Compton gets its groove back

A web-only, video-rich feature at Newsweek's site says the city of Compton "has a new lease on life" after shedding its image as the region's murder capital. Excerpt:

The community is still poor, and unemployment is more than twice the national average. But the number of homicides is at a 25-year low, slashed in half from 2005. There are fewer gunshots and more places for kids to go after school. Alongside the liquor stores and check-cashing stands are signs of middle-class aspiration: a T.G.I. Fridays, an outbreak of Starbucks and a natural-food store. Along the way, blacks became a minority in Compton, which is 60 percent Latino today.

The change, say community members, is palpable. Residents walk dogs; they go out at night. Graduation rates are higher, and a recent canvassing effort counted more than 25 nonprofits targeted specifically toward youth, where a decade ago, there were few to none.

Writer Jessica Bennett also Q&A's Stacy Peralta about his new documentary, "Crips and Bloods: Made in America."