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Category: Ethics

  • The City Council should require masks at meetings

    023D5980-5DAE-4BAA-8091-9CB9DB5D4A18An open letter to the new Davis mayor and the city council:

    I attended the city council meeting in person this week for the first time in over two years. I wore a N95 mask for the entire meeting. A few of the audience also wore masks. Unfortunately, none of the councilmembers or city staff did likewise (although the city attorney had one on for at least part of the time).

    Also this week I had to call city hall on business and was informed on the phone that masks are required in city facilities for both vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals.

    The Yolo County COVID website states: "Yolo County strongly recommends you wear a well-fitting, high quality mask in indoor public settings when COVID case rates are moderate to high (above 7 cases per 100,000)." The current weekly average case rate is 45.8 cases per 100K individuals, six times higher than the recommended minimum level for masks, and higher than the average state rate of 36.8.

    By holding public meetings and not requiring masks the Council and staff put themselves and members of the public (and by extension their families) at increased risk for COVID infections.

    Given how well the city and community have responded to the COVID pandemic in the past two years, I am disappointed the council has not seen fit to require masks for themselves, staff, and attendees at meetings. Please follow the county health officer's recommendations.

    The pandemic is not over.

    Robert Canning

  • City Council issues lily-livered statement concerning abortion rights

    City council statementBy Roberta Millstein

    Two days ago, the City released a statement signed by all five members of the Davis City Council in response to the recent Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade.  Sadly, the statement is wishy-washy and lacking in any sort of call to action.  One wonders why they even bothered.

    Those who moved to Davis recently may not be aware that the City Council voted to make Davis a pro-choice City in 1989.  The LA Times quoted then-Mayor Michael Corbett: “The resolution is a political act to support women’s choice to choose their own morality. . . . I know that will alienate people, but that’s the way I see it.”  That was bold leadership, leadership that is sorely lacking in today’s City Council.  Are we still a pro-choice city today?

    There are, it should be acknowledged, some positive elements to Tuesday’s statement, namely where it says:

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  • Welcome to Al’s Corner – “Pouring Gasoline on the Dumpster Fire of Davis Politics” – Volume #7

    image from www.sparkysonestop.comAl's Corner is a place to comment on local issues and articles/comments from other local forums that you may or may not have been banned from.  For the few Rule-ez at Al's Corner, see "Pages" –> "Al's Corner – What It Is".

  • The City of Davis Propaganda Machine & Sky Track – Tales of the Bizarre

    Last night, less than an hour after the Rec & Park Commission meeting considered Sky Track #large echo & trumpets#, a bizarre posting appeared on a Facebook Page with the City Logo that reads like an oil company trying to claim environmental brownie points after running an oil tanker into a reef full of penguins:

    The capstone of the posting: "The City of Davis and its staff work diligently to ensure a vibrant community that enhances the quality of life for residents, families, children and students."

    Oh please.  Gag me with a spoon.  Make me vomit.  I'm heading to the vomitorium to hurl chunks.

    Who wrote that, and why?  What is really going on here that the City has that written in an hour, and up on the web?   It's too perfect.  Why would a City website post something so vomitously self-serving?  That's not what cities do . . . they are government, not private.  Cities shouldn't make proclamations about how great the city and its staff are.  I've met several great City staff btw.  This isn't about how great or not great any particular staff is.  It's about the fact that it is not government's place to toot it's own horn — and we should all be asking:  why is it doing so in this case?  Something is rotten in West Davis.

    And why is the City providing a forum so City residents can get into a Facebook war?  So assholes can berate and belittle the neighbors for what, having an issue with the constant sound of metal grating on metal?  I had no idea the degree of vitriol from users and abusers of the zip-line. What part of 'metal grating against metal' don't you people understand?  This isn't rocket science, it's not even sound science.  We all fucking know that metal on metal and a constant grating noise next to where we live can destroy daily life.  That isn't a sound you just get used to.  We don't need paid sound scientists to use meters and numbers to justify my love when we all know whatever the damn meter says that 'metal grating on metal' is an awful sound.  I have not been so disgusted by some Davis people since the Trackside defenders.  

    More on the Facebook forum There are those playing the 'envy card' — 'you own a house!' – imagine the gall of someone owning a house in Davis :-|.  There are those playing the 'you hate children' card, even though they say they never minded any of the sounds or children playing or shrieking in joy — only the grating of metal on metal.  There are those playing the 'you get special treatment' card, even though the Krovozas and others are getting shat on by asshole zip-line users/abusers and City government.  There's the 'you knew there was a park there when you bought your house' card, even though the Krovoza's pointed out repeatedly that they moved in next to a park and had no problem with that, the zip-line came much later and that is the only and specific noise issue.  Metal on Metal!

    And why is the City now a propaganda machine?  Not that many years ago if I wrote to the City Council, two or three Councilmemebers would write me back with their personal response.  Now an 'information officer' sends me a pre-packaged response about how my email was sent to all the Councilmembers.  This is a new position paid for with your taxpayer money, and what we get is pre-packaged pablum.  Now the propaganda machine is expanded to bizarre City-serving Facebook posts with forums for citizens to berate citizens.  The City isn't a corporation that needs a slogan that it "enhances the quality of life for residents, families, children and students."  Why are we putting up with this shit?

    That meeting last night was bizarre.  Truth is lies.  Words are reality.  Coneheads roam City parks.  All that virtual meeting proved to me is a lot of people got dropped on their heads as infants.

    Anyway, have fun playing 'Spot the Flaming Davis Assholes' as you read the comments in the Facebook page  😐

    P.S.  Why do we call it Sky Track with capital letters like it's some special thing with a proper name — instead of "that fucking zip line" ? 😐

  • Do NOT Change Noise Ordinance Standards nor Formulas

    Recreation & Parks Commission,

    I am highly concerned about the proposal to change the sound standards for the City of Davis.  My understanding from articles written by former mayor Joe Krovoza is that standards are in consideration to be changed in terms of duration, levels, and measurement of peaks.

    I have aural nerve damage in one ear and so have had to, out of necessity, learn  how sound affects the human body.  Loud sounds can cause me splitting headaches emanating from the inside of the ear, severe ringing in the ears, internal ear pressure, disorientation, burning, aural misinterpretations, etc.  Sound frequency, duration, distance, peak-volume and distortion all factor into the severity of an 'event' as I have come to know them.

    Though dependent on particular circumstances, in general shorter bursts of loud sounds are more damaging than longer duration of softer sounds.  That is why going with some sort of 'averaging' system would be a tragic mistake.  This would ignore the very real damage done by peak sounds.  My world-renowned ear doctor from Stanford Ear Clinic would back me up on this.  He has coached me on how to live with my condition, which is not treatable.

    My ear doctor explains that there is a 'threshold' level at which the noise becomes damaging to hearing (in my case, the threshold is much lower than those with a healthy ear). The PEAK noise is almost always the problem. Therefore, changing the city noise ordinance to consider some AVERAGE measurement as the standard is not only unwise, it is INSANE.

    To give an example of how unwise this is, an example everyone can understand – consider train horns.  A train horn — at 100' in front of the horn — ranges from 96 to 110 db.  Even at the low end this is painfully loud, and on the high end can cause ear damage in just a few seconds.  But, if you averaged the railroad noise around the tracks over a period of hours, it would show very low AVERAGE noise as over time there are few trains.  The PEAK noise is when the damage is done; AVERAGING OVER TIME would FAIL to CATCH the DAMAGING peak sounds.

    While I am more bothered by sound than those with healthy hearing, ear disease is rampant and hugely under-diagnosed in this country.  There are many people with my condition and many other hearing diseases who are intolerant of various sound conditions.  This is not just about an annoyance, it is at times debilitating.

    Another thing to consider is that those close to a noise source suffer from the exposure repeatedly and over time.  Those adjacent to noise sources are the people who must be considered paramount and above all else.  Let's say a nightclub with sub-woofers goes in next door to someone's house.  But ON AVERAGE less than 1% of the people in town even hear the noise.  The standard must be on how the noise effects those adjacent, not on the fact that 99% of Davis voters never hear it.  Another abominable use of 'average' exposure.

    I urge the commission, the City, and the Council to retain current noise-ordinance formulas and standards, and reject any attempt to change the noise ordinance to be more allowing of harmful peak noise exposures.

    Sincerely,

    Alan C. Miller, District 3

  • City Hid Data to Justify New Locations for Arroyo Park Sky Track

     Quote 2by: Janet and Joe Krovoza

    Regarding Arroyo Park’s Sky Track, here’s the latest reveal: data omitted from a March 1, 2022 noise report shows that for the three years of the Sky Track’s use, the apparatus has been in constant violation of the city’s noise standard of 55/50 dBA (day/night). This same data shows that alternative locations in Arroyo Park will violate the noise ordinance – day and night.

    Last December, the city’s Acoustic Group, Inc. (AGI) consultants collected, but then buried, the relevant maximum (Lmax) noise data from the new March 1 report. With the Lmax data conveniently missing from its 40 pages, the AGI report continued the city’s bizarre use of average noise (measured in Leq) and the equally necessary policy assertion that “Maximum Noise Level (dBA)” explicitly stated in the ordinance really meant “average.” This theoretically allowed for a potential new Sky Track location in Arroyo Park to squeak by within .5 dBA of compliance.

    Confronted again on its use of Leq and their it-says-maximum-but-means-average trick, staff refuses to own their mistaken decision and they are now asking the Rec and Park Commission to clean up their mess by endorsing a reinterpretation of the noise ordinance that will increase every noise maximum in the city by 20 dBA – huge increases on a logarithmic scale, with citywide implications. This 20 dBA increase would apply to residential, commercial/industrial, and high traffic corridor noise – all in the name of placing an amusement park caliber apparatus close to homes. We lay this out further below.  

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  • Welcome to Al’s Corner – “Pouring Gasoline on the Dumpster Fire of Davis Politics” – Volume #6

    image from www.sparkysonestop.comAl's Corner is a place to comment on local issues and articles/comments from other local forums that you may or may not have been banned from.  For the few Rule-ez at Al's Corner, see "Pages" –> "Al's Corner – What It Is".

  • An Open Letter to South Davis on Issues at Pacifico (January 2021, recycled)

    Today the D. Vanguard recycled some old content from January 2021 in a 'new' article "Commentary: Long Troubled by Some of the Comments on Pacifico" and sprinkled in some recent content from an Anti-NIMBY Council-meeting public comment.

    I, too, am disgusted by some of the comments on Pacifico, but the comments I find twisted are the opposite comments Greenwald is troubled by — those by David Greenwald, Georgina Valencia and some much-DV-recycled comments by Gloria Partida . . . and the rest of the Usual Suspects of the "Anti-NIMBY" crowd.

    My position remains immortalized in the following letter:

    An Open Letter to South Davis (January 2021)

    Hello South Davis,

    I don’t live in South Davis, but I’m looking at District 3 100’ away out my window.

    I share your problems and your concerns. There is a spot 200’ from my house where drug addicts / drug dealers / thieves camp outdoors. This is not a homeless encampment, it is a revolving crime den. In Spring 2020 I had three scary men on meth (I believe) approach me late at night and one threw rocks at me. There were numerous incidents of mental health outbursts. I slept little for two months as these people were up all night.

    Our neighborhood mostly solved the problem *this time* eventually by having meetings with both the Police Chief and his Lieutenant, and relentlessly pestering the City Council. That took two months.

    Your problems I have heard regarding Pacifico are similar, and thankfully also seem better but not solved. I am here with you in unity. We cannot participate in these issues only when the problem is next to us. We must support other Davis residents who have similar problems, as the problem is bigger than Pacifico, and bigger than the location next to me.

    God Bless the people who are helping the truly homeless population that are in need. Those who spoke today on that are I believe sincere. However, the problem is not the needy, but the criminals. We cannot conflate these.

    There have been times when residents, and subtly even our leaders, have shamed “the homed” for being “privileged” and not being sensitive to those in need. These are separate issues. We must recognize the needs of the truly homeless. We must also recognize that there is no shame in having a home and a roof over our heads, nor the need to protect our families and yes, our things.

    When people talk of drug dealers and thieves, they are not talking about the needy homeless; we must not conflate the two as a rhetorical trick. We must recognize and acknowledge that shaming the ‘other’ and demonizing those with homes, and those without homes, will not result in constructive resolution. We must recognize the needs of all parties as legitimate. Except for criminals, they ‘need’ to be removed.

    Alan C. Miller is a resident of Old East Davis

  • Bias in jury selection in Yolo County Court

    JusticeBy Roberta Millstein

    What makes a juror too biased to serve on a case? 

    Recently, I was called for jury duty selection for case that involved repeated sexual assault on a person who was a minor at the time.  I was not selected; the prosecuting attorney used one of his peremptory challenges to dismiss me.  I’m OK with that – the trial would have been weeks long – although I do, in an idle curiosity sort of way, wonder about the reasons.  My friends insist it is because I have a PhD (apparently many of my fellow PhDs have been dismissed from juries), but I’d also note that the prosecuting attorney seemed very concerned about having people on the jury who were not in favor of the district attorney, who was on the ballot for re-election.

    But it wasn’t the prosecuting attorney’s dismissal of me that I found troubling.  Instead, it was process, largely led by the defense attorney and, if I understand correctly, allowed by the judge, for dismissing people “for cause.”

    I know at least some of what I say here will be controversial and perhaps heretical.  It won’t be as well-organized as I’d like because I am still thinking through some things.  But perhaps the reader will think through things with me.

    The defense attorney’s questioning of potential jury members was very haphazard.  He asked what was ostensively the same question in different ways, to the point where they seemed like different questions, although I don’t think that was his intent.  Some people were queried more intensively than others.  And it seemed to me that women were queried more intensively than men.

    That was bad enough, but as the process went on, it became apparent that anyone who had experienced sexual assault or who had someone close to them who had been sexually assaulted was being dismissed for cause on the grounds of “bias.”  Since something like 1 in 4 women have been sexually assaulted, this was quite disturbing.  A lot of people were being dismissed.  (Of course, some people are going to find it too painful to serve, and those people were rightly dismissed – but the dismissals were going beyond that).

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  • Post-election statement from No on H campaign

    No on H 2022_Sign Design_Final w SC Endorse Seal(From press release) We are pleased by the overwhelming defeat of Measure H, which we believe would have resulted in a development that was harmful to Davis.

    It was a true grassroots effort of many volunteers over many months, who poured countless hours of their personal time into the campaign. It was also the result of many passionate supporters who donated to the campaign, displayed lawn signs, wrote letters to the editor, and participated on social media.  We thank everyone who was involved in the effort.

    We hope the resounding defeat of Measure H  leads to more collaborative community discussions that engage Davisites in creating future projects which will be truly sustainable and environmentally progressive.