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Category: Ethics

  • VCE Pays Back Startup Loans Early

    VCE_loan_repaid_early

    Pictured left to right: VCE Board member and Yolo County Supervisor  Don Saylor, VCE Chair and Woodland City Council member Tom Stallard, VCE Board member and Davis City Council member Lucas Frerichs, and VCE Interim General Manager Mitch Sears

    (From press release) Valley Clean Energy’s board of directors has announced that the local community choice energy agency is repaying its start-up loans early, years ahead of schedule.

    VCE was formed in 2016 as a joint powers agency comprising the city of Davis and the unincorporated area of Yolo County. The city of Woodland joined later, in 2017. Each agency lent VCE $500,000 to cover program implementation costs with a requirement that the loans would be repaid with interest.

    “Now, after less than 1½ years in operation, we are repaying the loans — far ahead of schedule,” said Tom Stallard, a member of the Woodland City Council who chairs the VCE board of directors. “The agency’s firm financial footing allows us to do so.”

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  • Candidate runs for Yolo County Supervisor on a Local Green New Deal platform

    IMG_4955My name is David Abramson and I am running for District 4 Yolo County Supervisor on the platform of a Local Green New Deal. A Local Green New Deal lays out a plan for local infrastructure, planning, and policy that will help us address the climate crisis we are in. It also aims to transform our economic system into one that supports ecological healing and true community wealth-building.

    Growing up in Davis and living here most of my life, I know that Yolo County residents care about their communities. We care about each other, we care about our families, our neighbors, our schools, about the health and well-being of our workers, our youth, and our elders. We care about the health of our planet, and about the future we want for our grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

    We hear the calls from the youth saying, "We want a future! We want our political leaders to step up to the challenge, to transition from fossil fuels, and to take the challenges that humanity faces seriously and fearlessly, and to spring forward into action!"

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  • VCE takes steps toward creation of a locally owned and operated public utility

    VCE(From press release) The board of Yolo County’s clean power agency has submitted a $300 million bid to purchase Pacific Gas & Electric’s lines, poles and other electricity distribution assets within Yolo County.

    The purchase would enable the creation of a locally owned and operated public utility that the board has concluded would result in a more successful, efficient and safe electricity system.

    Following the announcement this summer of its intent to examine the purchase of local PG&E assets, and after months of study and review with expert consultants, the Valley Clean Energy board of directors submitted a non-binding offer Friday, Oct. 18, to purchase PG&E’s assets.

    Valley Clean Energy’s offer would ultimately be subject to approval by the federal court handling the PG&E bankruptcy case.

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  • United Methodists Host Program on Students with Disabilities

    (From press release) Large numbers of K-12 and college students have disabilities and, although schools are legally required to accommodate the special needs of students with disabilities, often they do not. 

    On Sunday morning, October 27, from 9:45 to 10:50, the Davis United Methodist Church will host a presentation on Disabilities, Students, and Schools with Joyceanne Beachem and Austin Tam, members of the Disability Task Force of the California-Nevada Conference of the United Methodist Church.   The church is located at 1620 Anderson Road in Davis. 

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  • Open Letter to City Council on Jump’s Age Discrimination

    Jumpvote

    Uber photo modified by T. Edelman

    Todd Edelman sent the following email to the City Council today for tonight's Council meeting. For reference, please see yesterday’s article by the same author.

    Dear City Council,

    1 -  I feel it is important to note that when modifications to the bike share ordinance related to bike share were initially adopted, the BTSSC was bypassed, and that one element which Staff pushed hard for – locking bikes TO racks – resulted in a lot of the problems we had with bikes parked where they were not supposed to. Though Sacramento's unofficial policy permitted flexible parking in 2018, the Staff resisted a change until the spring of this year. Thankfully, the current Staff Report recommends e.g. "parking in the street like a motorcycle".

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  • City of Winters set to join VCE in special meeting, Thurs, Oct 10

    VCE(From press release) The Valley Clean Energy board of directors has scheduled a special meeting for 3 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10, in the Woodland Council Chambers, 300 First St. in Woodland.

    The board is scheduled to accept the city of Winters’ request to join Valley Clean Energy, a community choice energy agency that has been providing electricity service to customers in Davis, Woodland and unincorporated Yolo County since June 2018.

    The Winters City Council is set to execute a joint powers agreement with VCE on Oct. 15 and authorize enrollment of Winters’ municipal, commercial, agricultural and residential accounts.

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  • Student Debt Town Hall, Wed Oct 9

    Cancel-student-debt(From press release)

    WHAT:

    Student debt in the U.S. has now reached $ 1.5 trillion and is currently the second biggest source of debt in the country. In 2017, 65% of students graduating from college had taken out loans, graduating with an average debt of $ 28,650 . In this country alone, 44.7 million people are living with student debt.

    This is no small matter. Student debt can prevent people from getting a mortgage on a house, starting a family, saving for retirement, leaving a stable yet unfulfilling job to find a position in their field of study, leaving a job to live with their loved ones in another city – the list goes on. Just the thought, and fear, of accumulating debt prevents many from pursuing higher education, affecting their chances at social mobility. And this fear is quite justified. Student loan delinquency or default rates are 11.4 %, with black college graduates defaulting at rates five times higher than those of their white classmates. Defaulting on a loan can have serious consequences. It can prevent an individual from getting an apartment or a job and take away a section of someone’s paycheck, tax refunds, or Social Security payments. Some states even cancel professional licenses for individuals who hold student loan debt.

    This is why student, community, and labor organizers will be hosting a student debt town hall on October 9th, 7pm-8:30pm in Davis, CA to discuss our communities’ experiences with student debt, as well as existing legislative and political solutions like the Student Debt Cancellation Act , proposed by Rep. Ilhan Omar, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, and Sen. Bernie Sanders.

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  • VCE Workshops to Answer Solar Customers’ Questions About Upcoming Enrollments

    VCE(From press release) Valley Clean Energy will host two public workshops in October to review upcoming enrollments for PG&E customers who have solar panels.

    The workshops, which are designed to review VCE’s solar policies and answer customers’ questions, are set for:

    • 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2, in the Community Chambers at Davis City Hall, 23 Russell Blvd. in Davis, and
    • 5:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 14, in the Council Chambers at Woodland City Hall, 300 First St. in Woodland.

    Residents of Valley Clean Energy’s service area who had solar panels installed on their roofs or property prior to VCE’s launch in June 2018 have continued as PG&E Net Energy Metered (NEM) customers. That’s about to change, as VCE begins enrolling these customers starting in January 2020.

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  • Response to UCD Chancellor’s Housing Task Force, “Turning the Curve on Affordable Student Housing”

    Affordable-housing-task-forceAs a followup to Greg Rowe's letter concerning UCD's seeming failure to follow the recommendations of its own Affordable Housing Task Force, below is a memo sent by Rowe on September 15 to Mayor Brett Lee, Councilmember Lucas Frerichs, City Manager Mike Webb Yolo County Supervisors Jim Provenza and Don Saylor, giving a more detailed response to the recommendations of the Task Force. The report of the Task Force can be found here.

    This memo is a revised version of a memo sent to the City’s Social Services Commission, which received a presentation on the UCD Chancellor’s Housing Task Force (“Task Force”) on October 15, 2018.[1]  The comments are keyed to specific text in the Executive Summary and other pages of the Task Force report, indicated by bold font.

    • Page 4, paragraph 2: “A dramatic 47% upsurge in Davis campus enrollment programs between 2000 and 2017 has outpaced local housing affordability, helping drive up rents in the City of Davis by over 31% (in inflation adjusted dollars).”
      • Comment: This tremendous enrollment spurt was arguably the single greatest factor responsible for the sharp upsurge in Davis rents.
    • Page 4, paragraph 3: “Far too often, housing costs and unsettled and even abusive housing circumstances undermine students’ educational experiences while they attend… Bold action is needed.”
      • Comment: Again, this is a problem brought on by UCD's failure to moderate admissions and build on-campus housing on pace with growth in the student population.

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  • UCD grants to homeless students treat the symptom, not the cause

    Affordable-housing-task-forceUCD seemingly ignores recommendations of Affordable Student Housing Task Force

    By Greg Rowe

    A recent article described UCD grants to homeless students. This program treats the symptom and not the cause: UCD’s continued failure to construct affordable campus housing matching enrollment growth.

    Last year the Chancellor appointed an Affordable Student Housing Task Force, which was guided by the assumption that improving housing affordability “…is part of the campus’s fundamental responsibility to students.” The June 2018 task force report had 15 recommendations, some which would directly boost housing affordability.

    Unfortunately, UCD has seemingly ignored the most meaningful recommendations, including:

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