More than 29,000 employees worked overtime in the 12 months through April, with nearly 1,500 earning more than $50,000 each in overtime pay alone.

The soaring OT has become a major contributor to a gross annual city payroll that now costs $120 million more to compensate the same size work force as a year ago, according to a Daily News review of salary and overtime data obtained from the City Controller's Office under the California Public Records Act.

And de

Uniform and accessories: $1,620.

Service pistol and ammunition: $1,300.

Protecting and serving the nation's second-largest city: priceless.

If you think gas and food prices are high, try outfitting a new Los Angeles Police Department recruit. Jason Kandel in the Daily News.

Prices for everything from buttons to badges and bullets are way up, boosting the cost to outfit a single recruit to $9,000 this year, up 20percent from last year.

"It's a lot of

In the past year alone, gross annual payroll costs have soared $120 million for nearly 48,000 city employees - $90 million of that going to 35,000 civilian and sworn workers - and bumped the total payroll up to $3.2 billion, or nearly half Los Angeles' $7 billion budget.

While city leaders seek to close a looming $406 million budget shortfall with everything from fee hikes to service cuts, a Daily News review of salary data shows more than 21,000 city workers take home $70,000 or more a year and more than 6,000 take home more than $100,000.

Cit y Salary Database

In its latest 30-year plan, the Southern California Association of Governments spelled out a range of projects that the region desperately needs to keep people and goods moving - from high-tech maglev rail lines to low-tech pothole repairs.

And the region has to plan for at least an additional 6million people in the next 30 years, said Gary Ovitt, immediate past president of SCAG and a San Bernardino County supervisor.

"That means more vehicles and more people traveling," he said. "We really want to get these projects done - and we would love to do even more because we can't afford to take the risk that we don't implement changes to improve the quality of life."

Weng is a prize catch for colleges - valedictorian at El Camino Real High, president of six school clubs, an immigrant success story. But despite all that, he's been placed on the waiting lists at five colleges to which he applied. Connie Llanos in the Daily News.

And he's not alone as colleges this year are faced with a surge of applicants - higher than even during the peak baby boomer years - and have resorted to putting more students than ever on the dreaded "wait list."

That means even as their friends are celebrating this month as college acceptance letters come in, many more students such as Weng are left in limbo, waiting and wondering.

"It isn't fair," s

And city officials demanded Friday to know what went wrong and why work has yet to begin on the three new crosswalks at the heart of the project.

"I want some answers," said Councilman Dennis Zine during a City Council investigative hearing, which was referred to a committee. "As a representative of that community, I'm very upset. I want some answers."

The Fond Land Preservation Foundation will dedicate the open space acquisition today, adding another piece to a growing swath of public land in an area eyed for development.

"Most people would not have guessed that it was still possible to purchase 485 acres of open space in the city of Los Angeles," said Bill Eick, a Shadow Hills resident and member of the Fond foundation's board of directors.

The mayor nominated his former chief deputy, Marcus Allen, in March and since then Allen has been meeting with council members to lay out his plans for the post and discuss his salary request, which is $70,000 more than the salary of outgoing CAO Karen Sisson.

The pay request comes even as the city faces a $406million budget shortfall and would make Allen the fourth-highest-paid official in the city - making even more than the mayor.

In a far-ranging speech about his proposed $7.01 billion budget and Los Angeles' economy, Villaraigosa told those attending the annual summit-style meeting of the Economic Alliance that he recognizes the need to encourage businesses to open and remain in the city.

"These are tough economic times," Villaraigosa said. "The fact is a lot of economists, a lot smarter than I am, didn't see this coming. A year ago, no one expected us to have the problems we are to the extent we are.

The injunction was requested last month against the San Fers, one of the San Fernando Valley's oldest gangs, which has ties to the drug trade and the Mexican Mafia.

"This is a long-term problem and a gang injunction is truly a long-term solution," said Bruce Riordan, head of anti-gang operations for the City Attorney's Office.