Economy

Inglewood spent soundproof funds far from airport

WAVE NEWSPAPERS — The city of Inglewood spent millions of dollars in public funds to soundproof middle-class areas of the city while bypassing one of the poorest neighborhoods, where the roar from the Los Angeles International Airport flight path is loudest, according to a Los Angeles Times data analysis.

Published

6 years ago

June 7, 2019

Wave Wire Reports

By Wave Wire Reports

INGLEWOOD — The city of Inglewood spent millions of dollars in public funds to soundproof middle-class areas of the city while bypassing one of the poorest neighborhoods, where the roar from the Los Angeles International Airport flight path is loudest, according to a Los Angeles Times data analysis.

Over the last several decades, the Federal Aviation Administration and Los Angeles World Airports have given the city of Inglewood nearly $400 million to purchase and demolish hundreds of homes around the flight path and soundproof thousands of others, the Los Angeles Times reported May 23.

A Times review of local and federal records shows Inglewood spent the money for soundproofing disproportionately in middle-class — and primarily single-family neighborhoods — on the east side of the city, farthest from the airport. Most of the eligible homes there received soundproofing.

Meanwhile, the city’s zoning rules prohibited improvements in a struggling neighborhood of about 1,200 homes and apartments along the Century Boulevard corridor.

The Times analysis also found hundreds of units in an apartment village called Darby/Dixon that were eligible for FAA funding but have not been soundproofed.

Presented with the analysis, Bettye Griffith, director of the city’s residential sound insulation program, said she didn’t know why the Darby/Dixon apartments hadn’t been upgraded. But, she said, they will be offered soundproofing in the next round of funding. It’s unclear when that will be.

Inglewood also used noise abatement funds to further its redevelopment strategy, purchasing and clearing properties along Century Boulevard for commercial projects.

The city’s development program stalled after the economic collapse of 2007, leaving a patchwork of vacant land that is now being sought by the Los Angeles Clippers for a basketball arena.

Amid the current affordable-housing crisis, the city is facing pressure to offer that land for housing. In answer to a lawsuit contesting the Clippers’ plan, attorneys for Inglewood wrote that “housing directly under the flight path of one of the busiest airports in the world, as this lawsuit seeks, makes no sense.”

The lack of any noise mitigation in the neighborhood most affected by noise is partly a historical irony.

Inglewood officials decided decades ago to eliminate homes on the city’s western boundary where the noise exposure was greatest and blight was encroaching. They rezoned the area south of Century Boulevard to industrial.

The change prohibited future improvements to the housing.

The hope was that, over time, the city could encourage or carry out by itself the removal of the area’s homes using redevelopment and noise abatement funds. But there was never enough money to buy all the homes, and the rezoning prevented the city from spending federal and airport funds to soundproof those that remained.

Instead, the city focused its redevelopment efforts on removing housing in the two blocks nearest to Century Boulevard — land most suitable for stores and office space. Century Plaza, a shopping center with a Costco and other stores, stands on land purchased with noise abatement funds.

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Activism

Bank of America Grants $200,000 to Richmond Housing Nonprofit

RNHS has provided housing services to Richmond residents since 1981. The organization develops, acquires, and/or rehabilitates single-family homes and housing developments in blighted or vacant lots in order to make them available as affordable homes for rent or purchase to low-income families.

Published

2 weeks ago

November 24, 2024

Oakland Post

Photo by RDNE Stock via Pexels. Courtesy The Richmond Standard.

The Richmond Standard

Richmond Neighborhood Housing Services, Inc. (RNHS) was one of two Bay Area nonprofits awarded a $200,000 grant over two years from Bank of America’s Neighborhood Builders program.

The nonprofit also serves residents through education programs involving financial literacy programs, home loans, foreclosure prevention, and affordable rental counseling.

RNHS plans to use the $200,000 Bank of America grant to hire leadership staff, and to expand its Emerging Developers Program and Restoring Neighborhoods Program.

Through this grant program, RNHS will also benefit from comprehensive leadership training for its executive director and an emerging leader.

Since the Neighborhood Builders program’s inception in 2004, 59 nonprofits have been selected in San Francisco and the East Bay, with the bank investing nearly $12 million in philanthropic capital into these local organizations.

Along with RNHS, San Francisco-based mental health nonprofit RAMS also won a $200,000 grant this year.

“We’re proud to include RAMS and RNHS as the 2024 Neighborhood Builders,” said Gioia McCarthy, president of Bank of America San Francisco-East Bay. “Countless individuals, families and neighborhoods have felt the profound impact that these 59 Neighborhood Builder nonprofits have had in our area over the past two decades.”

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Activism

LIVE! — TOWN HALL ON RACISM AND ITS IMPACT — THURS. 11.14.24 5PM PST

Join us for a LIVE Virtual Town Hall on the Impact of Racism hosted by Post News Group Journalist Carla Thomas and featuring Oakland, CA NAACP President Cynthia Adams & other Special Guests.
Thursday, November 14, 2024, 5 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. PST

Published

3 weeks ago

November 12, 2024

Oakland Post

Discussion Topics:
• Since the pandemic, what battles have the NAACP fought nationally, and how have they impacted us locally?
• What trends are you seeing concerning Racism? Is it more covert or overt?
• What are the top 5 issues resulting from racism in our communities?
• How do racial and other types of discrimination impact local communities?
• What are the most effective ways our community can combat racism and hate?

Your questions and comments will be shared LIVE with the moderators and viewers during the broadcast.

STREAMED LIVE!
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Business

With Immigration Reform on the Table, Advocates Put Human Face on Calif’s Migrant Farmworkers

About 99% of the commercially grown crops consumed by people across the United States come from California, according to data compiled by the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA). Between half and one-third of the farmworkers who help to grow, tend, harvest and package these crops live in the Golden State. That’s about 500,000 to 800,000 workers. Astonishingly, 75% of them are undocumented.

Published

4 weeks ago

November 6, 2024

Oakland Post

Shutterstock.

By Edward Henderson

California Black Media

About 99% of the commercially grown crops consumed by people across the United States come from California, according to data compiled by the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA).

Between half and one-third of the farmworkers who help to grow, tend, harvest and package these crops live in the Golden State. That’s about 500,000 to 800,000 workers.

Astonishingly, 75% of them are undocumented.

“People are very afraid,” said Manuel Ortiz Escámez, a sociologist, audio-visual journalist, and co-founder of Peninsula 360, a news organization based in Redwood City.

“I hold interviews with people who later call and say, ‘Please do not publish anything, because I’m afraid of what could happen,’” he added.

Escámez spoke last month during a news briefing organized by Ethnic Media Services (EMS) that addressed the plight of migrant workers in California, particularly those who live in the United States without legal status.

During an election year when immigration is a polarizing issue with strong opinions on all sides, Escámez says the lives and critical contributions of farmworkers have been reduced to soundbites or barbs in Left vs. Right talking points.

The fervent anti-immigration rhetoric these debates generate can brew hate and motivate hate crimes and hate incidents against migrants, creating an atmosphere of fear and danger among California’s farmworkers, advocates warn.

In these situations, the debate shifts from the virtues of legal vs. illegal immigration to politicians scoring political points by finding a group to blame for the country’s problems.

“Power in politics needs to invent a physically and morally repugnant enemy who wants to take what’s yours because the feeling of emergency creates unity and the need of a savior,” said Escámez. “That’s why migrants have always been the ideal enemy of some U.S. political campaigns … and the data shows that it works.”

No matter where Californians stand on immigration, the contributions migrant farmworkers make to California’s economy and the country’s food supply are undeniable.

In February 2024, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) calculated that immigration will generate a $7 trillion boost to gross domestic product over the next decade. A vast majority of these contributions come from immigrants like California’s farmworkers who perform jobs and endure conditions many Americans choose not to.

“I’m undocumented with a sliver of privilege. I’m still in a precarious position, but millions of people would love to be in my shoes,” said Gustavo Gasca Gomez, immigration outreach specialist and a Stop the Hate coordinator at the Fresno-based Education and Leadership Foundation.

“I can work, and I have social security. But I can’t vote or leave the country and return without express permission. And before I was a DACA recipient in 2012 I was a farmworker right out of high school,” said Gomez. “The work is difficult. It’s hot, dirty and tedious. It makes your mind numb in many ways. But it’s a job that the entire country depends on.”

This resource is supported in whole or in part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library in partnership with the California Department of Social Services and the California Commission on Asian and Pacific Islander American Affairs as part of the Stop the Hate program. To report a hate incident or hate crime and get support, go to CA vs Hate. 