"I wouldn't have bought a house there" in Salida's Vizcaya neighborhood

My comments during the public comment period at the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors 9 am meeting on February 25, 2020:

”I wouldn't have bought a house there” are words that have haunted me since the January Salida MAC meeting. They were spoken by a county employee; an honest answer to a Salida resident who asked him if he would want to live near the various developments being planned around Hammett and Pirrone.

“I wouldn't have bought a house there” begs the question then – is that because we cannot trust the County to not allow development conducive to homes? Checking what is to be built in empty lots and farmers' fields around your home is not something most people think to do, myself included. When I purchased my home 27 years ago I did not check the county zoning to see what was going to be built in the vacant lot behind my home. I was absolutely horrified last year when plans were circulating for a 4-story hotel and that's not something that would have surfaced either had I checked then.

Several years ago, I had a conversation with Supervisor DeMartini about my neighborhood and he also honestly remarked, “They should never have allowed homes to be built there, it should all be industrial and commercial.” I was surprised when he said it, but the more I think about it, I have to agree. As I've mentioned in recent public comment here, I can hear Freeway 99, even with my windows closed – that's how close I am to it.

But it is what it is and there are thousands of homes on the east side of Salida. We've been pretty fortunate as long as I've lived there with one or two exceptions, the businesses built along Pirrone have been pretty quiet and not a nuisance to their neighbors.

But that will all change now if you approve the planned developments at Pirrone and Hammett. And here's why you should not: It is a stupid use of that land. The developer does not even have a gas station committed – he's trying to sell it to 7/11 or Circle K. There are gas stations at Pelandale, Kiernan and Ripon, we do not need one there too that will cause noise, light and air pollution on the Vizcaya neighborhood. The other projects include a fast food type restaurant, two hotels, and a mini-storage. I don't know how close the hotels are to the homes, but if they are close, that's a permanent invasion of the homeowners privacy. And a mini-storage on that prime freeway frontage location is an insane waste of land! We already have two mini-storage businesses in Salida and one is a ½ mile down on Pirrone.

Modesto has been complaining for years that they don't have anywhere to build a business park on 99 and here's this beautiful pristine area that would be perfect for that or even better, my husband's idea that he wrote to you in an e-mail about – create tourism with a San Antonio River Walk-type development. If you haven't already heard, Madera County is building one along the San Joaquin River. A San Antonio River Walk in Salida would bring much more tourism to the county than shooting pumpkins out of catapults or the Frank Raines ATV billboard currently up in Salida.

And that's nonsense that it was a “drafting error” and not included in the Salida Community Plan. Jeff Grover would not have been able to vote on the Plan if his cousin's land was included and oh, they just all of sudden call it a drafting error when after 13 years they haven't complained nor was it corrected in the County's recent General Plan update.

To sum it up, the buck stops with you – you are the ones with the binding votes. Put yourselves in our shoes and don't vote to make Salida just another ho hum gas station exit next to a neighborhood where you or your employees wouldn't buy a house there."

SALIDA CSA 10 TAX INCREASE

If you live in Salida and have Mello Roos taxes on your bill, you need to read this. Not only is the board that governs your Mello Roos bond looking to refinance, but Stanislaus County also wants to raise your CSA taxes! CSA is the acronym for "Community Service Assessment" and Salida has two CSA districts: CSA 4 which applies to the Amberwood neighborhood (Finney and Bacon area) and CSA 10 which applies to all the homes built since 1990 (i.e. Gold Valley, Murphy's Ferry) and ALL neighborhoods on the east side of 99 with the exception of Clarendon Woods and Morgan Glen Estates (the homes off Kiernan and Sisk up to Wallasey Way). Mello Roos applies to approximately 2,800 homes in Salida. 

The CSA 10 taxes (and it is a tax, but "assessment" sounds more PC to the County) is a tax you will ALWAYS have to pay. It does not end in 2030 like the Mello Roos does (or is supposed to if the board does not mess with it again.) 

Stanislaus County wants to increase your CSA 10 tax primarily because they nearly wiped it out when they used it to replace the trees and sidewalks on Pirrone. Whomever put the trees in front of the developments on Pirrone did not put in root boxes to train the roots to grow down and they lifted the sidewalks. So they want ALL of the CSA taxpayers to pay for that and raise your taxes. 

Fresno xeriscaping

Currently, the CSA assessment primarily goes to pay the County to do the landscaping around the developments, and maintaining every park in Salida except for Salida Park. Why should you pay more for the County to mow the grass around the neighborhoods when they could install xeriscaping that's drought tolerant and does not create green waste from having to be mowed? It's not like children play on the grass; it mostly gets used by dogs to relieve themselves. The City of Fresno used a grant to install xeriscaping on some of their landscaped center islands. Stanislaus County should do the same for Salida.

Again, have a say in the matter of your taxes and what they are used on. Look at the County's PowerPoint they shared at the October Salida Municipal Advisory Council meeting. They put a flashing sign on Sisk Road to notify people of the meeting, but I thought I'd do this post to let people know because really now, who actually knows what "CSA 10" means when they see that sign? And God forbid they spend any money to send you notices - geez!



Attend the upcoming meetings at the Salida Library Community Room to have a say before this tax gets increased on you.

Tuesday, November 12, 2019 at 7 pm for a special CSA 10 presentation
Tuesday, December 3, 2019 at 7 pm at the Salida MAC meeting
Tuesday, January 28, 2020 at 7 pm (last chance to give input at Salida MAC)

When the past comes back to haunt you

According to Lowell H. Beachler's book, "Wood Colony District", the first Grovers to settle in Wood Colony were Ira and Maggie Grover, who moved to the area in 1918. They bought a farm on Shoemake and are buried in the Wood Colony Cemetery. Several Grover families descended from Ira and Maggie's four children still live in Wood Colony today. 

One of their descendants, Jeff Grover, served on the very first Salida Municipal Advisory Council (MAC) board when it was formed in 1984. He was then elected to represent our community on the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors. In 2007, Jeff Grover pulled the Salida Now initiative off the ballot and was one of three "yes" votes needed to pass it into the new Salida Community Plan. 

The Grovers in Salida and Wood Colony are related. Jeff's cousin owns a landscaping business with locations in Salida and Modesto. And the Grover family owns a large tract of property off of Pirrone near Hammett.

And this is where the past has come to haunt us in the present and future.

I honestly believe that Jeff Grover tried to improve Salida by replacing the old Salida Community Plan (SCP) with the Salida Now initiative because it expanded Salida's boundaries and called for more beneficial aspects for the community like a recreational riverfront parkway along the Stanislaus River. He didn't know the economic recession was coming that caused the developer to pull out of the project and would result in Salida being frozen in time (2007) ever since.

But here's the rub: Jeff Grover would have been conflicted out of voting on the Salida Community Plan if his family was named anywhere in the SCP document - if they derived benefit - if they signed a Developer Agreement (DA). Oh, they most certainly would benefit if the SCP were activated - they own land in both areas of Salida - by Hammett and the landscaping business on Ladd and Stoddard. So now this is why the Stanislaus County Planning Department is saying it was "draftman's error" that the Grover Family Properties land was included in the SCP map. It's no accident it's there, it's a matter of convenience to now remove it because the Grover family wishes to develop it. It's a free country, so a landowner can sell their land at any time. But the benefit is derived when they can sell their land for commercial land prices, as it's now zoned in the SCP rather than selling for agricultural land prices.

And what they plan to sell their land for will create the tenth level of Hades for Salida. The truck stop/travel plaza they propose to put there will be a magnet for crime and

Grover Family Properties land with Vizcaya neighborhood
in background. Salida, California - November 2019

vagrancy that Salida does not have the law enforcement coverage to handle. In neighboring Ripon, the police told a Salida resident that 84% of their crime calls result from the truck stops located at Jack Tone Road. 

Even worse than the horrendous criminal impact upon Salida is the fact that the truck stop/travel plaza will be located just feet from the Vizcaya residential neighborhood. There is NO BUFFER that could be installed to protect this neighborhood from the 24-hour onslaught of light pollution, noise pollution and air pollution, let alone the criminal element just beyond a cinder block wall with no gate to the neighborhood. 

Additionally, the water well in Vizcaya was shut down several years ago due to being over the allowed level of arsenic contaminates. The way the well system was explained to me is the water for Vizcaya will be drawn from the next closest well. The only time it brings in surface water from the City of Modesto system is when there is high usage (like during the summer months). A truck stop is generally a high water user so will draw more from the system to the business in addition to creating the possibility of contaminating the water for the Vizcaya neighborhood. I say this because it is already happening at the truck stop in Ripon. 

Which brings up another glaring point on why allowing this project would be the epitome of bad planning: NOWHERE DO YOU FIND TRUCK STOPS BUILT NEXT TO NEIGHBORHOODS!  Just look at existing truck stops: Ripon, Madera, everywhere between here and Montana (as a Salida resident pointed out from a recent road trip), municipalities DO NOT build truck stops by neighborhoods for all the aforementioned reasons given. They know to provide the natural buffer of distance to protect the residents from the various pollutants and the criminal elements. 

Our community needs to continue to oppose this planned atrocity. Sign the petition, write letters in opposition and send to the Stanislaus County Planning Department.

Grover Family, I implore you - don't do this to Salida. Don't do this to your longtime neighbors. Develop your land for something quiet that will buffer the Vizcaya neighborhood just like all the other businesses currently on Pirrone.

Stanislaus County plans to rip democracy away from residents

On Tuesday, November 27, 2018, Patrick Cavanah, who works in Stanislaus County's Chief Executive Office, sent a letter to all of Stanislaus County's Municipal Advisory Councils (MACs) stating that the county planned to make an "administrative change" which will remove the freedom to choose who represents the people living in the county's unincorporated communities served by MAC councils. (Read the letter here).

The first Municipal Advisory Council (MAC) to be established in Stanislaus County was in Knights Ferry in 1983. The second MAC established was Salida in 1984. Salida MAC was founded due to rapid growth and development occurring in Salida in the 1980's. The purpose of the MAC as outlined by state law is to represent the community to the county's Board of Supervisors. At that time, the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors had the forethought and vision to establish our county's MACs as elected, as opposed to appointed. 

An elected MAC gives the community the right to chose who represents them, just as we vote for county supervisor, school and fire board members, state senators and representatives, federal senators and house congress reps, and even the president. It is the democratic way so why should local representation be any different?

Stanislaus County is seeking to change that and rip the democratic process from county residents who have the least amount of local representation already. 

Former Salida MAC Chairman, Don Murphy, described the issue succinctly in his Next Door post:

"When full term openings occur however, it is the basis for democracy that we get to pick our representatives. Even though the vote of the MAC is only advisory, the discussions and the actions of the MAC have engendered thoughtful discussion."

As a former Salida MAC member and chairman, I could not agree more with Mr. Murphy. So let's address the reasons why our county would want to make an "administrative change" to remove our right to vote. Mr. Cavanah states the following reasons in his letter:

"First, since 2003, there has been only one instance where there were enough candidates to force the election onto the ballot. This occurred in 2007 when five candidates ran for three open seats on the Keyes MAC. Second, MACs occasionally face issues with reaching a quorum due to a lack of members and/or attendance issues. Having an appointed body will provide a more flexible timeline to appoint members to vacant seats and allow MACs to implement attendance requirements. In addition, staff surveyed 20 counties in California, of which 12 use MACs. Of these 12 counties, 11 appoint members. Appointing members to MACs is in alignment with the long-standing practice of the Board appointing members to advisory boards and commissions."

Regarding the perceived apathy of the lack of people applying to serve on a MAC board, I think the fault for this lies with the county. The county does next to nothing to communicate to the communities served by MACs, what a MACs functions are, and how

people can apply to serve on it. I have lived in the unincorporated community of Salida for 25 years and NOT ONCE in a quarter of a century, has my household ever received from the county a single piece of mail or even an e-mail to educate the community about Salida MAC. Now are all communities treated equally? A resounding "NO!" Because the MAC next door to Salida - Wood Colony MAC - has had the county send snail mail to inform their residents of their MAC. Multiple letters too, the most recent letter was sent to households in May 2018 (see image at left). Do Keyes MAC residents also get letters sent? How about Denair MAC? South Modesto MAC? I don't know but I do know that Salida MAC does not. So how do people know what a MAC is, if there are openings, or that it even exists if it's not communicated to them?

Back to Salida MAC for a moment. Salida MAC has had an opening on their MAC board since August 2018 due to a resignation. The current chairman has announced the board opening at the last several meetings, but it has not been announced on social media or the Salida MAC reminder e-mails that are sent out. And the county has certainly not communicated to the community that there's an opening. Why? I don't know but since I seem to be the only one communicating this outside of the meeting, if you'd like to apply for the open Salida MAC seat, you must be a Salida resident and fill out this application. Follow the instructions and turn it in to our District 3 Supervisor's office. 

Facebook profile pic frame

The second reason Mr. Cavanah cites for the "administrative change" is his survey of MACs in other counties that are all-appointed. But what he fails to mention is how the residents in those counties feel about it. There's a whole movement including a Change.org petition and Facebook frames to change Alameda County's Castro Valley MAC from all-appointed to elected. All appointed MACs can serve as a crystal-ball-turned-cautionary-tale in that they tend to end up being made up of the appointing supervisor's campaign donors as noted in this article by the East Bay Citizen. Castro Valley has been battling for more representation for years and transparency in how their MAC council members are selected. Their supervisor finally allowed members of the public to view the interviews which is not something that occurs in Stanislaus County when board openings are filled mid-term by appointment. As you will see if you read these articles, their residents feel "failed" by the whole process.

Perhaps Mr. Cavanah received some objections to his dictatorial "administrative change" because he sent the following e-mail to the MAC councils on Monday, December 3, 2018:

"I appreciate all of the feedback regarding the proposed switch.  In light of this feedback, I am requesting all MACs vote to either support or oppose the proposal at your January meetings.  This vote will help inform me how to move forward.  Consequently, the resolution requesting the Board of Supervisors switch membership from elected to appointed will no longer be on the Board’s December 18th meeting agenda.

I will work with all MAC chairs and/or secretaries on what information should be included on the January agenda."

It would also be helpful if the people responsible, meaning the County and the MAC board members, communicated with the community regarding this change. The county should send letters to ALL RESIDENTS in a MAC district's boundary, just as they do for Wood Colony MAC -AND- the current MAC board members should use e-mail and social media to get the topic out and ask for feedback from their community. 

The Assets of Exits

The "Yes" is same font as the Scottish campaign
for independence in 2014

When I first read of the growing movement for California to secede from the United States, known as Calexit, I was incredulous and I must admit, a bit fearful. Understandably so because the last time that a state seceded from the union, it resulted in full scale civil war and the seceding states lost. My great-grandparents in South Carolina lived through those hellacious times. Born in the mid-1850's, my great-grandparents were children during the Civil War and both of their fathers fought for the Confederacy. One great-great-grandfather sold salt to his neighbors when the Union embargoed salt to the South. His estate was valued in the 1860 U.S. Census at $10,000 and then after the war in 1870, at $1,000. The other great-great-grandfather was a doctor and later became a South Carolina state legislator. Family stories say he was so traumatized from what he saw during the war, that he quit practicing medicine once the war was over. Did they have any inkling of the misery and suffering that was coming? Would they have left the South if they knew? In looking at the lessons of the Civil War, and if Calexit is approved, should we Californians plan to leave before a similar fate arrives for us?

Because if there's one thing I understand and empathize with, it's many of the Calexit reasons for leaving because much it of also applies to our little Salida. One of the primary reasons cited is that California pays more in federal taxes than it gets back and the same is true for Salida. Salida and Denair (and possibly Knights Ferry) are the only unincorporated communities in Stanislaus County that do not have a "disadvantaged" status. Very little of the property and sales taxes generated in Salida goes back into benefiting our community. Oftentimes, when I ask for something to improve Salida, I'm told by the County reps, "If we do it for you, we'll have to do it for everyone". Take speed bumps for example. Many Salidans have asked for speed bumps to be installed in areas where cars are speeding, especially near schools. In response to this, Stanislaus County Public Works created a policy that if a community wants a speed bump, we'll have to pay $4,000 for each bump out of our own pockets. Why can't some of the estimated $5 million generated in taxes by Salida pay for that?

Which brings up another similar issue between California and Salida - taxation without representation. Now before you go and point out how many U.S. House of Representatives California has - two words for you - Electoral College. We pay a disproportionate amount of taxes as compared to the amount of representation we have in the Electoral College. For example, a single vote in Wyoming is worth 3.5 times more than a Californian's.

Salida has a Municipal Advisory Council (MAC), which as it states in the name - is "advisory". No binding powers can be made on behalf of the community by the MAC council. The only one that can make binding decisions on Salida's behalf is our County Supervisor. But unfortunately for Salida, we are a minority population in the district. The City of Modesto has the majority population so when Modesto wanted to annex Salida in 2012, our supervisor supported annexation up until several contentious MAC meetings in 2013. Salida shouldn't have to march out an army of angry residents every time one person makes a decision we don't agree with. Salida should be represented by Salida and for Salida.

But perhaps the most significant commonality between the State of California and Salida is we both have assets that our governments won't want to lose, and that's why I think they will fight any attempts to self-govern. Look at how much of the west coast is within California's boundaries. And how many federal military bases are along that coast. The ports and the commerce that goes in and out of those ports. How about Silicon Valley? What about food? There are active silver and diamond mines in California. There's oil. There's natural gas. And there's even salt. There's not much the U.S. could do to California to hurt us in the way of embargo; they will more likely suffer with the loss of our assets. Which is why they won't let us go quietly into the night based on a majority vote. I think history will repeat itself and they will fight to keep us in the Union just as they did with the South.

If Stanislaus County wanted to, they could incorporate Salida into a city with just a piece of paper called a resolution. But they won't. Our county supervisor gave perhaps the most telling quote that the county won't help Salida incorporate when he said in 2011, "Moreover, we would avoid the expensive and inefficient duplication of services from adding a 10th city to our county, with another expensive city manager and layer of bureaucracy that we cannot afford."  Just who is the "we" in that "cannot afford"? He

Salida sits over the highest area of aquifer
recharge in Stanislaus County.

represents the county so assuming "we" is the county, is he saying the county cannot afford to lose the property and sales taxes generated by Salida?  Not only that, but how willing do you think the county would be to relinquish control of Salida's assets? We have two major transportation arteries that go through Salida: Highway 99 and Union Pacific Railroad. As he mentioned in his opinion piece, Salida also has several hundred acres of open farmland that the county could develop and receive 100% of the taxes from. Full build out of this land was estimated to generate $22.8 million in a 2011 consulting study. But the asset that is worth more than gold is water. Salida is poised over the highest area of aquifer recharge in the county and our northern border is on the Stanislaus River. 

Salida may mean "exit" in Spanish, but like our state, our assets will complicate any exit to future self governance.

The Inequity of Stanislaus County's Invisible Lines

My public comments to the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors on July 12, 2016:

Good morning Gentlemen, 

A long time ago, Modesto's “Water, Wealth, Contentment, Health” arch marked the city's entrance. As we know, the city has grown way past the arch in all directions. Some of the city's limits are marked by signs, but for the most part, all the city limits really are, are lines drawn on paper indicating invisible lines on the ground. 

Salida has it's own invisible lines denoted on paper called the “Salida Community Plan”. But Salida's invisible lines are not as strong as city lines. Salida's community plan lines are consistently ignored by the City of Modesto. And while Salida's invisible lines are supposed to give credence to Salida as being a “Community of Interest”, there's no guarantee that any designation other than being a city will protect land within our lines from being taken away from us. Everything but a city's boundaries can be ignored.

I was discussing Salida with a Ripon resident last week and he said that he would've thought that Stanislaus County would care more about Salida than it appears you do because it's the first impression that people get when they cross the river into the county. If you look to the left, it's not too bad. The businesses along Pirrone are well kept, but on the right, there's a big ugly pile of dirt in the world's worst location for a drainage basin, then a nice firehouse, then an ugly patchwork painted wall (albeit a graffiti-free one) then a dilapidated fence surrounding an unsightly wrecking yard, then a bunch of billboards with trash and refuse all along the railroad tracks. That's the first impression people get as they enter the county if they look to the right.

You the County have many more big problems to tackle than the aesthetics of Salida. Spending money on the thousands of gallons of paint it would take to make our soundwalls all one color is not even on your list of things to fix in this county. But its on Salida's list. We hate that ugliness; of course we do, we see it every day of our lives. And if we were a city, we could do something about it. 

If Salida were a city, we could be like Escalon and install wayside horns to diminish the blaring train horns that pass through town around every 20 minutes. Again, not something that's even on your radar but is important to us and would improve the quality of life in Salida. 

The thing I consistently hear from You the County anytime I ask for anything to improve the quality of life in Salida is that “If we do it for you, we have to do it for everyone” or “If you want it, you have to pay for it yourselves”. If you want speedbumps, pay for it yourselves, if you want a traffic light, pay for it yourselves. After hearing those replies so many times, I feel pretty confident in saying that the majority of Salida's tax dollars are not spent in Salida. And while I won't delve into the politics behind this in the few seconds I have remaining of Public Comment, You the County and I both know that Salida is at the back of the line for any grant funding for many years to come.

The only way I can see to improve the quality of life in Salida is to incorporate as a city. The only way I know of where our tax dollars will be spent in our own community is to become a city. The only way I know of to improve the northern gateway to Stanislaus County is to become a city.

You the County can't protect our invisible lines from being taken from Salida, but you could help us change the status of our invisible lines so they can never be ignored again. Thank you for your consideration.

Stanislaus County could incorporate Salida into a city

My public comments to the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors on June 28,2016:

Good morning Gentlemen, 

I think this current Board of Supervisors has enacted some very proactive and visionary things for the future of Stanislaus County. Like Focus on Prevention, or the pay increases for a future Board that might not ever apply to any of you. 

So today, I want to share what I think is a huge problem that lies in our future and ask you to decide if you want to be proactive and visionary about it and that huge problem is the future of Salida. On Thursday, June 9th, I received a call from the Planning Department at the City of Modesto to inform me that the City plans to revert to their 1995 General Plan boundaries. While that doesn't appear to be much different than the way things are as Salida is still within the City's General Plan boundaries, I was also told that this does call for a change in their Sphere of Influence and they plan to apply to LAFCO for an SOI that includes Salida Community Plan land. The City of Modesto currently has over 11,000 acres in their sphere of influence, yet they consistently go after the land that You the County set aside for us in the Salida Community Plan. I think it goes without saying, but no one in Salida is going to be ok with this. And the worst part of it is, even if every Salida resident showed up to protest it, that may not be enough for us to stop it from happening.

Modesto tried to annex Salida in 1997 and it was voted down by one vote at LAFCO. In the meantime, they cherry-picked Salida's tax base and annexed in the land that Costco and Kaiser are on. Then Modesto planned to annex us again in 2013 and were met with a resounding “No”. And here we are only three years later and they are back to cherry-picking the open farmland which is all they really want anyway.  It's proof positive that Modesto is never going to relent until they get what they want; and all they want is Salida's tax base of undeveloped land.

The future for Salida is dismal. If allowed to, Modesto will take all the Salida Community Plan land that's north and south of Kiernan. We will be walled in by Modesto on the East, which only leaves growth to the west which is NOT what the majority of residents of Salida and our neighboring Wood Colony want. I see this future as the death of Salida. It will have no where to grow which is a requirement for incorporation as a city. Nowhere to grow was one of the reasons cited as a denial of East L.A.'s incorporation. Salida will age and stagnate; and next thing that will happen is we will end up a disadvantaged county island that Modesto will be forced to annex before they can grow further west under SB 244 requirements.

There's only one way to stop the destruction of Salida and the sprawl of Modesto westward, and that's to incorporate Salida as a city. An online poll last year showed that 70% of Salida residents supported incorporation. But incorporating Salida is easier said than done. Trying to do it ourselves has the odds stacked against us. You the County, has all the resources we don't have. You the County, has our $150,000 set aside by landowners for our incorporation studies. You the County, would be the ones to negotiate tax-sharing so Salida can have it's tax revenue go to the new city. You the County, as shocking as this might be to you, can incorporate Salida into a city. 

On Page 2 in section 2 of Stanislaus LAFCO's Citizen's Guide to the Incorporation Process, it states:

“After meeting the basic legal requirements for incorporation, the proposal can be initiated in one of two ways. One way is through a public agency. A resolution of application can be adopted by the legislative body of an affected agency, which is defined as any city, district or county that contains territory within the proposed incorporation boundaries.”

Salida will never be the town that David Curtis dreamed of when he founded it in 1908 calling it “A Model Town”. It will always be the poor man's Ripon of Stanislaus County unless we can incorporate. We will never get grants to build a city hall like Waterford did. We will never have the police coverage that Hughson does and they are 6,000 people smaller than Salida. Hughson City Councilwoman Jill Silva told me the best thing Hughson ever did was to incorporate. 

Incorporation would be the best thing Salida ever did too. It would have a chance to be a charming city like Ripon. It would have a chance to be a safe city like Hughson. Its borders would be set to prevent the slide into poverty. A green belt could be put between Salida and Wood Colony. Salida would have a chance to be the city David Curtis dreamed of and the present residents want. Please consider giving Salida that chance. You have the ability and the funds to make it a reality. Thank you.