SAN ANTONIO — Richard Lafoille misses the days when he could walk around the East Village neighborhood without fear of falling down due to cracked or uneven sidewalks.
The 86-year-old Michigan native has called San Antonio home for decades and serves as president of the East Village Neighborhood Association.
“Why don’t they want to fix it?” Lafoille said, who lives in the 5000 block of Castle Run Drive.
Members of the East Village Neighborhood Association have been fighting for a permanent fix to the sidewalks for years.
Lafoille said he’s seen little movement from the City of San Antonio to address the community’s concerns beyond officials visiting the neighborhood.
He claims in some cases, city officials aren’t following up with updates.
Lafoille is primarily worried about the safety and wellbeing of neighbors, many of whom are older adults and have physical ailments.
Lafoille is among those who’ve fallen due to the sidewalks. He walks with a prosthetic leg.
“Every time I have this leg on and the Packers are playing, they win,” Lafoille said. “I wasn’t watching where I was going I guess and I hit one of those curbs and over I went and flat on my butt.”
Virginia Bueno, a longtime resident of East Village neighborhood, has seen how dangerous walking on the sidewalks can be as well.
“Just walking down the sidewalk, you can’t just look around at the homes or enjoy the view, you have to look down to make sure you’re not going to trip,” Bueno said. “I saw an 84-year-old lady fall about 15 years ago and all she wanted to do was make sure her kids got home safe from school, her grandkids.”
A spokesman with the Public Works Department explained in an emailed statement how the City of San Antonio has performed sidewalk work in the East Village neighborhood on a few streets in 2022.
“Sidewalk work is planned for this Spring on Castle Path Drive, and we have a few more streets scheduled for 2025-2026. Four near-term street maintenance projects in this neighborhood will also include sidewalk improvements,” said Public Works representative Nicholas Olivier.
The City of San Antonio is faced with more than 5,400 miles of existing sidewalk network with gaps equaling nearly 1,445 miles. A sidewalk condition assessment is in the process of being launched to provide the City a more targeted approach to “enhance the usability of the sidewalk network,” the statement said.
“To complete the network would require nearly $717 million to fill the gaps, and to repair the areas of the network that have deteriorated would require additional funds to complete. Through the various funding mechanisms (i.e., Bond Programs and the five-year Infrastructure Management Program), the City has gradually been facilitating the completion of the sidewalk network as well as the repair of existing sidewalks in various neighborhoods citywide including the East Village Neighborhood,” Olivier said in the statement.
The City of San Antonio’s indicates residents are responsible for sidewalk repairs in front of their homes. Public Works conducts investigations in the condition of the sidewalks to determine liability.
Residents can call 311 to report sidewalk concerns.
Meanwhile, Lafoille stressed until he sees repaired sidewalks, he’s continuing to push for answers and solutions for the benefit of the entire neighborhood.
“I’m out doing it and I’m going to keep doing it until I can’t do it,” he said.