 The next group that I'm hoping we'll be able to speak really honored that you're here today to share your story with us. It's Mission Trust from the home community and specifically some folks from the resident council of that community. Mary, if you're ready. Good morning. My name is Mary C. Flotis. I reside at 1515 Mission Road with my husband and I am the face. One of the faces of gentrification along with a resident neighbor of mine, Mia Chavez. Gentrification is a shift in an urban community towards wealthier residents and our businesses and in increasing property values. In our case, the only wealth we have is our faith and love of our family ties. Our wealth is not monitored. Legal governments may favor gentrification because of the increased tax base associated with new high income residents as well as other perceived benefits of moving poor people. Actually, let's call it what it really is and that is displacement. I know that gentrification is occurring all over the world and not just in our community in San Antonio, Texas. But I do not live all over the world. I reside at 1515 Mission Road Mission Trust mobile home community. Gentrification has been occurring since the third century AD and just because it continues to happen, this does not mean that this is just or fair. When this involves people's lives and the way it impacts our lives. Our community did not want the rezoning to pass, but this point is moot now. Whether our community favored this change or not does not mean that anyone has the right to treat us as if though we do not matter because we most certainly do. No one should have to live through what we have continued to go through on a daily basis. Just last night we had another water line break. My husband and Mr. Valdez, another resident fixed the problem because the maintenance man was not available. And while the manager was contacted, he has nothing in place for such emergencies. Had this not been taken care of last night, I guarantee you our water would have been shut off today, turning into an all day inconvenience for everyone. Because the owner has failed to maintain this property, these occurrences which are happening, water issues, not to mention the raw sewage that is seeping out of some of the residents living area. While co-compliance has been contacted and the manager and the owner are aware of these problems to date, there has been no action taken to remedy this problem. We still have, we still live here and continue to pay rent. We are not living free, living there free and we are not asking for anything other than for the responsible parties to step up to the plate and make things right. An interview that Lauren Graham from Channel 4 had with Consulwoman Viagran for District 3, Viagran stated that what we are going to do is to make sure that we follow through with all the commitments that the city was made and that we that were made. I can tell you that the incentives that were made by the developer is not a viable plan. What they propose is something close to $4,000 and it's a case by case basis. Moving costs, Alamo Movers mobile home, Joe Richardson is $2,400 to move a mobile home. We have a porch and patio cover and our storage sheds to tear down and we put back up those costs are $800. Our Amendia, the AC people who have to disconnect and reconnect are conditioned at $600. Two guys moving, they charge $450 for a $90 an hour for an estimated five hours. Mission Road mini storage will have to store our furniture before we move is $99 a month plus the boxes, $52.56. The phone, AT&T, I'll have to have that disconnected and reconnected is $49. The hotel to stay at because where are we going to stay while the move is being made is $260. Utilities to reconnect $1,500, the water to reconnect $1,800. The land purchase, if you're looking to purchase land and not go to one of these mobile home communities that they're trying to say that they're not telling us where to move but yet they have a list for us. Earnings money $1,500, subject $1,000, attorney fees for the contract on the land $300, title county fees $200, title search fees $57, recording fees $174, courier fees $40, title commitment $380, tax certificate $470, appraisal $400, property survey $350, total of $12,881.56. And that's not counting the subsistence for down the meals and incidentals that the government federal government allows $66 a day per person to survive to eat while they're out of their home. There was a question asked of me which by a reporter which will remain unnamed. His question was that people were asking him while they were not taking sides why just why we just didn't find some land and move. My response to him was that's a very good question and I'll answer that for you right now. I told him that we attended several meetings with certain council members and a proposal was made. What if we were to acquire some land for the residents and make all the necessary living conditions that go along with just living whether it be a mobile home or a house. Where is that land? Then we had another proposal made by another city council person who suggested what if each resident was given $30,000 for moving costs? I replied that is a good idea. Where is that money? We are not looking to make money from this. We are just wanting what is fair enough to cover our moving expenses. If it comes to that, we will have to move. We should not have to pay anything out of pocket. I believe at the end of all of this, that this journey we are on, that God has a better plan for all the residents. So how does the reporter and his story that was Murray Flores and she says she doesn't expect to move. You give your report, you give your interview and yet at the end and everybody that's out there is watching the news and they're saying the stubborn woman won't move and that was not what I told him. What I said if it comes to that, then we will move. I did not say I did not expect to move. This plan is one the city wanted, the landowner and the developer. So they need to step up to the plate to do right by the residents of Mission Trails Mobile Home Community. The San Antonio Express News dated May 6, 2014 states that the city coffers has assets of $6.4 billion. So there's many there to be had to be used. Those that they use for incentives for the developers can also be used for people that are being displaced. In the future, when there is a development being proposed, the city needs to take a closer look and make sure that this is about growth and what is good for the city. And not let greed be the driving factor in all their decisions. Do not continue to build over people's lives. It's pretty ironic that our own mayor is being nominated for HUD Secretary. If the people of San Antonio couldn't be helped at the city level, how will the nation benefit? I wrote some questions down, just in case folks were kind of in terms of speaking to situations in your own neighborhoods. So I think Andy from Tel Aviv, if you're ready to come up. Some of the questions that I wrote down were just how has gentrification impacted your community? What have you experienced? Maybe you haven't experienced anything directly, but what have you observed your neighbors experiencing? What are your primary concerns in your neighborhood about how the cities approach gentrification? So you don't have to answer all of them, but any of those would be good places to stick to. Thank you. Thank you very much. My name is Angie Ruiz and I'm a resident of the Tobin Hill Historic District. I can readily say that I may be the gentrification baby of this situation. And I started off my, during my birth, living in the area in the downtown area at 211 Arroyo Alley, which became the hemisphere area. We in turn, of course, moved out, moved over as close as we could to the circular area that we were so accustomed to. This community was condemned, but was such an all-American community of Polish, Jewish, and Mexican immigrants, with ourselves as a first generation of children attending excellent education system, excellent schools, with Catholic, Jewish, Baptist, and all kinds of churches in that community. It was just an all-American community with people knowing each other and being part of the community in every way that you could think of. Well, this turned out that we would have to move out and we anticipated doing that before we were forcibly ousted, like some of the people that went through this experience. We moved over as close as we could and we moved down Gonzales Street, which is close to the Esfidipo, which was known as the railroad station at the time. And so we were very happily living there, close to the downtown area, still having the good schools, Catholic schools, and whatever. So here comes the expressway, purchased our home, and we had to move on. So we decided that we wanted to be close by to where the children were going to incarnate work. And my choice was Tobin Hill and became in love with the neighborhood. When I first saw the home that I bought, I went into the living room and loved the historical architecture that this two-story had and made the best of it and had a very good living area. This was in 1966 when I moved into Tobin Hill. In the early 1980s, I received a letter from Mr. Zachary from the construction company that he was interested in purchasing my home because he wanted to expand the Humana Hospital that had been built and wanted to develop a clinic area and a shopping area from McCulloch to St. Mary's from East Park to Elmira. This was his intent of erasing all the homes and making this clinic area and of course a business area. The thing that saved us was our neighborhood association. They built a good structural association of dedicated people and in 1987 formed our first neighborhood plant. And that's what saved Tobin Hill from Mr. Zachary tearing down our beautiful architectural homes and a very happy community at the time. It needed it all work, but we had a good association and I can say that is the most important factor right now that you have a good functioning neighborhood association. We're not working very hard and we need to retain those neighborhoods. In 1982, the city said they wanted to preserve these communities. The tourism was advancing and they felt that these neighborhoods were an asset with the architecture, the history behind them and helped us in every way. Helped us monetary wise, even send us to computer lessons so that we could have our newsletter and have a good functioning neighborhood. This worked very well but it seems like the city has forgotten about looking in on the associations and looking at these communities of people that need to live within the central area. The thing about it is that the encroachment began with a hospital wanting to purchase in which they did. They bought quite a number of homes in the Tobin Hill area and tore them down. Of course, San Antonio College eminent domain came in and also destroyed quite a number of architecture. In the 70s it had started already with a developer tearing down some of our northern part of Tobin Hill. So that had been completely destroyed. So if you want to call me a gentrification lady, here I am. And so the thing that really helped us was working as a group with the association and trying to preserve everything possible. It's gotten to the point where we're being encroached. The latest thing was Laurel Street was going to be blocked by the hospital because they were building their ICU unit and they needed the street along with the area in order to combine the hospital with the parking garage. It was a decision made by the planning department, by the association which is presently in effect, and by our councilman. But it takes three people to really work hard and dedicate yourself that this was unfair. This was not very healthy, not very safe, and not really a contribution to the neighborhood. So we presented a map with all the properties that the hospital had purchased and all the properties that they still had. And the reason why this street was very essential. And Tobin Hill has some streets that are not 90 degree intersections, they're T-intersections, they're curved in certain areas. And we made our justification that the time element of an ambulance or the fire department coming in would be detrimental and dangerous to the community as well as to the hospital. We presented this and other factors that were not stated by the hospital that the city council needed to know. And we saved that street but it only took three persons to do this. And the dedication should be there, that we should still be there working for our community. I'm no longer a president of the association, I passed it on at the time that I was appointed with the Senator and Independent School District for ten months and continued working. And so I'm still working and I'm still trying to save some of the properties that we have now. We have the Broadway, the Pearlboro that's coming in, so far so good it hasn't demolished any of our residential areas. It's progressing rather well but it may come into play where some of our homes may be destroyed if we allow it. So I'm just saying work hard and keep at it and let's erase some of this gentrification. Thank you very much. Hi, good morning. I have really been appreciating everything that I'm learning and I just thank you for having this conversation. My name is Luis Anas, I was raised most of my life in the east side of San Antonio. I remember from my early childhood living in the Victoria Courts and after my dad retired from working several years at Casarillo, he used some of that money to put a down payment in a home on Paso Jondo Street near Walters and so that was like the house where we grew up. Unfortunately he was deported and my mom was left to take care of all of our family on her own and as a homeowner you really have, it's your responsibility to keep up with the foundation or any problems that come up. We had leaks on the roof and it's just a lot of, she's working most of the time. Eventually we had infestations and stuff so we were too young to help her out and so she decided to leave to Mexico to reunite with my dad and she took most of the kids with her and I stayed behind with my brother at an aunt's house and she gave the house away to my aunt. Since then we've been renting, we've been renting and we always think like, I don't know why did you give it up, you should have brought another way to keep this home because now as a renter you're really forced to move and you're really up to the decisions of other people. So we've seen rent go up, we've been paying rent from like $5.50 to like recently $600 and now we pay $8.50 and so it's just really lucky now that our family is really united and we all live together and so all of us working were able to make rent, pay utilities, afford food and everything that comes with, we try to live a good life for your families. But $8.50 is a lot and they're like, well why don't you go to housing, you'll pay like $2.50 at the most or $3.50. But the waiting list is so long and then they want you to live wherever they want you to live and it's still at the date of housing sometimes too. So I still live in the east side, I'm a community health worker with Martins Street Women's Center, part-time basis and even having graduated from the university, I can't afford to live on my own without my family. And I've seen, it's just for me it's like boggling how these new condos on Cherry Street and then I have a sign that says starting from $170,000. How anyone could afford to buy a home that expensive. I'm sure credit has everything to do with it. My credit's like really bad because of the student loans and stuff but now we want to be homeowners, we would like to stay in our community and I really feel like my story is kind of like a lot of people's because not everyone is a homeowner. There's a lot of renters who want the opportunity to buy land and feel secure in something that you call your home. But when you have these high-rise condos that doesn't even have a yard and I'm just like how can anyone live like that? How is this healthy right in front of an industrial site? If that's what they want, fine. It's just like really putting everyone else who working really hard cannot ever dream of coming up with so much money. I really hope that the new Wheatley Quartz, they've torn down a housing project in the east side. I really hope that most people are able to come back and that they have access to a lot of resources, good educational programs for their kids. In the years that I've grown up in the east side, it really has been non-existent. Our Houston Street, our new Brownfield Street Avenue, there are some small businesses and I love that, but there's still a lot of empty buildings there. And sometimes there's nowhere to turn. I just remember being a teenager and just being on the streets and just playing on the streets and seeing a lot of stuff because there was not a recreation center there that had like awesome programs. There is Dawson Park, there's always been Dawson Park. I give thanks to Dawson Park because it got me playing basketball and took me off the streets. But it's like few and by the quality there's Lockwood Park. And now Martin Street Women's Center is renting that space which is awesome. But for seven years it was like empty and there was no parks and rides. There was the basketball court and like the park, but there was no staff there to like engage kids in real meaningful activities where they could play at night. I would really like to see like beautiful, like if you go up new Brownfields and you go over the bridge. There's this beautiful, there was this beautiful like Martin Luther King painting that has since been like, they kind of like painted over it. But there's still, there's a lot of things that they're missing, they're spending so much money on projects. But like the very simple things like having a beautiful mural of MLK, it's like faded and torn up and it's not inspiring and he needs to be honored. There's a statue of him on Houston Street. That space needs to be honored and maybe more flowers or something. I don't know. There's more and more activities around the area. I really dream of our neighborhood flourishing. I just hope that the city pays attention and has a conversation with the people so that we can. And that's the way that I've learned talking to other people. That's how great ideas come about. I just wish that the city would sponsor more events where it was a real public engagement and not only if you could afford to go to this meeting. Thank you. I'm Rachel Jennings. I'm an instructor at San Antonio College. And I also am a member of Travis Park Uniting Methodist Church. I wanted to talk about the impact that gentrification has had on Travis Park and on our church and all of the people who make use of Travis Park. I'm very familiar with the park. I first was introduced to it in 1999. I did not own a car at the time. I did not drive to get to work at the University of iconic Word. That year I had to take the bus and I changed buses at Travis Park. And I immediately recognized that we had a community there. A lot of bus riders, of course, change buses at Travis Park. There's this community of bus riders that's impacted. And there is the homeless population that's always been there. And since attending Travis Park Church, I've continued to be very familiar with that park. I'm there very frequently. And I was there just this morning, in fact, and I'm sure a lot of you have seen these changes, but they're happening very rapidly. This is something that's been planned, apparently, for a number of years, although we didn't know about it. But now it's gone into a phase of some very fast changes. So I wanted to talk about those changes. They've planted flowers, which is nice. There's beautiful flowers growing. And they've cleaned it up. They've added a number of areas to this small square that make it very sort of unfriendly to working class people. To people who might want to just use the park because they're passing through, but also to bus riders, to city workers, and to the homeless population. It's really intended, obviously. I don't think there's anything mysterious about this. It's obviously intended to make the park attractive, maybe to people who, to tourists, who stay in the hotel nearby the St. Anthony Hotel, or to people in the new condos and apartments on Broadway. And that's the population they're wanting, they're wanting the rest of us to stay away. There is, just yesterday, I noticed for the first time, this is what they call the popcorn wagon, which is a concession stand in the middle of the park now. I noticed the prices. I'll read some of these prices to you. There's bottled water for $2. A chili cheek dog is $3.50. A corn dog is $3. Cotton candy is $4. A pickle is $1.75. Sunflower seeds, $2. Nachos, $4. Frito pie, $4.50. You can get a large lemonade or iced tea for $3.50. Or a small one for $2.50. So I can't afford those prices. So, most people can't. So I think it's mostly well-off tourists, again, and expensive apartment dwellers are trying to appeal to. There's also, you might have seen, well, there's a little dog park, which is nice, I guess, for people who have dogs. It's very small. I noticed it has a little water fountain for dogs that dogs can use. Very few people seem to use it. I have noticed maybe a couple of people with their dogs who use it, but not large numbers. But it does take up space, which I think is what they're wanting to do. They're wanting to keep people out of the space. So they have iron railings around the little dog park. They also have the little architectural exhibit, this art exhibit. Which is very abstract. It's made with these kind of wooden beams. For me, the language of this abstract art is very unfriendly because it has these little white triangular shapes. It looks to be canvas or something, but to me what it looks like visually are like knife blades or something. Or sharp scales that are very sharp and penetrating. It does not look friendly. And it's surrounded by an iron chain with little posts. So you're not allowed to go near this art exhibit. And in fact, there are signs telling you to not climb on the art exhibit to stay away. So they have signs telling people not to go near. So again, that's a lot of green space where they do not want us to be at. And especially the homeless people. They do not want homeless people there. I did notice that they have signs advertising the park that tell us the hours of the park, which I guess would be from something like 5 a.m. to I think 10 p.m. or something of that kind. So actually, it's 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. are the hours. 5 to 11. In the night, if you're homeless and you need a place to sleep, I'm assuming they would kick you out. So they have those hours, they're maintaining. There is a very constant police presence in the area. The popcorn wagon even has video surveillance and audio monitoring. Again, just to keep track of people and what they're doing. And everything about it is designed for middle class people. If you go to a water fountain, it has a regular water fountain, and then you can also get filtered water. If you bring your own cup, you get filtered water. They have little trash bags for the dogs so that you can clean up your dog waste. So there's those sorts of little amenities that are clearly designed for middle class people, very affluent people to make them feel more comfortable. They have put in one of those meters, you've probably seen them around the Haven for Hope, that say, do not support panhandling, make a change here, and you put coins to make a donation to Haven for Hope. They have one of those at Travis Park now where you can make a donation to Haven for Hope. So what they're telling you is do not give money to homeless people, do not support homeless people because they do not want homeless people in that park. And I've seen a radical drop-off in the homeless people there in the park. There are a few who'll come in. I did see a man about a week ago who was lying on the grass and stayed there for about four hours or so. I noticed, so he was undisturbed for several hours. But for the most part, people are not there. They're used to on a Sunday morning, it used to be hugely crowded with people, many of whom were homeless. That is not the case now on a Sunday morning. More people will go into the Corazon Ministries for breakfast early on this Sunday morning. There's actually more people who'll do that. And I think the reason is because there are still people around who need food, who need to eat to sustain themselves. So they'll go in for food. After that they'll leave. They used to stay around the church. They enjoyed the 11 o'clock service. They leave after that because they're not welcome in the park. So where do they go? Between 8 o'clock and 11 o'clock, where would they go? And they have to figure out where to get lunch. Where do they go for their next meal? So those are all very real things that are happening in the park. Oh, I should also mention the bicycles. And again, that's a wonderful thing to have the bicycles that you rent. It's $10 a day for 30 minute intervals. But again, it's designed to attract these affluent tourists and whatnot. This is what those bicycles are there for. So that's having an effect on people. That's the effect of gentrification on Travis Park. And we have heard rumors, and I don't know much about this, but the rumors is that developers are wanting the whole street of, I think it's Travis Street to make it into what they're calling an adult playland for clubs and bars and whatnot. And they would actually want our church, they would want to put like a music club in the church. So that's, again, the nature of development in San Antonio. Thank you. So at this time we have about 25 minutes till noon. And at this point it would be really great to maybe we could segue some of our commentary to thinking about solutions. And also hear from Mike and any of the representatives from I think there's districts one, three, five, and I don't know if folks from 8K or something that come. But in particular, we, like I said, we're the ones who are impacted by these forces. And so we should be at the helm of developing solutions. And we actually got a policy tool that is useful, I think, to folks in office or folks who can take the tool back to the people you're representing. A recent report that came out from right to the city called Rise of the Renternation Solutions to the Housing Portability Crisis, which gives a whole kind of range of different, I mean part of the focus is the national level and sort of reforms that have to happen on that level. But a large focus is also local suggestions that we can use in our communities here. I think one of the big kind of points that they make that's relevant here is that housing policy is not just about affordability narrowly, which is kind of the way that it usually gets discussed. But actually we have to talk about housing security. So housing that's not just affordable, it's free from forces of speculation and displacement. And also housing that's community controlled. So when community is able to have cooperative ownership over land and also the structures on the land, that's when you can create the most, housing that is the most secure and actually the most affordable as well. So I think there's a few different copies of this floating around, but if they can make their way into the hands of the elected folks who are representing here today, that would be great. And if not, let me know and I can get you a copy. But there's another report that also came out. I didn't bring it with me, because we only have one copy, but it's produced by an organization in the Bay Area called Casa Husta, Just Cause. And they have produced a report in coalition with actually the public health department there. And the report is called Development Without Displacement, Resisting Gentrification in the Bay Area. So if anybody's interested in that report, I can also forward you the link. You can download it for free on their website. But it also includes a lot of different sort of concrete policy solutions to a lot of the... Their situation is slightly different there, but there's tremendous overlap between what's going on there, what's going on here, what's going on in New York City and other places around the world. So if y'all are okay, I'd like to invite folks who are representing different state and city offices just to kind of share your thoughts based on the testimonies that you've heard. And maybe there can be a kind of informal discussion, Q&A, where we can start to sort of think through what would solutions to these situations look like in the case of San Antonio.