Building Our Future
Bad To Worse
An October column in The New York Times called attention to California’s “epidemic of homelessness that seems to defy all attempts to fix it.”
Clicking on a link in the text, readers were directed to a Los Angeles Times article headlined: “This was supposed to be the year for California’s homeless. Instead it’s a slow train wreck.”
All true, but don’t expect the dire observations to discourage Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg, who has invested more political capital on this issue than most California mayors.
Walls Stand Tall
Phil Serna, a local politician known for straight talk, was up to no good. He had just lied to an old friend and lured him Downtown under false pretenses.
All was soon forgiven, however, because the Sacramento County supervisor brought his pal, local saxophone virtuoso Danny Sandoval, to 10th Street and Jazz Alley for the surprise of a lifetime.
Lavender Gold
The need for affordable housing is acute in Sacramento and much of California. How do we make a dent in such an intractable challenge?
For Mutual Housing California, a local nonprofit that has been building sustainable homes since 1988, the answer is straightforward. You scramble for money and creative solutions and never give up, no matter the obstacles.
Legacy Fight
It’s not often that a Sacramento redevelopment proposal pushes as many hot-button issues as the city’s West Broadway Specific Plan.
As it moves through the approval process, the long-range planning document has ignited passions about scarce affordable housing, the possible demolition of two public housing projects, historic preservation, isolating traffic patterns, gentrification, civil rights, Black Lives Matter and the memory of a Sacramento icon whose legal skills and advocacy improved the lives of African Americans here and around the nation.
Down, Not Out
Michael Ault, executive director of Sacramento’s Downtown Partnership, has been working to put more life into the city’s core for 25 years. He has experienced his share of economic gyrations.
California’s past budget crises, “Furlough Fridays” for state workers, the national housing crash that sparked the last recession and other big setbacks were painful, but largely overcome. So for the even-tempered advocate, last January’s “State of Downtown 2020” event at the Hyatt Regency was reason to celebrate.
New Housing development is not run of The Mill
Developers are capitalists. They assume risk, borrow money and partner with investors to make a profit and enjoy their piece of the American Dream.
But as anyone can see, there is more than just profit motive driving The Mill at Broadway, a hip and innovative condominium project on an old industrial site a few minutes south of Downtown.
