Join Sacramento Investment Without Displacement and its members for a discussion about the next steps in the community outreach efforts around Aggie Square and other developments in Sacramento. June 2 @ 6pm on Zoom.
You can watch the meeting live on Facebook or by visiting this link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86462756538.
Photo by EKATERINA BOLOVTSOVA from Pexels
The committee had a busy year in 2020! Click here to view a summary of their accomplishments!
Interested in learning more about this committee? Click here!
With the cold and frosty winter weather upon us, residents across the Sacramento Region might be thinking about using their fireplace to help keep warm. This holiday season, the Sac Metro Air District asks you to please remember to Check Before You Burn, to make sure wood burning is legal.
From November 1 through the end of February, the District will restrict or prohibit the use of all fireplaces, wood stoves, inserts, fire pits, and chimineas when fine particle pollution (PM2.5) is forecast to be high. The law applies to residents and businesses in Sacramento County and the cities of Citrus Heights, Elk Grove, Folsom, Galt, Isleton, Rancho Cordova, and Sacramento. Remember, if you observe burning on a day when particulate matter air pollution is forecast to be high, and burning is prohibited, you can anonymously file a complaint here. First time violations will result in either a $50 fine, or the option to take and pass a wood smoke awareness exam. Fines for subsequent violations are higher.
October 10, 2020
Sacramento Investment Without Displacement, of which ECOS is a member, sent a letter to UC Regents regarding our concerns about Aggie Square.
Below is an excerpt from the letter.
We are writing this letter to appeal to you and the Board of Regents to request that UC Davis and its developer Wexford Science and Technology commit to signing a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) with our broad coalition. We believe that this project could bring great possibility and promise for the future of Oak Park and other nearby neighborhoods, the City of Sacramento and UC Davis Medical Center, if the benefits are shared widely and equity and inclusion are embraced as core values.
Before this project’s Environmental Impact Report is approved, it is a moral imperative that the UC system consider our community coalition and the impacted community we represent. The leaders of our coalition are requesting a meaningful conversation with UC Davis and its developer to address inequities and unintended consequences of this project.
The Oak park community is mostly made up of people of color, low-income people and immigrants who have carried a heavy burden for generations in the history of the development of this region. Unfortunately, deep poverty, violence, inadequate affordable and safe housing, employment discrimination and the many subtle actions of hate have deeply wounded countless promising young and old souls alike. Residents have a list of concerns about how the build-out and operation of Aggie Square will impact their neighborhoods.
By Genoa Barrow | September 28, 2020 | The Sacramento Observer
Aggie Square is described as a “game changing partnership” that will bring innovative opportunities to the area surrounding the UC Davis Medical Center on Stockton Boulevard. Local residents say they don’t want to be losers when the project, which will include the building of spaces for research facilities, academic programs, offices, retail and mixed-use space,and housing, kicks into gear.
Kim Williams, of Sacramento Building Healthy Communities says the Aggie Square project should benefit everyone in the surrounding area, not just a certain part of the population.
The Sacramento Building Healthy Communities: Community Development Action Team and Sacramento Investment Without Displacement (SacIWD) held a press conference at the Fruitridge Community Collaborative last week, demanding a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) in the UC Davis Aggie Square project to ensure issues of affordable housing, jobs, healthcare access, and other issues are addressed in any major projects brought to the community.
SacIWD is a coalition of community organizations and neighborhood associations. Coalition members have been working together for almost two years and say the proposed Aggie Square project at UC Davis Medical Center “has the potential to improve and protect residents’ health, provide residents with access to good union jobs that pay a living wage, improve the quality of our neighborhoods, and reduce existing inequities.” Members want to make sure area residents in the 95817, 95820 and 95824 zip codes aren’t summarily boxed out, and priced out, by the Aggie Square project.
Community involvement topped a list of concerns.
“While neighborhoods surrounding Aggie Square will be altered by the many thousands of new workers and students at Aggie Square, with a recent estimate as high as 25,000, and the flow of billions of dollars, the traditional avenues of resident involvement will be weakened, and those communities already on the fringes are likely to be further silenced,” reads a statement from the group.
Concerns also include local hiring, affordable housing access, access to primary care for Medi-Cal beneficiaries, project labor, and local business protections and support.
“This is about building with our community,” HUB Director Kim Williams said.
September 18, 2020
The environmental review for Aggie Square Phase 1 is being done in a document called the “Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the University of California, Davis Sacramento Campus 2020 Long Range Development Plan Update.” For additional information and to access the Draft Supplemental EIR and Draft 2020 LRDP Update, click here.
Public comments on the Notice of Availability of the Draft Supplemental EIR were due on September 16, 2020. The Environmental Council of Sacramento and its partners submitted comment letters outlining our concerns with the document.
“Our primary concern is that the planned expansion of the UC Davis Sacramento Campus facilities does not cause displacement of low-income residents in the surrounding neighborhoods.”
Environmental Council of Sacramento (ECOS)
Click here to view the letter from the Environmental Council of Sacramento.
“We hope to see a version of Aggie Square that supports the health and livelihoods of existing and future Sacramento residents through the creation of affordable home and job opportunities for communities too often excluded from the economic prosperity and investments elsewhere in the City.”
Sacramento Investment Without Displacement
Click here to view the letter from the Sacramento Investment Without Displacement.
Click here to learn more about this project, and our concerns.
Mailing address: PO Box 1526, Sacramento, CA 95812
Email: office [at] ecosacramento [dot] net
909 12th St., Suite 203, Sacramento, CA 95814