{"id":147,"date":"2009-09-06T17:39:00","date_gmt":"2009-09-06T17:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/terragrafix.com\/blog\/?p=147"},"modified":"2009-09-06T17:39:00","modified_gmt":"2009-09-06T17:39:00","slug":"comments-from-our-readers-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.thesecretnewsonline.com\/?p=147","title":{"rendered":"Comments From Our Readers"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Pay Attention and Look Ahead,
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and Save Our Town From a Future of Declining Services and Increasing Debt<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n


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Have you not been paying attention to what has happened in Emeryville over the past 20 years? As a long term resident who has watched this city turn into a strip mall, I am very concerned. This small city could have been a model for all of the nation, small enough to provide the very best of education from pre-natal through college bound; small enough to provide small businesses with subsidies to keep a feeling of relationships and connections; small enough to provide neighborhoods of caring people. What did we do instead? Turn it into a developers’ and bondholders\/bankers’ dream, indebt the citizens of Emeryville so that the general funds are depleted and there is not enough funding for schools, neighborhoods, and our community services, including police and firefighters.<\/p>\n

Watch how the game is played; try sitting through planning meetings as the staff of Emeryville recommend over and over again to ignore height, width, and setbacks. Yes, I said, over and over again. Take a look at the records. Pay attention to the council, who have cut back citizens’ speaking time to 3 minutes, and then watch the council berate every citizen who gets up and shares their concerns; sometimes for as long as 20 minutes. Look at how the city has been built. Where is the housing for those with limited economic means; where is the housing for families; where is a true living wage?<\/p>\n

What has happened is appalling, and still we sit and pay little attention. You can rant from a Republican\/Democrat stand, but that is futile. This is about the quality of living, life, and the desire to have a relational community and not a strip mall town.<\/p>\n

What are you going to do when you truly find out how much each and every one of you owe in indebtedness to the Redevelopment Agency?<\/p>\n

I ask you to pay attention to the detail and look ahead. We are in deep trouble, we have misunderstood the bubble of supercapitalism and we will go under if we continue in this way. Pay attention, save Emeryville, and stop the subsidies to development. We owe too much already and we no longer need to pay the developers for development in this city.<\/p>\n

Ruth Major, M.A. Ed.
Early Education Consultant<\/span>, Infant Parent Mental Health & Birth to Three Specialist<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Ruth Major has lived in Emeryville for 25 years
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