[9] Three previous attempts to incorporate as a city had been rejected by voters in 1971, 1990, and 1994 before it was approved by a 20-point margin on March 14, 1995, within a smaller area.

Lakewood is home to the Clover Park School District, the Lakewood Water District, Fort Steilacoom Park and Western State Hospital, a regional state psychiatric hospital.

The United States Postal Service suggested that the new city be renamed due to frequent mixups in mail delivery that required the two post offices to forward deliveries with a one-day delay.

[14][15] The Snohomish County post office was renamed to North Lakewood in 1998 by the Postal Service due to the other community's unincorporated status.

A number of small creeks flow through Lakewood, some of which drain into nearby Puget Sound.

The City of Lakewood contracted with the Pierce County Sheriff's Office for police services between 1996 and 2004.

On the morning of November 29, 2009, four Lakewood Police Department officers were shot and killed at a coffee shop in Parkland by Maurice Clemmons, an ex-convict.

All four officers had served with the department since its inception and died at the scene; two baristas and several customers in the shop were not injured.

[25] Lakewood's economy is highly dependent upon on the nearby Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

It also boasts one of the few true International Districts in the South Sound along South Tacoma Way and Pacific Highway, with Korean, Vietnamese, Chinese, Latino and other influences (the population of Lakewood's Tillicum neighborhood is nearly half non-English speaking[26]).

KVTI-FM, known as "I-91 FM", broadcast top 40 music from its Lakewood studio at Clover Park Technical College until 2010, when the college transferred management of the station to Washington State University's Northwest Public Radio who discontinued the locally produced programming in favor of a network feed from the University's Pullman campus.

Lakewood receives Seattle area television and radio stations.

Lakewood and Pierce County were named among the 100 Best Places for Young People by America's Promise.