Is Vallejo the Flint Michigan of the Bay Area?

3/24/09

By Marc Garman

Most of you remember the 1989 film “Roger and Me”. In it, filmmaker Michael Moore relentlessly pursues General Motors CEO Roger Smith. Moore keeps confronting Smith over the impacts downsizing at GM have had on the factory town of Flint, Michigan. Smith was an easy target. GM was the largest employer in town and Roger Smith ordered the massive layoffs that left economic ruin in their wake. Much like Flint, Michigan...Vallejo seems to be a place that just can't grab a break.

As we now know, Touro University has decided to pull out of building a cancer treatment center on Mare Island.

Just the latest in a long string of “missed it by that much” opportunities for the city of Vallejo. Unlike the premise of Moore's movie, there is no one culprit who is exclusively responsible for Vallejo's decline. Just a long string of greedy acts, incompetence, shortsightedness, corruption, missed opportunities, and plain bad luck.