I had a very discouraging conversation with a city council member over the condition of some of our neighborhood streets. You know, I was complaining about the area we’ve always affectionately referred to as “the college ghetto,” but I live across town, in a neighborhood full of property tax paying homeowners, and the same could be said about the streets, sewer, and drainage in my neighborhood. In fact, the houses across the street from me are in a designated flood zone, and those with mortgages are required to buy flood insurance, simply because the city has never installed drains along that section of our street. We were annexed in the early 1990’s, with promises of “services,” but only the new subdivision down the street has drains.
Oh yeah, and my neighbor Phil’s house, because he complained about flooding caused by a nearby new subdivision. And because he was a drinking buddy of the late Tom Nickel. Tom literally made that happen – don’t call me a liar, just drive over and look at it – they came over and put sidewalks and drains just in front of Phil’s property. I love Phil, and God bless Tom – of course that drainage was necessary – but just that section?
That’s how stuff works in the City of Chico, as you’ve seen with the new paving program – the squeaky wheel that knows who to squeak to gets the pavement. You read the news stories – at first they were going to “repave” in newer, high-end neighborhoods, but somebody pitched a howl, so they started looking for poor-people neighborhoods to slop their slurry. It’s all just bullshit anyway, they are not doing the type of work that is needed, just band-aid repairs on streets that haven’t been maintained properly or updated since people were still using horses and buggies.
I know at least one council member who has done a lot of tongue wagging on the subject of providing housing for low-income residents, but when I pointed out the fact that we have square miles of low-income housing that is in third world condition, his response was very discouraging. I’m not really blaming this person, I’m just saying, this is discouraging.
“The City definitely doesn’t do any inspections and is pretty hands off. We are updating our nuisance code with the goal of improving the look of downtown buildings, but there isn’t the political or administrative will to target slumlords.”
There it is, what I’ve said for years – Downtown gets a disproportionate amount of attention. How can they justify that when Downtown businesses don’t generate a fraction of the total city sales tax receipts? They used American Rescue Plan funding for parklets for Downtown bars – our city council has been hitting the bottle.
And of course, the new subdivisions going in around the outskirts of town are all getting new streets, while the center of town is sinking faster than Mexico City.
“the will to target slumlords…” This council member is quick to blame landlords. The worst slumlord around here is the city of Chico. The streets, sewers, sidewalks, street lights (or total lack thereof) and street trees are all the responsibility of the city of Chico.
So it’s time to go after Measure H. That was a total scam, and we all know it now. The Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act, which has made the 2024 ballot, will overturn Measure H. You know that’s true, because a group of legislators has mounted a campaign to require measures like the TPGAA to get 2/3’s of the vote. That means they’re scared, and they better be. More next time, on This Old Lady Needs a Better Bra to Drive the Streets of Chico.
UPDATE: Since this post is getting hit again, I’m going to ID the council member – Addison Winslow. Winslow has been a big disappointment so far .
Chico Taxpayers Association 
Back in the early 80s I went to Chico state and I lived in a duplex on normal street across the street from the Graduate. The house was in pretty decent shape it was clean it was well kept up it was the kind of place that was actually a step above the dorms and I felt like a pretty high-end student living there. Back in those times the Graduate was the Hotspot on Thursday nights. So we did have to deal with loud noise at 2 AM, the occasional fight, beer bottles in the front yard and people yelling and screaming at 2 AM when the bar let out. But beyond that it was a pretty good neighborhood.
Fast forward to about 2 years ago when I was driving by that duplex. From the outside the place looks like shit. It looks like it’s had no paint no landscaping and it truly looks like a crack den or a hell hole. There was a contractor truck parked in the front yard and the front door was open so I thought i’d stick my head in and see how the old place looked.
The words crack den don’t even begin to describe how bad this place was. Back in my day the place had been a duplex. 2 small bedrooms on one side and 1 small bedroom on the other side. The landlord had knocked down the wall between the 2 units and had somehow used some crappy sheet rock to create 5 bedrooms in that place. The contractor who was clearly illegal let me know that the landlord didn’t want to spend any money fixing up the place so he was required to buy paint and then water it down so it would use less paint.
I don’t claim to know anything about occupancy rates or building codes but I can guarantee you that if that place were to catch on fire and a bunch of unassuming stupid entitled college kids got burned out, their parents would have a field day suing the city of chico. And there’s 20 square blocks of that stuff.
Chico has always been a party school and it still is. When I was there they shut down Pioneer week and at the time I couldn’t figure it out. I thought it was a great idea to be able to party for a week in the middle of the semester with no consequences. I was young and I was wrong. But chico is still a playground for rich kids from the Bay area with a lot of alcohol abuse and a school that really doesn’t seem to do much other than talk about it. Downtown chico which once had businesses now almost completely caters to drunk college kids with trendy bars cheap alcohol bars with beer signs in the window and homeless people on the street.
The optimist in me looks at all this and says when you hit rock bottom there’s no place to go but up. Are we at rock bottom?
Wow, I think we went to CSUC at the same time – late 80’s? You said it – town has totally deteriorated. I remember it was a lot more vibrant all through my childhood and when I was at school, there were restaurants where you could afford a quick meal – Gina Maries, Sam’s, I can’t remember all the places we used to eat on very little money. But as an adult I’ve learned, cheap stuff doesn’t generate enough sales tax for a bunch of revenue hungry bureaucrats. They want Downtown for their cash cow.
For years now the city has talked about making a special “zone” downtown. I remember hearing the term “entertainment zone,” which would enable special taxes, fees and rules for restaurants and bars. Now they’re talking “historic district” – same thing – special taxes, fees and rules for businesses. This is so obviously not for the residents of Chico, it’s a really sad ploy for tourism, which is a questionable revenue source since it can cost more than it brings in. Especially if you got a bunch of idiots running it.
As for housing, I’ve realized – that’s probably the county’s responsibility, but I think the city should ask them to get a move on there, before the whole west side of town is knee deep in shit.
Unfortunately, I don’t think Chico will hit rock bottom, I think it will grow to the point of dysfunction, like so many other once-nice towns along Hwy 99.
One idea – if we can find them, maybe we can hire the A Team. Seriously, we can support the Taxpayer Protection Act, which would overturn Measure H. We need to hold council accountable – Measure H has no accountability. Much of the road work they’re doing now is funded through grants. And while they’re spreading slurry, there are projects like the Guynn Street bridge that have been on hold for 20 years. While they budget a quarter million (for starters) for an ice rink and discuss a “nuisance code” for Downtown buildings, they forget the “historic” sewers and water lines, which have already failed on at least two high profile occasions (sewage in the creek and collapse of a sidewalk that closed a popular business).
I’ll try to post more stuff about the TPGAA in weeks to come. Thanks for commenting.