Stories of North Fair Oaks: The necessity of listening for true Environmental Justice

The hot August air is waiting for us as Gabriela, the treasurer of the North Fair Oaks Community Alliance (NFOCA), and I prepare fliers and a game plan for our door-to-door knocking session. As we head out the door and walk two blocks away to start distributing fliers, Gabriela tells me stories.

She’s lived in the neighborhood of North Fair Oaks for over 30 years and has seen things change and stay the same. As an unincorporated neighborhood, North Fair Oaks is underfunded and underdeveloped in comparison to the neighboring cities of Redwood City and Menlo Park. Having been historically redlined out of these two areas, North Fair Oaks has no dedicated city representation and is directly overseen by San Mateo County.

As we walk, she points out how the roads still flood despite the fact that repairs were promised over 20 years ago. When we pass Middlefield Road, North Fair Oaks’ main commercial street, she tells me about how, decades ago, she had been part of a committee that the county had put together to improve Middlefield Road. Back then, everyone on the committee had fought for safety measures like flashing lights on the crosswalks but the county denied their requests, and the need for better pedestrian safety can still be felt today.

Being reliant on solely the county for services has led to problems such as the severe underreporting of COVID cases leading to a lack of sufficient COVID resources, the lack of dedicated fire and police services causing delays when emergencies happen, or a difficulty in getting trash services when illegal dumping occurs. As time passed, Gabriela and other neighbors became increasingly frustrated with the way the county handled problems, which led to her co-founding NFOCA, a grassroots organization working to improve the lives of everyone in the neighborhood. Some of their recent efforts include advocating for more stop signs on Middlefield to reduce speeding and planting more trees to combat heat. As Gabriela speaks, I listen intently, eager to absorb her wealth of knowledge about the neighborhood.

Eventually, we arrive at our destination—an empty lot surrounded by vibrant homes. Our goal today i

s to inform the neighbors about an upcoming NFOCA information session on Cal Water’s plan to build a water well pumping station in the middle of their residential neighborhood. Here, we will be placing fliers on mailboxes and knocking on doors. Cal Water, the water utility company that serves North Fair Oaks, had held a public information session in October 2023. At that meeting, community members had many concerns about the project that had gone unanswered until now. These worries included issues such as noise, safety of their families, utility prices, overpumping, and the justness of putting an industrial facility in a residential area that has had a history of being taken advantage of.

In the winter before my summer fellowship, I took a class called Just Transitions Policy Lab where I worked in a team of students conducting research for NFOCA that gathered more information about their project concerns. Now, it is coming full circle as I spend the summer working towards holding an information meeting with the community to share what I learned. At the end of the session, we plan to send emails to Cal Water and the county to ask them to not go forward with the project without the full consent of the community.

The thing about this project is that, at first glance, what Cal Water is doing seems perfectly reasonable and even admirable. As an environmental systems engineering major, it made sense to me that Cal Water was doing this for the good of the region, that they simply wanted to improve water reliability for everyone in preparation for times of drought. However, after I heard the stories about how industrial projects are often placed in North Fair Oaks, how services such as emergency response and garbage are often slow to get to the neighborhood, and how residents have been having the same issues for years that never seem to get solved, it became clear that people rightfully did not trust that this project would give them any benefits at all.

This was a big learning experience for me since, in my time at Stanford, I had been looking at things in the same way that Cal Water was. I always wanted to think of the bigger picture. In my classes, I learned that it would be important to diversify our water resources as concerns about drought rose so I thought that a well would be a practical solution. It wasn’t until I spent a summer with NFOCA that I realized that my technical knowledge was not giving me a grasp of the real-world impact of these projects on communities. I’ve always cared about environmental justice but, still, my perspective had been too narrow. When it comes to any project like this, it is crucial that any benefit does not come at the expense of a community.

Ensuring that no harm comes to a community is no simple task. It takes more than just one community meeting to understand the history and needs of a community. From Gabriela, I learn about various organizations that have attempted to do work in North Fair Oaks, some with limited success. The ones that didn’t work out often had good intentions but lacked a true understanding of the community, leading to ineffective solutions. Building trust is a slow but necessary process that requires careful listening and consistent feedback. I experience this firsthand while organizing the community information meeting about the water well station.

We know that the success of the water well station meeting depends on addressing the specific needs of the community. We consider things like the language needs of attendees, their potential hesitations on sharing personal information, and any possible technology gaps. We make all of our materials— such as PowerPoints, fliers, forms, and information sheets—in both English and Spanish. On our forms, we don’t require people to give their address but instead ask them whether or not they are a resident in North Fair Oaks to alleviate concerns about sharing too much personal information. Our website has dedicated pages entirely in English and Spanish and, when we send email petitions at the end of the meeting, we make sure to walk people through the process. Since the members of NFOCA are members of the North Fair Oaks community themselves, they know the needs of the people the best. If we had not understood the community’s unique characteristics and taken these extra steps to alleviate possible concerns, we would not have been as successful.

In the end, the results from our water well information session exceed expectations! Twenty-four community members attend and show support for demanding real answers from Cal Water. About two weeks after the meeting, 42 people have signed the petition form and sent emails to Cal Water and the county. During the over nine months since Cal Water’s initial meeting in October, they failed to respond to any community requests for more information. Now, less than a week after NFOCA's information session, they finally begin to give people the responses they deserved. And, although the answers still leavesome concerns, they open the door for more meaningful dialogue between Cal Water and the North Fair Oaks community that will hopefully end in a result that makes everyone happy.

I love North Fair Oaks, including all of the lovely places I’ve been to and people that I met. It was on Middlefield Road where I had the best strawberry ice cream in my life and also talked to the wonderful people at El Concilio, whose longtime work in the area inspired me. In the future, I could be working as a project planner, collaborating with local governments, or even supporting a nonprofit. No matter what, I know that the principles of listening, building trust, and tailoring solutions to the specific needs of communities will always guide my work. My experience as a fellow with NFOCA has only cemented my goal of working to advance environmental justice and ensuring that sustainability efforts benefit all, not just a select few. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to be with such an amazing community!