Another good thing that came out of the neighborhood meeting on Monday night was meeting Harry. He lives nearby on E Street and is starting up a community garden of sorts along the side of his apartment complex. He already has an area mulched and has space for several more gardeners to join in! If you live over at Harriet Lane, RiversSide, Metro Place or even Good and would be interested give Harry a call at 821-5748. It’s always fun meeting people who are jumping a little outside the norm and working to bring some changes (and good food) to the neighborhood around them!

Steve

Warning! This image may not be suitable for some viewers.

So about 18 months ago Jason dreamed up this campaign called “Sit Here and Dream Big”. It took a while to build the signs and have the rocks delivered to all of the sites, but we did it. We did it because we wanted to inspire a community. We wanted to get people to think about things a little deeper than just the common stuff that occupies so many of us so much of the time. It didn’t take long to show up to one of the sites and find the above sign broken off of its supports and laying on the ground with the message you see scribbled on it.

Now, at the time, this was very troubling to some of us at LJ Urban. I think when the sign was kicked over it was a little disconcerting, “Oh crap, what have we gotten into over in this neighborhood?” We were having town-hall type meeting with the residents where we invited everyone in the neighborhood to come eat Sal’s Tacos and converse with us about our plans for the community. We had questions and answers but everyone was pretty civil and supportive. Then there was this abuse of our ideals, violence against private property, passive aggressive rejection of our plans and dreams. I know I sound a little melodramatic here but I am trying to dig deeper into what these public interactions mean and show the feelings that were buried behind them.

So we got over it but we never did get rid of the sign, or put another one up in its place actually. We have kept it turned around facing the wall because of its offensive nature but I went and turned it around to face out the other day. I think I just wanted some inspiration. It’s also funny and gets laughs from whoever sees it now. I think what I understand now is that we never can tell how an action, we perceive as helpful or uplifting, might be digested, or barfed back up as the case may be, by the ones we intend to encourage.  All in all I think this sign and all of its deeper meaning are just what I needed yesterday to keep on fighting.

Micah Baginski

We updated the lot layout to show the units we sold and I feel a bit of bragging is in order…..4 since January 1st! How cool is that?

Tonight is the big night over at Good! We are hosting another open house and showing off the sites where the next phase is being constructed. We will have pricing and all the juicy details available on the new Medium unit!

All you need to do is drive over the I St Bridge into West Sacramento and look for the orange signs, or you can click here for a map. We will be there starting at 5 tonight!

See you there!

Levi Benkert

Before I start I need to break a rule I read once about blogging. The rule went something like this. “Never open a blog post with, I am sorry I have not written in a while.” You all have most likely noticed that it has indeed been a while and despite the rules I am going to say I am sorry.

If you are signed up on the LJ Urban email list you got an email from us yesterday about the progress we are making on the good project. That is exactly what has been keeping me so busy. Since January 1st when word got out that we had another phase available people started blowing up my phone with calls to get in contract, which is very good news. So anyway. I am sorry for neglecting the blog here, even though I am not supposed to say that. But at the same time I am not sorry because I have such a good excuse. More people living in Good is a very good excuse right?

Anyhow. More posts to come I promise.

Levi Benkert

If you take a walk one block down B St from Good you will see a tree on the side of the levee that the neighborhood has turned into a playground. Three different rope swings are hung on the tree and because its right up against the levee you can actually get swinging pretty high. What I like about the swings is that nearly every time we go there we meet another neighbor. It’s like the corner in New Orleans or a community garden. The swings were put there by people who were just trying to make a better place and are enjoyed by everyone. I know its not going to change the world when someone hangs up a swing but small things like that go a long way in building a stronger community. And that I believe is a good thing.

Depending on who you are and where you’re at in life this may be either the most interesting opportunity to come your way in a while or it may be way out in left field. Either way I think you need to hear about it because someone is going to be really lucky who steps up and takes the initiative.

Let me stop here for a second, I really to explain our role in all this, we at LJ Urban are not involved in any way in this project and are not going to be hand holding or sitting in endless meetings to make this happen. If you want it you have to come and get it all on your own and once you hear the story you will see why someone is going to be very lucky who does.

Ok, now that I have you thoroughly confused let me tell you what is going on. On the corner of 3rd and C Streets in West Sacramento there is this neat little cafe/restaurant space that has been sitting empty for far too long. John Leonard built it a little over a year ago along with the Riverside housing project and it has remained un-leased since then. So we were looking at the space thinking….Hmmm something needs to happen here. We then called up our friends over at the Redevelopment department in West Sacramento and asked them if they had any ideas.

Before I go any further I have to make sure I don’t get into any trouble with the city: Anything and everything they told me was purely ideas on the table and not commitments or specific agreements. OK. Got that? Good. Now I can go on.

Basically the concept is this. John Leonard is super eager (as you can imagine) to lease the space and is thus willing to make some serious concessions on rent and help out whoever wants to start up a cafe, and the City is (remember what I said about not being for sure) willing to step in and help pay the rent for something like the first 3-5 years. So…Ever thought of starting your own coffee shop? Or have a friend who wants to? Now is the time, you have the perfect location with something like 13,000 cars driving by per day, and on top of it help and lots of it from the city and the landlord.

What do you think? Email me at Levi(at)LJUrban(dot)com if you want some phone numbers to start checking things out, and in the mean time drive by 3rd and C and see what I am talking about.

Levi Benkert

After more than a year of hard work and countless hours of meetings with the city staff we finally got a chance to sit before the City Council last night and hear what they had to say about Simple and Habitat.

They spent more than an hour and a half debating the parking and design of the projects. In the end we got our vote 5-0!

Thank you for everyone who came out and spoke up for our projects, my blog post must have worked because there were several people there who I have never met. You all are awesome!

Levi

I am pretty sure if there were a book about blogging (which there are many I have not read) there would be a whole chapter in there about not doing blog posts like this one but oh well. Sometimes you have to break the rules.

This is basically a blog post about nothing…. I just got back late yesterday from Chicago and am trying to catch up on a ton of back work and in the midst of that getting ready for the hearing tonight at city council in West Sacramento. My trip was good, negotiating with lenders and meeting with people in offices way to far from the ground. I like chicago even when its 10 degrees out,  that is saying a lot about the city.

Ok have to go get my day done here and get ready for the hearing. I am using most of the same material you all helped out with the last time around. Thanks agian!

Levi

We’ve got a big City Council meeting next Wednesday night that is critical for our projects in the Washington neighborhood of West Sacramento. If you are bought in to the vision of what we are doing there (urban/green/good) we would love to have you come out and help support it – especially if you live nearby! There are quite a few neighbors that are objecting to the limited parking we are proposing, we are making the case that society needs to move beyond a car only transportation scenario and that not every house needs to have space for 3 cars. I once heard a really neat quote by Jamie Lerner “The car is kind of like your mother in law. You need her around but if she is the only woman in your life you have problems”

If you are interested in coming out and supporting good sustainable development let Steve know if you could make it and he will tell you about what time the topic will probably come up! He’s at 329-3727 or steve@ljurban.com