Earthen silk-like velvety slipperiness of cool clay in hands. Warm palms meet cool clay in celebration of contrast. Warm and cool. Soft yet firm. Its suppleness invites touch and kneading. Shapeshifting stirred by strength, will and desire to create. Palms, fingers and thumbs eagerly begin the magic of play, creation and manipulation of transforming material from one form to another. Hands pleasure in the fresh feel of clay in the moist form, perfect malleable state to create. The softness of skin meets the gentle quality of earth and water. Blending elements and combining forces. Earth and water. Now the fiery warmth of hands from the power of each heart. Fire.
Month: May 2018
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Transform with Clay
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Grieving Mother of 5 Seeks Answers After Son’s Suicide; Says Son Needed Mental Health Services Instead of Felony Prosecution by Yolo D.A.
(Press release) Patti Pape – mother of recently-deceased UC Davis student Eric Pape – wants answers about why the Yolo County D.A.’s office pressed serious felony charges against her late son for an incident that occurred when he was having a panic attack while receiving treatment in a hospital.“The D.A.’s office should have realized that this was a mental health case and should never have charged my son. I believe that the stress of his felony trial contributed to his eventual suicide,” she said.
Ms. Pape and a few others will make brief comments at rally this Thursday, May 17 at Noon at the UC Davis MU Patio.
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Davisite Runs for Governor: Josh Jones
![IMG_2850[1]](https://davisite.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/mt_imported_image_1759216538.jpg "IMG_2850[1]")
Davis’s own Josh Jones is running for governor as a green. That makes 2 Davisites in the gubernatorial race.And Josh is not like the other candidates. His campaign is corporate-free and people powered and that people power has already taken him up, down and all across the state in his quest for votes and to ignite the Green Party.
Josh's platform is based on two principles: "Maximize equality of opportunity, and minimize harm. We will take no money from corporations."
Much like 3 City Council candidates have pledged not to take developer money (Deos, Beeman and Gunther), Josh has made a pledge to "take absolutely no coal, oil, or fracking money."
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Davis Councilmember Lucas Frerichs Endorses Dean Johansson for District Attorney — citing ‘values’ and ‘leadership’
Davis City Councilmember Lucas Frerichs has announced his endorsement of Dean Johansson for Yolo County District Attorney. Frerichs, who has served on Davis’ City Council since 2012, emphasized that Johansson represents the values of community members in Davis and in Yolo County more broadly.
Frerichs said, “Citizens of Davis and Yolo County have consistently and overwhelmingly voted for statewide criminal justice reforms, such as Three Strikes Law Reform (Prop. 36), Sentencing Reform (Prop. 47), Reducing Mass Incarceration (Prop. 57), and most recently, Legalization of Adult Use of Cannabis (Prop. 64). These measures represent progressive change in California, and it is time that we are represented by a District Attorney who shares these types of values of our community.”
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Getting the Nishi Discussion Out of the Rabbit Hole: Part 2 of 2 (Red herrings? No, bad planning)
By Colin Walsh and Matt Williams
In Part 1, we detailed the three main reasons to vote against Nishi 2.0/Measure J that we gave at the CivEnergy forum on May 6: 1) bad air quality, 2) costs, and 3) lack of integrity in the process. If the City and the developer could rectify these three concerns by demonstrating that the air quality was acceptable for housing with an onsite study, by fixing the budget shortfall, and by returning integrity to the process, then housing could be built at Nishi – but then the project should be far larger than it is. The current proposal is too small and does not make proper use of the site.
Instead of addressing these three serious concerns, the Vanguard spends the entirety of its May 9, 2018 article addressing the so-called “Red Herrings,” all of which were points of discussion stemming from audience questions. Here in Part 2, we show how each of the points the Vanguard raised are examples of bad planning on the part of the city, possibly due to the rush to put this matter on the June ballot at the request of the developer. Each of these concerns are real problems with the ordinance the City Council voted to put on the ballot. Clearly this ordinance should have been better vetted before going to Council.
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Please support – and push even further – City staff’s recommendations on housing in UCD’s Long Range Development Plan
By Greg RoweItem 4.L. on next Tuesday’s City Council consent agenda is a report on the draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for the UC Davis Long Range Development Plan. The report recommends that the City Council authorize the City Manager or his designee to finalize and submit a comment letter on the DEIR to UCD by the May 29 deadline. The draft comment letter is attached to the staff report.
The link to next Tuesday’s City Council report and draft comment letter is below. Although the report is on the Council’s consent agenda, readers are encouraged to support the draft comment letter during the Council meeting’s public comment period. Due to ceremonial presentations, the regular agenda is not scheduled to start until 7:10 PM.
The proposed draft comment letter prepared by City staff is right on target, hitting all of the shortcomings of the draft LRDP and DEIR. In January of last year the City transmitted a detailed 9-page comment letter to UCD on the letterhead of the City Attorney’s law firm, Best Best & Krieger. That letter, which responded to the DEIR Notice of Preparation (NOP) issued early last year by UCD, provided excellent critical analysis, comments and suggestions. It was, in fact, one of the best NOP comment letters I’ve seen in more than 30 years working with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). It is now unfortunate that UCD decided once again to completely ignore the City’s concerns. I developed a similarly detailed comment letter, which it now appears was likewise ignored by UCD in developing both the draft LRDP and the recently released DEIR.
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Brody for Beeman for Davis City Council
Greetings fellow residents of Davis, I hope this message resonates with all of you. The City Council race in Davis will be such an important choice for this City going forward. I myself have lived in Davis for only 2 years as a current student. However, contrary to popular belief, I do not wish to leave abruptly after my academic tenure here at UC Davis. This is such a great place to live, and that’s why it’s imperative that the City elect a leader that will speak for all Davis residents, young and old, student and non-student alike. That’s why I’m backing Beeman.Shortly after I left the race several months ago, Ezra was the first candidate to reach out in solidarity, in an effort to hear what my concerns and platform issues were in this highly contested race. After our conversation, and several to follow, I concluded that Ezra Beeman would suit the city's needs and speak for all of its residents. In a field full of diverse and qualified candidates, I think Ezra has the perfect amount of salt and pepper in his hair to get the job done. Although Ezra was not the only candidate to reach out to me, he was the only one I felt that could truly resonate a tangible connection with my cohort of young students and professionals.
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Getting the Nishi Discussion Out of the Rabbit Hole: Part 1 of 2 (air quality, finances, lack of integrity)
By Colin Walsh and Matt WilliamsThe Davis Vanguard’s article of May 9, 2018 (“Commentary: Enough with the Weird Red Herrings”) is a disservice to the Davis Community. Instead of addressing the main body of the CivEnergy Measure J Forum (held on May 6), the article goes down a rabbit hole of answers given in response to audience questions.
Let’s start with the basics. As we stated at the CivEnergy forum, there are three main reasons to vote against this project: 1) bad air quality, 2) costs, and 3) lack of integrity in the process.
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Davis Police Making Latinas Feel Unwelcome in Davis
Photo credit: Davis WikiAs a Latina mother of two. my incident with a Davis police officer is hard for me to retell due to how degrading it feels to remember. Yet such stories are crucial to share with community, so we all are aware of Davis Police improper behavior
One sunny afternoon at the end of January, 2018, I with my daughter and her friend decided to take Ragsy, our pet rabbit, out for a walk in Willowcreek Park. We were excited to try out his new leash on a walk outside after much indoor time during the rainy season.
As we arrived in the park it was immediately clear that the two unleashed dogs would pose a risk to our rabbit. I asked the owners of the dogs to please leash their dogs because I had two young kids and a leashed rabbit with me. The middle-aged white man seemed to agree and said he understood. He would tell his friend, a white woman, who had a teenager and elementary-school-aged kid with her. And they would both leash their dogs. I thanked him and walked away smiling.
Sadly, they refused to comply. He casually walked over to the woman; they both laughed; they did not leash their poodle or lab.
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You Can’t Compare Davis with San Francisco
By Jon LiRoberta Millstein recently wrote in the Davisite that if six to ten story buildings were allowed in the Davis Downtown area, then there would be all kinds of urban problems, citing an article in the San Francisco Chronicle.
Wait a minute. You can’t compare suburban Davis with world famous celebrity magnet City By The Bay with over ten times the population of 750,000. There are villages, nooks, streets that have more economy, more society, more culture than all of Davis put together. I get that some people came to Davis to escape that rat race, but many people who work in Davis commute from SF.
Davisite 