VIOLENCE IN L.A.: THE LAPD REPORTS : ‘Hot Spots’ Residents Aware of Risks : Crime: Those who call troubled areas home were familiar with the dangers long before the studies were released.

The Los Angeles Police Department did not need to tell Traci Cummings that the coffeehouse on Ventura Boulevard where she works is smack in the middle of a street robbery “hot spot.”

Although the Police Department only a few days ago released reports detailing the problems with the part of Ventura Boulevard stretching from White Oak Avenue on the east to Vanalden Avenue on the west, Cummings said she knew about the area’s dangers--her boyfriend was robbed outside her workplace a few months back.

“I work with only other women and I just know I’m a target,” Cummings said. “Our corporate office told us to watch out. Every time someone comes in, you look and you’re ready to roll out of there if you have to.”

Despite the fact that crime has decreased in the San Fernando Valley over the past few years, pockets of criminal activity persist and have gotten worse. Crime analyses released by police for the five Valley-based divisions on Friday don’t mean a whole lot, some Valley residents said; people who live in the “hot spot” areas identified by the department are well aware of the problems.

Fred Reyes, 71, a retired grocer who has lived in a small house at the corner of Tampa Avenue and Parthenia Street for the past 35 years, offered a virtual crime log of his neighborhood, detailing what had happened where.

“We had one person killed right there,” he said, pointing to a corner across the street. “Another person died at that corner after being stabbed.”

Reyes lives a couple of blocks south of the Northridge Fashion Center, which was identified as one of three trouble spots in the Devonshire Division because high pedestrian and vehicle traffic “attracts the criminal element,” the report stated.

The police reporting district that includes the mall logged 31 robberies and 29 aggravated assaults in 1993. By comparison, a district in Van Nuys reported 208 aggravated assaults for the year, the highest in the Valley; the highest number of robberies, 119, occurred in a neighborhood in North Hills.

But Reyes added that although he has seen crime increase dramatically in his neighborhood during the past 10 years, the situation is not as bad now as it was a few years ago.

More security fences have been placed around apartments, Reyes said, and there appears to be more police on patrol. He added, however, that drug dealers and other criminals still lurk in the streets and alleys near his house.

In many ways, Reyes’ house marks the border between two distinct communities near the mall. North of Parthenia Street, on Tampa Avenue, residents pay high rents and mortgages to live next to the newer businesses where they work and shop.

On the south side, particularly to the east, buildings are run-down, protected with iron bars, covered with graffiti.

Elizabeth Coon, manager of Rosie’s BBQ & Grillery, said a driver was robbed while making a delivery to a residence south of Parthenia a year and a half ago and employees are now allowed to decide whether to take food to that area.

“I probably wouldn’t go,” said Jeff Bennett, a delivery driver for the restaurant. “It’s not a good area.”

In fact, the two police reporting districts that include that neighborhood had 65 robberies, 121 assaults and three murders during 1993.

Residents south of Parthenia Street agreed that some criminals live in their neighborhood. But they said the residents are not responsible for all that goes on there.

“It’s not only this area, because a lot of gangs live outside the area,” said Nicholas Chavez, 32, who lives on Chase Street. “What they do is come down to this area and commit crimes.”

Georgia Gross, who manages the Ridgegate Apartments across from the mall on Tampa, said the shopping center is a blessing because it attracts tenants. But, she added, several times a year people involved in crimes at the mall run across the street and try to hide in the gated complex.

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“I have apartments over here with windows facing out toward the mall,” Gross said. “I have a lot of little old ladies living in them, calling me and saying, ‘Why are there police cars out there?’ ”

Only one business was singled out as a crime hot spot in the LAPD reports. The West Valley Division noted that the Canoga House Motor Hotel at 7435 Winnetka Ave. attracted prostitutes and drug activity.

Just inside the door from a banner advertising “Weekly Rates,” a hotel desk clerk behind 1 1/2-inch thick, bullet-proof glass acknowledged that the motor lodge has had its share of problems. She said she frequently calls police herself to ask them to come and calm disturbances among the guests.

The clerk, who asked not to be named, said a new owner had lost the hotel’s AAA rating a few years back. Although she said she could not comment on the specifics in the LAPD report about the hotel, she said that the quality of the clientele varies.

“Some are people wanting to get back on their feet, some are business people coming through, some are just people from the street,” she said. “What can I tell you?”

She said she could weed out the unsavory guests--if building management would be willing to lose their business. For the clerk, remedying the problem at her hotel is more straightforward than stopping robberies on Ventura Boulevard or elsewhere in the Valley.

“If they have a local address, usually there’s trouble. If you live here what do you want a room here for?”

People in other Valley hot spots said combatting crime is not so simple, even if the problem is obvious.

“I’m 6 feet 3, 200 pounds--not small,” said Derek Lipman, who was robbed by a group of young men when he went to pick up his girlfriend at a Ventura Boulevard coffee shop in Tarzana. “If these guys would be willing to go after me, then they would go after anybody.

“Crime in this area,” he said, “has been building for years.”

Abigail Goldman is a Times staff writer and Mark Sabbatini is a special correspondent.