To the editor: The hollowing out of Alhambra’s middle class serves as one other unhappy testimony to the injury that the lethal trifecta of unaffordable housing, predatory scholar mortgage debt and actual property hypothesis continues to inflict on Los Angeles County. The typical dwelling value sitting at round $900,000 is pricing out native residents, such because the household talked about on this article.
When an increasing number of middle-class households are compelled to desert their roots looking for reasonably priced housing, all people pays the value. Colleges 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 modifications 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 of reasonably priced?
A vibrant center class is crucial for a society to operate — these are our academics, nurses and legislation enforcement officers. In the event that they proceed to be pushed out of the communities that they serve, we could have a metropolis in decay.
Lisa Ansell, Beverly Hills
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To the editor: Via the years, many households particularly with school-age youngsters have moved away from Alhambra. Hire is simply too excessive, or folks just like the middle-class household you will have written about can not qualify to purchase a house. I’m an Alhambra house proprietor, neighborhood activist and reasonably priced housing advocate. I’ve no youngsters and my husband handed away in 2021. I reside in my house constructing and wish to proceed dwelling right here for a while. Nonetheless, I’ve given quite a lot of thought to, who will change into the subsequent 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 folks change into homeowners of their unit. The promoting value must match excessive affordable gives. The precedence could be academics, longtime Alhambra residents and small households. Discovering the best nonprofit and financing could also be a problem. I would want the cooperation of Alhambra’s Metropolis Corridor, Metropolis Council and, seemingly, planning commissioners. I wish to be an instance to homeowners who’re promoting to think about 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 faculty districts and Los Angeles Unified Faculty District, my then-employer.
Concerns that continuously got here to thoughts on my 15-minute commute to work: Are non-public faculties 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 parking zone which might be newer, dearer fashions than these within the school lot?
Wendell H. Jones, Ojai
