Tahoe Latinos confront garbage problem
April 29, 2008
North Lake Tahoe residents were talking trash at the last Nuestro Tahoe community meeting — some even took pictures.
Identified at an earlier meeting as one of the problems confronting Kings Beach and Tahoe Vista, members of the new citizen action group Nuestro Tahoe recently documented the pile up of garbage around Kings Beach through photographs and stories.
David Escobar, 38, interviewed Kings Beach residents.
Some residents didn’t think the neighborhood was dirty, said Escobar, while others lamented the state of the houses, apartments and mobile homes in the area.
He did not write down the names of the people he interviewed, but he did take notes on his conversations.
He said they told him they would like to see the homes remodeled so “they could live in dignity.”
But the solution is not as easy as it sounds.
People living in the run-down homes see it as the responsibility of the landlords to renovate and make the apartments more liveable. Renters are reluctant to 
spend money on homes they don’t own, and often have no plans of living in for long.
It’s that cycle, Escobar reported, that keeps the homes in disrepair. In short, Latinos who live in those homes are often transient, willing to pay their rent for the short time they’re there, then move on.
Contributing to the problem are landlords who have no incentive to clean up the properties as long as they have people willing to live there and pay the rent.
Also adding to the debris problem is trash accumulating around dumpsters. Escobar said he heard that people often send their children to dump the garbage, and some kids are too small to reach the opening of the dumpster.
Mario de la Rosa, editor of Ahora, led a discussion among the nine attendees of the community group about what could be done.
He suggested identifying the associations that govern rental properties and researching relevant city and county ordinances.
Others suggested organizing the community to pick up garbage along streets and beaches and cover graffiti.
The next meeting will be Thursday, May 8th, 8 p.m. at the North Lake Tahoe Conference Center in Kings Beach.
For more information, contact Donica Mensing or visit Nuestro Tahoe.
Related posts: [ Site set up to encourage Hispanic participation ] [ Hispanics attend landscaping class ] [ Community meeting to discuss solutions for BMPs - Live streaming video available ] [ From morals to economics, poverty is everyone’s problem ] [ Sitting on a park bench ]
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