Ask Glendalians what they like most about...

Ask Glendalians what they like most about living in the third-largest city in Los Angeles County and they will likely tell you it’s the safety factor.

Despite dramatic growth and socioeconomic changes in recent decades, many residents say they still feel safe here. And when a national survey named Glendale the second-safest larger city in the United States last year, it was a feather in the cap of city officials.

Despite its seemingly tranquil, suburban exterior, the “Jewel City” has abandoned much of its small-town attitude as it tries to position itself as an economic force in Southern California.

Spurred by the 1975 opening of Glendale’s signature structure, the giant Glendale Galleria shopping mall, the city has embarked on a long redevelopment process.

In the last two decades, many mom-and-pop shops have been replaced with big retail stores, tall office buildings and, more recently, corporate entertainment giants such as Disney Imagineering, Turner Feature Animation and the forthcoming Dreamworks SKG animation studio.

Along the way, residents and city leaders have dealt with a massive influx of people and problems associated with big-city living. In recent years, the city has started a task force to combat a rising number of hate crimes, and the rising number of homeless has led to the opening of two shelters.

Armenians, who now make up an estimated 40,000 or more of the city’s 180,000 population, have become a vital part of Glendale’s cultural and economic fabric, but immigrants from numerous other countries have contributed to the diversification of this once-homogeneous white community.

Students in the Glendale Unified School District speak 60 languages other than English, officials say.

Glendale is split between those who believe that more retail and other development is needed to enhance dwindling city revenuesand to improve the city’s position relative toits fiercely competitive neighbors, Burbank and Pasadena, and longtime residents who say that the 30.4-square-mile city is overdeveloped and overpopulated.

Residents are also divided among the mostly lower- and middle-income people living south of Broadway and the more affluent residents of the hills, canyons and foothills.

In spite of the traffic jams, the ongoing construction and city leaders’ constant talk about the future, there are still many signs of Glendale’s past.

More than 200 years ago, a Spanish soldier named Jose Maria Verdugo petitioned the governor of California for permission to raise cattle and horses on the area’s verdant foothills.

Permission was granted on Oct. 20, 1784, marking the beginning of Rancho de San Rafael, the second such land grant in California.

Verdugo and his descendants prospered in the area that now encompasses much of Glendale, Eagle Rock, Burbank and the foothills until the late 1800s, when the family parceled out the land and sold it to farmers and developers.

One of the most famous land tycoons from the city’s early days was developer L.C. Brand, whose white mansion remains preserved as a city library, and for whom Glendale’s downtown thoroughfare is named.

The city’s name was adopted in 1884 when six people filed a map with the county recorder.

By the time the city was incorporated in 1906 it had grown to 1,486 acres.

Historic sites abound throughout the city, from century-old adobe and wooden farmhouses to the Alex Theatre and the Grand Central Airport Tower.

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By The Numbers

City Business

Incorporated: Feb. 16, 1906

Area in square miles: 30.5

Number of parks: 25

City employees: 2,127

1995-96 budget: $84- million

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People

Population: 180,038

Households: 68,694

Average household size: 2.58

Median age: 34.3

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Ethnic Breakdown

Asian: 14%

Black / Other: 2%

Latino: 21%

White: 64%

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Money and Work Median household income: $34,372

Median household income / L.A. County: $34,965

Median home value: $341,700

Employed workers (16 and older): 87,188

Percentage of women employed: 55.0%

Percentage of men employed: 75.1%

Self-employed: 8,378

Car- poolers: 12,524

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Retail Stores

Number of stores: 1,6124

Number of employees: 14,368

Annual sales: $1.8 billion

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Families:

Married couples with children: 25%

Married couples with no children: 26%

Non-family households: 34%

Other types of families: 16%

Source: Claritas Inc. Household expenses are averages for 1994. All other figures are for 1990. Percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number.