Walk a Mile on our Hamster Wheel
The Covid-19 Pandemic gave everyone a taste of powerlessness. Though Covid is not "over", the declared emergency has ended. Life is returning to "normal". But what's normal for residents of a city is likely to be different for residents of unincorporated areas. Our communities were powerless, unimportant and overlooked before the Pandemic and during the Pandemic. That's our state of normality. And it hasn't changed now that the Covid emergency has been lifted. Joe Mathews wrote an excellent article on this subject back in November of 2020 that talked about some of the struggles that we all face. It also makes the point that unsavory people can take advantage of the lack of local resources to get away with bad actions.
...life under the thumb of your county is full of uncertainties about the future, frustrations about our powerlessness, and feelings of abandonmentJoe Mathews, "California’s Unincorporated Places Can Be Poor, Powerless—And the Perfect Place to Commit Murder" (Zocalo Public Square, Nov. 10, 2020)
Photo of Tulare County crime scene featured in Jessica Garrison's 2018 article, “I Killed Them All.” The Life Of One Of America’s Bloodiest Hitmen" (https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/jessicagarrison/martinez-hitman-cartel-black-hand-mano-negra-contract-killer)