Sacramentans love their dogs. With two municipal animal shelters, a state-of-the-art SPCA, 22 off-leash dog parks and dozens of mutt-friendly restaurants, Sacramento canines are living big.
California law authorizes food facilities to allow pet dogs in outdoor dining areas as long as the city or county does not pass an ordinance prohibiting the pooches, and restaurant owners do not object. There must be a separate outdoor entrance and dogs must remain on leash and off chairs.
Desperate to manage a homeless population that’s nearly doubled in three years, the Board of Supervisors opened a two-pronged strategy this summer.
Board members approved 100 “tiny homes” for a vacant lot in South Sacramento. And the board took preliminary steps to restrict encampments in sensitive places such as sidewalks, waterways, levees and the American River Parkway.
In what’s become familiar blowback, supervisors were criticized for doing too much and not doing enough.
Highly adaptable and irresistibly adorable, raccoons abound in Sacramento. Mischievous, clever and cute, yes. But raccoons can quickly become nuisances when they take up room and board in your neighborhood.
Ask neighbors about raccoons and stories come tumbling out. Mike and Gail Johnson on 38th Street tell of raccoons using the cat door to access their home and finding their way to a jar of kibble in the kitchen. One unforgettable day, a raccoon followed by two kits charged Gail when she found herself between their exit and the food source. No more cat door.
People in Pocket are becoming shy. I don’t know the reason for this, but I know it’s happening because part of my job is to ask people to pose for photographs. About half say no.
It wasn’t always this way. When I started writing for Inside eight years ago, my success rate with asking people to pose was close to 90 percent. I would interview someone for a story and explain that our photographer would call for a quick photo session. People were generally agreeable. The published photos were always flattering.
The sights on lower X Street did it for me. Coming off the freeway, I saw wrecked cars and busted campers and people standing around, a pitiful procession pinned against the gutter like a forlorn carnival that took a wrong turn. Somebody stuck two orange traffic cones partway into the street, warning motorists to steer clear.
Lower X Street, home to warehouses and body shops, never delivered a welcoming hug to visitors who enter the city from river’s edge. Now it arrives with a punch in the face.
