War II from an area in Glendale, California, sparking controversy. A federal judge dismissed the lawsuit for the statue's removal and was met with support from the Los Angeles City Council, Korea-Glendale Sister City Association, and the Korean American Forum of California as part of a "large-scale effort to raise international awareness of the comfort women's plight." The Japanese American Citizens League and other Japanese-American organizations supported the statue and deplored the Japanese delegation's claim that it had led to racially motivated bullying of Japanese-Americans as propaganda. Geography As of 2008, about 350,000 ethnic Koreans live in Los Angeles County. As of 2008 the largest Korean ethnic enclave in Los Angeles is Koreatown and the majority of the Koreans have been concentrated around that area. By 2008 many ethnic Korean communities had appeared in the northwestern San Fernando Valley, including Chatsworth, Granada Hills, Northridge, and Porter Ranch. That year, the San Fernando Valley Korean Business Directory had a list of almost 1,500 Korean-owned businesses in the San Fernando Valley. Amanda Covarrubias of the Los Angeles Times stated that area Korean community leaders estimated that 50,000 to 60,000 Koreans lived in the San Fernando Valley in 2008. In addition, by 2008 Korean communities had appeared in Cerritos and Hacienda Heights in Los Angeles County, and Buena Park and Fullerton in Orange County. Also, a long standing community, known as Koreatown or Little Seoul has been in Garden Grove since the 1970s. This formed the center of the Korean Community of Orange County which later spead out to Buena Park, Fullerton, Cypress, and Irvine. Demographics As of 2008, 257,975 Korean Americans lived in Los Angeles, Orange County, Ventura, San Bernardino, and Riverside counties, making up 25% of all of the Korean Americans. As of that year, over 46,000 Koreans lived in Koreatown, making up 20.1% of the residents there. Koreatown, in addition to Koreans, houses other ethnic groups. Economics By 1988, in Los Angeles, many Korean stores had opened in African-American neighborhoods, and by then several boycotts by African-Americans of Korean businesses had occurred. By that time many Korean garment manufacturers acted as middlemen by employing Hispanic workers and selling product to White-owned manufacturers of clothing. In 2014 the federal government ran a raid against business operations that it accused of being money laundering. By 2015 some Korean business owners stated that they may take their operations out of Los Angeles due