Clear Need to Reinvest in Public Institutions & Infrastructure after Participant on 260-Mile March for California’s Future Turns

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By Willie Pelote
AFSCME

Repairs for broken roads and environmental protection can now be added to the list of improvements needed in California alongside jobs and assistance for families losing their homes.

Los Angeles probation officer and Central Vally émigré Irene Gonzalez, who is participating in a 48-day trek from Bakersfield to Sacramento to highlight the need for quality public services and education in California, sprained her ankle Saturday two miles outside of Tulare.

The accident occurred on a severely cracked and pock-marked road along Highway 99 that is surrounded on either side by a wasteland of empty fields contaminated by agricultural runoff.

“I remember that there was a really bad smell along that road,” said Gonzalez, an executive board member of the American Federation of State County&Municipal Employees’ (AFSCME) local 685. “There was this green, smelly, mossy water coming out of pipes and going right into these fields we were walking next to. Then I took a wrong step on the street, because it’s really messed up, and I just kept going and didn’t think about it, and I just pushed myself to the limit, but once I stopped, I felt some really sharp pain, and I couldn’t go forward. When I took off my shoe, the whole inside of my left foot was swollen.”

The majority of California voters support public services and want to see programs like education, environmental protections, child care, health care, job training, mental health services, etc. adequately funded.

The broken roads and environmental pollution encountered by Gonzalez and her fellow marchers are the legacy of Sacramento’s misplaced priorities and the lack of revenue created by the decision to allow the wealthiest among us to shirk their financial responsibilities.

“It is ironic that I hurt my foot on this literally cracked street while marching to find solutions to the problems we have in California,” said Gonzalez. “All the budget cuts have really taken their toll on the people and on the state’s infrastructure over the years. That’s why we need to restore quality public education and public services, rebuild a government that serves all Californians, and create a fair tax system to fund our state’s future. Otherwise, the final casualty will be the California dream.”

Gonzalez said she has been resting her ankle and icing it.

“I’m not going to let something like this stop me,” she said.

Sponsored by a coalition of labor, education, and civil society groups including AFSCME, the March for California’s Future is designed to highlight the growing ephemerality of the California dream due to the deterioration of the state’s social infrastructure that has left many citizens to fend for themselves at a time of record unemployment and home foreclosures.

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Willie L. Pelote, Sr. is an Assistant Director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), AFL-CIO. AFSCME’s 1.6 million members provide the vital services that make America happen. With members in hundreds of different occupations — from nurses to corrections officers, child care providers to sanitation workers — AFSCME advocates for fairness in the workplace, excellence in public services and prosperity and opportunity for all working families.