What's at stake:
According to community organizers and residents, the health and well-being of south Fresno residents are at stake as bureaucratic obstacles, particularly the county's uncompromising stance on code inspections, prevent eligible households from accessing a crucial $300,000 community benefit fund meant to mitigate the impact of increased air pollution from a nearby Amazon warehouse.
Three years ago, the residents of a small neighborhood just outside Fresno extracted a rare concession from the developers behind a proposed Amazon warehouse: $300,000 to help them cope with the anticipated surge in air pollution from a million diesel trucks passing through each year.
For Daleville residents like Bernardo Vera, the settlement held the promise of much-needed relief, like new windows and modern HVAC systems to keep out the heat, noise, and polluted air.
Instead, more than two years later, the money sits mostly untouched. Just 14 of the 38 eligible households have applied for the free upgrades of up to $10,000 apiece, according to the city of Fresno, which is administering the fund. Nearly two-thirds of the funds remain untouched in a city bank account.
The primary culprit, residents and organizers say, is an ultimatum from the county: If the residents want the upgrades, they’ll have to submit to a top-to-bottom code inspection and fix any violations inspectors find — at their own expense.
In a neighborhood of aging homes, many with unpermitted remodels dating back decades, that’s tantamount to writing the county a blank check, said Ivanka Saunders, a local organizer with the Leadership Counsel for Justice & Accountability.
“Because of the fear factor, they don’t want to touch the money,” she said. “They are worried about the little citations they could get hit with.”
The county’s insistence on conducting full code inspections for “any apparent [code] violations” on any major home upgrades has left many residents in an impossible position: Either live with the pollution or risk costly citations for violations that have gone overlooked for years.
Faced with the prospect of an investigation for a rusty car in the backyard or a jerry-rigged laundry room, interviews show, many residents are simply foregoing the free money.
“Those rules are no good,” said Fortuna Gonzalez, a Daleville resident who hasn’t applied. “I don’t want the county at my house.”
The city of Fresno has adopted a markedly different approach, promising in mailers to residents that it will ignore all but the most serious violations during code inspections that put people’s health at immediate risk.
But that olive branch is cold comfort for the vast majority of residents eligible for the funds. Of the 38 households who qualify, 36 sit just outside the city limits, placing them under the county’s more exacting rules.
Confronted with the potential hardships its policy has created, the county remained unmoved. “The code is the code. We have to follow it,” said county spokesperson Michelle Avalos in an interview with Fresnoland.
Supervisors Sal Quintero and Steve Brandau also confirmed that they haven’t granted any exemptions for code violations related to home improvements, not only in south Fresno but also in wealthier enclaves like Old Fig Garden.
Fresno County’s uncompromising position on code inspections, although possibly in line with its standard operating procedure, has raised questions about its appropriateness in this unique situation.
Compared to the more accommodating approaches taken by the city of Fresno and other California counties in similar circumstances, Fresno County’s position sticks out like a sore thumb, said Ramon Quintero, a UC Berkeley researcher who studies such agreements across the state.
Other California municipalities with similar programs, like LA County, routinely waive code enforcement to ensure public health and that residents receive the benefits they’re entitled to, Quintero noted.
“They don’t want to relinquish that bureaucratic power,” he said about the Fresno situation. “What I would recommend is going back to the table and getting the county to tweak the program so that residents can access it.”
City scrambles to salvage stalled program
Fresno city planners, eager to boost participation and start spending the money, are redoubling their outreach efforts to residents in the wake of the county’s decision. They’ve scheduled a June 22 meeting at nearby Orange Elementary School, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., to answer questions and help residents enroll.
“We want to start writing checks,” said the city of Fresno’s planning director, Jennifer Clark.
Some remain skeptical that will be enough to overcome the chilling effect of the county’s approach.
“This was the biggest fight we had,” Saunders said, who helped negotiate the agreement in 2021. “The county said they weren’t going to turn a blind eye [to code violations].”
Panfilo Cerillo, a community leader who was instrumental in organizing residents at the start of the community settlement negotiations, said everything was going well until the question of county code inspections came up.
“I think we had a good mix of people and conversation,” Cerillo said. “It was only until I asked about inspections. I told [the county] at the start – ‘that’s going to be a problem.’ I knew what people’s fears were going to be with the county coming out there and inspecting them.”
Three years later, those fears have proven well-founded, as residents struggle to convince their neighbors to apply for the funds.
“I talked to my neighbor the other day: ‘The county is giving you money to make upgrades on your house,’ I told him,” Bernardo Vera said. “‘No, no, no, I don’t want anybody coming to inspect my house.'”
City officials declined to comment on the potential causes of the low enrollment and it remains uncertain how they will address the problem.
Other hurdles may also be discouraging participation, residents and organizers say, including the reluctance of some absentee landlords to navigate the red tape required to access the funds.
Moreover, for homes with outdated electrical systems, the costs of obtaining permits, upgrading wiring and service panels, installing ducts, and purchasing a new HVAC system can be prohibitive, with some residents reporting quotes from contractors as high as $17,500 – far exceeding the $8,000 to $10,000 in aid provided by the city.
But the county’s rigid stance is part of a familiar pattern, said Quintero, the Berkeley researcher. Too often, the very government agencies charged with protecting vulnerable communities end up prioritizing their own parochial interests over the public good, he said, even if it means depriving residents of much-needed aid.
“They always want to have this sort of control thing. They are not very democratic about the money. They’re not there to distribute the funds how the community wants them to.”
