05 July 2008
The Gap fire, a couple of miles from the line
Thank you to everyone who has written or called to express concern. I shall update this post whenever there appears to be new news — assuming of course that the Internet doesn't go down again, along with the rest of the power grid! (The photo below, after the jump — click to enlarge — makes it clear why the power went out on Wednesday and Thursday nights, and for a while yesterday afternoon: thick smoke and ash wreaked havoc with Edison's main transmission lines.)
Update: 11:40 a.m. PDT, Wednesday
It looks as though we're in the clear. We at the coast, that is. The fire continues to burn in the back country, and the high heat inland and unpredictable winds mean that firefighters still face significant challenges. According to The Independent:
It appears possible that many of the hard fought gains of the past five days could be lost if today’s weather proves to be as potent as the forecasts predict. While there is no danger of the fire turning back and threatening those parts of Goleta which were evacuated earlier, should the fire breach the West Camino Cielo fuel break and move onto the north side of the mountains, this would expand the fire line dramatically.
Update: 10:15 p.m., PDT, Monday
The winds are still low; there was a heavy marine layer (the famous "June gloom" comes to July — anyone got a good rhyme?) overnight and into this morning; and the fire crews are expressing "cautious optimism." I was out doing errands this afternoon, and there was only a slight haze. The heavy gray clouds had dissipated. There were two small plumes of white smoke rising from the mountains; they looked to be coming from someplace behind the ridgeline.
The lights went out again this evening (at about 7:30 — you could almost set your clocks by these outages...if your clocks weren't electric, that is) but fortunately only for an hour and a half or so. Nothing for it but to hunker down with Nixonland and an Itty-Bitty Book Light. After a while I developed a bit of cabin fever (Pat's in Los Angeles at the Dodgers-Braves game) so I decided to go for a spin. Aside from the persistent haze, the only noticeable fire feature was a large gray rise of smoke coming from somewhere off to the north and west. No flames visible from here tonight.
During my cruise I had the radio tuned to the L.A. news station and heard that Hiroki Kuroda was pitching a perfect game for the Dodgers. Pat is a Braves fan, so that wasn't going to make her happy, but I thought it would be thrilling to be there for such an event. Alas, by time the lights came on and I was able to check the game's progress on television, the Braves had got a hit — so not only did her team lose, but no history was made after all. Bummer.
Update: 11:20 a.m PDT., Sunday
From the perspective of my house, if you didn't know something is going on, you wouldn't know something is going on. It's a bright, clear morning, comfortable and cool (though the weather report says more high temperatures are coming later in the week).
Good news — The Independent is reporting that the southern flank of the fire is contained. That puts the most populated areas out of harm's way. However, overnight the burn did get bigger, with winds pushing the fire further into the higher wilderness, north and west.
Update: 7:31 p.m. PDT, Saturday
On the 6 o'clock news KEYT announced that areas on the western side of the burn area have been downgraded from "mandatory evacuation" to "evacuation warning" — good news for the residents who can now return to their homes. (Map updates, however, are a little slow in keeping pace.) Firefighters have been working hard on the eastern flank; and say they're making good progress on the southern flank — a relief to us and our neighbors.
More good news: wind speeds are expected to be low this evening. And at the moment, in our immediate micro region (basically the coast), whatever wind there is is blowing from the south, which means more moisture off the ocean and a pushback against the wind in the mountain area, which still is coming out of the north and west.
The "Gap" wildfire is our fire. We're only a couple of miles from the southern- and eastern-most perimeter of the fire as the crow flies. (See maps, below, under "More details.") But, unless things change drastically, we are safe.
There are, however, friends and acquaintances who are directly affected. Fortunately, as of this writing, no homes have burned, but there are mandatory evacuations and evacuation warnings over a considerable area. This time it is not the back country that is burning, as with the Zaca fire that raged at exactly this same time last year; now it is the front-most ridges of the Santa Ynez Mountains that are being consumed, the ones that construct the striking brown and green and purple backdrop to our seaside paradise.
There have been no new evacuation orders since 11 o'clock last night, which may mean that the huge number of firefighters and support aircraft (we are the #1 priority fire in the state, because of the number of structures in harm's way) may finally be having an effect. The sky above my house is relatively clear this morning, which means that the prevailing wind is not blowing toward the populated areas of Goleta and Santa Barbara — but that, alas, can change in the blink of an eye. The most deadly winds are the Sundowners.*
The fire is awesome, even beautiful, like a gift from the Devil himself.
This is from an e-mail I wrote to my son early yesterday (Friday) morning. (He's on a trip to the East Coast.)
I wasn't able to email earlier, because — as a result of the fire raging above Goleta, which has affected SoCal Edison's power transmission lines — we had another blackout. The one last night seems to have fried my computer — I happened to have chosen that moment to install an update to the operating system, and when the power came back on, the computer wouldn't boot. (I took it to Mac Mechanic today, and they say they can fix it, but not until next week.) Meanwhile, fortunately, I've got the laptop, and now that I've plugged it in to be our "server" we have the Internet again.I don't mean to alarm you unnecessarily. You can check the current conditions of what they're calliing the "Gap" fire at the SB Independent or at KEYT. For now it's still up in the foothills, but damn, you can see the leaping flames from our driveway. Sundowners, of course, don't help. When the wind starts blowing the whole thing south and east, we get a pall of smoke and a coating of ash. The Painted Cave fire in 1990 [we weren't yet living in Santa Barbara] jumped the 101 and was stopped only at Modoc and Hollister [about a quarter-mile from our house] — and now Painted Cave is under an evacuation order. That one apparently came downhill at great speed, so we are just a tad edgy. (You can see by the timestamp that I'm in no mood for sleep.) [It was 4 a.m.]
When the lights went out on Wednesday night Pat and I decided to drive around to see how widespread the outage was. (Turns out it went from north of Goleta all the way to Carp!) We drove out to the airport, and could see the flames across the whole ridge. [The drive to the airport normally takes about 7 minutes.] It was truly eerie. The perspective may in fact be skewed, foreshortened — especially at night — but suddenly everything about our comfortable life seemed contingent. Sobering, to say the least.
Today I had to drive up to Fairview (the main pulse of the fire was centered in the lower hills north of Fairview at the time) and drove under an umbrella of dark gray smoke, tinged with orange and brown — like a low pall of smog, only raining ash. There was an otherworldly quality to it that gave me a deep chill.
*Sundowners:
"The city's geography at the feet of the Santa Ynez Mountains has made it subject to sudden, extremely hot winds locally called "sundowners", similar to the more famous Santa Ana winds in the Los Angeles and San Diego regions. They are caused by high pressure drawing dry air from the inland side of the mountains, whereupon they can become superheated as they rush down the city's side. On June 17, 1859, a sundowner wind rushed through Goleta and rapidly raised the temperature to 133 degrees Fahrenheit (approximately 56 degrees Celsius) in a matter of minutes. People were forced to take shelter immediately; when they emerged they saw that most animals and plants had been killed. It was the highest temperature recorded in the United States until 1913." [From the Wikipedia article on the City of Goleta.]
More details:
There are some stunning photographs in the L.A. Times. Firemen must be the most courageous people on what used to be "God's green Earth."
The Santa Barbara Independent (by far the best, most up-to-date source of information) has this interactive map pinpointing the loci of the various burn areas. If you zoom in, you can see that what looks from a distance like empty wilderness is, in fact, quite built up.
Here's a map I made showing Goleta (the orange marker "A") on the west and Carpinteria on the east — a distance of some 20 miles. This was the range of the power outage, which lasted about 5 hours, from just after 7 p.m. on Wednesday. Our house is approximately at the other orange marker. We are immediately to the west of Hope Ranch, which is some of the priciest real estate in Santa Barbara. (Fireman, save my mansion!!) My little neighborhood, which is rather rusticated — lots and lots of fruit trees, horses, and even a couple of cows — is laughingly called "Hope Ranch Annex."
Below is a closer view of the area around my house. Follow State St./Hollister Ave. (below the 101) about a third of the way in from the right. Find Arboleda Rd. Travel down to Nueces Dr. See the spike below the "N" in Nueces? That's a private drive — there are about six houses along one side of the driveway, a horse barn and corral on the other. We're at the very end. Rising from the back of our property is a low hill. There are houses up there too. But the hill gives us plenty of privacy; it is covered with dense foliage, gorgeous old California live oaks and eucalyptus trees. Hawks and owls nest in the trees. The nightime is filled with the croaking of frogs from a nearby creek, and the chirp of crickets. It is so beautiful — a constant pleasure. Until, in circumstances like these, you think of how dangerous all that beauty could become...how dangerous beauty has become to so many who chose to create neighborhoods in the steep terrain of the Santa Ynez foothills.
A saving grace: we are close enough to the ocean here to get some high humidity overnight. (In the spring there is often in the mornings what in May is termed "May gray" and in June "June gloom," a layer of low fog from the sea that burns off by mid-day. It is usually not welcome. It would be very welcome now.)
For anyone who wants to compare maps, note Cathedral Oaks Road, at the top. That is the southernmost point of the evacuation zones; it is a principal line of defense. You should be able to find it on the interactive Independent map.
A passing observation: In praise of our California drivers I want to note that — during our drive to the airport and the university — we and every other car, in the absence of traffic lights, stopped at every crossing and treated each as though there were four-way STOP signs, alternating rights of way with drivers coming in from the side, just as we've been taught. To the best of my knowledge, there weren't any road accidents reported during any of the outages.
Posted by EDN on July 5, 2008 at 12:56 PM in California | Permalink | Comments (2)
09 August 2007
Red Alert: Watch out, California Democrats. There's danger ahead.
If you read Hendrik Hertzberg in the August 6 New Yorker, or Jonathan Alter in the August 13 Newsweek, or Hannah-Beth Jackson at her Speak Out California website, then you'll know that we California Democrats may be facing a daunting challenge in June 2008.
Note how the three authors have slugged their pieces: Hertzberg calls his "Votescam." Hannah-Beth tells us that the Republicans are "Trying to steal the Presidency — again!" Alter goes with a three-fer: "Is California GOP Trying to Steal the 2008 Election?" "A Red play for the Golden State" "There's some malicious mischief at play in efforts to reform our electoral system." Bam! Bam! Bam!
This is serious stuff, and will require us to be on our activist mettle at the very moment we'd most like to take a breather. Dammit, we have another election — in June 2008. It's only the presidential primary that's been unbundled from our usual June ballot. The primaries are held then for all the other offices up for a vote in November. It's the perfect opportunity to put stealth initiatives on a ballot that too many people will regard as ho-hum.
The Repubs will be angling to get us to vote for something they've named with perfect Rovian pitch. Here's how Alter describes its intended effect:
The Presidential Election Reform Act would award the state's electoral votes based on who wins each congressional district. Had this idea been in effect in 2004, Bush would have won 22 electoral votes from California, about the same number awarded the winners of states like Illinois or Pennsylvania. In practical terms, adopting the initiative would mean that the Democratic candidate would likely have to win both Ohio and Florida in 2008 (instead of one or the other) to be elected.
[Alter tells us that Democrats are hoping to do a similar deal in North Carolina, where far fewer votes are at stake. In all fairness, we should stand in opposition to that ploy as well.]
The California effort may, in fact, not be constitutional — the Constitution gives only state legislatures the power to change how electors are chosen — so it will face a court challenge. Will it pass muster? We don't know that yet. But this is a development that bears close watching, and major action when and if the initiative is cleared for the ballot.
Meanwhile, please read the linked articles, know the stealth terminology, and stay wary.
Posted by EDN on August 9, 2007 at 02:04 PM in California, Election '08, Red Alert, Scoundrel Time, True Blue v. Red Menace | Permalink | Comments (3)
08 August 2007
Living in Paradise can often bring Hell
or, how a raging wildfire can become a moment of Zen.
I've lived here in Santa Barbara for decades, with a few stray "run-away" moments in San Francisco, Sacramento, Pismo Beach and La Crescenta. I've seen many things go...and new things come to take their place. One thing, however, always remains a constant. The threat of fires.
Santa Barbara has certainly seen it's share of monster wildfires that wipe out 200, 300, 400 homes in a session. It gets to be, in a certain way, "old hat." You accept the fact that your life quite possibly could change in a single moment. Your "things" could be dust in a matter of minutes. You enjoy the beauty of the vibrant red/orange sunsets, but you know in your heart it more than likely means "disaster" fairly close by. But isn't that like life, anyhow? Enjoy the beauty while you can but understand there is a dark side to that beauty; there's a price somewhere that needs to be paid for it. Wildfires are our price for living here in "Paradise." And, often, we don't know when the payment has come due.
Well. We've been given notice with this Zaca Fire raging up in the valley, threatening to creep up and sweep down the glorious mountains, possibly taking with it our area's power supply. Residents of the City have been warned about a worse case scenario of the flames roaring down upon the City, and, with fewer hands to fight the fire, thanks to this Administration having sent the National Guard to Iraq to fight a useless and non-winable war, it quite possibly could destroy a good portion of the City and it's surrounding areas.
You start taking mental notes. Water? Check. Flashlight? Check. Radio with batteries, or in my case one of those "wind up" varietals....check. ID. Check. Extra cash. Check. Gas tank more than 3/4 full? Check.
Extra clothing? Check. But what then...which photos can you take? What favorite books can you pack? Do you really need to take the teddy bear? How about the mask from New Zealand that was handed down by a lost loved one? The paintings or lithos on the wall...can you manage to squeeze them in the car? And, don't get me started on my All Clad cookware. You know you can only take the very basics, because the simplicity of your baggage could mean life or death.
Simplicity. That's the key to survival in the threat of disaster. Simplicity. That's the key to surviving life.
Now...back to my filling up my water bottles.
Posted by Jillian Johnson on August 8, 2007 at 09:06 PM in California, Earthly Concerns | Permalink | Comments (0)
27 May 2007
The Governator's War on Agriculture
The Ethicurean alerts us to a troubling little "add on" to The Governator's Budget Plan.
As suburbia roars into farming and ranching areas, the new housing and offices bring the possibility of higher property-tax rates for farms and ranches, which means more money in the coffers of local government. If owners of working farms and ranches are required to pay property taxes based on their land’s residential or commercial valuation, they usually have no choice but to sell the land to developers. A 1965 California law known as the Williamson Act helps preserve farms and ranches by allowing those who enroll in the program to have their land taxed at a rate based on actual use, not potential use. The state then compensates cities and counties for the revenue loss.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
BURIED IN Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget plans for next year is a small but truly bad idea. He wants to save $40 million by canceling a farmland preservation program.
He thinks he can dump the costs on rural and suburban counties, a favorite gambit of Sacramento budget balancers. In this case, however, he will unhinge a successful state plan that rewards agriculture and local government for staving off sprawl.
…Ditching [the Williamson Act] won’t mean that hard-pressed counties will step in and take over the subsidies. It will likely result in land sales, a decline in farming and ranching, new development in unprepared areas and a giant monkey wrench tossed into efforts to control and plan California’s growth.
Just a little thought...nearly 16.9 million of the state’s 29 million acres of farm and ranch land are currently protected under the Williamson Act. California Department of Conservation statistics show that between 2002 and 2004, Fresno County lost 11 agricultural acres a day. Kern County lost 9 a day, Merced 4, Stanislaus 8, San Joaquin 5 and San Diego 10. Kings and Imperial both lost the equivalent of 6 acres a day during that period.
Do we really want to trust all of our food to be imported from China?
The California Department of Health Services (CDHS) is advising consumers not to eat monkfish imported from China because the product may actually be puffer fish, a species that may contain a powerful toxin which can cause serious illness or death if consumed. - KFSN Fresno
Posted by Jillian Johnson on May 27, 2007 at 02:29 PM in California, Earthly Concerns, Press Clippings | Permalink | Comments (1)
28 April 2007
Bloggers Hit the Beaches in Sandy Eggo
and the Convention Center, too.
The SFChronicle has a front pager about the Democratic State Convention and how the "bloggers" have swarmed to attend...and blog about it. (Including our very own Ellen, I believe)
When Democrats gathered at their candidate-rich California state convention five years ago, a lone blogger from Berkeley was the first, and only, one of his kind to apply for media credentials to cover the events.
...This year, a record 50 Internet-publication bloggers will join the estimated 400 credentialed "mainstream" media in the press room to track the goings-on of seven Democratic presidential candidates and 2,100 California party delegates this weekend.
Calitics is wondering who said this, though.
...But one key state Democratic strategist, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of concern for riling the netroots crowd, warns that such efforts are potentially positive and negative.
Netroots commentary can frequently be intensely personal, even "totally mean and irrational," the strategist said, with some bloggers finding power in their ability "to assassinate political characters online."
"It's amplified by the anonymity, and it can be scary that it's so irresponsible," the insider said
Commentary intensely personal and "totally mean and irrational?" Oh, you mean like the latest from those "netroots" folks Adam Nagourney and Maureen Dowd who went after John Edwards' hair?
Posted by Jillian Johnson on April 28, 2007 at 10:03 AM in California, Press Clippings | Permalink | Comments (0)
20 March 2007
UFCW v. Grocers: negotiations extended
There's another temporary extension of the UFCW contract with Von's, Albertson's and Ralph's while negotiations continue. The new deadline is midnight April 9, with day-to-day continuations after that unless cancelled with 72 hours' notice by either side.
Please take this opportunity to visit the UFCW Contract Campaign website for greater depth of detail, and while you're there sign the petition expressing solidarity with the employees.
Posted by EDN on March 20, 2007 at 03:38 PM in Broadsides, California | Permalink | Comments (0)
19 March 2007
New grocery contract is not in the bag
One of the signal new delights Santa Barbara offered me when I arrived here from New York City was...Von's. Von's was a revelation! — a supermarket with wide aisles, capacious carts, and checkers and baggers who were helpful, cheerful, attentive and and unfailingly polite. What a happy change from cramped New York markets and the even more cramped attitude of their personnel.
I take Von's for granted now — and Ralph's, and Albertson's — and I've been taking the checkers and baggers and stockers for granted too. But no more.
Now I know something about the stress they're under, as an extended period for contract negotiations is set to end at midnight tonight, and at issue again is the appallingly unfair "two-tier" system the employers imposed on their workers as the last contract dispute was finally settled, three years ago.
Two-tier system severely penalizes new hires
During the last contract battle — which resulted in a 4 1/2 month work stoppage as members of seven Southern California locals of the United Food and Commercial Workers [UFCW] went on strike and the three major supermarket chains closed their doors "from Bakersfield to the Mexican border" — the Big 3 cried poverty.
The union members — 65,000 of them — finally accepted a deal in which veteran employees continued to receive pay increases (but in the non-cumulative form of bonuses) and health benefits for themselves and their families; but new hires were brought in at a significantly lower pay scale, and were forced to wait anywhere from a year to 18 months before any health benefits at all kicked in.
The result? Under the old contract, close to 98% of workers had health care coverage; under the two-tier system, only ±50% do. In other words, approximately one-half of the stores' employees are now in the second tier. Instead of promising a stable, middle-class job, the grocery chains are making second-class citizens out of its new hires — many of whom simply don't stick around. There is hardly any incentive to: no health care, no pension, and pay that is in some cases only 5¢ above minimum wage.
Increased employee turnover means higher training costs, and an inevitable fall-off of service to customers. In the long run, it can't be a good strategy for the employers. And it is a bad one for our communities.
Stores showing record profits
Pleading poverty may have worked the last time, but how can the three chains square their employee squeeze with what can now be seen as record profits — and record compensation for their CEOs? Last time the Big 3 cited increasing competitive pressure from other chains, pressure which simply didn't materialize. We don't know what their negotiating stance is this time around (neither side has gone public with the specifics), but the old arguments just don't work.
"No news is good news"
Yesterday I asked the check-out lady at my local Von's whether she'd heard anything about how the negotiations were proceeding. She hadn't, but then added, in that cheerful way I've come to know, "No news is good news."
We'll know better at 12:01 tonight whether her optimism is justified.
You can find more information about the dispute at the Los Angeles Times (do a search on UFCW) — though there is surprisingly little reporting on the subject. And for the union's point-of-view, as well as action items for demonstrating support of the workers, go to http://respectufcw.com/.
Meanwhile, you can give your custom to Gelson's or Costco, both of whom came to reasonable agreements with the union some time ago.
Posted by EDN on March 19, 2007 at 01:29 PM in Broadsides, California | Permalink | Comments (0)
07 March 2007
Gas prices are insane
Gas prices in Santa Barbara are insane. They can go up a couple of times a day. The farther away from downtown, the higher they rise — sometimes there's a difference of as much as 30 cents between downtown and up. Near a large shopping center yesterday I noted prices at two gas station across the street from each other. One had a gallon of regular unleaded at $3.16, the other at $3.18. (Add a penny per, actually, since there's always that minuscule "9/10" posted alongside the price.)
And a couple of blocks away, the owners had apparently given up. They simply took all the prices down from the panel display you see from the road.
Posted by EDN on March 7, 2007 at 10:40 AM in California, Kvetch & Retch | Permalink | Comments (0)
17 February 2007
Jerry Roberts, a local hero
Needs a little help. He's battling cancer AND he's battling his former employer, Wendy McCaw, a socialite divorcee who believes herself to be omnipotent here in town.
Dear colleagues, friends and supporters,
I was humbled and honored to be among nine journalists, all formerly on the staff of the Santa Barbara News-Press, given a National Ethics in Journalism Award several months ago by the Society of Professional Journalists.
The SPJ, after an independent investigation of the extraordinary events in Santa Barbara, awarded the honor to a group of us who felt forced to leave the paper last summer because of concerns over the ethics of management decisions involving news coverage. Our group, the SPJ citation said, "opted to risk their livelihoods rather than remain in a position where they felt their journalistic ethics and professional credibility were being violated."
Amid the ongoing exodus of dozens of professional journalists from the News-Press, the paper’s owner has filed a flurry of legal threats, claims and lawsuits against people who dared to speak out or report about what was happening in the newsroom.
In response, a group of prominent local attorneys formed the Lawyers Alliance for Free Speech Rights, to help level the playing field for journalists who found themselves bludgeoned by legal attacks by Ampersand Publishing, owned by billionaire Wendy McCaw.
I am one of those journalists, now facing a $25 million arbitration claim filed by the company.
Colleagues and friends put together a web site - http://www.jerryrobertsandfriends.org - to help the Alliance help me and other journalists fight back.
Please take a few minutes to review the events at the paper by reading the stories on this site. And then please make a donation to the Lawyers Alliance for Free Speech Rights, in defense of the values, standards and ethics of public interest journalism.
Thanks for your consideration.
Jerry
Hope you can help him out. He's a great guy, a fine journalist and a dang good moderator of a continuing education course I'm attending, "As the World Turns: The Games People Play."
(photo from the Santa Barbara Independent)
Posted by Jillian Johnson on February 17, 2007 at 02:30 PM in California, Moral Values, War of Words | Permalink | Comments (0)
31 October 2006
The Democratic Party in California
Soon it will be time, on all sides and in all quarters, for an "agonizing reappraisal."
One of the things we'll need to look at closely on this coast is, "What does the California Democratic Party do and when do they do it?" If this election cycle is at all indicative, and it is, the answers are "Nothing" and "Always."
When Barbie Deutsch and I ran to become delegates to the party, we did so as a slate, on the platform of "BE for Change — Bring the people to the party and the party to the people." In other words, um, help the CDP to understand the tremendous power of the grassroots and get them to work with us. Or give us something to work with.
It was perhaps naïve of us — hell, it was naïve of us — to think we could dislodge the fossils in Sacramento, at least in the short term. I've just been checking the agenda for the upcoming CDP Executive Board meeting (a sort of mid-year mini-convention), and it's the same old same old. All the various caucuses meet. Candidates, once and future, usually drift in, one after the other and give us their palaver, taking up all the time that might otherwise be devoted to discussing issues relevant to the caucus's putative area of responsibility (Veterans, Rural, etc.). The committees meet and, in rather desultory fashion, discuss and possibly ratify whatever is put before them. My own committee — Legislative Action — is generally Legislative Inaction, and I don't see anything on our docket for this gathering. Nothing like leadership or passion or innovation ever emerges.
It's expensive and time-consuming to attend these things. You look at what's on, and you wonder, "Why bother?"
However . . . I think it may be time for Barbie and me to start banging the drum again and see if anybody hears it, much less follows us into battle. We've been delegates for a couple of years now, and there have been significant elections before us during that entire time. Heigh-ho. Could it be that 2007 is the time to take a deep breath and a fresh look at the perennial problem of the state party's relationship — or non-relationship — to its many parts here on the ground?
Posted by EDN on October 31, 2006 at 01:47 PM in California | Permalink | Comments (1)
