Change is Good? July 29, 2008

Nearly 15 years ago, our household moved from a congested suburban area of NE Sacramento county to the more rural area of Elk Grove. At the time, EG was a small unicorporated town, but soon developers bought all the land in the area from dairy farmers, who with the lure of a well funded retirement, took the cash. Some even preserved their homes in the bargain, only to find them surrounded by strip malls and tract homes. Eventually most of these holdouts moved, and almost immediately the farm house, many built in the 1880-1910 period, werre leveled and replaced with gas stations and commercial buildings. Our family saw what was coming, and so after 4 years, and seeing the dairy behind our house disappear into tract homes and a baseball park, we uprooted again, and moved to the definantly rural Wilton area. Today, there is a clear boundary (Grantline Road) that defines Elk Grove sprawl from Wilton. Elk Grove had a population of about 45,000 when we first moved there, today its over 139,000.

And so we lived in peaceful country life for nearly a decade. Then the sleepy nature of our community became different, as the remoteness we all treasure has become a calling card for criminally minded youth, knowing the police take forever to respond to "that hick farm town".

Last year our house was burglarized, and thousand of dollars in property taken. Six months later my brother in laws car, which he parks out front of the house nearer the county road, was stolen- although the CHP did find it in a ditch later. Cost him hundreds of dollars to get it fixed.

Now we come to Sunday morning. I got up, made coffee, and opened the blinds on the living room...yes I could see my brother in laws car, but something was different. As I went outside and walked towards his car, a sick feeling sank upon me as I realized he no longer had a rear window. I walked to his car, and a large cinderblock brick was in the back, shattered glass everywhere. The dents on his trunk attested to the window probably deflecting the brick once, and the final insult obilterating the window. Because he drives a Ford, the glass companys we have contacted all say Ford auto glass is very expensive. It looks like it will cost about $500 to replace. Honey and him are thinking of looking in some junk yards for a replacement...

My point is this trend coincides with the opening a a new subdivision about a quarter mile the other side of the divide between Wilton and Elk Grove. When the police took the report for our house, they said that crime in our area had gone up 300%. "Probably kids, teenagers" he said. I asked why, and the cop looked at me and said he didnt know why, but that his experience was they were likely teens in a gang that had taken root in the XXX subdivison.

This series of events has caused us to consider moving. But no where is safe from crime it seems. Not even Wilton.