Let the citizens vote on redevelopment

By Barbara Flockhart

Lodi already has a system in place to take care of problems that come up. What happen to that system?
Lodi citizens pay into every month: electric, water replacement program, water 1-3 bedroom house, PCE/TCE water cleanup, wastewater, replacement program wastewater and solid waste.
Why is Lodi in dept $250 million?
The city of Lodi created blight as their justification for a Redevelopment Agency by deferred maintenance of thes, parks, streets, sidewalks. the skate park and leaking roofs at Hutchins Street Square and the recreation building. Why did they not put teeth into code enforcement to clean up the parts of town they are complaining about? The city created high-density zoning to fill our sterrts with parked cars.
We don't want to be another Stockton. It was interesting that Michael Fitzgerald wrote an item in Stockton Record on June 16 about lack of tree care. I quote:"In my opinion, the failure to properly addresscrime, blight and neighborhood maintence issues is souring people on redevelopment and growth. People would better tolerate growth and support downtown redevelopment if city hall responded to neighborhood issues-if, citizens' tax dollars brought benefits to them and not primarily to developers and rick redevelopment entrepreneurs."
Lodi's Redevelopment Agency has set its debt celing at $500 million. This is not free money. Every cent has to be paid back with interest and commissions for the bond brokers. You are making decisions about redevslopment that you will not be able to control 20, 30, or 40 years down the line.
LET THE CITIZENS VOTE ON REDEVELOPMENT.

Written in the Lodi News Sentinel, June 23,2008, Letter to the Editor, By Barbara Flockhart, Lodi