Kicking Paradise while it’s down

On what planet does Chico City Council believe an Ice Rink downtown is a good idea? To directly compete with a rink in Paradise, while Paradise is just barely starting to recover, is moral turpitude.

I live in Chico, but Paradise is where I grew up, and I work there every day. Chicoans have no frame of reference for how difficult it has been to pick ourselves up off the ground here on the Ridge. Building prices, insurance changes, the town council waffling on how long someone can stay on their property, a lack of services, Covid… but we did have a little ice rink. Felt like a little bit of “normal” in a town that looks more like a faraway planet than it does the place I grew up. Brought a few extra dollars to the businesses making a brave but shaky go of things up here.

For the City Council to try to cut in on that little bit of normal is unconscionable. How dare you kick a proverbial man while he’s down? And how dumb do you have to be not to recognize that you’d be directly competing with a town taken about as low as anyone can go? Folks on the Ridge have always kind of thought Chico folks looked down their nose at us, but is the council really this backward and cruel? This council’s legacy seems to be using the cops to harass homeless folks (many of whom are Camp Fire survivors) and turning their backs on their neighbors on the Ridge.

To use some city revenue to goose spending in downtown Chico during the holidays is good for the community. To so obviously and directly compete with Paradise is a senseless and immoral act.

— Matt Sutter, Chico