Davisite logo
Davisite Banner. Left side the bicycle obelisk at 3rd and University. Right side the trellis at the entrance to the Arboretum.

Category: Ethics

  • Will this City Council Uphold Democracy?

    DemocracyTuesday’s Council Meeting will give us our first indication

    By Roberta Millstein

    This City Council does not have a good track record on democracy.  It has the opportunity to do better this time.  Will it?

    Newly appointed Mayor Lucas Frerichs, having served on the Council since 2012, is anticipated to step down on January 2, 2023 to become Yolo County District 2 Supervisor.  That will leave a vacancy on the Council in District 3 (note that county and city district numbering is different) until the November 2024 election.  The Council has a choice of two ways of filling the vacancy: 1) call a special election to fill the vacancy (see staff report for possible dates) or 2) appoint someone to fill the vacancy.

    The first way is the democratic way.  It’s the way that allows the voters of District 3 to select a representative who they feel listens to them and understands their concerns about their district.  It’s the way that allows new voices to put themselves forward for leadership of the city, fulfilling one of the promises that district elections were supposed to bring – i.e., more localized campaigns being easier and less expensive to run.

    The second way is the power-abusing way.  All the other districts will have elected their representatives, but District 3 would be appointed by councilmembers who are not even in their district.  There is nothing about this process that would ensure that the appointed representative would know about and care about issues particular to District 3.  What this process does allow for, however, is for councilmembers to appoint someone who sees things their way or who is part of the current power structure in Davis.

    Note that the Council also has the option of calling for a special election (the second way), but then appointing someone to fill the vacancy until the election.  I think this option is problematic too.  The person appointed for the interim period before a special election would have the advantage of incumbency in that election. The council should refrain from any appointment at all and simply call an election to fill the seat.[1]

    (more…)

  • Welcome to Al’s Corner – “Pouring Gasoline on the Dumpster Fire of Davis Politics” – Volume #8

    image from www.sparkysonestop.comAl's Corner is a place to comment on local issues and articles and/or 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".  Burn Baby Burn!

     

  • Happy 4th of July?

    FlagBy Roberta Millstein

    When I was growing up on the east coast, 4th of July was always a wonderful day.  My father, a WWII vet, loved fireworks and imparted that combination of awe, excitement, and patriotism to my sister and me.  We'd head to the next town over and stake out a position on the grass and wait for the amazing display from a barge on the river.  It was always over way too fast, the "big finale" being the part you looked forward to the most while knowing that it signaled the end.

    Of course, I want everyone to have a good day.  I want children to have wonderful experiences like the one I was able to have as a child.  No one wants to be a killjoy.

    But.

    I also want our celebration of the 4th of July to be a genuine one – that is, a celebration of freedom.

    It's hard to feel free when 6 people are dead and more than 2 dozen hospitalized for the sin of attending a 4th of July parade, when mass shootings have become a daily event and our elected lawmakers fail to take action that would make a difference.

    It's hard to feel free when 50% of the population has just been told that their bodies are not theirs to control, that the state can make one of the most fundamental and life-changing decisions for them.

    It's hard to feel free when in the same decision, one of our Supreme Court justices threatens to eliminate the right for heterosexual couples to use contraception, the right for homosexual couples to have sex, and the right for gay people to get married.

    It's hard to feel free when racially-motivated voter restriction laws have been passed across the country, preventing full participation in our democracy.

    It's hard to feel free when Black Americans are incarcerated at nearly five times the rate of white Americans.

    As civil rights leader Fannie Lou Hamer said, nobody’s free until everybody’s free.

    Meanwhile, Davis's "celebration" continues as planned even with known harms of fireworks both for those who are attending and not attending, spewing toxic chemicals into the air,  triggering PTSD in humans, and scaring animals into bolting.

    When is Davis going to have a more appropriate celebration, one that is healthy and recognizes the liberties we have as well as the liberties we still have to fight for?

    When are we going to start fighting for our liberties?

     

  • 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:

    (more…)

  • 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.  

    (more…)

  • 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".