Reviews & Comments
Lancaster, CA
re: Best to live somewhere else - 4/3/2014 -
11/17/2016You are absolutely correct. I think some who have posted positive reviews of this place were paid to or work for the city. Anyone who claims this ghetto depressing city is nice to live in has clearly never lived or been outside of California. I lived in Lancaster from February 2014 to June 2015 and high tailed it out of there as quickly as I could. The day I drove back to Seattle, WA may well have been the best day of my life. I do believe there are some shady things going on out there by the military base and I do believe there is a lack of care and regard for the residents of Lancaster by the city. When people have little to no standards for the quality of life they live, city officials won't, either.
Lancaster, CA
By FAR the Worst Place I Have Lived -
11/17/2016Not only is Lancaster the worst place I have ever lived, it is the worst place I have ever been to. I moved there from Seattle, WA in 2013 and lived there for a year and a half and was continually mind boggled that people thought life there was "normal." There is nothing normal about this place. It is run down and ghetto. Even their "nice" area, Quartz Hill was indistinguishable to me from the rest of it. I had a lot of first there in Lancaster.
Shortly after moving into my rental, two young men tried to break into my home at about 10:00 pm after ringing the doorbell numerous time and thinking nobody was home. They tried to get in through my kitchen window. Two women tried to jump me at the gas station next to Walmart on J Avenue because I got to the gas pump before they did. My kids got desensitized very quickly to bad language, the smell of weed smoke, and belligerent behaviors. Everywhere you go, you hear "mother f-er" this and that. Every other word is a cuss word. They cuss at their own kids so they don't care that other people's kids are around.
Going to any government office there is a nightmare. Lines down the sidewalks outside and customer service everywhere is TERRIBLE. People would get fired in Washington for giving that type of customer service. How many places do you go to that have fully uniformed security officers outside and/or inside of most businesses? Walmart parking lot is patrolled 24 hours a day. Grocery carts are scattered around the entire parking lot no matter what time of day you do, you have to drive around them.
It became normal for us to see out-of-control drunk or high people being escorted out of places. The schools are absolutely TERRIBLE. I had kids in every level of school (elementary to high school) and they all came home with horror stories almost daily about the behaviors of other students, the disrespect toward teachers and lack of control teachers had in their classrooms. Fighting is a spectator event and kids go around randomly asking other kids if they want to fight—kids they don't even know.
People seem to think all of this is normal and I can assure you, it is nothing close to normal. I literally felt as if I was living amongst a bunch of wild animals who have never taught to be civilized. For the record, I am Native American and Hispanic and my kids are mixed with black. We fit in physically but this place is nothing short of oppressive and depressing. I scrounged up the money to move back to the Seattle area and thank God every day that we are back here and away from Lancaster. The entire SoCal area is a very ugly landscape, as well. If you cherish trees, grass, flowers, shrubs, bushes; an abundance of bodies of water, this place is not for you. It is desolate, dry, and brown.