Are you ready for gang land bus safaris?

Have you ever been to the San Diego Wild Animal Park?  You get to ride a tram through their park and see the wild animals up close.  Now a non-profit organization in Los Angeles is proposing to conduct bus tours of gang-stricken areas in Los Angeles.

“A group of civic activists, united by faith and a belief that the poor economy in the interior of Los Angeles is a social injustice, is preparing to offer bus tours of some of the grittiest pockets of the city, including decayed public housing, sites of deadly shootouts and streets ravaged by racial unrest,” according to the L.A. Times.

“Alfred Lomas is the man behind LA Gang Tours. Lomas, a former gang member, says that the whole idea behind to his non-profit group is to create jobs and open the lines of communication between rival gangs,” according to KABC7.

Lomas heads up the Dream Center.  It appears to be a quasi-religious organization.  There is no information about the bus tours on their website.  However the L.A. Times does provide additional info about the gang bus tours:

The nonprofit group plans to offer two-hour tours at an initial cost of $65 per adult, with profits funneled back into the community through jobs, “franchised” tours in new areas and micro-loans to inner-city entrepreneurs. Early routes will focus largely on South L.A., with forays through Watts and Florence-Firestone.

Not sure about this one.  Maybe they need to armor plate the buses?  I cannot imagine how they will insure these tours.  But I hope the concept does some good for L.A.  I just don’t think I would ever get near any of these gang tour buses.  It doesn’t sound like a great way to spend the afternoon…

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"Admin" is just editors Vern Nelson, Greg Diamond, or Ryan Cantor sharing something that they mostly didn't write themselves, but think you should see. Before December 2010, "Admin" may have been former blog owner Art Pedroza.