Assembly Select Committee on Select Committee on Reconnecting Communities

Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for being here. Call to order of our Select Committee, the Assembly Select Committee on reconnecting communities. I am the chair of the Committee, Assembly Member David Alvarez, representing the 80th Assembly District, and I want to welcome you all and thank you very much for being here. This is the second in a series of three hearings that we will be hosting or holding. The first one was held last December in the City of San Diego, and today is a second hearing.

And on March 14, we will be in San Francisco for our third and final hearing. We anticipate that at the end of the three hearings, those interested in the work that this Committee is doing will have not only access to the testimony that will have been provided over the course of the three hearings, but also a report to the Legislature on the work that was done in the Committee, in addition to legislative ideas and priorities that will be introduced for the Legislature's consideration.

So I want to thank again, all of you, for being here today. Particularly, I want to thank the presenters, the panelists, which we'll have two panels today to hear from, excited to hear from both. While we were in San Diego, we got to hear some perspectives locally about some work being done in San Diego. We also had a chance to hear about what a sister city in Seattle and the State of Washington and the work that they're doing on reconnecting communities.

And also at that hearing, we heard from our transportation agency, Caltrans, and our MPO, SAnDAG, in our case, the San Diego Regional Association of Governments, where we heard about some of the work that's being done around reconnecting. There is some takeaways already that we have from those panels. There is also more work that will be coming and some questions that were brought up and remain to be answered from those panels, and that will be included in the final report.

But again, I want to thank you for being here today. Very excited to have this second conversation. And we have a fantastic set of panels to talk about, two additional perspectives of what's happening in two other parts of the state. And I certainly can't wait to hear directly from those that have been involved in this. The reports and the information provided ahead of time was useful, but I'm looking forward to the actual conversation here today. So I thank you for that.

So with that, let's get started. We'll call up our first panel, which is reclaim Japantown, Sacramento. I believe we have four individuals that are part of this presentation, so please come forward to provide your testimony as they are getting prepared. I just want to briefly overview from our first hearing, we did hear from researchers about the history of infrastructure, of this kind of infrastructure, highway infrastructure and communities, the redlining that occurred.

The research demonstrated the failed promise of urban renewal as a result of some of those projects. Again, we also learned about the work that others are doing, like in Seattle and State of Washington. We also heard a little bit about some of the work that is being planned statewide through our Caltrans state agency and also regionally in the case of San Diego. So we are here in Sacramento and are excited to hear about the work that's been happening here.

So with that, I'll turn it over to our presenters. If you have an order, please go right ahead. I know we have Ms. Priscilla Ochita, Michelle Huey, Joshua Kaizuka, and Jim Tabucci, all four of you here. So I'll let you go in the order that you prefer. And welcome. Thank you very much for being here. Yeah, just bring it closer to you.

Is my mic okay? Thank you. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to present today on the demolition of Sacramento, Japantown. My name is Priscilla Ochida. I'm the former Director of the Japanese American Citizens League, the oldest Asian American civil rights organization in the nation. My grandfather came here in 1907 from San Francisco after the earthquake, and he opened up a theater, movie theater in Japantown.

And then in 1923, he opened up the Wakano Uda restaurant, which was in operation until 1913, but the original restaurant was demolished when Japantown was demolished. We lived two blocks north of Broadway, and so my family's house, although is outside of Japantown, was demolished when highway 50 was constructed. So today we're going to be presenting the story of Japantown, which was the first ethnic community in California to be demolished as a redevelopment project.

In 1945, California became the first state in the nation to adopt a community redevelopment act. In 1952, California allowed local governments to Fund redevelopment projects without a public vote or approval. Following World War II, the City of Sacramento pioneered the use of redevelopment, often referred to as slum clearance, to demolish the city's most populated, diverse, integrated, and historic neighborhood in the city. The project displaced hundreds of minorityowned businesses and thousands of Asian, African American, and Latino residents.

After approving the Capitol Mall project in 1954, Sacramento's zeal for redevelopment continued to disrupt communities of color throughout the city. The Capitol Mall project targeted Sacramento's west end, which had long been subjected to the city's racist housing policies. The west end was created as a segregated community in the late 18 hundreds for Africans, Japanese, and Chinese who were excluded from other parts of the city strictly enforced. All white covenants confined persons of color to the area west of the state capitol to the Sacramento river.

So if you just follow from the west side of the capitol down to the river that used to be considered the west end is the film on. By 1890, the West End's Japantown had become both an agricultural and commercial hub for Japanese migrants in Northern California and was home to one of the most significant Japanese communities in the United States. By population percentage, Sacramento was the most Japanese of any American city.

By 1910, Japantown has successfully developed into a distinct and separate city within the city, Sacramento. Japantown was a cultural and commercial hub that served Japanese from Vacaville, West Sacramento, woodland, Marysville, Penrin, Loomis, Clarksfield, Wanna Grove, and Florin. And we're showing you some pictures of what was described as a slum. And as you can see, other than being primarily persons of color, the city, this neighborhood, Japantown neighborhood, looks just like any other city in the nation in the 1940s or 1950s.

By 1941, the Japanese community was about as American as any ethnic community in the United States. Japanese baseball and basketball programs served youth who were denied participation in school and white programs. Youth were involved in football, track and field, golf, swimming and tennis. Although Japanese Americans were not accepting to Boy Scouts of America, they formed their own segregated troops and competed against mainstream troops.

In 1929, the Sacramento Bee reported that Japanese troop 25 was one of the best in the Sacramento council Boy Scouts, having placed first in an efficiency contest with 75 other troops. Despite racial barriers, the Sacramento Japanese community was doing well. The road to Japan town's destruction was preceded by decades of anti Japanese discrimination. By 1892, Dennis Kearney, who led a successful campaign to exclude Chinese in 1882, brought his anti Japanese message to Sacramento. Atop a Sacramento.

Atop a wooden crate at K Street and Fourth Street, Kearney declared, japs must go. The drumbeat of racial discrimination against Japanese and other communities of color. Led by the City of Sacramento, the State of California and local newspapers continued through the 1950s. V. S. McClatchy, Valentine McClatchy, founder and publisher of the Sacramento B, was an early and vocal anti Japanese advocate.

Between 1906 and 1945, McClatchy was responsible for 90 anti Japanese editorial cartoons that appeared in the b. Trying to get to it, but I'm not getting there fast enough, I guess. In 1913, the Sacramento community of Florin became the example that led to the anti Japanese alien land laws of 1913 and 1920. Because of their agricultural successes, on May 71942 the Fourth army command issued orders for the forced removal.

zero, that's an editorial for the forced removal and incarceration of 8600 Japanese Americans from within the City of Sacramento, giving only a week's notice to report the memorial auditorium with only what they can carry. The first group of 3800 left aboard buses on May 131942 for the Assembly center of Wilderaga, Earl Warren continued the anti Japanese drumbeat. He was Attorney General of California and is notable for his anti Japanese efforts.

In 1942, he was a prominent proponent of the forced removal force behind the internment of Japanese Americans. Between 1944 and 1948, he filed over 200 escheet suits against lands owned by Japanese Americans, charging that the lands were purchased in violation of the Alien Land Acts of 1913 and 1920. The California Legislature appropriated $200,000 to Fund the attorney general's program to take property from Japanese landowners. Between February and April, 1942, the State of California terminated every Japanese American working for the state from their civil service jobs.

Over 300 Japanese Americans, most of whom lived in Japantown, were fired. On May 281943 the Sacramento City Council and mayor Tom Monk joined the Home front commandos to unanimously pass resolution 207, which stated, we are opposed to the return of any Japanese from concentration camps to their former locations, and we endorse the orders made by General John Al Dewitt of the Western Defense Command that all Japanese be confined in concentration camps and that they be not returned to any Pacific Coast state. This is a climate that existed in Sacramento as the city planned to demolish its west end.

Hi, Mr. Chairman. My name is Michelle Huey, and I'm with the Florin Japanese American Citizens League. So growing up, my grandmother told me stories about running home after school to help make beds at her family's hotel. And every time we passed the Crocker Museum, she would point it out and say, that's what my family's hotel used to look like. zero, sure, grandma. That's a pretty big hotel. Where is that now? And, yeah, so I always wondered where it was and what happened to it.

So I started doing research, and I learned that it was about 30 beds. And if you walk out of the front steps of the state capitol or the west steps of the state capitol, about five blocks, and you face the golden one center. That's where my family's hotel used to be. And then I learned that it was part of Sacramento Japantown, which I previously didn't know existed, and that that hotel and a second hotel that they tried to establish were demolished through redevelopment.

So, located on south of L Street, the West End's Japantown was bounded by Second street to Fifth Street, L Street to O Street, and after President Roosevelt's exclusion order was lifted. In December 1944, Japanese Americans began to return to Sacramento. While Japanese Americans were resettling in Japantown, Sacramento had already begun to formulate plans for the demolition of the neighborhood. In the 1940s and 1950s, city leaders and the Sacramento B began to portray the west end as a blighted, disease ridden skid row.

In 1949, Sacramento commissioned a survey of 244 blocks in the downtown area 65 blocks in the west end were identified as blighted. In 1950, the city established its redevelopment agency and identified 62 blocks in the west end of Sacramento as redevelopment area one. By 1950, Japantown had recovered despite its complete devastation during World War II. By 195480% of the city's Japanese owned businesses and homes stood in the eight block area between l and P streets and third and fourth streets.

Japanese Americans occupied over 50% of the living quarters and owned or managed at least 95% of the real estate or insurance businesses, 57% of the eating establishments, 40% of the grocery stores and 33% of the apartments, motels and smaller specialty shops. The west end was the city's business district and welcomed people from around the world. Despite its development as a segregated community, it was the city's most populated, diverse and integrated neighborhood.

The vibrant population of the west end was made up of 22% African Americans, 30% Asian Americans and 13% Latin Americans. However, the redevelopment agency characterized the west end as a full blown, three dimensional, horrible, filthy slum. The Sacramento B, led by publisher Valentine McClatchy, a well known anti Japanese activist, amplified the city's position. In 1950, the City of Sacramento proposed the Capitol Mall project, a plan to connect the state capitol building to the riverfront, a path that went straight through Japantown.

Realtor W. C. Wright challenged the city and said that redevelopment was not meant for a city like Sacramento that didn't have slums and that Japantown had homes as nice as in any other part of the city. After two years of debate, the redevelopment agency reduced the scale of the proposed redevelopment from 62 blocks to 15 blocks between Fourth and 7th street and K and P streets, an area that encompassed the entirety of Japantown.

The proposed project called for the acquisition of property through eminent domain powers over a two year period. The plan included the wholesale demolition of most of the area's buildings, the relocation of residents and the sale of project property to private investors. The plan's mission was to replace Japantown and the surrounding area with government buildings, shopping malls, commercial buildings and parking.

There was no information on property acquisition procedures, rehousing assistance or relocation compensation for western businesses or residents in the plan to help demolish the area specifically created for segregated minorities. The 7000 Japanese Americans living in Sacramento had been relocated to the Walerga Assembly center and then to the Tuli Lake wartime relocation center and often to a third prison camp. And in a matter of a few years, Sacramento was again attacking the community and we had to move. The Japanese community felt unfairly targeted.

The proposed forced relocation now came under the guise of civic progress rather than the former military necessity.

So my name is Josh Kazuka. I am the co President of the Florin chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League and also community organizer on various issues in Sacramento. I came to Sacramento in the mid 80 s. I had no idea that there was a Japan town or even a cultural district. Especially considering how diverse of a community we have here in Sacramento. I'm going to focus on some of the pushback that the community made against this redevelopment project.

Because there were voices that tried to explain that this was not okay and that it was destroying a very vibrant and cultural district. So the area designated for the Capitol Mall project was not a city slum. The city's intention to demolish Sacramento Japantown was clear. Japanese Americans, the NAACP, the Westside Community Association and leaders in the Latino community joined the fight against a proposed redevelopment plan.

Representatives of JACL, the Japanese American Citizens League, the Nisei Veterans of Foreign War, Japanese community leaders, merchants, property owners and residents convened at the Buddhist Church auditorium and organized JarSA, which is the Japanese American Redevelopment Study Association. JARSA was formed to do its own independent redevelopment research and to legally represent the community in negotiations. It created a $6,000 defense Fund and formed a 15 Member advisory board.

Sacramento's first African American attorney and civil rights icon, Nathaniel Collie teamed up with Mamoru Sakuma, who later became the first Japanese American judge in Sacramento to represent the west end residents. Anti Japanese sentiment was still a barrier and the community had little public support or public power.

The Sacramento Bee was relentless as a mouthpiece for redevelopment and the Capitol Mall project, which is endorsed by the Sacramento Chamber of Commerce, the Builders Exchange, the Association of Landscape Architects, the American Society of Civil Engineers, the Sacramento Area Planning Association and the League of Women Voters. On June 201954 the City Council held a second public meeting and a large number of residents, not just from Japantown, but from the west end, appeared memorial.

Sakuma argued that the Sacramento redevelopment agency had made no efforts to engage residents of the impacted project area. He accused the agency of having no plan beyond destruction of the area. He stated that the agency has been so evasive we can't put our finger on a thing. We are not interested in what the agency might do, can do, or will possibly do. We want to know what actually is proposed to be done. He admonished the agency for turning down offers to meet with JaRSA.

The Sacramento Bee continued to print political propaganda against minority opposition, running front page editorials and political cartoons ridiculing those in opposition. The Bee actually wrote, quote, any community leader who would reject such an opportunity might properly be called the representative of blight. JArSA and the NAACP asked the city to assist residents and businesses relocate. The Westside Community Association scolded the city for failing to provide relocation assistance or provide a relocation area for western businesses and residents.

Reverend EC Rigolato spoke out on behalf of the Latino Americans that non white residents of the west end faced racism and discrimination and were excluded from all white neighborhoods and they had nowhere to go. Henry Takeda argued, we sincerely feel it is reasonable and just for us to ask that appropriate safeguards be made by the Sacramento Redevelopment Agency to protect the economy and livelihood of those who may be dislocated.

Nathaniel Collie, representing 32 black business owners, feared that for, quote, whites only signs on new structures built under redevelopment would replace the alleged conditions within the, quote, blight of bigotry. Frank Yoshimura, representing the Nise, veterans of foreign wars, characterized the proposal as an abuse of power, of eminent domain and un American.

Despite these arguments from the West End community, the agency refused to guarantee minority groups that they would not be subjected to some pressure and prejudices if they attempted to move into certain residential areas in Sacramento. On July 1954 San Francisco developer Ben Swig proposed to Fund the development of a pedestrian shopping mall between Second and Fifth street and Ellen capital, the heart of Japantown. That proposal proved to be the final nail.

The City Council called a special meeting on July 201954 to make a decision on Swig's offer. Attorney Dean Itano, Director of JArSA, proposed the city set reasonable standards for altering, improving, reconstructing, modernizing and rehabilitating existing structures and allow us an opportunity to meet those standards and by this method achieve the objective of redevelopment. Toko Fuji, representing Sacramento JAcl, stated, Japanese Americans as a particular minority group are just barely recovering from the tragedy of the recent mass evacuation of World War II.

We hope that safeguards will be insured for every resident of Sacramento, regardless of his economic status, and that the City Council will defend the needs and rights of every person, regardless of race or color. In a final effort, Jarsa proposed to retain a one block section of the redevelopment area where Japanese American merchants could consolidate their businesses. Eleanor McClatchy and historic landmark preservationist maintained that the wholesale clearance approach failed to preserve a sufficient number of important landmarks.

The Sacramento Redevelopment Agency immediately dismissed the opposition, arguing it was an obstacle to large scale construction projects, and rejected any proposal that would not result in the total devastation of Japantown and the west end. On July 221954 the City Council unanimously approved the agency's capitol Mall project over the objections of the entire west end community.

Good afternoon. My name is Jim Tabucci and I'm the facilitator for the Sacramento reclaimed Sacramento Japantown organization. The community initially thought they had swayed city voters to spare Sacramento Japantown, a $1.5 million bond measure asking the public to pay for the initial cost of the Capitol Mall project failed passage in the November 54 elections. Within days of the bond measure's defeat, the Sacramento redevelopment agency went against the will of the voters and implemented a new funding mechanism approved by the California Legislature in 1952.

Sacramento became the first city in the state to utilize tax increment financing, which did not require a public vote. Tax increment financing allowed the city to use future tax revenues to pay for a city issued bond. On May 555, the Federal Government approved the financing plan, and on July 1956 the redevelopment agency issued its first tax increment bond of $2 million. The fight to preserve the community's sense of place and maintain a culturally and historically important neighborhood was lost.

Governor Gordon Goodwin Knight operated the crane that brought down the first building, a two story house near the corner of 6th and Capitol, on January 281957. By March 1961, all 310 parcels in the area had been demolished. Over 300 businesses and 4000 residents were forcibly evicted. Kanji Nishijima, owner of LNM appliances, and others questioned the city's calculation of fair market values for impacted homes and buildings. Appraisals did not reflect property improvements or pre condemnation values, and offers were below purchase prices.

The redevelopment agency also refused requests from property owners such as Toko Fuji to continue to operate rental properties until the buildings were scheduled for destruction. As a result, property owners suffered lost income as the building sat empty for two to three years. The destruction of the former Japantown was complete and thorough. Not a single building in the redevelopment area was preserved.

Gone are the Momo club and the Zanzibar jazz clubs that attracted Billy Holiday, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, who often performed at the clubs after their concert performances at the Memorial auditorium, uncommon in the 1940s and racially diverse clientele that were drawn to Japantown's jazz scene were also gone. The communities of color displaced by redevelopment were left to scramble for new homes and new sites for their businesses. Redlining and racially restrictive covenants existing in Sacramento's neighborhoods created limited options for those displaced by Japantown's condemnation.

For Japanese Americans, redevelopment meant a second forced relocation and the destruction of the community's city within a city. In 1960, Nathaniel Collie, Sacramento's first African attorney, argued that there are certain human values at stake here that we are not paying enough attention to. Usually minority groups. People are the ones who inhabit the areas first cleared by urban development.

But it seems to me almost immoral for a government to go in and tell a slum dweller, we're going to clear you out and then have him go out and face a closed housing market. Redevelopment created a human void. In 1950, over 4000 people lived in the census tract that included Sacramento Japantown. After redevelopment, only 377 lived in the area, a loss of population of 92%. The project initiated a redevelopment cycle that impacted minority communities in Sacramento.

Many of Sacramento's Japantown residents relocated to Oak Park, a neighborhood that became a redevelopment target again in 1973. Sacramento Japantown businesses relocated to the 10th street corridor, and with the construction of Highway 150, Japantown was destroyed a third time. The new Sacramento Japantown was later bisected by Highway 50. Downtown underwent multiple rounds of redevelopment, each phase removing another community. The property acquired by the city at fire sale prices, became the property of IBM, Crocker Bank, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and other large corporations.

Downtown commons that features the golden one center, the home of the Kings, and the Sawyer Hotel, were once part of Japantown. The heart of Japantown was located at 301 Capitol Mall, just six blocks of where we're sitting today. This property, which became the Sacramento Union building in 1968, afterward the Sacramento Union's demise. This building has been a vacant lot for at least 13 years. The area immediately west of Japantown became interstate five.

So throughout this presentation, we've provided a history of the systematic destruction of Sacramento Japantown. Just to share my own personal story, my grandfather moved here from San Francisco here to Sacramento and worked at the Sakayama dry goods store exactly at 301 Capital. He then moved to Stockton to open up the branch store there. And Stockton followed Sacramento's lead and also went through redevelopment. And our family owned building was taken by eminent domain. So here I was, and I remember this is clear as day.

As a four year old boy, I was sitting on my mother's lap in the front seat of our station wagon, watching the wrecking ball slam into our building and turn it into rubble. And with tears streaming down my four year old face, I told my mother I'm going to rebuild our store one day. But my story isn't unique. It was replayed hundreds of times as families lost their businesses and livelihoods multiple times, first through Japanese American internment, then through redevelopment, and finally by freeway construction.

We want to thank you for seeking to understand this story, and we welcome your comments and questions.

Thank you all. I appreciate your sharing the history, for sure, but also the personal connection really humanizes the impact and brings to real to life the decimation and destruction of the community. So thank you first of all for that. I think what was interesting for me, I love the way you presented the story. It was very well done, took us through some history and then sort of like walked us. We walked with you through what happened, and it led to.

I think for me, what it pointed out to is that these decisions don't just happen overnight. When we talk about eliminating communities because of urban renewal, redevelopment, or in the spirit of what has been claimed in the past of progress, we leave a lot of people behind or out of that progress.

We learned that in our first hearing, where our researchers from UCLA presented in depth analysis of the decisions that have been made time and time again with data of alternatives that in the case of highway systems, the state had as to where to place the highway systems. Similarly, you shared with us that there was originally, with redevelopment here, sort of a larger map, if you will. And yet the destruction time and time again happened to hit the Japanese community, targeted the Japanese community.

So I want to thank you for walking us through that and setting the tone as to how these decisions have been made in the past that have led to now, the repercussions that we live with, not only demolishing of communities and erasing communities entirely, but also the impacts that that brings. I want to ask you, because you didn't talk, and I'm just fascinated in learning more about what you hope or desire either as a result of where things stand today.

Specifically, if you have anything that you're working on towards the impacts that the highway systems had and anything that you'd like to share about any of the work that you're doing around that space.

Yes. The formation of reclaimed Sacramento Japantown is not just a memorial, it's not just a recognition of what was in the past. But we hope that there will be some action that's taken, led by our team, but not just including our team, what we regard the west end as being is not just a Japan town, but actually a multicultural, multiracial area of the city.

And so if you look at the Sacramento region, it's often claimed to be one of the most diverse places in the country, if not the world. And yet because of this redevelopment, it is no longer integrated at this part of town.

And so part of what we're thinking is this is not just a Japantown type of issue or opportunity, but this enables us to then bring in partnerships from our Latinx and from Filipino, Chinese American communities, African American communities, to really bring together the city not only in a diverse way, but also in an integrated way. And so we have hopes that in some way there would be a celebration of bringing that part of the city back in this multicultural way.

We have some initial just kind of glimmering in our eyes of possibilities, but it could be something like an international marketplace, where there are restaurants and shops and artwork and community centers and monuments and art that all comes together to really celebrate not only the diversity, but reintegrate the community as it once was back before redevelopment.

Yeah. And you all, I think, mentioned examples of private enterprises that were essentially ended as a result of what happened, as we talk in this Committee about primarily public space or utilizing public assets. Just curious as to thank you for sharing about what you intend to do in terms of bringing people together more for opportunities to exchange, maybe culture, but also exchange commercially through opportunities, but on the public side, as those are the sort of things that we have more purview over.

Just interested in hearing your thoughts of what you would imagine that to look like in the public sphere.

So we imagined the sort of space where he had been talked about to be where we can share. We have venues for music, like jazz music that used to exist in the Old West End, but also we're still formulating. But is there a possibility for housing, affordable housing for disadvantaged communities impacted because there's still a west end community, it's just much smaller and much more distributed now, but there still exists a disadvantaged community in what used to be the West End that needs services.

So one of the things by having this international marketplace is international space. It would also be an opportunity to have community services here that we know assess Center for bringing together community services for what used to be the West End.

You all talked very well about some of the impacts that happened. Are there any things that you can point to that maybe were positives? I mean, there was clearly no just compensation in any way for what happened with the loss of property and businesses and all of that is there anything in the work that you've done that was a potentially good thing because we always want to try to find the good as well and use that to help us move forward.

Is there anything that you've discovered in your research and in talking to family and in talking to others about something that you'd like to share and leave us with today?

So it's interesting. We started looking into this project a while ago, and it's come to our attention that the City of Sacramento recognizes that the West End was a very diverse, lively, and an important part of what made Sacramento. They're actually asking for ideas to revitalize the Capitol Mall area, which is encouraging. But there's some potential with the city now understanding that redevelopment wiped out a very important part of Sacramento, I think this can bring our communities together.

There's got to be some public spaces that are not owned privately. That might be something that we can think about getting back that are within the bounds of what used to be the West End. Because as we've talked about, it's not just about Japantown. It's about this diverse community, which included the black community, the Latino community, the Filipino community, Chinese community, and, of course, Japantown.

And there's got to be a way where we can create public spaces and maybe some business opportunities for our local communities of color to bring back what was once a vibrant west end. And I think there's a potential for that if we really look into what kind of public spaces are available and for development of those spaces.

Well, I want to thank you. Before we move on to the next panel, I just think it's important to reflect that sometimes, and you've done one of the best jobs, as I've read about efforts throughout the state about reclaiming spaces that were unfortunately lost due to. Again, in the case of our Committee, we're focusing on what highways did to a lot of communities, and it impacted this community as well.

But we haven't been able to find a lot of very direct stories, and what you've done, I think, has really captured that history well, because I think that's the underlying story of probably many places throughout the state that you've had the fortune of being able to research and to share with us. So I thank you for that. And others maybe have not because those communities were completely displaced and the stories have not been told.

So thank you for setting the foundation and being part of this conversation and certainly look forward to your continued work. Thank you very much for being here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks so much so now we'll move on to hear about another community and some efforts that are happening in the Pasadena area. In Pasadena, we have the example of Sr 710. The 710. And I think we'll see some visuals. I've already seen some visuals in our report about what happened there. The 710 was part, if I remember correctly, of the UCLA research on some of the decisions that were made on where this highway went and what it did.

And so I'm looking forward now to hearing, I've heard the history, now this Committee has heard the history, and now what's happening there today and the hope of what can happen. So I'll turn it over to you all. Thank you for being here. And please, whatever order is best for you. And please introduce yourself.

Absolutely. My name is Brenda Harvey Williams, and I'm an assistant city manager with the City of Pasadena. I want to begin by, first of all, thanking you, assemblymember Alvarez, for this important work that you and your Committee are doing. And we're very grateful for the opportunity to come here and to share our story. Pasadena's story is that we were bifurcated by the construction of a freeway in the 1960s.

And we now have this exciting opportunity to enter a thoughtful process to repair our city because this land has been returned or relinquished to Pasadena, where the freeway was not completed by Caltrans. And we are very thankful for that. Today we have here a number of our three other colleagues with me, and I'll allow them to introduce themselves when they do speak. But we are very grateful.

And I wanted to mention to Caltrans for their collaboration and support for this opportunity for having this land returned to Pasadena. And we now have the opportunity to revision and reconnect our community. And I will now turn it over to David.

Thank you, Brenda. Honorable chair. My name is David Reyes. I'm one of the assistant city managers with the City of Pasadena. And it is our great pleasure to hopefully present a story of hope and one of perseverance. This is a unique opportunity that we hope to be a model for this state. We are in a little bit different position than the first panel, although we could learn a lot from their research.

They have done a tremendous amount of work, and it was really inspiring to see that we are at the beginning of that process for our specific area. But this is really going to be a collaboration between the city, its residents, Caltrans, the Federal Highway Administration and other advocates for how to reclaim, how to reconnect, and how to revision an area that's really been displaced by the wrongs of the past. So with that, I'll turn it over to Wendy.

Thank you, David. Thank you, chair Alvarez, and to your Committee. Thank you for inviting us to talk about our 710 project and the reconnecting communities planning grant process. Let me see. Here we go. Here we go.

I will begin with a brief background of the 710 stub, which starts with the date of November 181964 when the California Highway Commission determined the final 5 miles of the state route 710. The freeway was meant to go through the communities of El Serino, South Pasadena and Pasadena, but numerous administrative proceedings, court actions and legislative initiatives from cities like South Pasadena stalled the construction in cities south of the stub. As a result, by the early 1970s, the 710 stub was constructed, but only in Pasadena.

The construction of the stub displaced thousands of residents and divided a residential community from the city's very active central business district. Here are three aerial views that show the seven 10th stub area before, during and pretty close to construction of the 710 stub. As you can see, the change of the city's layout in the span of approximately 10 years was significant. Homes, churches, institutions, all disappeared. Here is an old Pasadena planning map from 1935.

As we can see, there was quite a concentration of African American, Mexican American and Japanese American communities in the section of the city where it was decided that the seven 10th stub would run through. The current location of the seven 10th stub was selected by state and city officials and obliterated large portions of Pasadena's communities of colors.

We know now that the seven 10th stub route could have taken a different trajectory to a second route option, which would have caused significantly less displacement of the city's residents.

Unfortunately for many of the displaced residents, relocating within the city and other neighborhoods proved difficult. Most were limited by restrictive covenants, redlining tactics, segregation, and lack of available housing. So fast forward to November 26 of 2018, when the State Route 710 North Project Final Environmental Impact report was released by Caltrans, where they identified that the TSM and a TDM option was a preferred alternative for this corridor. This demonstrated the transportation solutions and strategies had significantly changed since the 1970s, when the 710 stub was constructed.

Transportation agencies no longer want to displace communities with large transportation projects. As a result, legislation introduced by state Senator Portantino and Assembly Member Holden passing SB seven and AB 29, respectively, where it amended the California street and Highway code allowing the CDC to relinquish the portion of the 710 that is contained within the City of Pasadena. But first, the city and Caltrans would enter into agreement providing for that relinquishment. Additionally, a transportation feasibility study was part of the process of securing an agreement from Caltrans.

This relinquishment essentially eliminates the possibility of a future 710 north freeway connection with Caltrans, relinquishment of their former 710 stub in June of 2022 and the actual transfer of the property to the City of Pasadena in August of that same year. The city was tasked with planning and redeveloping this piece of land to best serve the community. Excuse me.

With the land in hand, so to speak, the Pasadena City Council created the reconnecting Communities Advisory group and appointed residents to collaborate with city staff and consultants to create a vision and a plan based on the five City Council goals for the project, which include equity, environmental justice, community engagement, climate resiliency, and fiscally responsible land management. The reconnecting communities 710 Advisory group will continue to collaborate with city staff and consultants to create a vision and a plan.

And here with us today is the 710 reconnecting communities Advisory group chair, Danny Parker. We would like to invite him to speak and share about his role with the advisory group.

Yes, thank you, and it's quite an honor to participate in this process and really want to applaud these efforts to bring to light some of the historic inequities that still face us today as a society and respective communities. Again, my name is Danny Parker and it is quite an honor to serve as chair of this task force that Wendy just mentioned. I am a native of Pasadena and I had a lot of experience and exposure to the areas where the 710 stub now sits.

I went to elementary school at the southern terminus of the stub I went to a church that was located at the northern terminus of the stub until 1967. My father worked in the area where the freeway sits for an aerospace firm. In the 1960s, my parents bought a car from an auto dealer that was located where the freeway stub now sits and then would go back for service, as well as just generally frequent businesses in the area.

So I definitely have an extensive familiarity with the area. Prior to the freeway, I also grew up hearing stories at the dinner table about the area and what it was like and some of the impact. And just to finish the thought as briefly as possible, which is always a challenge for me, is I'm a product of Pasadena schools, private and public. As for the task force itself, as I said before, it is quite an honor to serve as a chair.

We have a very diverse 16 Member group that represents so many different backgrounds, ethnically, experience wise, business wise, and they bring so much thoughtful discussion to the table. It's quite beneficial over the past year that we've been meeting since April of last year, we're developing a camaraderie that I think will serve us well as we face in the future increasingly complex and potentially contentious issues.

But to use a bit of a cliche, I think we are developing a bond and a familiarity that will give us the ability to disagree without being disagreeable. Our General role is to provide input to the city staff and the consultants and work with them, as well as to provide that community input and community backdrop. And to that point, I really want to applaud the City Council for providing a very specific mechanism and conduit for community input.

I would say at the core, our role and responsibility is to solicit, to hear and to amplify the voices of the entire Pasadena community, because this is a major, incredibly impactful project that impacts the entire community, not just those nearby. With respect to community involvement, I think substantively it always makes projects better. Hearing diverse voices and opinions can surface issues, nuances and details that might otherwise be missed.

And I think in this role, in the way that City of Pasaden is approaching this, it merits applause by ensuring that. And it also sends a symbolic message that everyone will have a figurative seat at the table in the process, which I think is important as well.

And lastly, and one more slicing or characterization of our task force and its role, it's to be a conduit of information, getting information out to the community about what we're doing, as well as hearing from the community about what we could be doing. Last point I would like to raise or last sort of bucket would be that there are multiple stakeholders in this process. There are residents both in the immediate neighborhood or vicinity, as well as citywide.

There are businesses impacted and those that may wind up relocating and in some cases, hopefully coming back to that area. We have community groups, including churches and nonprofits, and we have government at multiple levels, municipal, regional, state and federal. And part of the goal and responsibility of the task force is to manage expectations of all those stakeholder groups and understand we're trying to get input from all segments of our community and not that any one group will have outsized influence.

And ultimately, we need to aggregate and synthesize those various opinions and make sure that that final result that we come to reflects and integrates those varying opinions. And I think that makes for ultimately the best type of product and best end result in this case a master plan, or specific plan, as the case may be. And ultimately, we want to never lose sight of a bit of a north star that we have and that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.

It's located a couple of blocks from old Town Pasadena, which is a vibrant economic engine for Pasadena, if not all of Southern California. And as such, it creates a tremendous challenge and a tremendous opportunity. And we're determined to meet this most important of moments. And with that, I thank you. And again, it's quite an honor to participate in this process and we're really looking forward to not just making history, but being a guiding light and a reference point for the entire state.

Thank you, Danny, and I will continue with my presentation here. Now I'd like to move into the federal grant process. In 2022, the bipartisan infrastructure law established a new reconnecting communities pilot discretionary grant program, which was funded with $1.0 billion over the next five years. It is the first ever federal program dedicated to reconnecting communities that are cut off from opportunity and burdened by past transportation infrastructure decisions.

The timing of the pilot grant program worked in the favor of Pasadena with possession of the recently relinquished 710 stub. Securing a planning grant from the reconnecting communities pilot program helped the master plan process gain even more momentum. There were various partners during the relinquishment and the reconnecting communities grant application process as we went out into the community to inform the city's regional partners about the importance of the sub.

The Caltrans district seven office, the CTC, the Federal Highway Administration and the office of La County Supervisor Barger were instrumental in helping the City of Pasadena build its case for the importance of this planning project. On Friday, April 21 of 2023, the city hosted Christopher Coe's US Department of Transportation's Assistant Secretary of Transportation policy. Mr. Cose took a brief helicopter tour of the seven 10th sub and surrounding area and received a PowerPoint presentation regarding our application and award.

We thanked Mr. Coes for his support and made him aware of the city's future resource needs for project implementation. On February 282023 the Department of Transportation announced the first round of the Reconnecting Communities program's grant awards. Pasadena was awarded the maximum $2 million planning grant to assist with future planning of the area and was one of only three cities in the entire state to receive one. Funds will be used to support the study of transportation and land use needs related to the future development.

The three year planning process, which will include a feasibility analysis and vision planning, will ultimately result in a 710 northern stub site specific plan. The goal is to develop a collaborative plan for the 50 acre site that will take a restorative justice approach while coordinating land use, housing, and transportation needs reflective of the city's existing and future population. And so, with the task as big as the one in hand, professional support is necessary.

The historic project portion of the master plan aims to acknowledge and document what happened in history to the Pasadena communities during the construction of the 710. As part of the master plan, the historic portion of the process is very important to the city. It has been broken up into three sections. The first, which is a historical data setting portion, will look at and document the historical data of what existed before the stub, like homes, schools, businesses, and institutions.

The second part, known as the oral History Project, will identify persons and sources with direct knowledge or experience of the freeway expansion and displacement. This particular portion of the historic project will also focus on locating individuals that might have direct ties and will consist of a oral portion where they will be interviewed and their interviews will be recorded as part of the project.

Lastly, the impacts of freeways on segregation in Pasadena will look at zoning, redlining covenants, and the overall impacts the freeways had on the Pasadena community.

They include a community engagement strategy which will be inclusive of all community Members, a restorative justice framework bolstered by the work of the historic project consultants a restorative justice framework I'm sorry again, bolstered by the work of the historic project consultants. The data collection part of the scope will survey the existing 710 conditions and provide 3d modeling of proposed solutions. The economic study and market demand analysis will identify market supported land use options that can help realize the city's economic development goals.

The mobility and circulation analysis will include defining and identifying mobility and circulation options. Land use options will incorporate what is heard from stakeholders and will consider elements addressing urban form, community and environmental health, public assets, transportation and mobility, to name a few. Lastly, the climate resilient infrastructure plan will provide input and direction of climate resilient city commitments and prioritize of opportunities based on levels of success.

The next steps as we continue through the Master plan process include annual updates to the California Transportation Commission continued discussions with the 710 Advisory group of potential uses, massing scale and broader community engagement continued coordination with Caltrans and stakeholders, the ongoing and continued process of the historical report and master plan development process, and quarterly updates to the Pasadena City Council. Also, we are very happy to come back to see you and give you regular updates as needed.

We want to say thank you to the groups and to the agencies that continue to grant us support. We want to say thank you to the reconnecting communities pilot planning program to Caltrans, the reconnecting communities 710 advisory group and our consultants who are guiding us through the master plan process. And so the city looks forward to participating in the state's reconnecting communities highways to Boulevard's process for future assistance as we work to develop the 710 stub. This concludes my presentation.

I'd be glad to answer any questions.

Thank you very much. Again. I was really looking forward to this discussion. Obviously very important discussion the previous panel, but one of the reasons why I requested the speaker to create this Committee is to share more information. As I know there are communities like the one that I grew up in and I live in now in Barrio Logan Logan Heights, where the five freeway came in and demolished, displaced and divided the.

So I actually started this work formerly a City Council Member in San Diego and then just as a resident, being active in the community. And so when I came here to the Legislature, I just thought, like, now I'm in a place where I can help bring this conversation together.

And I was really looking forward to your presentation because what I hope is that this Committee, through the questions that I'll ask now, but also the report that we provide, that we can help others who might be wanting to engage in this kind of work, learn from the best practices and learn the steps of what needs to happen in their own backyard. So you have a big responsibility right now to help us all understand sort of how you got to where you're at.

You did a great job of walking us through it. But I have some more specific questions and anybody who like to answer, please do. So I guess the first question, to sort of lay a little bit of foundation, can you pull up a slide that best depicts what the stub looks like? I'm looking at slide number 11 and wondering if that's the one, because I am not familiar with this portion of the 710. So just to help us sort of see what it looks like.

And then I'd ask you to describe its scope and size. Do you know which one is the best visual that you can share with us?

I think 11 is a good slide to go to.

And I'll start. Honorable chair. While that's being pulled up, it's about 50 acres of potentially developable land, which is, for a city like Pasadena, which is built out, is massive. Like, this is a massive planning opportunity for us, but it creates many, many challenges. I think that was the one. I think that's very nice there.

And really, if you look at the third bridge at the top of the screen going down to sort of the last bridge, and it goes a little bit further, actually, out of screen there. There's different elevations. And the challenge is it's actually referred to as the ditch in the city. And with the recent rains, it's sometimes referred to as the pond.

Sorry to interrupt. I'm going to probably interrupt you a lot because I want to get clarity. There are no vehicles that traverse this whole section that you're showing us here?

That's correct. They stop right at the northern terminus there.

And it's all the underpasses. But what about those overpass bridges? Are those local streets?

Those are local streets.

Okay. And they are utilized today.

They are utilized today. Incredibly clear picture. I'm not sure why there's no cars.

Yeah, there is nobody there.

The 50 acres, as I was saying, is challenging because it's not flat land. It's not a rectangle. It really is this incredible. That's a nice one as well.

Yeah, I think what we really see is this discussion about the feasibility of. Do we fill in the ditch? Do we fill in portions of the ditch? Are we going to cap it and build on top of that? All of those things remain to be seen. But in terms of area, and to answer your question, really, it's 60 acres plus, but potentially developables is about 50.

And it goes from that green, maybe some trees down at the. Is that the south or the east?

Yes.

California to union. To union. That's sort of where the freeway starts, if you will. Got it. You mentioned, and I might bounce around a little bit here, so excuse me for that. You mentioned the CTC, and I saw that you're going to be doing regular updates there as well. Tell me about their involvement and maybe others involvement in the process as you were going.

I think sort of right now, the promised land for people who are not where you are is let's get a grant to begin the planning. Right, which is the stage you're at. How much of that was like, did you have to have support? I saw that you had some matching funds. Where did that come from? What is the CTC's role in that? Your local municipal planning MPO, your city was a part of this. It sounded like your supervisor was involved.

Can you share a little bit more about that?

Before I talk about the grant, it was a complex process for what we call relinquishment to have happened because the city didn't own it. We weren't sure if the state owned it. Did the Federal Government own it because the federal highway Administration put in dollars for that to happen. And so we knew that by deed Caltrans owned the property, but they didn't acquire it by themselves. There were federal highway dollars involved. And so there was a lot of sort of background understanding.

There was a lot of discussion, a lot of negotiation, a lot of back and forth. When it became very clear that from a feasibility standpoint, the freeway was not going to be constructed, we immediately went to work and said, well, it's in our backyard. How do we reconnect? How do we do this?

And so through the help of the Legislature, you saw the honorable Senator Portantino, as well as Assemblymember Holden helped draft bills and legislation that allowed this process where it was actually the California Transportation Commission that ultimately granted the relinquishment. And so we, along with Caltrans, worked closely in concert with, and we're lucky to be joined in the room by Mr. Tony Harris, who's a former Director of Caltrans District Seven, but who was instrumental in helping us understand that process because it hadn't been done before.

And so we did break new ground. And I would say that anybody in this sort of world, this beginning process step, it takes collaboration between local, state and federal agencies together. The collaboration, the working together on the left, we see Mayor Gordo along with, we do see Hillary Norton from the CTC, who's also in the picture.

So we see the Federal Government, we see the state government, we see our county government, and we see our local elected official all working hand in hand to make sure that this happened. And so once the relinquishment was done, and I know I talked about that very quickly, but that's when we realized that to do the planning, there's dollars involved for sure.

But the reality is, without having the hard discussions that Danny talked about, of acknowledging those past wrongs, of having a city, your first panel was fantastic. They were residents. And so here we are, city government saying we need to acknowledge the past. We need to understand that in order for us to move forward.

And I think that that's a key for any project like this in the state, in the country, you have to have everybody sort of walking hand in hand and being able to acknowledge the ugly past because the stories are the same no matter where you're at. Throughout the state, people of color were displaced.

Thank you, Mr. Harris, for your service. Our district directors are always wonderful at Caltrans. I know ours have always been. I ask these questions because, again, this is meant to be hopefully of service to others. Your reconnecting project is a little bit different than some of the ones we're looking at in San Diego. We're talking more about lids or caps because of the way the topography is. But there are some talks about some potential relinquishment of some state route systems.

And so I appreciate you giving sort of, it's important that you share that process that you went through, because there might be people out there that are going to have to go through and answer the same questions that you all sort of answered. And so we want to definitely make sure we capture that as part of the testimony here and in our report. Now going to the award, I'm definitely familiar with the reconnecting federal program, because we're trying to receive some of those awards locally.

The matching, getting to the specifics on the matching, can you tell me about how was that also state support or was that local support? And was the grant. I don't remember, although I've signed on to letters of support. Did it require a matching and were you more competitive? You were matched. Is that how it worked?

We had to have the matching portion, and it was a 50% match. We knew that the planning was going to be more than $4 million. We did an estimate at the early stages and came out to about 4.5 million. With the relinquishment came $5,000,000.01 time from the state. And that's really towards long term maintenance and other things. We are going to use some of that money to help Fund the planning studies. Others will come from the city's General Fund.

But the matching grant was a requirement at the federal level anyways. The 50% for the planning side, there was an infrastructure grant for reconnecting communities. I believe Long beach received over $30 million. They were much farther ahead in the process than we were, and they're ready to build. I'm not sure there was a matching grant there, but ours did come with the 50% matching grant.

Okay. And as you all think of other things, please share more information, the better. I'm just looking through the presentation. Some questions that I've sort of thought of. When you made your application, did you apply with, by the way, I think the breakdown of your planning process is to be commended. I think it's certainly the work that wasn't done when these highway systems came to be. And you've clearly identified the work that needs to be done in terms of engagement and all of that.

Was that something that came after you received the grant, or was that all part of your application? That whole process of what you were going to do to engage the community to create a plan for this project?

Assembly Member, I think it was all done simultaneously. We are very fortunate to have a very thoughtful City Council, mayor and City Council. And it was very important to them that however this process developed, that they set the guiding lights as to what the goals were. So they were developed really in conjunction with the grant, and especially when they set out to appoint the advisory body of citizens. They really wanted to give them some clear direction.

But it was very important to them that they understand the past, that they understand how we got here, so that we can look to the future through the lens of what happened in the past, and that's why restorative justice is a piece of this. And we think that's very important that we know what happened and we want to be careful not to do it again.

And it is so sad to see, as we listen to the group before us, to see what has been done throughout our state and really our nation time and time again. It's the same game plan. But I think our City Council did thoughtfully try to consider all the ways that we make amends for the past as we move forward in planning for the future.

Just add, chair Alvarez, that we wouldn't have received the grant alone. We applied as a partner with Caltrans. They were a direct partner with us. And I think that really put us over the top and having that partnership instrumental in showing that we're going to move forward together.

Yeah. I am not familiar with all of the demographics and data of Pasadena and certainly not of the adjacent communities. Can you share with me a little bit about, are they categorized as on the Cal enviro screen, as any disadvantaged communities as are categorized there? Maybe they're called something else, but I know, I think you know what I mean about the Cal enviro screen. Are there health disparities? What are the just General sense, give me a General sense of the communities that surround it.

That was some of our application requirement that we identify how we're going to help those disadvantaged communities. There are a couple of spots that are clearly within the screening process and screening criteria that are a little bit north of the ditch, actually, just north, what we refer to as the northwest area of Pasadena. That's largely African American and Latino by population.

Okay. I wanted to also ask you, I always press my city folks on the length of time things took. And I heard you mention three years. You do have a very robust engagement and plan, but that still seems like quite some time. Where are you? You received this grant last year. Now it's about a year ago. Have you started the work? Where are you? And the three years is important, specifically for which phase of the plan.

Thank you. Chair Alvarez? Yes. I believe I didn't introduce myself. I'm Wendy Macias. I'm the senior project manager. I've been with the city and with the project for approximately six months specifically to guide the project through the master plan process. And so we have started the process. We just brought on board our master plan consultant. Prior to that, we had secured our three consultants for the historic portion of the master plan.

And we are, first of all, very excited to have our first three consultants really getting into the history of the city. Basically what we discussed and the master plan process has begun. We are working with what we feel is a very knowledgeable firm and we're looking forward to using the upcoming spring and summer season to really get out into the community and start our engagement process.

And ultimately the goal is to take the work of our historians that are working now and integrate that into the larger master plan component. Again, this is going to be the portion that's going to really bolster the restorative justice framework. And the reality is that the goal is to have a master plan that will have that restorative justice lens applied in all the various sections of the work that we're doing. So yes, the work has started.

Has it been difficult to procure firms to do any particular part of the work? Just curious as to what exists in the marketplace, if you will.

UCLA is helping us with proportion as well.

They've got a lot of good information.

Great. Anyone else having difficulty like finding some expertise around given this know relatively new work? I guess.

Correct. I think this project is very exciting. I think various agencies and firms and groups have been looking to us to really see where or in what direction the city was going to move in. And so my understanding is that the city put out an RFI which resulted in a lot of interest. There were. David, correct me if I'm wrong, hundreds that attended that.

Okay, so there's no issue there.

No issues.

I think there was concern about big interest.

Can I add something to the prior question? I apologize for going backwards, but when you're mentioning about the timing, I think one of the things we recognize and need to be mindful is the planning process can be extensive and take some time. But along the way, any way we can streamline the process and be mindful of that, I think is important. By way of specific example, my favorite aunt is 92 years old. She has an amazing memory.

She was a longtime school teacher, knows chapter and verse and who's zooming who and everything that happened. She took a year off from teaching to work for the Pasadena redevelopment agency that did an unfortunate project under the guise of urban renewal that created a housing project. Her office was located where the freeway is now located. So she knows what was in that area. There's another local legend who is 102 years old. She came to Pasadena when she was three months old.

So she has been in Pasadena literally over 100 years. She grew up with Jackie Robinson. The Jackie Robinson. She would get a ride with him to Pasadena City College on Monday nights. They would study at a local library, and she is completely lucid and shares stories. And the importance of mentioning their ages is with each passing day, the ability to capture those stories and information of elders of the community diminishes.

And it would be wonderful in their lifetime not merely to capture their stories, but to see the end result of this process. So I think there is an urgency that is inherent to this process. And to misquote slightly legendary UCLA coach John Wooden, we need to be quick, but not hurry.

Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. I wanted to also ask about. I should write these down. Everything you say always sort of spurs some questions, I think. I wanted to ask you about one of the components of the. zero, I know what it was. Will, the planning grant that you have now also provide you with potentially a financing plan? Because that's one of the big issues when it comes to the investment that has to go into.

Even in your case, we're talking about street level or ground level. Obviously, as you mentioned, there's ditches and you got to do a lot of work. But all that takes resources, money, public infrastructure that has to go in. No matter how well intentioned you can find the private sector to be, affordable housing always requires support. It can't just be done based on Low rents. My point is there's a need that's public financing to help these projects come to fruition.

Will, your plan, and I have a follow up to that of an idea that I have that I'd like to bounce off of you. Will your plan include a financing plan with scenarios?

Ultimately it will. And to talk about, panel one talked about the tax increments. A portion of what we're going to have to do is enhance infrastructure financing district we're going to have to, but it's not going to cover at all. We're going to need state federal dollars for sure. And so we'll have some options that will have various scenarios and options for funding. Some of it we're going to have to ask the state and the Federal Government to help.

Just pointed to staff, because one of the things that I've talked about is for all the horrific things that redevelopment did, as we just heard from the previous panel, it was a tool that is useful and just to sort of preempt our final report a little bit, one of the things that I'm thinking about, and this is the idea I wanted to bounce off of you.

So we're thinking the same way, is in select areas, such as in your case, the stub, in the case of communities that are looking at maybe creating new land with caps or lids. The tool of tax increment financing is one that I think we should be looking towards. There's probably people that are hearing this that are probably shrieking at the thought of me mentioning it because it's sort of been a sacred issue for the last 10 years or 12 years now, since 2012.

But I think it's in select instances, perhaps, like in your example and in other projects that are looking to essentially create new opportunities where they didn't really exist before, this might be a tool that's available to us. So that's the idea I wanted about, and I'd like to hear what your thoughts are.

We would love that. We would love to take advantage of that opportunity and really use a tool that historically harmed folks in a way, sort of bring it full circle and have it heal. So we'd look forward to the details of that plan. And I think it's something that we would certainly welcome.

Yeah, it's not going to be. And I think maybe we'll end it with this and certainly open up to anything else you want to share. But again, as a public service to those who are looking to do the work that you are doing, that we hope to do in San Diego, this is not an easy and inexpensive task. It's going to require a substantial investment way beyond the 4 million to plan. And so everything that is available or can be made available to help will help.

Right. And so I'm looking forward to, certainly to your continued progress, your financing plan that I think maybe my little input as you go through that process is identify tools that the state can provide to you that will help close that gap. Because private sector is not going to afford to do this. You, the city, cannot afford to do this. It's going to have to be the creative financing that we know we can do.

And we can, as you said, put it to work in a positive, good way. So this has been tremendously helpful. I want you to succeed. We are all rooting for you. We want this to be successful. I don't know anybody who lives in Pasadena.

I don't think besides Mr. Holden, who's a great representative of yours, but you're part of our state, and part of the work of this Committee is to identify the areas in our state where this injustice occurred and how to find solutions to not just say that it was an injustice, but to actually make a change and make a difference and make a positive impact. And you're doing that. So congratulations. We thank you for your presence, your testimony.

Is there anything else any of you would like to share with us before we close?

If I could add? I think one of the most important things that's so striking and motivating to me is in the early 70s, communities were dictated. They were told what to do. They were talked at, as opposed to now. There is a once in a lifetime opportunity for a complete do over in this case. And it's an opportunity to have community involvement and talking with communities, and communities having the ability to do self determination. And I think that is so important, again, substantively and symbolically.

And the last additional thing is Pasadena. And I say this with all the pride. As a Pasadena native, Pasadena punches above its weight. It ushers in the new year. Then arguably, the focus of the world is on Pasadena, January 1, with the Rose parade and the Rose bowl. So things that happen in Pasadena have quite the ripple effect, and there's quite a leverage.

So if we can do this right in Pasadena, I think it'll serve as a very highly public, highly visible model for other places of how to do this right. Whether there's the opportunity for a complete do over when a freeway is removed or where there's a cover type of activity, as you were mentioning, is a possibility in San Diego, even in that mid range place, there is an opportunity to have the correct community involvement that unfortunately, didn't occur in the past.

But we have a chance to do it right going forward and to be guiding and informed by the mistakes of the past.

Thank you. Anybody else?

I would just add that one of the keys to our success, and one of the things that's, I think, special about Pasadena is our citizen participation. So you can see this is one of our residents, our citizen, who volunteers their time to assist. And with people like this, helping us and keeping their eye on we as the city staff, we can't go wrong.

And finally, I would just like to thank you for enlightening and letting people become aware of this process, because there is so much history that has been lost and bulldozed over, and people have tried to forget about it and don't want to talk about it. So I thank you for bringing this to light, and thank you for the opportunity for letting us share our story.

Thank you. Well, as we saw here, it definitely takes dedicated Members of the public, thank you for your service in that role and for your willingness in Pasadena to acknowledge the importance of the public participation process. It also takes someone to just shepherd this through. You have a full time project manager. That's a lesson that needs to be shared with everybody. This can't just be another project or an idea.

It's got to be something that's very intentional, which you've clearly decided it is for you and your city. Again, wish you well and appreciate your testimony here. And if there's anything else you'd like to submit for us to include in our final report, we look forward to that. Thanks again.

And with that, we will be taking on some public comment. If there are any Members of the public who'd wish to speak on this item, now is your time to come forward and love to hear from you. I hope the presentations and the panels were as enlightening and useful to you as they were to me. And so please come forward because we have only a few of you I see there. I'll give you a couple minutes to share your thoughts, and please introduce yourself and come forward.

Great. Good afternoon, chair Alvarez. I'm Sophia Aficova with the Coalition for Clean Air. And California prides itself on being a land of opportunity. It is a place that welcomes all and inspires with its unique diversity of life, nature, and cultures. Yet over the past 70 years, our state has spent billions of dollars on highway projects that increase poverty, reduce quality of life, separate communities, destroy nature, and make California sicker.

Highway expansion projects are advertised as necessary for our economy as a way to reduce congestion and create good bank jobs. Yet research shows this is not the case. Highway expansions do not reduce congestion. In fact, they worsen it through a process known as induced demand, which states that the number of cars will increase on the road as more space becomes available. In particular, increasing road capacity by 1% leads to a 1% increase in the number of cars on the road.

Highway expansions are also poor job creators. Instead, investments in public transportation produce 70% more job hours, and even road repair produces 16% more jobs per dollar than new road construction. And as we heard today, how expansions don't just hurt our economy, they hurt our most vulnerable communities. More traffic on our roads generates more air pollution, which leads to health effects such as lung cancer, asthma, heart attacks, and even premature death. This pollution tends to concentrate near roadway communities, which is where 45 million Americans call home.

These communities not only bear the burden of air pollution, but are often displaced to make room for additional highway lanes. Since the development of the interstate highway system, more than 1 million people have been forced to leave their homes, many of which have been in black neighborhoods. We do ask you to consider whether road expansion projects provide value to Californians or whether our investments would be better spent on projects that actually improve our economy and benefit communities, such as building public transit and active transportation infrastructure.

One way to do so would be to reallocate funding from the state highway count to backfill proposed cuts to the ATP and the TRICP programs in the current budget proposal.

Please wrap up your comments.

Yes. Additionally, knowing what highway expansions are being proposed would start to rebuild trust between agencies and communities, which is why we asked the Legislature to request the Caltrans release its unpublished list of legacy highway expansion projects. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, chair Alvarez, I'm Jeannie Ward-Waller. I work for a firm called Fearless Advocacy, and I'm here representing transform Cal bike and the Leadership Council for Justice and Accountability, which is based in the San Joaquin Valley. I want to thank you first for chairing this Select Committee, bringing this really important issue forward, and also for the folks that testified today. I live in Sacramento, so really appreciate hearing about the history of Japantown in Sacramento.

It's incredibly moving, and I think it's very important that we right the wrongs of the past. I also was recently an employee at Caltrans, so I want to also appreciate our state workers, the work that we do at Caltrans. But I do want to emphasize that this is not just past harm. We are continuing to widen freeways today and perpetuate a lot of the harm of this legacy.

Communities of color, underserved communities, as well as rural communities all face the brunt of the impacts of our highway system. You mentioned wanting to have some ideas for how we can repair this harm and move forward. Certainly you've heard some today. The work of the reconnecting communities program, both federal and the state program, are critical, and there's a lot of flexibility in our transportation budget, which is bigger this year. Despite the deficit in the General Fund.

We have more transportation money than ever because of all the federal funds flowing from the infrastructure law. That's flexible money. A lot of that can be used for these types of projects. We really encourage to look at that. We encourage project sponsors to work with you, to work with Caltrans, and to do more transformational investments that create more vibrant community space, more walkability, places for children to play, and certainly revitalize communities that have been harmed. So thank you for your time.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair. James Thuerwachter with the California State Council of I'd like to thank the Committee for commend the Committee for its work that it's doing in this space. I also want to thank each of the panel Members that were here today for shedding a lot of light and educating us on the history that's happened throughout the know. Our history is replete with injustices and we want to do whatever we can to ensure that those events are not repeated.

As an organization that's comprised of over 70,000 working men and women throughout the state, we do fully support community driven transportation planning and the Caltrans Highways to Boulevard program, which is working to convert underutilized highways into multimodal corridors to reconnect communities and create new economic opportunities throughout the state. I would like to add that transportation projects do in fact create thousands of good paying union jobs. Protecting communities and supporting union jobs are not and should not be mutually exclusive goals.

With that, we look forward to working with both the Committee and other stakeholders throughout this process. Thank you. Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair. Mike West, on behalf of the state building and construction Trades Council of California, the building trade supports smart and well planned freeway construction and supports continued budget funding for those well planned projects. Also, the support of maintenance of out of date roads and crumbling infrastructure is important to the state building trades. We also support the reconnection plan that was presented here. And I would also like to thank the presenters that came through this Committee today.

And we are looking forward to engaging with the Committee in this process and want to point out that the health and safety of the drivers should be paramount. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, Mr. Chair, Don Wilcox with the California conference of carpenters just want to take time. Thank you for holding this important hearing. It's enlightening all the things that have. Happened in the past. A lot of my comments will mirror the folks that just preceded me. Thanks again.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Members of Committee, Manny Leon with the California alliance for Jobs. We're a labor management organization representing the construction industry. Echo many of the comments that our labor partners provided. But I do want to mention also that on top of bringing communities together, these type of reconnection project or reconnecting projects also provide opportunities to enhance transportation safety, incorporate active transportation, and create well paying jobs that will further help the surrounding community and regional economy.

The construction industry understands that in order to address the climate crisis that no new freeways can be built. However, majority of the state's transportation policies to address the climate crisis move towards transitioning vehicles to zero emission and incentivizing transit ridership, in other words, not requiring a reduction in vehicles on our roads.

What this means is that it's imperative that we continue to invest on improving the state's transportation infrastructure, including when considering projects that reconnect communities as improving access will be critical to allow buses, vampires, bikes and even goods for businesses to move efficiently to and from these neighborhoods. Additionally, using transportation, best planning, best practices, reconnecting projects have the opportunity to significantly improve the safety for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists in these neighborhoods. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you to all Members of the public for their comments. I'll just conclude today's hearing by once again acknowledging the two panels and thanking them for their testimony and in the case of their first panel, lifting up the voice that has been often unheard, and in the case of second panel, thank them for their work and helping us better understand how this could be a win win.

As the public, Members of the public mentioned, there is important infrastructure that still needs to be built, that could be built and create good jobs. And really, this Committee is focused on that. What are those opportunities where we can continue to build a transportation network that works, where we reconnect communities where we don't? This is about correcting some of the injustices that were eloquently already shared with us today in our previous meeting, and I'm sure we'll hear about at our next hearing as well.

So work remains to be done in the Committee and then hopefully work out in the community with everybody so that there's improvements to the communities throughout California where highway systems in particularly divided and displaced families and created a lot of inequities in our state that we need to correct. So with that, our hearing today is adjourned until our next hearing March 14 in San Francisco. Thank you.