We are at a crucial point in our community’s timeline— the time for unity is now. Why? We bring this city to life with our rich culture displayed through diversity in foods, arts and genuine hard-working ingenuity; and yet, young adults are depressed as their hopes of owning a home in their beloved city are crushed by rising housing prices. Renters are much more likely to be burdened by housing costs than homeowners, posing a severe financial burden on said tíos, tías, y los abuelitos. Nearly half of the population in East San José is foreign born. If fluent English is not predominantly spoken at home, there is a higher chance of being economically unstable due to rising costs of child care, housing, and groceries. Food insecurity is a prominent part of this economic instability. The ugly reality is students, families, and the elderly have to rely on food assistance programs like Second Harvest. This dependency has sharply increased since the beginning of the pandemic and shows no signs of stagnation.
Big developers are buying the land under small businesses and pushing them out. A major example is the Berryessa Flea Market being bought out and converted into the Berryessa BART Urban Village in 2024. The cost of generations losing a source of income and memories are mere pennies to developers with greed in their pockets. The current market housing prices and minimum wages as they are now, are not conducive to the prosperity of recent graduates, young families, or aspiring entrepreneurs. How does a city built on wealth and technology drive innovation when creative minds are hungry for their next meal that may or may not be there? Inflation is squeezing the last drop out of the current community’s livelihood. We can take this time now to understand how to support the existing infrastructures in our community attempting to combat these hardships.
