What does it take to get the attention of city leaders who play a role in maintaining or improving the streets in the city of Turlock? 

Myself, along with others who reside in a senior complex on East Avenue, have tried for four-plus years to get the attention of city leaders to fix the street that runs directly in front of the complex on East Avenue between Golden State and Johnson and where Colorado dead ends.

Many email conversations have been had with Mayor Amy Bublak, (with whom I voted for) while being directed to other places such as engineering and/or other district leaders to no avail. The Journal has listed many streets being fixed and you can drive all over Turlock including around the corner on Lander Avenue, and see streets with improvements being made but for some reason this street remains unchanged. 

We have pleaded, begged and some have been to city council meetings, only to receive broken promises. 

East Avenue is a very busy street with people who travel up and down exceeding the speed limit while going to the swap meet. 

There are disabled seniors in this complex with no access to a vehicle who either wait at the bus stop or who at some point have attempted to cross the street at the crosswalk without getting hit. 

A couple of months back there was a dog that got hit and ran across the street seeking refuge bleeding. What is it going to take?

 At one point we had even stated that we would settle for just repainting the crosswalk itself and adding additional signage here (like the high school has) and still nothing. 

When someone says they care for the seniors in their community or they “love” their seniors but continue to ignore/put off requests, after four-plus years we have come to the point where we say “prove it.”

We have been asked to be patient and I think we are well qualified in that department.  I mean, after all patience is a virtue. Here is the definition of that word: The capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble, or suffering without getting angry or upset.

In other words, patience is essentially "waiting with grace” apparently for more than four years.

“Love” is both a noun and a verb, an action word. You can make many promises but without action behind it those promises are nothing more than words. 

This is just one more attempt as a senior advocate for our community

 Please, fix our street.

— Katrina Thomas