work re-making its city into a place of beauty. 

Today Paramount is the gateway to the Los Angeles Metropolis, with around 55,000 residents, 3,400businesses, 12 parks, 37 art sculptures located throughout the city as part of their Outdoor Museum, and clean visually appealing infrastructure instigated by the amazing community efforts to refurbish and revitalize Paramount City. 

Interesting landmarks of Paramount include the Paramount Hay Tree, a mature camphor tree where the hay farmers would meet to discuss hay prices, and home to the Paramount Iceland Ice Rink where owner Frank Zamboni invented the first Zamboni, the ice resurfacing machine seen at every local ice rink. 

Paramount is predominantly Hispanic with the top industries being professional services, restaurants, and metal fabricators. It’s currently trending high in crime rate, ranking 15/100 on the crime index (100 being safest) but if we look at the date over the last 20 years we’ll find that the 4.8 square miles that make up Paramount has actually seen a 37% decline in crime. The city is making large efforts to continue to curb those crime rates and has maintained the lowest emergency response time among the five Lakewood Station cities of 3.2 minutes in 2019 and the lowest in 2020 with 3 minutes.

In light of COVID-19 Paramount has also been incredibly active in supporting its community: 80,000 masks were provided for residents in 2020, they held 3 food distribution events serving over 6,000 families, donated $125,000 to help pay for online tutoring, formed Paramount Al Fresco to streamline city requirements helping restaurants take their dining outdoors, Issued $232,300 in grants for renters, mortgage holders, and small business, added 6 murals by local artists, found shelter for 12 homeless individuals and services for 68, as well as numerous other enhancements and benefits for the community. On Paramount’s YouTube page, you can find an 11-minute video highlighting all the blessings they provided to their community. 

Paramount City cares for its community and the community makes the effort to care for their city. If you’re looking to engage in your city of Paramount, there are some amazing nonprofits at work in the community:

Compton Initiative: The Compton Initiative is a non-profit organization founded in 2006 with commitment to restore the City of Compton by painting homes, schools and churches on quarterly workdays in partnership with individual volunteers and other organizations. 

A World With Compassion: Local Food Drive nonprofit that partners with Paramount City

PMA: Prison Ministry of America:  Prison Ministry of America (PMA) is a ministry of compassion with a focus on outreach to our community, evangelism and discipleship to the poor in spirit and those experiencing incarceration. PMA is one of the last remaining organizations in the country that provides an in-prison evangelistic program where prisoners can acquire Bibles and Christian literature at no cost. 

For additional information on Paramount City:

https://www.paramountcity.com/
https://www.paramountcity.com/government/city-profile