MORE ON: California Lost

The unincorporated neighborhood of Parklawn, one of hundreds of impoverished California communities that lack basic services, celebrated a breakthrough this month when Stanislaus County broke ground on a new sewer line connecting the district to the city of Modesto. Parklawn, which has... + read more

Locals like to say that Easton is closer to Fresno than parts of Fresno, but as an unincorporated community seven miles south of downtown, residents relish its small-town ways. “We don’t have the same commodities and resources, but we can hear the crickets at night and it’s... + read more

The Winnemem Wintu, lacking official recognition from the federal government, are fighting to preserve their traditions and save sacred sites threatened by a Shasta Dam project. + read more

For a good part of its rich history, residents of unincorporated Allensworth, the first African American colony west of the Mississippi, have gone without a reliable supply of safe drinking water. This is still the case today, where the Tulare County community’s wells –... + read more

About 1.8 million low-income and often Spanish-speaking Californians live in unincorporated communities that lack sewer systems, clean drinking water and other basic services. + read more

On a cool, bright day last month, a party tent set up at a working ranch in west Marin County was transformed into a Mexican basilica, the scent of dozens of roses brought as an offering to the Virgin of Guadalupe infusing the air. They came from as far as 40 miles away – dairy hands,... + read more

Htoo Mlar’s son was born in a Thai refugee camp, and inexplicably, he never learned to walk. There weren’t any Western-trained doctors at the camp, so it wasn’t until Mlar’s family – refugees from rural Myanmar, formerly known as Burma – came to Oakland in 2009... + read more