The Los Angeles 2020 Commission's first report, releases Dec. 2013, notes L.A. community plans are many decades old and hopelessly out of date, and dramatic underinvesting in three of L.A.'s greatest assets: the Port of Los Angeles, L.A. International Airport and the Department of Water and Power. Pictured is Wilmington Park, a green space created to buffer residents from the Port of Los Angeles.

On January 8, 1964, in his State of the Union speech, President Lyndon Johnson proposed introducing "War on Poverty" legislation to combat what the federal government deemed a 19 percent poverty rate in the U.S.

The U.S. official poverty rate today is 15 percent, or 46 million Americans living below the poverty line. Some sources believe that without the government "safety net," the poverty rate would be 29 percent. www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/01/why-you-should-forget-about-the-poverty-rate/282849/

Now, 50 years later, the Obama administration has declared its intention to direct millions in federal grants and tax incentives ($5 billion if Congress approves) to "promise zones." The zones are in Los Angeles (parts of Pico-Union, Westlake, Koreatown, East Hollywood and Hollywood), West Philadelphia, San Antonio, southeastern Kentucky and the Choctaw Nation (11 southeastern Oklahoma counties).

L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti's office expects to receive tens of millions of dollars, but the cap is set for a half billion dollars over a decade. The sources of the federal grants are the departments of Education, Agriculture, Justice, and Housing and Urban Development.

Funding will go not only for training, education, and career development, but for affordable housing, more investment in public transit, and even for bike lanes.

The plan, announced by President Obama during his 2013 State of the Union address, ultimately wants to include 20 struggling cities/towns.

Surprised that L.A. is on the list? Early in 2013 L.A. City Council President Herb Wesson asked Mickey Kantor, a lawyer and former U.S. Secretary of Commerce, to establish an independent commission to report on the fiscal stability and growth of the city. In Dec. 2013, the 13-member Los Angeles 2020 Commission released "A Time for Truth" (www.la2020reports.org/), the first of two reports it will produce.

The report begins: "Los Angeles is barely treading water"?(R)?" The report asserts: "two decades of slow job growth and stagnant wages"; poverty pay for "28% of working Angelenos"; a poverty rate "higher than any other major American city"; a median income is lower than in was in 2007; and "almost 40% of our community lives in what only can be called misery."

The report goes on: ""?(R)?strangled by traffic"?uthe most congested urban community in America"; "a failing public school system" (less that 60% of students graduate from high school); "dramatically underinvesting in"?(R)?three of our greatest assets"?uPort of Los Angeles, Lost Angeles International Airport and the Department of Water and Power"; community plans many decades old and hopelessly out of date"; "9% of L.A. businesses are planning to leave, citing stifling regulations and an unresponsive bureaucracy." L.A. was home to 12 Fortune 500 headquarters three decades ago, but today, the report says, there are only four.