🚀 go-pugleaf

Iconoclast wrote:
> White Americans describe how Orange County is turning into a Mexican slum
> and unlivable Third World Hell.  I heard on the radio today that the
> reporter, Ellyn Pak, has recieved threats from the invaders for telling the
> truth.  Perhaps, as Mexicans do to reporters and editors in Nuevo Laredo,
> they will kill her for reporting what the Mexicans don't want reported.
>
> http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1161076.php
>
> Tuesday, May 30, 2006
>
> Changes in Orange bring exodus
> Longtime neighbors in Orange, wearied by crowding and new cultures, decide
> to leave.
>
> By ELLYN PAK
> The Orange County Register
>
> ORANGE - The Hills left East Vine Avenue two weeks ago. The Wigginses plan
> to leave in a month or so. And just last week, the Hansons put up a for-sale
> sign.
>
> In a few months, most of Carol Fulton's longtime neighbors will be gone. And
> in a flash, summer barbecues, Fourth of July parades and baseball games at
> the East Vine cul-de-sac will become distant memories.
>
> Fulton sits on her front porch, pensive and surveying the neighborhood. It
> has changed drastically, she says.
>
> The familiar smells and sounds of backyard barbecues are replaced by
> mariachi music and the honking horn of a shaved-ice cart. Fulton sees
> unfamiliar cars and people streaming onto the street.
>
> Overcrowding caused by boarding homes - more than two leases on the same
> property - is an issue that city officials and residents have grappled with
> for years.
>
> "This used to be a fun neighborhood," says Fulton, 56. "Kids stayed outside
> until 10 or 11 p.m. I figured we'd live here until we died. We never in
> 100,000 years thought it would change."
>
> On most days, Fulton caps off the night at 10 with a cigarette in her
> garage. But these nights, she does it with the door closed.
>
> "We were always outside. In the summertime, I was a free spirit," she says.
> "Not anymore. We don't go outside anymore."
>
> Fulton has to decide if she, like her friends, is going to go.
>
>
> Fulton moved to Orange in 1986 with her husband and two daughters from a
> previous marriage.
>
> She loved the clean neighborhood. There were other families with children.
> And everyone called each other by their first names. The house they rented
> had no air conditioning. Fulton cooled off under the tree in her yard.
>
> A year later, they moved across East Vine into a three-bedroom house they
> bought for $175,000. The Fultons, whose family grew to five kids, envisioned
> growing old with their neighbors.
>
> Orange had deep roots, a city with generations of families where
> grandparents and parents settled and their children held onto the threads of
> their childhood.
>
> The neighborhood transformation was subtle at first.
>
> Some families moved away and a more transient community began to develop.
> Unfamiliar faces filtered in and out of several houses.
>
> By the late '80s and early '90s, longtime residents complained about a
> parking crunch caused by dozens of people crammed into the neighborhood's
> first boarding house - the big house they called "the Fortress." The city
> eventually required parking permits, and the problems subsided.
>
> In the late '90s, Fulton caught people peering into her rooms, urinating in
> her yard and making catcalls at her.
>
> It was common knowledge that there were multiple families and dozens of men,
> mainly day laborers, living in the homes, she says.
>
> Drywall was delivered to the homes and quickly disappeared. People built
> additional rooms without permits. Blinds were closed and no children played
> outside.
>
> The houses stayed tidy and well maintained on the outside. The street, by
> day, looked like any other in Orange. But Fulton and some neighbors said
> that in the evening, droves of cars came into the neighborhood.
>
> The idea of not knowing who lived on their street began to rile the
> residents.
>
> One by one, Fulton's friends talked of moving. East Vine Avenue had become
> intolerable, and they didn't want to wait for things to improve.
>
> "We've been here for years, and now everyone is bailing," Fulton says.
>
>
> In February, city officials tried to crack down on overcrowded houses,
> tightening the definition of a boarding house and creating a task force to
> look at the problem on streets like East Vine.
>
> The city tried to discourage illegal garage conversions and room partitions
> that allowed multiple families to live in one house. The city code does not
> allow more than two lease agreements in one home.
>
> Violators are told to comply, and city officials say most do.
>
> "It runs the gamut," says City Attorney Dave DeBerry. "You get the
> allegations ... gathering evidence is very hard. Maybe people are telling
> the truth and maybe not."
>
> Fulton testified at council meetings about the overcrowding problem. Visits
> to East Vine by city officials and code enforcement officers did little to
> appease her.
>
> "These are houses but this street is becoming an apartment complex. They are
> not touching each other but they might as well be," Fulton says.
>
>
> Language and cultural barriers also make it difficult for some neighbors to
> connect.
>
> When Fulton's son accidentally hit a baseball into someone's window, she
> promptly went over to apologize. Her neighbors nodded and smiled and did not
> understand English, she says.
>
> But race is not the issue, Fulton says. She would be incensed at any
> neighbor who disrespected her privacy and property.
>
> "What burns me is that we're middle-class working people who didn't have
> extra money to buy anything. We all worked hard to get here," she says.
>
> During her free time, Fulton helps a neighbor pack for her move out of the
> county.
>
> "Get out when you can," says her friend. "I'm moving to an American
> neighborhood."
>
> They plan a night when they will lay out blankets on Fulton's yard and stare
> at the stars. And they will have a Fourth of July parade for old time's
> sake.
>
> She says she is too tired to fight anymore. But she cannot let go of her
> memories. Fulton, unlike most of the old neighbors, says she's staying for
> now.
>
> She hopes city officials will listen to her concerns. She says things will
> get better if the codes are enforced.
>
> Until then, when she has her evening smoke, she'll keep her garage door
> closed.

Coming to a neighborhood near you or maybe next door.

John