According to the Los Angeles Times, current and former city of Bell officials imposed illegal taxes on residents and took large salaries without authorization. With this in mind, UCLA Urban Planning Professor Vinit Mukhija, sent his class of graduate urban planning students to the city as part of a class project to come up with urban design and physical planning proposals to help improve the town from the ground up.
See the full article in the Daily Bruin [4]
Links:
[1] http://luskin.ucla.edu/urban-planning
[2] http://luskin.ucla.edu/school-public-affairs/urban-planning
[3] http://luskin.ucla.edu/sites/default/files/images/38820_web_ns_11_19_bell_picA_small.jpg
[4] http://www.dailybruin.com/index.php/article/2010/11/students_visions_to_revitalize_the_heart_of_bell
