- The city of Chino Hills—a suburb of Los Angeles—is home to 74,799 people. About a third of them are non-Hispanic whites; just over 30 percent are Asian; and just under 30 percent are Hispanic. The three largest employers are the school district, the city, and Costco. But the median income is higher than that of Beverly Hills.
- Basketball has been the most popular youth team sport in America since at least the 1980s, when the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association began tracking kids’ athletic interest.
- The typical American town has one public outdoor basketball court for every 7,340 residents—less than half the number of public baseball diamonds per capita.
- The popularity of playing basketball peaks at age 13 and remains strong through the teenage years. The popularity of playing baseball and soccer peaks at age seven and eight.
- The average salary of an NBA player in 2011 was $5.15 million. A high school basketball player has a 0.03 percent change of going on to play the sport professionally.
- In the mid-1990s, controversy over midnight basketball—a program designed to divert kids away from crime and toward neighborhood games—dominated debate about President Bill Clinton’s crime bill. Midnight basketball accounted for less than one percent of the cost of the bill, but was mentioned in 30 percent of national magazine articles on the legislation.
- Urbanites report less mental distress and higher life satisfaction when they live in areas with more green space, even when controlling for income, employment, marital status, physical health, and housing type.
- The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that urban tree cover has been declining at a rate of about 20,000 acres a year.
- A recent U.S. Forest Service study found that in some areas the loss of native trees increased local mortality rates: More people in these areas died of cardiovascular and lower respiratory tract illnesses.
- San Bernardino County, home to Chino Hills, tops the list of the most ozone-polluted counties in the United States, according to the American Lung Association.
*Compiled by Olivia Cvitanic, Kihana Langdon, and Sarah Sloat.
This post originally appeared in the March/April 2014 issue of Pacific Standard as “In the Picture.” For more, subscribe to our print magazine.
