Eh Eh Wha is a Karen Senior at Crawford. Gwen Osgard was her teacher at the school's New Arrival Center.

Imagine trying to study for a test after having witnessed the torture and killing of a parent or other close relative.

 

Many Karen students at Crawford High Educational Complex have to do just that. These students and their families escaped a brutal military regime in Burma, a country also known as Myanmar. They are an ethnic group that makes up a small percentage of the country. As recently as 2010, news organizations like the BBC reported that the Burmese military engaged in ethnic cleansing.

 

After experiencing that, studying for Algebra might seem, well, insignificant.

 

The Mid-City CAN School Attendance Momentum Team is working to help about 10 of these Karen students with truancy issues adjust and complete their high school education. They are a small part of about 100 Karen students at the school.

 

Carolyn Smyth, co-chair of the School Attendance Momentum Team and youth department program manager at International Rescue Committee, and representatives from several other groups have led the efforts. The other groups include the Karen Organization of San Diego, SAY San Diego's Dad's Club, The Union of Pan Asian Communities and Building Healthy Communities AmeriCorps members. The groups' focus on truancy at Crawford started in October.

 

For Karen teenagers, school can be daunting.

 

"At the New Arrival Center we get kids who are at zero," said Gwen Osgard, English-as-a-second-language teacher at Crawford's New Arrival Center. "They don't have any English, but maybe they haven't even been to school."

 

She often witnesses a frustrating pattern where students leave the New Arrival Center and struggle in regular classes.

 

On Jan. 14, Crawford students celebrated Karen New Year on campus.

"They begin to feel very unsuccessful very quickly," she said.

 

That is what she believes happened to the group of Karen boys who haven't been coming to school.

 

"The first week of school [one of them] came to me and said, 'I feel really sad. I just want to sleep all the time,' " Osgard said. "He didn't have the word for depressed, but the first week of school he was depressed because he felt like such a failure."

 

As with most high school students, the idea of working hard for four years to graduate and eventually land a job can be a tough sell, Smyth said. Sometimes the temptation to do something illegal and earn a quick buck is difficult to resist.

 

"They are hungry now," she said. "They need money, now, to feed their families."

  

Not having parents to model how getting a degree pays off in the long run is also a challenge, Smyth said.

  

"Their parents come from preliterate society," she said. "Their English skills are progressing even slower than their kids are."

 

Earlier in the year fighting on campus was also a problem, Osgard said. Other students singled the Karen boys out for fights.

 

That Karen group of boys "just feels unsafe and out of place in so many ways," she said.

 

Despite these challenges, the School Attendance Momentum Team reports that two of the Karen boys with truancy issues have started attending school again.

 

And Eh Eh Wha, a Karen senior, is about to achieve a milestone.

 

Despite coming to the U.S. and enrolling in Crawford as a freshman, where "it was hard to make new friends and talk to teachers," she said.

 

Wha will be the first Karen student to get her diploma from Crawford this year, according to Osgard.

These young children, shown modeling traditional Karen clothing at the Karen New Year celebration Jan. 14 at Crawford, will likely have an easier time adapting to the U.S. than their older siblings.

 

 

Kern County may be the victim of zero-tolerance gone wild.

 

Nationally, administrators sometimes apply zero-tolerance, which started out as a reaction to horrible gun violence at school, to student infractions like insubordination.

 

Kern expels nearly 15 students for every 1,000 pupils last year, iWatch News found through analysis of 2010-2011 California data (read more here). San Diego expelled 2.2 for every 1,000.

 

A less visible problem is how policies like the No Child Left Behind Act creates incentives for schools to get rid of low performing students, so they don't negatively affect the schools' test scores.

 

Read the Education Law Center and the Juvenile Law Center position paper here.

 

These policies that push students of color, English-as-a-second-language learners and disabled students out of the education system are often called the "School to Prison Pipeline." They reduce children's chances of getting a degree and increase the likelihood they will end up in juvenile detention and the criminal justice system.

 

 

Eastern Coachella Valley is looking to youth to lead the way to healthy schools.

Elizabeth Toledo is manager of the Building Healthy Communities Initiative Eastern Coachella Valley and a member of the Riverside County board of education

 

Elizabeth Toledo, manager of the Building Healthy Communities Initiative Eastern Coachella Valley and a member of the Riverside County board of education, is excited to be working with forward-thinking leaders at Coachella Valley Unified School District in this process.

 

One of the issues they are examining is school wellness policies. These are local guidelines that "include goals for nutrition education, physical activity, and other school-based activities that are designed to promote student wellness in a manner that the district determines is appropriate" according to "Student Wellness: A Healthy Food and Physical Activity Policy Resource Guide."

 

Superintendent Darryl Adams and Maria Estrada, director of Nutrition Services, are implementing a school wellness council to revise school wellness policies, Toledo said. The Building Healthy Communities Initiative made a grant to support this work.

 

"One of the exciting things that was mentioned to me by the food services director is that she is looking at also potentially integrating youth in that process to ensure that a youth voice is at the table," Toledo said.

 

The district has already made headway in making lunches healthier by including things like salad bars, but it still has room to improve, Toledo said.

 

 

 

Schools' impacts on children's lives go far beyond what makes it into tests.

 

"California schools serve 900 million meals a year, each one a chance to fight childhood obesity," wrote Robert K. Ross, M.D., President and CEO of The California Endowment, and Dean E. Vogel, President of the California Teachers Association, in a letter.

 

The two released the joint statement from the California Teachers Association and The California 

Dean Vogel / photo courtesy KPCC

Endowment around the beginning of December about creating a healthy environment for California Students.

 

"Every school day also offers the opportunity to improve the physical fitness of California's children, not only through physical education classes but by weaving physical activity throughout the learning day," they wrote.

 

Read the entire statement here. 

Click the image above to hear a video of them introducing themselves.

A message from Carolyn Pinces and Tara Beeston, co-chairs of Teen Sexual Health Momentum Team:

 

We would like to invite you to be a part of the fourth biannual Core 1:30-4 p.m. Feb. 8 at Herbert Hoover High School. Core is an empowering afternoon organized by Mid-City CAN's Teen Sexual Health Momentum Team. It bridges the dialogue between youth and health professionals using arts and culture to ask the question: "What is the Core of teen sexual health?" Throughout Core, local experts, community organizations, artists, and youth create an empowering, positive, safe, and facts-based environment that engages participants in conversations around sexual health.

We are looking for community organizations and artists to participate in the following ways: 

• Skill building workshops - Students who attend Core will be incentivized to attend two workshops that will provide them with the knowledge and skills to make healthy decisions regarding their sexual health. We are looking for engaging presentations that promote healthy relationships, communication, and attitudes. You may submit a workshop proposal by clicking here.
• Interactive Resource Booths - At Core, students will learn about resources in their community that will empower them to make healthy decisions regarding their sexual, mental, physical, and spiritual health. The more interactive, innovative, and engaging your booth is, the more students will remember how they can utilize your organization's services. Table, chairs, and a shaded space will be provided at no cost. Register to host a resource booth by clicking here.
• Arts and Culture activities, performances, and displays - Core is all about changing the way we talk about sexual health. Sexual health isn't just about sexually transmitted infections and risky sexual behaviors. It's about self-esteem, cultural attitudes, expression, relationships, and communication. We are seeking a variety of artistic and cultural activities that address sexual health and self-empowerment in a positive and engaging way. Please submit your arts and culture proposal by clicking here.

For more information about Core, click here

 

 

 

The coming health-care reform bills will produce fundamental change in the U.S. health-care system says a Sacramento advocate.

"It is a pretty radical shift from the current world - from the world where you get charged based on how sick you are, to a world where you actually pay based on what you can afford - as a sliding scale based on income," said Anthony Wright , executive director of consumer-advocacy group Health Access California.

Medi-Cal currently provides health and long-term care for about 6.5 million of California's low-income children, their parents, elderly and the disabled. Nondisabled adults who aren't parents will be eligible for Medi-Cal in 2014, as one of the highest-profile consequences of health-care reform, also known as the Affordable Care Act. This will add about 2 million people to Medi-Cal in the state.

"There was this big hole in our safety net, and they were the responsibility of the counties," Wright said. "In their agreement with the federal government, the states actually got permission from the federal government to have counties put up match."

This agreement allowed for Low-Income Health Programs, which provide new federal money to California counties to expand coverage for the poor now.

The programs allow the state and federal government to evenly split the cost of caring for those who are at or below 133 percent of the federal poverty level until 2014, when the federal government assumes the entire cost.

"So it is a very exciting opportunity not just to sort of get a lot of people into coverage and be a bridge to health reform in 2014, but it also an exciting opportunity for the county to draw down more funds," Wright said. "It is [also a chance] for the hospitals and providers in an area to get more resources flowing through them for the local economy."

All counties in California except for Fresno have taken advantage of these programs to draw more federal funding.

San Diego County's pilot Low-Income Health Programs has enrolled close to 15,000.

However, the county's efforts are not without critics.

Hannah Gravette of the San Diego Organizing Project was quoted in The San Diego Union-Tribune as saying the county needs to do more outreach.

The county will not come to events, churches or other venues to sign people up or allow emergency rooms, clinics or community groups to sign patients up for the Low Income Health Program, according to the Nov. 27, 2011, article.

Health Access is working with groups like PICO, which SDOP is a member of, and Western Center on Law and Poverty to encourage counties to be as aggressive as possible to take advantage of these new funds, Wright said.

The second major part of health care reform that Health Access has been advocating for is health-care exchanges. The state's is called the California Health Benefit Exchange.

"The exchange is something that is going to be incredibly important, but those benefits will come in 2014," Wright said.

One of its five board members is Dr. Robert Ross of The California Endowment.

Its executive director is Peter V. Lee.

Starting in 2014, people whose income is 133 to 400 percent of the poverty level will have subsidies for their insurance premiums - that are a sliding scale from 2 to 9.5 percent of their income, Wright said.

"If their premium goes above that they can get a subsidy to basically make up the difference," he said.

These exchanges are designed to give individuals and small businesses the advantages that large corporations enjoy when negotiating with large insurers.

"Our task in the future is to create a new health insurance marketplace," he said. "One where, not only will we be in a world where folks will no longer be denied for preexisting conditions, but that individuals will no longer be all alone at the mercy of the big insurers."

 

A major focus of the Council of Community Clinics is helping City Heights-based clinics move toward a preventative focus that is part of health-care reform law.

 

"Our goal there is to eliminate re-admissions and unneeded emergency room visits," said Steve O'Kane, Council of Community Clinics' Chief Executive Officer.

 

One model that is being used to achieve that would involve a team of people that partner with clinic patients to provide ongoing comprehensive care.

 

How would it be different than what the clinics do now?

 

One example would be "a care coordinator, saying 'Wait a minute, [this patient is] on three medications, he should be coming in now for his labs and his physical' and reaching out."

 

This concept is called a patient-centered medical home, and the idea is that the Medi-Cal system will realize greater efficiency - and save money - by treating symptoms before they become severe.

 

"That provides better over-all care and lessens emergency room admissions," he said.

 

The Council of Community Clinics partners in these pilot efforts include Planned Parenthood, San Diego Family Care, La Maestra Community Health Centers, UCSD Medical Center and Scripps Mercy Hospital.

 

The Council of Community Clinics is also working to make health-care accessible to diverse, low-income communities.

 

It has been participating in the Mid-City CAN Access to Health Care Momentum Team for a year and a half to work on access problems and do trainings, he said.

 

O'Kane gave one example of why cultural sensitivity is important by describing one of the City Heights member clinics, La Maestra.

 

Refugees who come to La Maestra for treatment often see someone who came to the U.S. from the same country as them, O'Kane said.

 

"At La Maestra, there are Somali speakers, Spanish speakers, speakers of different Asian dialects," he said. "You walk in and you are greeted by someone of your culture."

 

Helping City Heights residents find their voice is part of the San Diego Consumer Center for Health Education and Advocacy's mission.

 

"We are in the midst of developing some trainings funded by [The California Endowment] on using the youth and some residents for policy and community lawyering," said Gregory Knoll, director of the San Diego Consumer Center for Health Education and Advocacy, which is a special project of the Legal Aid Society of San Diego.

 

This training will begin in City Heights and then expand to the 13 other Building Healthy Community sites, Knoll said.

 

The group  conducts a Medical Legal Community Partnership in the Family Health Center's clinic in City Heights. This allows medical providers to get legal and policy clarification for patients in areas including housing, immigration, consumer protection and domestic violence. These problems often are beyond the scope of a medical provider's expertise, but may still be a major factor in a resident's health.

 

The group also works with the Access to Health Care Momentum Team and several other Mid-City CAN organized work groups.

 

"[For example, we] are working with Food Justice folks around legal questions about community gardens and on policy issues," he said.

 

About eight City Heights residents and organizational representatives attended a two-day event hosted by The California Endowment to reflect on work in the 14 Building Healthy Community sites during the past year.

 

"Celebrating BHC Achievements and Relationships" was Nov. 29 and 30 in Los Angeles and a major focus was cross-pollination of ideas.

 

"People from City Heights got to share information with people from 13 places on larger state-wide strategies," said Steve Eldred, The California Endowment's program manager for City Heights. "One of our goals was just to let people talk amongst the sites."

Another aspect of the gathering was video and PowerPoint presentations about Building Healthy Communities' work in all the California sites.

 

"City Heights really focused on letting youth tell their story in their own voices," he said. For a link to the video, click here.

 

Fred Carson, Dad's Club project coordinator and School Attendance Momentum Team member enjoyed the camaraderie, both with other members from City Heights and those throughout the state.

 

"It was interesting for me to talk to people in similar areas," he said. "It was a good chance for collaboration and sharing ideas."

 

Sadad Ali, African Coalition Workforce executive director and newly elected Mid-City CAN Coordinating Council member, agreed.

 

"It was a very interesting two-day conference," he said. "It was very good. A lot of the different sites are working on creative things."

Sadad Ali, African Coalition Workforce executive director and newly elected Mid-City CAN Coordinating Council member, enjoyed hearing Dr. Anthony Iton speak at the BHC Celebration at the end of November.

The Mid-City Community Advocacy Network elections determined three new members for the Coordinating Council, which is the network's governing body.

More than 100 members voted Dec. 13 at the City Heights Wellness Center.

Winners are:

• Carolyn Pinces, community engagement associate manager at Planned Parenthood, co-chair of the Teen Sexual Health Momentum Team and a member of the School Attendance Momentum Team.

• Sadad Ali , executive director of the African Coalition Workforce and member of the Peace Promotion Momentum Team
• Ahmed Malinomar, property manager at Metro Villa Apartments Interfaith Housing and City Heights resident

Coordinating Council leadership consists of two co-chairs and a secretary. The overall Council is made up of 15 representatives elected from the general membership. A representative from the fiscal agent (SAY, San Diego) and the Community Liaison from the Central Region of San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency attend.

Co-chairs and council members are elected to three-year terms.

• Jeanette Neeley, City Heights resident and Coordinating Council Member, was one of about four Coordinating Council members to attend the Equity Summit 2011, the fourth national PolicyLink Summit, which brought together advocates, activists, policymakers and leaders from across the country from Nov. 8 to 11 in Detroit. Speakers included Geoffrey Canada, president and CEO of the Harlem Children's Zone in Harlem, N.Y., and Manuel Pastor, an advisory committee member for The California Endowment, as well as an author and professor. For Neeley, the network the conference created has already proved valuable. PolicyLink created equityblog.org, which she has stayed engaged with. "I have been on it asking for samples of other cities transportation surveys to create better access to disenfranchised areas," Neeley wrote in an email.

• On Dec. 5, about 40 Building Healthy Community grantees gathered at Price Charities City Heights Center. Grantees updated the group on their projects and networked. To see photos of the event, click here.

A dozen co-chairs, youth council members and residents are flying to Washington, D.C., to present at the American Public Health Association's 139th Annual Meeting and Exposition.

The trip starts on Oct. 30, but the group isn't immediately coming back after the conference ends. Members are planning to meet with Bob Filner, U.S. Representative for California's 51st congressional district, and Susan Davis, U.S. Representative for California's 53rd congressional district.

Attendees include

• Access to Health Care Momentum Team Co-Chair Shukri Adam
• School Attendance Momentum Team Co-Chair Iddo Gelle
• Food Justice Momentum Team Co-Chair Jennifer Chandler
• Youth Council Member Angel Quintero
• Youth Council Member Angeli Hernandez
• Youth Council Member Marcos Olascoaga
• Youth Council and Coordinating Council Member Rosa Olascoaga

 

Colin Mathewson

Colin Mathewson remembers being co-chair of the Mid-City CAN coordinating council during a huge transformation.

 

Mathewson, 30, who served as Price Charities Community Advocate from September 2007 until April 2010, understood that joining Mid-City CAN would be helpful to him on a professional and personal level. So he did and quickly became co-chair, from February 2008 to April 2010.

 

"It made my job more fun, more efficient and productive," he said.

 

But he added that there was more to it than that.

 

"It wasn't just about getting to know each other, but how do we work together, too," he said.

 

During that period he remembers two major changes that shaped Mid-City CAN into the organization it is today: hiring Collaborative Director Diana Ross and the beginning of the Building Healthy Communities Initiative.

 

"It was a really exciting time," he said.

 

Kevin O'Neill, the previous collaborative director, became the director of Integrated Neighborhood Services at SAY, San Diego, which is Mid-City CAN's fiscal agent.

 

"One of the things that [O'Neill] thought was important was to empower the Coordinating Council, partly because he was just so busy he needed help, but also because that is really part of what the collaborative is about -- building more ownership," Mathewson said. "It is not about Mid-City CAN or Kevin, but there is this larger thing going on that is about community-owned change."

 

Mathewson believes that adding Ross helped Mid-City CAN become more attractive as a hub site for Building Healthy Communities.

 

"The fact that we were relatively strong, that we had someone like Diana, who was really good at consensus building and mediation," gave the organization an edge, he said.

 

She was inclusive and believed in making decisions and establishing a plan through consensus and by involving more community members, he said.

 

Also at that time, the Building Healthy Communities Initiative process became the main focus.

 

"It transformed the organization in so many ways," he said.

 

Other projects that the Coordinating Council focused on during that period were trying to increase membership, diversify stakeholders and work on bylaws.

 

"I certainly felt useful and part of something important and valuable, so I continue to be grateful for that," he said.

 

Mathewson currently is in his second year of seminary. He and his wife are studying to become Episcopal priests in Tennessee with their 10-month-old child.

 

Mitra-Sarkar

After Oct. 8, a group of Crawford Educational Complex students are a little closer to their dream of attending a four-year college.

 

But undocumented students like them suffered a big setback before they got there.

 

"My junior year when I found out I was undocumented, I found out I was completely different from everybody else," said Victor Alvarado, 20, who is now in his third year at San Diego City College. "I felt different and I shut myself down from school and started doing horrible, my grades completely dropped."

 

In December, national legislation called the DREAM Act, which would have provided a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who served in the military or got a college degree, was defeated in Congress. DREAM stands for Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors, and California recently passed a series of laws that address the education aspect of the defeated Federal legislation. On Oct. 8, the state passed a law that will allow undocumented students to apply for state financial aid starting in 2013.

 

For Sheila Mitra-Sarkar and the Crawford Dreamers, "it's a huge day," she said. "It's a huge opportunity."

 

Mitra-Sarkar is the project director of the group that started in March. Alvarado is student mentor for the group. The group's goal is to build capacity for undocumented students.

"We'll be a strong advocate as we build," Mitra-Sarkar said. "What we want to build first is self-esteem. When the self-esteem is there, we'll go for the advocacy."

The California Endowment funds the group.

 

Mitra-Sarkar originally became interested in helping undocumented students because of Mid-City CAN house meetings, which brought together nearly 1,400 residents of City Heights to learn more about the lives of average residents. The meetings revealed that many residents felt that the struggles of undocumented residents were a critical issue.

 

"It is so stigmatized," she said. "It is also lack of knowledge, lack of information."

 

For students that stigma can be even more severe.

"I'm not picking on any counselor," she said. "I'm not picking on any school, but generally speaking nobody is giving them time of day. Because once they know they don't have Social Security [numbers] they are bottom of the list for everything."

 

Today is the group's first meeting during this school year. Last year the group had six or seven core members, and it is hoping to attract 20 people to its first meeting, she said.

For Mitra-Sarkar, trust building is key. After all, many students have been hiding their undocumented status for most of their lives.

 

"To be able to sit together in a group and discuss that, ... and to be able to speak to each other freely has been huge," she said.

 

 

The School Attendance Momentum Team wanted to make sure that Crawford students weren't kept out of classes, and that the school didn't lose money because of the state's "no shot, no school" rule.

 

The rule is a California law that requires all 7-12 graders to get the Tdap shot, which includes a vaccine for whooping cough, within 30 days of the start of school. School attendance is directly tied to school funding.

 

"At Crawford, every day is a battle with the budget being really tight," said School Attendance Momentum Team Member Faiza Ahmed.

 

For Crawford Educational Complex students, the deadline for Tdap compliance fell during the first week of October.

 

To make sure that students and parents were informed, team members distributed information to students at Crawford Educational Complex during registration week, Ahmed said.

 

Group members also met with County of San Diego officials to try to find exact numbers of students who did not meet state requirements,

 

The diversity of the momentum team made it more effective in calling parents with children who were still in the noncompliant category shortly before the deadline, Ahmed said. The group discovered that many of these students had received their shot, but had not shown proof to the school yet.

The school now reports that only 9 students are not compliant with the new law -- more than 99 percent of the students have met the requirements.

The principals at Crawford were grateful for the group's help, especially with staffing levels low due to state-wide budget cuts.

Principal Diego Gutierrez sent out an email thanking the team on the school's email lists, said Momentum Team Co-Chair Iddo Gelle.

 

And for the momentum team it was a gratifying win.

 

"We don't want attendance to go down," Ahmed said. "And it shows how strong we are as momentum team. There is a lot more we can do as a group."

The Coordinating Council is the governing body of Mid-City CAN and its projects. The Coordinating Council is responsible for setting the overall strategic direction of the Collaborative; including policy and fundraising.

To vote in the 2011 Mid-City CAN elections, you must be a registered Member of Mid-City CAN no later than 5 p.m. Nov. 8. There will be no new members accepted between Nov. 8 and Dec. 31. Mid-City CAN will resume accepting members at 9 a.m. Jan. 2, 2012. To become a member please complete the membership form by clicking here.

 

University Avenue and 50th Street is now safer to cross because of high-visibility crosswalks and signs. City Heights Community Development Corporation wants to train residents to advocate for improvements like these. Photo courtesy CHCDC

 

All different types of road users from bicyclists to walkers, young to old, transit-riders to drivers can face dangers and obstacles in City Heights.

 

"Many of the sidewalks aren't even really sidewalks in City Heights," said Randy Van Vleck, active transportation manager for the City Heights Community Development Corporation. "They are driveways," he said, referring to the design of Huffman, six-pack apartments where drivers cross the sidewalk to access their parking spaces.

 

Addressing safety issues like these for pedestrians, bicyclists and public transportation users is the mission for the City Heights CDC as a partner in the Built Environment Team collaborative. The group also includes International Rescue Committee, Environmental Health Coalition and Proyecto de Casas Saludables.

 

It is funded by The California Endowment. Mid-City CAN is the City Height's hub, which helps coordinate local grantees.

 

The four partners are collaborating on a leadership academy in February to teach residents to advocate about issues like unsafe streets.

 

Each organization will pick at least a dozen residents that will be a part of the nine-week academy.

 

The resident team members are going to learn about the history of City Heights, land-use policies, and how to advocate on different issues, Van Vleck said

 

"The real vision that binds the active transportation team is this: We believe all different types of road users, bicyclists, walkers, pedestrians, kids, elderly, motorists, transit riders, should be able to get where they need to go safely, healthily, and with convenience," he said.

 

Van Vleck says the transformation of 50th Street and University Avenue is one example of a relatively inexpensive change that can make the streets safer.

 

Community leaders convinced members of the City of San Diego's traffic engineering department that rather than blocking the crossing with a fence at the intersection it should be made safer to cross with high-visibility crosswalks and other traffic calming devices, including signs.

 

"The street should be designed for all users," he said. "That's what a complete street is - a street that works well for everyone and is safer for everyone."

 

City Heights CDC is also interested in promoting green space.

 

"The fact that City Heights is one of most park deficient areas in region means that kids don't have anywhere to play," he said. "So they play on the sidewalk. The ball goes out in the street. They run after the ball in the street. They get hit by a car."

 

Statistics back up the idea that lack of space to play and streets that aren't pedestrian friendly is a deadly combination - especially for children.

 

Van Vleck said a report that came out about 2 years ago found that within the span of 4 years 114 kids were struck by motorists within a quarter of a mile of a school in City Heights.

 

However, despite these challenges, Van Vleck sees opportunity in the area.

 

"We also know that City Heights has the highest transit-ridership in region, and also the lowest automobile ownership in the region," he said. "City Heights has a lot of unique things going for it that could make this place a lot better for all users to get around."

 

City Heights CDC is completing the draft of the Full-Access Community Transport System, or FACTS, study that focuses on the Colina Park neighborhood.

 

"The No. 1 community demand was a walk-able, bike-able neighborhood," he said. "And that makes sense because actually Colina Park out of all the neighborhoods in City Heights has the lowest automobile ownership."

 

Randy Van Vleck