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CASTRO VALLEY FORUM A COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER SERVING CASTRO VALLEY SINCE 1989
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 22, 2021
YEAR 33
70-Year-Old Truck Ban on I-580 Debated
INSIDE YOUR
FORUM NEWS
rawing the Lines
By Mike McGuire
Board of Supervisors voted last Wednesday on a redistricting map
CASTRO VALLEY FORUM
Page NEWS
PHOTOS BY MICHAEL SINGER
fter years of serving brea fast and lunch to Castro Valley patrons, the owner of the ell Cafe is closing its doors ne t month.
Season of iving CHP provides gifts to local shelters through the Rotary Club of CV
Page NEWS
Sweet Success CV/ Eden Area Chamber welcomes new business to Castro Village
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NO. 51
Dell Cafe to Close By Michael Singer CASTRO VALLEY FORUM
After 22 years of serving breakfast and lunch to Castro Valley, the owner of the historic Dell Cafe says he will close the doors for good sometime at the end of January 2022. “We’re so very thankful and grateful for all of the support we have gotten over the years with our loyal customers and people
who have tried us for the first time,” owner, Said “Sam,” Nabhan told the Forum. The building on Castro Valley Boulevard first opened in 1940 and has been a staple for multiple generations of families in the East Bay. The 50-seat restaurant with bright crimson seats and a classic luncheon counter design was one of the only places to get custom omelets and burgers in town before even the downtown shopping area was built. see DELL on page 2
Big trucks could drive on Interstate 580 in San Leandro and Oakland as early as 2023 if some residents and a group of activist schoolchildren are successful in unraveling what they see as the environmental racism of the current ban. Some 400 people participated in an online town hall meeting on the ban held last Thursday night to express their concerns. “Oakland only allows trucks on I-880, which runs right through my neighborhood,” said Angel, a seventh-grader at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in Oakland. The school is also near that freeway. Angel said that many of the students at her school and in her neighborhood have asthma, which is made more likely by pollution. She is also worried about the health effects of breathing particles of soot from diesel exhaust.
Last year, Angel and other then-sixth graders at Life Academy researched the ban and brought their complaints both to District 4 County Supervisor Nate Miley and to KQED television, which broadcast an examination of the ban. “There are a number of things that need to be investigated,” Miley told the Forum. “We need to determine what the congestion might look like if all of those trucks are still on either corridor.” The Thursday town hall was hosted by Miley, who represents many of the freeway’s neighbors. Representatives from Caltrans and Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD) were also in attendance to listen and learn more from the neighbors living near both freeways. Trucks weighing 4.5 tons (9,000 pounds) can currently use I-580 through Castro Valley but must take Interstate 238 to Interstate 880 rather than see BAN on page 4
District Spotlights Upgrades at CV Schools School, and four elementary schools for its Board of Trustees and members of its oversight committee. It was Castro Valley schools are ending the year with hundreds the first time in more than two years the district showed off of finished improvements to the progress of its modernizatheir 15 campuses including tion projects. more permanent buildings, improved classroom experi“I am always impressed at ences, and support systems for the thoughtfulness of the disstudents. trict staff who are overseeing this work, to bring together site Earlier this month, the staff and the contractors so that district hosted a tour of six work can proceed smoothly different sites including the high school, Creekside Middle and efficiently,” said Board of By Michael Singer
CASTRO VALLEY FORUM
Trustees president, Dot Theodore. “That’s not something that you can visualize, but that impresses me immensely.” Improvements at the schools range from addressing health and safety, heating and air conditioning (HVAC), roofs, lighting, fields, and playgrounds in addition to the expansion and upgrades of multi-purpose rooms, classrooms, and imPHOTOS COURTESY OF CASTRO VALLEY UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT proved access to facilities. Many improvements are ta ing place at CV schools The most visible changes . see UPGRADES on page 4 than s to the passage of ond Measure in
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