Welcome. Here's how the canyon works.
You've moved to a quiet, horse-friendly canyon inside the second-largest city in America. The bureaucracy on the other side of that fact — utilities, trash, permits, alerts — is the same bureaucracy that runs downtown. This page is a practical cheat sheet for getting set up.
Essentials, in order
The first week in a new canyon home typically means five calls: power, water, gas, trash, and internet. Power and water are one call, because Los Angeles runs both through the same utility. Here's the short list.
LADWP — electricity and water
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power provides both. Start service, stop service, and outage reporting all go through the same channel.
Customer service / start service: 1-800-DIAL-DWP (1-800-342-5397)
Website: ladwp.com
Outage reporting: same main number, 24/7
SoCalGas — natural gas
Southern California Gas Company handles residential gas service for the canyon.
Customer service: 1-877-238-0092
Gas leak emergency (24/7): 1-800-427-2200 from a safe location — or 911 if life or property is endangered.
Website: socalgas.com
LA Sanitation — trash, recycling, bulky items
Weekly collection. Schedules vary by block; check sanitation.lacity.org or call for your pickup day.
Bulky item pickup (free, by appointment): 1-800-773-2489 or submit through MyLA311
Illegal dumping reports: MyLA311 (canyon roads see sporadic illegal dumping — reporting helps)
MyLA311 — the single door for almost everything else
The City of Los Angeles runs a consolidated 311 system for all non-emergency service requests. One phone number, one app, one web portal. If you have a pothole, a streetlight out, an abandoned vehicle, a tree limb on a sidewalk, a graffiti tag, or any other non-emergency city issue — this is where it goes.
MyLA311
Call: dial 311 from inside LA, or 213-473-3231 from anywhere
App: "MyLA311" on iOS and Android
Web: myla311.lacity.org
Hours: 24/7 for requests; live operators 6 AM – 10 PM
Library
Sun Valley Branch Library
Address: 7935 Vineland Avenue, Sun Valley, CA 91352
Phone: (818) 764-1338
Part of the Los Angeles Public Library system. Free library card for any California resident with proof of address. Access to the full LAPL e-book, audiobook, and research database collection.
Animal services
LA Animal Services — East Valley Shelter
Address: 14409 Vanowen Street, Van Nuys, CA 91405
Phone: (888) 452-7381
The primary City shelter for the canyon. Licensing, adoption, lost-and-found, dead-animal pickup, coyote reports, and wildlife concerns all route through here.
Emergency animal rescue (24/7): 311 or (888) 452-7381
Other useful numbers
Street tree issues — City Urban Forestry Division: 311 / MyLA311 (street trees in Los Angeles are city-owned; you cannot legally remove them yourself).
Pothole repair — 311 / MyLA311 with specific block address.
Streetlight out — Bureau of Street Lighting, 311 or (800) 303-0867.
Permit questions (construction, additions, pool, etc.) — LADBS, (213) 482-0000, ladbs.org.
Property tax questions — LA County Assessor, (213) 974-3211, assessor.lacounty.gov.
What's next
Once the utilities are on and the trash days are on the calendar, the next calls worth knowing about are civic rather than administrative — the Council District 7 field office, the neighborhood council, and the local police and fire stations. Those are collected on the next page.