FRUSTRATED EL SERENO RESIDENTS CLAIM THEY HAVE BEEN FORCED TO LIVE IN “SLUM LIKE CONDITIONS” BECAUSE OF THE CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION AND NOW THEIR RENTS ARE INCREASING 10% EVERY SIX MONTHS.
By Brian Hews • Aug. 22, 2013
The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) is known for its’ meticulous maintenance of the state’s highways, bridges and roads managing more than 50,000 miles of California’s highway and freeway lanes, but that is not the case in the tiny neighborhood of El Sereno, where residents contend that Caltrans, who owns many of the houses in their area, is treating them like a slumlord.
Last week Hews Media Group-Community News, State Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez, and State Senator Ed Hernandez got a firsthand look at the “slum like conditions” that an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 residents have been forced to live in at the end of the Long Beach 710 Freeway for more than a generation now.