Irvine Districting: Map + Public Comment
Retrieved June 29, 2023 at 12:24 a.m.
Dear Irvine City Councilmembers and Staff:
My name is Sibylla Leon Guerrero, Ph.D. and I am a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California Irvine. I am also a parent, renter, bicycle commuter, and postdoc union representative. I support the recent UCI community of interest map (attached) collaboratively constructed with diverse stakeholders from the UCI & campus community.
It is very important that the UCI community be kept together in one district, along with the neighboring off-campus housing, rentals, and apartments where we live, work, and study. Specifically, this includes parcels 185, 2641, 3988, 2083, 2816, 2822, 2209, 5619, 1842, 0, 1304, 2829, 1885, 4499, 13, 3071, 6346, 7433, 3885.
Like me, those in these parcels are more likely to be renters, more likely to be lower-income, more likely to use public transportation, and more likely to commute via bikes and pedestrian pathways. Like many others in this community, I live nearby UCI in off-campus rental housing. It is important that nearby rental neighborhoods be included in the UCI district because renters are a particularly vulnerable community of interest in Irvine where the cost of shelter is extremely high. Renters often have less voice in our city planning because we are often excluded from participating in neighborhood HOAs, and we are incorrectly viewed as being temporary in our city’s governance.
Without a strong voice in our city’s governance, we are priced out of living where we work and study, and we lack robust transit systems necessary to meet our community needs. I thus join others in the community in requesting that UCI and the neighboring rental communities where we live be together in one district — so that we can continue to work together to improve our living, working, and commuting conditions.
Thank you!