I decided to live downtown with the promise from the city of a renaissance. Major developers had set upon Mare Island to make it an exclusive area -- several new homes were in the works and a lottery system put in place for those chosen few who wanted to occupy one of the new homes. People from neighboring cities had moved in to Vallejo with hopes of making it like Sausalito or Santa Rosa. The Empress Theater had been refurbished and the doors opened for private parties.

I recall when I noticed that things started coming to a standstill. We were supposed to see the launching of a new shopping complex complete with condominiums and underground parking on Sacramento Street and that effort was supposed to have broken ground in 2006. 2007 came and went, and finally folks started realizing that construction wasn’t going to happen. Businesses that depended on financial investments into the downtown area began to realize that they had relocated downtown to their own detriment.

The newspaper began to report city budget problems, for instance, how the city was spending $0.95 for every dollar on city services. Pretty soon the fire department became the area of focus as firefighters were judged for bringing in salaries well into the six figures in overtime, salary and benefits. Next came battle royale over who would become mayor of our bleeding city. The victor, Osby Davis, inherited a mess that foreshadowed the type of mess our entire country is currently facing.

In spite of it all, we have a strong arts community, a beautiful waterfront and parks, and Vallejo is an overall beautiful city centrally located to other major cities such as Sacramento and San Francisco. I would say that the city’s biggest asset is its citizens, who will ultimately have to be responsible for helping the city reach its potential.