‘Third California’ can be a good place to live

“The third California” (Current, Jan. 29), about the inland migration, recommends the possibilities of resettling east of Interstate 15 but sounds less than whole-hearted about it. I am a lawyer who came back to live in Riverside after many years in San Diego and Berkeley.

There is much to like about living here. My government salary goes further here than in the first or second California. Our 1914 Craftsman house would cost a great deal more in Pasadena. I commute less than 10 miles a day, including dropping my son at school. And, even though he attends a public elementary school where half the students qualify for free breakfast and lunch, the school still earned national Blue Ribbon status.

In the morning or evening, I walk up a mountain park or down around an Olmsted-designed lake, still leaving me time to get to work or make dinner. Most of what we need is within a few miles radius, and our music, art and theater are bargains. The money we save even allows us to attend the L.A. Opera occasionally.

Our greatest challenge is the air quality imposed on us by Los Angeles and its environs. But we no longer suffer the toxic soup that hovered over the region throughout the 1970s. Although we must work to preserve, improve and extend the quality of life that already exists inland, people should know they can find good opportunities and comfortable places to live beyond the coastal rim.

VICKI BROACH

Riverside