To the editor: The hollowing out of Alhambra’s middle class serves as one other unhappy testimony to the harm that the lethal trifecta of unaffordable housing, predatory scholar mortgage debt and actual property hypothesis continues to inflict on Los Angeles County. The typical house value sitting at round $900,000 is pricing out native residents, such because the household talked about on this article.
When increasingly more middle-class households are compelled to desert their roots in quest of reasonably priced housing, everyone pays the worth. Faculties are compelled to shut, households unravel — inserting unimaginable burdens on those that present elder care — and communities lose their cohesion.
What number of extra communities like Alhambra, the place adjustments are leaving room for less than the very rich and those that obtain authorities housing help, will erode earlier than our Metropolis Council lastly acts on the rezoning that we so desperately want? How lengthy will Los Angeles proceed to cater to the loudest and whitest voices calling to protect the exclusionary zoning that finally results in the displacement of the center class even in areas that had been as soon as thought-about reasonably priced?
A vibrant center class is important for a society to operate — these are our academics, nurses and regulation enforcement officers. In the event that they proceed to be pushed out of the communities that they serve, we can have a metropolis in decay.
Lisa Ansell, Beverly Hills
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To the editor: By way of the years, many households particularly with school-age youngsters have moved away from Alhambra. Hire is just too excessive, or individuals just like the middle-class household you’ve got written about can’t qualify to purchase a house. I’m an Alhambra residence proprietor, neighborhood activist and reasonably priced housing advocate. I’ve no youngsters and my husband handed away in 2021. I stay in my residence constructing and wish to proceed residing right here for a while. Nonetheless, I’ve given loads of thought to, who will turn into the following proprietor?
After researching choices, I’ve determined I wish to promote my constructing to a nonprofit that can be sure that solely low-income to middle-class individuals turn into homeowners of their unit. The promoting value must match excessive affordable affords. The precedence can be academics, longtime Alhambra residents and small households. Discovering the proper nonprofit and financing could also be a problem. I would wish the cooperation of Alhambra’s Metropolis Corridor, Metropolis Council and, doubtless, planning commissioners. I wish to be an instance to homeowners who’re promoting to contemplate this feature.
Shirley Tatsuno, Alhambra
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To the editor: I’m a former highschool instructor and faculty counselor who lived for 15 years in Alhambra and South Pasadena, pinned between prosperous college districts and Los Angeles Unified College District, my then-employer.
Concerns that always got here to thoughts on my 15-minute commute to work: Are personal colleges and/or prosperous neighborhoods higher in any manner for college students? And what which means does it have when one sees autos in a scholar car parking zone which might be more moderen, costlier fashions than these within the school lot?
Wendell H. Jones, Ojai
