Help Pease Moving to !! Stockton CA

[FutureFormerCalifornian]

Mat޲޲te޲l޲ rec޲޲en޲t޲l޲y ann޲޲ou޲n޲c޲ed޲޲ the޲޲ rel޲޲ea޲s޲e޲ of the޲޲ imp޲޲ro޲v޲e޲d lim޲޲it޲e޲d޲-e޲޲dit޲޲io޲n޲ Bar޲޲bi޲e޲ Dol޲޲ls޲ for޲޲ the޲޲ Gre޲޲at޲e޲r޲ Sac޲޲ra޲m޲e޲nt޲޲o mar޲޲ke޲t޲:޲

"Ro޲sev޲ill޲e Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s pri޲nce޲ss Bar޲bie޲ is sol޲d onl޲y at the޲ Gal޲ler޲ia Mal޲l. She޲ com޲es wit޲h an ass޲ort޲men޲t of Kat޲e Spa޲de Han޲dba޲gs,޲ a Lex޲us SUV޲, a lon޲g-h޲air޲ed for޲eig޲n dog޲ nam޲ed Hon޲ey and޲ a coo޲kie޲-cu޲tte޲r hou޲se.޲ Ava޲ila޲ble޲ wit޲h or wit޲hou޲t a tum޲my tuc޲k and޲ fac޲e lif޲t. Wor޲kah޲oli޲c Ken޲ sol޲d onl޲y in con޲jun޲cti޲on wit޲h the޲ aug޲men޲ted޲ ver޲sio޲n.

"Ri޲o Vis޲ta Bar޲bie޲"
The޲ mod޲ern޲ day޲ hom޲ema޲ker޲ Bar޲bie޲ is ava޲ila޲ble޲ wit޲h For޲d Win޲dst޲ar Min޲iva޲n and޲ mat޲chi޲ng gym޲ out޲fit޲. She޲ get޲s los޲t eas޲ily޲ and޲ has޲ no ful޲l-t޲ime޲ occ޲upa޲tio޲n. Tra޲ffi޲c jam޲min޲g cel޲l pho޲ne sol޲d sep޲ara޲tel޲y.

"Mo޲des޲to Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s rec޲ent޲ly par޲ole޲d Bar޲bie޲ com޲es wit޲h a 9mm޲ han޲dgu޲n, a Ray޲ Lew޲is kni޲fe,޲ and޲ a Che޲vy wit޲h dar޲k tin޲ted޲ win޲dow޲s, and޲ a Met޲h Lab޲ Kit޲. Thi޲s mod޲el is onl޲y ava޲ila޲ble޲ aft޲er dar޲k and޲ mus޲t be pai޲d for޲ in cas޲h (pr޲efe޲rab޲ly sma޲ll,޲ unt޲rac޲eab޲le bil޲ls)޲. Unl޲ess޲ you޲ are޲ a cop޲, the޲n we don޲'t kno޲w wha޲t you޲ are޲ tal޲kin޲g abo޲ut.޲

"Lo޲di Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s yup޲pie޲ Bar޲bie޲ com޲es wit޲h you޲r cho޲ice޲ of BMW޲ con޲ver޲tib޲le or Hum޲mer޲ H2.޲ Inc޲lud޲ed are޲ her޲ own޲ Sta޲rbu޲cks޲ cup޲, cre޲dit޲ car޲d, and޲ cou޲ntr޲y clu޲b mem޲ber޲shi޲p. Als޲o ava޲ila޲ble޲ for޲ thi޲s set޲ are޲ Sha޲llo޲w Ken޲ and޲ Pri޲vat޲e Sch޲ool޲ Ski޲ppe޲r. You޲ won޲'t be abl޲e to aff޲ord޲ any޲ of the޲m.

"Ga޲lt Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s pal޲e mod޲el com޲es dre޲sse޲d in her޲ own޲ Wra޲ngl޲er jea޲ns two޲ siz޲es too޲ sma޲ll,޲ a NAS޲CAR޲ t-s޲hir޲t and޲ twe޲ety޲ bir޲d tat޲too޲ on her޲ sho޲uld޲er.޲ She޲ has޲ a six޲-pa޲ck of Bud޲ lig޲ht and޲ a Han޲k Wil޲lia޲ms Jr.޲ CD set޲. She޲ can޲ spi޲t ove޲r 5 fee޲t and޲ kic޲k mul޲let޲-ha޲ire޲d Ken޲'s but޲t whe޲n she޲ is dru޲nk.޲ Pur޲cha޲se her޲ pic޲kup޲ tru޲ck sep޲ara޲tel޲y and޲ get޲ a con޲fed޲era޲te fla޲g bum޲per޲ sti޲cke޲r abs޲olu޲tel޲y fre޲e.


"De޲lta޲ Loo޲p Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s tob޲acc޲o-c޲hew޲ing޲, bra޲ssy޲-ha޲ire޲d Bar޲bie޲ has޲ a pai޲r of her޲ own޲ hig޲h-h޲eel޲ed san޲dal޲s wit޲h one޲ bro޲ken޲ hee޲l fro޲m the޲ tim޲e she޲ cha޲sed޲ bee޲r-g޲utt޲ed Ken޲ out޲ of Lin޲col޲n Bar޲bie޲'s hou޲se.޲ Her޲ ens޲emb޲le inc޲lud޲es low޲-ri޲se aci޲d-w޲ash޲ed jea޲ns,޲ fak޲e fin޲ger޲nai޲ls,޲ and޲ a see޲-th޲rou޲gh hal޲ter޲-to޲p. Als޲o ava޲ila޲ble޲ wit޲h a mob޲ile޲ hom޲e.

"Sa޲n Fra޲nci޲sco޲ Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s dol޲l is mad޲e of act޲ual޲ tof޲u. She޲ has޲ lon޲g str޲aig޲ht bro޲wn hai޲r, arc޲h-l޲ess޲ fee޲t, hai޲ry arm޲pit޲s, no mak޲eup޲ and޲ Bir޲ken޲sto޲cks޲ wit޲h whi޲te soc޲ks.޲ She޲ pre޲fer޲s tha޲t you޲ cal޲l her޲ Wil޲low޲. She޲ doe޲s not޲ wan޲t or nee޲d a Ken޲ dol޲l, but޲ if you޲ pur޲cha޲se two޲ San޲ Fra޲nci޲sco޲ Bar޲bie޲s and޲ the޲ opt޲ion޲al Sub޲aru޲ Wag޲on,޲ you޲ get޲ a rai޲nbo޲w fla޲g bum޲per޲ sti޲cke޲r for޲ fre޲e.

"St޲ock޲ton޲ Bar޲bie޲"
Thi޲s Bar޲bie޲ now޲ com޲es wit޲h str޲oll޲er and޲ inf޲ant޲ dol޲l. Opt޲ion޲al acc޲ess޲ori޲es inc޲lud޲e a GED޲ and޲ bus޲ pas޲s.

Welfare Ken and his 1997 Caddy were available, but are now very difficult to find since the addition of the infant

[Long_time_resident]

Stockton, California has many potentially useful benefits. Excellent city college (Delta CC), good private University (University of the Pacific), excellent City Symphony (Stockton symphony), local support of music education (usually found only in "better" cities). But it has many serious cultural problems that may never be solved. I mentioned the "good" now here is some "bad". Gangs are rampant! The local County Sheriff and Stockton police have been reduced to nothing more than "report writers". Other urban cities with similar problems have been successful, but in those cities there is less economic stratification. There are some very wealthy families who live in or near Stockton, but they live on either large tracts of land with a natural protective barrier (example: the Grupes) , or they live behind gated and walled communities with a full time staff of alert security staff. The local police do not allow gang intrusion into the wealthy conclaves. The result is that the rest of the city becomes a playground for thieves, criminals and gangs. One reason for this is that Stockton is a "release point" for indigent criminlas as they are released from state prisons. Another reason is that thwere is no main infrastructure other than "agribusiness-industrial farming" (few small farms and ranches), local government, building, construction and real estate. Many residents (the ones who want to work), commute to other metro areas such as the San Franciso Bay area or Sacramento .


Bad #1) Stockton is a "me too" town. It tries to be a "real city" but it never seems to get past its "bad boy' image caused by all the gangs and criminals. It IS THAT BAD. I have so many stories , that it is the rare exception that you are not affected by the criminal behavior. Add to this the fact that most of the town is lower socio-economic (*many who work "think" they are doing better because they compare themselves to the people who roam the streets with nothing) From the perspective of "just having a job" many residents feel "rich". There is a small middle class in the town. The political ramifications are serious. Most voters are "liberal", so local politicians including the so-called "conservatives are really all "liberals". "Political correctness" is so rampant that most don't even know where they are on the political spectrum. One result is coddling of criminals and gangs which only reinforces all other bad things in the town. Here are a few points: Stockton has a very high murder rate (per capita). Stockton and adjacent bedrooom communities of Lodi and Lathrop have one of the highest rates of auto theft in the nation year after year. The local police blame the vistims--- "thats what you get for owning a car". One Sheriff who was a candidate Sheriff actually bragged about having his car stolen from his house!! To "prove" he was just a regular citizen. Talk about political correctness!! Can you imagine Sheriff Arpaio of Phoenix, arizona bragging about criminals stealing his car from his house? I don't think so!

BAD #2) Development and local real estate. Stockton is consistently one of the worst places to live considering FORELOSURE RATES. One out of 27 houses is in foreclosure! New houses built and quickly sold in 2006 are now being sold for les than 50% of that and still no one wants them---mainly because of gangs and crime. Recently over 20 NEW houses were raided because they were part of a real estate scam where these new houses were really marijuana growing operations---in so-called "safe" neighborhoods.

A few big developers own the town. For example The West side of the I 5 freeway is the huge San Joaquin County DELTA---WHICH MEANS WATER--FOR MILES AND MILES. And what holds the warter back? Agricultural levees meant to allow farming on numerous "islands. When levees break, you only had to worry about asparagus fields. Today, tens of thousands of ghouses are being built on bogging soil called peat. Here is an example of peat. In California, much of the land is "caliche". Its mushy clay when its wet but as harder or harder than a rock when dry (like a brick). The fertile areas are used for agribusiness and the less fertile areas for cattle ranches. State law controls the surburbanization of the farms (except on the Delta "islands"). So lets say you want to dig a post hole for a fence post. Thats going to take a long time without power tools in "caliche" but only a few minutes with nothing but a small hand trowel opr scoop in the Delta area. The reason is the PEAT. Peat is loaded with water and is NOT a good soil to built buildings on. BUT THE LAND IS CHEAP---you can't do much with it. So guess what happens. Local builders have built tens of thousands of ticky tacky tract houses on this peat. I always thought that laws prevented that---but NOT in Stockton. Most Stocktonians don't even know they ARE "FLOATING ON A boat" OF PEAT. I challenged a friend to a test of my statement. We went out to Spanos West and across the street from some houses that were being constructed TODAY May 2008. We each had one small gardeners trowel. The goal was to dig a three foot hole (I'll explain) for a fence post. The first one done gets a cheeseburger. We finished each hole at about the same time---12 minutes BY HAND NO shovels! Now here is the good part. Wwe visited the local shoiiping cemnter also buyilt on the PEAT and bought a few bags of "readimix" concrete. My friend said where do we get the water? I laughed and said watch this. AS WE POURED THE CEMENT INTO THE HOLES IT IMMEDIATELY STARTED getting wet. Within a few minutes you could see the concret had plenty of water and was already starting to set. It has not rained in at least a month. Where is the water??/ Its everywhere. dig a few inches WATER everywhere. Do you want to pay $ 500,000 for A TICKY TACKY TRACT HOUSE BUILT ON A HIDDEN LAKE? I wouldn't pay $10,000 for it UNLESS it was a houseboat waing for the next rain or flood. Dont ever think of earthquakes. Most earthquake structural damage is on soft soils.

Now why did we dig a three foot hole? We want the fence straight at least for a year. If you look up and down the street lets say "8 mile road" where there are many new developments going up---yes even during a housing crash. Notice the wood power poles. EVER ONE OF THEM is crooked. leaning to the left or the right. Some lean so much they have to be repalced or strengthened with side poles like on a ocean pier. Because the ground is so unstable because of peat. Now guess what happens when the houses start to move? The windows pop out or crack! These are NEW houses with breaking windows. As you travel to the West it gets worse. Several thousand new houses will be built to the West of this area. Imagine what happens when we get another flood like in 1997? That was only ten years ago. THESE LEVEES WERE NEVER designed to protect a city---but only flat crop land. If you need to live in the area, I would try to go to the EAST OF STOCKTON. There is plenty of crime to the West North and South. The smaller hillside communities are not impressed with "homie talk" and city gangs.

[hotornot]

Originally Posted by Long_time_resident

Now why did we dig a three foot hole? We want the fence straight at least for a year. If you look up and down the street lets say "8 mile road" where there are many new developments going up---yes even during a housing crash. Notice the wood power poles. EVER ONE OF THEM is crooked. leaning to the left or the right. Some lean so much they have to be repalced or strengthened with side poles like on a ocean pier. Because the ground is so unstable because of peat. Now guess what happens when the houses start to move? The windows pop out or crack! These are NEW houses with breaking windows. As you travel to the West it gets worse. Several thousand new houses will be built to the West of this area. Imagine what happens when we get another flood like in 1997? That was only ten years ago. THESE LEVEES WERE NEVER designed to protect a city---but only flat crop land. If you need to live in the area, I would try to go to the EAST OF STOCKTON. There is plenty of crime to the West North and South. The smaller hillside communities are not impressed with "homie talk" and city gangs.

I was wondering when someone was going to get around to addressing the levee situation and the chance of them breaking.

www.stocktonstandingup.org/1030.html]Stockton
http://www.riverislands.com/AN10.html]In (broken link)
USATODAY.com - Schwarzenegger visits site of Calif. levee break

[korbyn]

have you ever been in a city that can get to be 115 degrees f. for an entire week? stockton mostly is an armpit, not much to do here. most nice neighborhoods are surrounded by low income slums, oh and according to forbes it is number 2 in the top 5 most miserable places to live, due to the foreclosure rates. that being said, it is easy to make day trips to some nice places. lake tahoe is about 2 hours away, as is yosemite, and so is san francisco. you could go surfing one weekend, with a dry-suit, and go snow boarding the next. the nicest school in stockton would have to be bear creek, on the north end of town, that is also near the nicer neighborhoods. there is a plus about the foreclosures though, house prices where horribly inflated a couple years ago, and have plumited back down to more reasonable prices. i hope this helps a bit, stockton isn't the worst place to live by far, but you may want to stay clear of the south side at night, or altogether.

ps. enter wal-mart at your own risk

[Dave209]

OK, I'll tell you about Stockton. It's a love hate relationship. It has an old west mentality. It has a ton of cultures but no culture. Stockton has good people and is deeply rooted, if you say a last name people all know eachother and are connected by family roots somewere down the line. Strong bonds are created in Stockton. Stockton has a ton of potential that is untaped. Bad government throughout the cities history has lacked foresite and has never tap into the beauty of Stockton. Let's become a green city guy's check out portland Or or Ashville, NC and get some ideas. Stockton schools suck K-12 public. Atlanta has hundreds of charter schools that blows me away. The creative talent of Stockton flee's the city. Stockton dose not see, hence can not sell it's potential. It's tring to improve the downtown area but it is slow. The people of Stockton will accept new idea's but if you don't build it they won't come. Example is the Cocoro sushi restuarant a huge success they have been rewarded by bringing a classy sushi house to Stockton. I am Stockton like KRSONE is hiphop and if anyone would like to hire me as consultant I'll tell you how to be successful in Stockton. No, not by selling weed. OK, here it is, Victory and Legend park and UOP areas are the best places to live. It is a real neighborhood and feels like a nice little city. Ride your bikes but remember to bring your kriptonite lock. There are other nice pockets but our city has been tainted by section 8 buildings in all parts of the city. Your never to far from a ghetto apartment complex. New construction is cheap and generic BS these are our up and coming ghetto's.Give them 25years and they well crumble in shame. Stockton is near everything this is the best part it is so central you can take a day trip and see beautiful places and things this is one of the best things about Stockton. The family style food joints, mostly in the not so good parts of the city are some of the best. Night life is nil! Live music none! Classy bar nope! Stay home and drink a 40oz you'll have more fun. How can we ever expect to keep our young professionals? There is nothing for the youth, a skate park, everyplace I played basketball growing up is now fenced off. That is f***up this what kept me out of trouble so now the youth just smokes weed, pops pills and plays video games and all we can hope for is that they don't get into meth, oxycotin, and **** that will take a quick toll. The city needs to hire me to tell them what will work in Stockton. Although I am a product of the Stkn public schools I think i'll run for Mayor sometime soon. VOTE for DAVE. I have self educated myself by traveling far and wide. I see the potential of the city but until we can pull some outside help people will continue to say, that it is a **** hole. So we finally got a semi nice restuarant Paragary's to move downtown we had to pay them millions but after talking to people around town all I hear is about it's horrible horrible service. The servers who work there are simply town folk who probably never experience first class service so how could they provide it. The conclusion is, "Stockton is a half-ass city but there are a few real cute nice neighborhoods, " It Starts at UOP heads toward Legend park then to victory park or you can always lock ourself up in Brookside rental which many think is a nice neighborhood. I think it sucks but these are the folks (Stockton Elite) with money who should be involed with improving Stockton. I don't have kids yet so I wont talk ****. Just because people say brookside is fancy dose not mean you cant rent a house cheap it's trashy elite. Brookside dose not have character. Granted there are exceptions to everything. Stockton is lovely by a old house fix it and travel where ever you want on the weekends and you'll Love Stockton.

[17271]

Here is my idea of Stockton, from living here all my life (20 years)...

Good:
Good restaurants
Easy to locate and drive into, close to Sacramento and San Francisco

Bad:
Ugly, old buildings
The downtown is very unpleasant
Full of illegal aliens and wannabe thugs
Gang writing on a lot of buildings
Extremely boring, lack of things to do
Lame environment... unless you like orchards
Garbage public schools; awful education

That sums up Stockton. The bad definitely out ways any good it has. It's strange, really, Lodi and Ripon and even Tracy are a lot better than Stockton, even though they are a lot smaller. San Joaquin county itself sucks though, I couldn't imagine why anyone would choose to live there on purpose if they had the choose to move somewhere else, esecially with 100% better counties right next to it.

[LuckyJ26]

17271, maybe it's time for you to move.

[LisaMaj]

I have lived in Stockton most of my life except for two years in Sacramento when i was a kid and i hated the school there. Now I went to high school in the 80's when everything was way more conservative than it is now but i still think Lodi High School would be the best for your kids if you have to live near Stockton. I lived in North Stockton at that time but my mother got approval for me to go there since all my cousins were there. Let me tell you, the school work was way harder than the stuff i got in junior college later. I never had any trouble with the other kids like i did in Stockton schools. They picked on me for being too quiet and shy. But whatever you do, no matter how beautiful or affordable the house, don't move to the East side or South side of Stockton. I live in the East side in a nice house that we remodeled but let me tell you it has been a brutal 20 years living here. With rentals all around sometimes you get good neighbors and sometimes you get neighbors from HELL. The best place and safest area is near the Miracle Mile {Pacific Ave}and UOP. That's my dream area with beautiful small and huge vintage homes. Good luck if you're not hear already.

[ashdre]

Hi Everyone, I do apologize if I am repeating a question that has already been answered. Does anyone know how safe is the Eastland Plaza in Stockton?