| Photo by Umanoide on Unsplash
Part IV of “Proactive People Must Protect Own Neighborhood” Series
This series will now discuss how socioeconomic projects can be launched by the people of West Covina (California). The alleged scandals involving its City Council members and other city officials shall be submitted to the Office of the State Attorney General (SAG) for investigation, beginning with a suggested forensic audit of perceived anomalous transactions, as reported on Facebook by some community activists and in the San Gabriel Valley Tribune. It will take time for the SAG office to do its work. The series will publish its official findings, as they become available.
The problem with the city government of West Covina is a lack of financial resources. The majority of its elected leaders resorted to higher taxation and selling part of its public parks to real-estate developers (some of whose councilmembers reportedly have a financial stake in them). The city allegedly sold some portions of public streets. And continues with its policy of deficit spending and borrowing more from lenders.
Even if the incumbent councilmembers refuse to submit the required documents and dossier, former city officials like ex-Mayor Fredrick Sykes have records of the needed reforms and alleged improprieties that occurred over their objections as minority members of the City Council.
The series is addressed primarily to voters in West Covina, who will elect three of the five seats on the City Council in the coming election on November 3, 2026. This column suggests that the city’s voters must persuade all the candidates to sign a “Covenant with We, the People” to undertake fundamental structural reforms, beginning with helping the SAG office conduct the forensic audit and turning over all pertinent documents from the past 25 years. We also suggest that each candidate submit a representative to a public-private partnership (PPP) study group to finalize pre-feasibility studies by the last week of October 2026.
This column suggests that the study group should focus on five economic initiatives that the city may pursue in developing the recommended PPPs, one for each area of development. I suggest using the Olympic Games logo, or a variation of it, as the rallying symbol for the projects tentatively dubbed “Five Interlocking Chains of West Covina”.
“The Five Chains represent (in alphabetical order) Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Healthcare, and Sports that will make “West Covina, the City of the Future of California”. The acronym “ACEHS” may be used. It can be pronounced as “aces” with a silent “h”.
The Five Chains represent (in alphabetical order) Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Healthcare, and Sports that will make “West Covina, the City of the Future of California”. The acronym “ACEHS” may be used. It can be pronounced as “aces” with a silent “h”. We also suggest holding the formal launch of a 20-year program in 2028—a week before the grand opening of the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles County. There are at least 18 months from January 2027 to June 2028 to finalize feasibility studies, organize cooperatives, and prepare project sites.
Here is the bird-eye view of agricultural endeavors that West Covina, which bills itself as “Tree City U.S.A.,” may undertake. Yes, in cooperation with neighborhood cooperatives, beginning with the First Responders for Emergencies and Disasters (FRED), as discussed in Part I of this series. Neighborhood FREDs can, and ideally, be organized as co-ops.
The neighborhood co-ops — as maybe federated — can start to: 1.) Replace shade trees with fruit trees; 2.) Replace shrubs and hedges with cacti that bear edible fruits like the dragon fruit. Cacti can help in containing forest fires; 3.) Plant sweet potato in between fruit trees; 4.) Convert neighborhood houses into rooms or spaces for growing mushrooms. bean sprouts, and vegetables in backyards; 5.) Work with the Water District to harness gray water (rinse water), increase its recycling, and construct small- to medium-sized water storage tanks at the tops of hills, so as to use gravity for piped-in irrigation of the planned fruit-tree, cacti, and bamboo plantations.
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For short- to medium-term projects, offer the same initiatives to neighboring cities and terrace hills to create more agricultural space for fruit trees, cacti, or bamboo. At the same time, minimize or mitigate forest fires. All of these suggested projects can be done in joint ventures with the other cities’ co-ops. Then, when harvests are large enough, the PPP agricultural ventures can produce organic fertilizer, fruit wines, olive-and-avocado oil, guava jelly, bamboo shoots, sweet-potato fries, and other consumer items such as fresh flowers and orchids (which can be cultivated in greenhouses).
The co-ops can also establish neighborhood grocery stores with bakeries and coffee shops to market their products. This can even be done in a joint venture with established grocery chains, which will supply other consumer items not produced or processed by the co-ops. The said groceries can also have ATMs of a West Covina-based credit union. Or, if no credit union is willing to work with the neighborhood co-ops, they can organize a new financial arm.
