Redding has problems, but many posters seem to say that it is the same everywhere. That may be so, but while Redding seems to want to play the blame game, elsewhere is doing something about the problems.
I have posted here on aNewsCafe.com, and written letters about what Cheyenne, the Colorado front range. and Phoenix are doing to solve homelessness and affordable housing and jobs. It seems to have fallen on deaf ears in Redding.
Many blame the uneducated long-time locals, while others blame the liberal newcomers. The few who try to promote Redding are treated with negativity because they are not doing it the poster’s way. Now I read it is Bethel’s fault. Is it?
Even in areas in California that have been as negatively represented as being just as bad as Redding, many of those places are doing more to help the poor, but doing things like using empty storage sheds — as is done in Cheyenne and Phoenix –as one-person apartments. Some posters comment how how dangerous a storage shed is. Do they think a cardboard box under the freeway is safer?
Many areas have recovered from the recession, granted, some not as well as others; but Redding, again, according to some of the posts and articles here, is still stuck in a black hole. They blame everyone else.
Construction of homes is booming in Cheyenne, the front range and Phoenix. I see it with my own eyes. That means families are moving into subdivisions that the recession stopped, and now the homes are being built. Business parks are filling up, except for Redding.
Another sign of a good economy is how all the fast food establishments have high school kids working there. These are the starter jobs. My oldest granddaughter, a junior in high school, just went to work at Subway. Her boyfriend, also a junior, went to work at Wendy’s. These are their first entry jobs and they will save money to go to any number of community colleges.
El Mirage, a city half the size of Redding, and where I live, just hired three firemen and five police officers. On their website are all the services they provide the community, including vacation watches. My new neighbors leave their cars outside with the windows down. One neighbor has a Wrangler Jeep that only has the top shade on. That is how I used to leave my Jeep in Redding. Phoenix is the stolen car capital of the world, but apparently my neighbors haven’t heard.
The housing tracts are all clean everywhere. The cities have their own landscaping crews working all the time while the HOAs hire landscapers to service the yards. Rental property managers do periodic walk-through inspections to make sure no one is building a meth lab or other illegal activity.
Is Bethel the cause or the savior? I grew up in Salt Lake City when the Mormon Church had a strangle hold on Utah. Utah is doing well economically, and has changed many of its policies, some of which were like Bethel’s.
Instead of blaming everyone else, Redding needs to start its own recovery program. Can it?
I am not anti-Redding. I am anti the Redding that is posted on here, not the Redding area in which I lived for 40 years.
Bruce Vojtecky lives in Cheyenne, Wyoming
