By Rick Estrada, District 10 PIO
encampment liaison to local partners
Caltrans District 10’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) means race, socioeconomic status, identity, where people live, or how they travel will never factor into our decision-making process.
That’s why our February closure of a massive homeless encampment adjacent to Garden Avenue in Stockton was a major event: We worked to give the neighborhood back to the people who live there and who send their kids to their two local schools.
Roosevelt and King elementary schools have 1,500 students combined: 98 percent are minorities and both schools ran far below the state average for math and reading proficiency. It’s critical these kids can get to school every day to keep learning.
The camp and its packs of wild dogs prevented many in the neighborhood from using the footbridge over State Route 99 (SR-99) and to Anteros Avenue. This is the only reasonable footpath for young adults attending Franklin High School.
Children attending Roosevelt school? If they live on Garden Avenue, the walk to and from school meant evading vicious dogs, ignoring putrid smells, turning an eye to horrible scenes of destruction, and deciding if school was worth the risk.
The camp extended 400 yards, north of the footbridge to the chain-link fence where Roosevelt School begins. District 10 worked with Stockton to close the camp, since each owns part of the narrow parcel between Garden Avenue and the transition ramp from eastbound State Route 4 to southbound SR-99.
District 10’s two-day effort removed a recreation vehicle; refrigerators, washers, stoves, and other appliances; and a whopping 220 cubic yards of decaying debris that kept many Garden Avenue residents in their homes due to the ugly smells and sights.
The proud people on Garden Avenue used to look across the street and see the equivalent of a dangerous landfill – with health and physical safety risks.
Now they look across the street and see open land, a place for their kids to run free and exercise, a footbridge to east Stockton – and hope for their future.