WATSONVILLE (California) REGISTER-PAJARONIAN

November 1, 2006

Pajaro housing complex opens
 

BY AMANDA SCHOENBERG

PAJARO — For Maria Sepulveda, celebrating the grand opening Saturday of the 63-unit Nuevo Amanecer affordable housing complex on Salinas Road in Pajaro was the final stage of a long fight.

As she described the new two-bedroom apartment she shares with her daughter as “super, super pretty,” Sepulveda remembered what it was like for her family and other residents of 15,17 and 19 Salinas Road, an overcrowded complex of 70 squalid units.

“There were a lot of rats, roaches, the carpets were bad...we were very unhappy,” she said.

Another resident of the new complex, Margarita Garcia, recounted bad wiring and apartments badly damaged by flooding of the Pajaro River that were never fixed.

After many complaints, residents banded together to form a committee. They decided it was time to speak up, Sepulveda said.

With help from the Salinas-based Center for Community Advocacy, the tenants organized a rent strike, using the money to pay for new roads and bathroom improvements.

Convincing other residents to speak out about the conditions at the apartments was tough. Nearly all residents of the apartments were farmworkers, Sepulveda said as she showed her own cut hands from years of nursery work.

“They were af raid,” she said. “They thought they wouldn’t be able to come back. We said, ‘Speak up. Don’t be ashamed.’”

Even after Gilroy-based nonprofit developer South County Housing Corp. purchased the complex in 2002, the residents were still living in poor conditions as the agency worked to bring the site up to code, then relocated residents to other apartments and finally demolished the old buildings, said Matt Huerta, project manager with South County Housing.

By Saturday, more than a decade after residents first complained, most former residents had returned to the new $23 million complex of 1-, 2-, 3- and 4-bedroom apartments. The remainder of the residents, who will pay between $430 and $900 per month, are expected back in November, Huerta said.

The six-building complex, which received support from 15 funding sources, was built by contractor Segue Construction in one year, Huerta said.

At the grand opening celebration, local and state officials recognized residents and donors for their work on Nuevo Amanecer, which means new beginning in Spanish.

Assemblymember Simon Salinas (D-Salinas) told the crowd that he remembered arriving in Pajaro years ago as the child of farm worker parents. At the time, he couldn’t have imagined anything like Nuevo Amanecer going up in the impoverished town, he said, describing the project as a model for future affordable housing projects in the state.

“When I see the families that are going to be living here, going back to what they were living in . . . you’ve got to be proud of everything that happened here,” said Monterey County Supervisor Lou Calcagno.

“You’re the ones who really deserve the applause,” he told residents.

Sabino Lopez, deputy director of CCA, reminisced with Sepulveda and other members of the original committee.

“It’s like a dream to see this now,” he said.