By providing language interpretation at City Council and other important public meetings we will create a community of inclusion and outreach.  Currently the population of District 1 is approximately 78% Spanish Speaking including many non-English Speakers who want to participate in our City’s activities, programs and services but are excluded due to language barriers.

Ventura Avenue is a vibrant friendly community with many of us living close enough to walk  or bike to our places of work. But there are some industries that are not compatible with a neighborhood filled with children, schools, parks and the like.  Most of The Avenue is an historically disadvantaged neighborhood exposed to pesticides, dust from the rocklite bentonite & diatomaceous earth mines, and toxic chemicals and gases being manufactured or processed nearby. First and foremost we west siders need a safe and healthy place to live and raise our families.
To increase environmental equity and maintain livable spaces during this time of excessive heat and advancing climate devastation, we must plant more trees along our streets and in our yards and parks. Building Electrification is a must to maintain or improve clean air and health equity along the Ventura Avenue Corridor.</p

While the city has been improving the Westside broken streets and sidewalks, there is much work still to be done. No Parent should have to push a stroller into the streets to get around a mid-sidewalk telephone poll or to avoid a bicycle.  Ventura Avenue has been needing safe, practical bike-lanes for years, along with options for slowing traffic in the areas where children walk to and from school.  The street lighting on the west side is deficient, at best and on many side streets is entirely non-existent.

We must have safe crossings at busy intersections,  and properly paved alleyways.
Avenue residents take pride in our neighborhoods, but have been left behind by the City not fulfilling its duty to care for our infrastructure.  This will be an important feature of our work if I am elected to represent Council District 1.

Westside Residents over age 55 will remember learning to swim at the community pool far up the Avenue.  But after a devastating explosion and fire at Petrochem in 1974 a safety inspection closed down the pool at the former Mills School site. leaving west-siders without swimming lessons.  Avenue residents live from 1/2 to 2 miles from the pacific ocean, but a generation has reached adulthood without ever learning to swim. It is time for the City and School District to resurrect the Memorandum of Understanding that set aside money from the school and insurance paid to the city for the explosion’s emergency services costs and build a pool so our youth and adults can learn how to swim and have a space to cool down during climate driven heatwaves of the future.