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Category: Politics

  • DISC is back… and so is bad process

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    Staff and City Council favor developer interests over citizen input

    By Roberta Millstein

    This past Tuesday (Sept 7), the City Council formally set in motion the process to evaluate the twice-reborn industrial park/hotel complex on prime farmland outside the Mace curve, now dubbed DISC 2022. Readers will recall that this project was handily defeated at the polls less than a year ago. Now it is back again with half the acreage, fewer amenities, and a smaller proportion devoted to revenue-generating commercial uses. 

    Also back again is staff acquiescing to the developer's extremely short requested timeline. 

    There have been some improvements in process this time around. The project was made a regular agenda item, allowing for greater citizen awareness and discussion, though apparently a number of people were still caught by surprise. And all of the relevant commissions are scheduled to be consulted from the outset, something that citizens had to fight for the last time. 

    However, staff's Tuesday proposal was that each commission can only evaluate the project once. Why? The developer wants this on the ballot by June 2022 and staff wants to comply with that, stating there is not enough time for commissions to have more than one meeting concerning the proposal. Why do they want to go along with the developer?  Well, you will have to ask them, but it is certainly not a timeline that favors citizen input, remembering that commissions are intended to be a conduit for citizens to give feedback to the City.

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  • We need critical thinking from our City Council on climate change

    By Mike Corbett

    Given an understanding of what’s in the recent IPCC 6th report what would you expect a rational city council to do in response? Humans evolved because of our critical thinking abilities. So if a current city council possessed those abilities what would they be doing right now?

     You would expect them to convene a special meeting so the city could begin taking urgent steps to stop greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere as well as steps to sequester carbon from the atmosphere. They would make it a priority for their staff and commissions to find ways to take immediate steps to accomplish these crucial actions. 

     Since the Davis City Council declared a climate emergency two and a half years ago, little has been done. And as we approach the completion of the current climate action plan (CAP), our City's approach seems to be falling far short of what it should be. The recent survey of our citizens has revealed a very weak City understanding of all our options and what we should be doing today.  We need to employ more critical thinking.

     Critical thinking must first address the ability to find the most important thing or issue to focus on in any given moment or situation, from personal choices to issues within the global realm.  Additionally, critical thinking must start with the work of understanding a problem’s core by analyzing its depth and breadth. That means understanding the full context around the issue (in this case the IPCC report), and that means looking past biases or views that obscure the core of the problem.

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  • How to vote in the gubernatorial recall election? Step one – vote!

    Wheretovote

    By Roberta Millstein

    If you are registered to vote in CA, you should have received your ballot for the election to recall Governor Gavin Newsom by now.   If for some reason you aren’t registered, August 30 is the last day to register to vote; after that, you can “conditionally” register and vote at your county elections office or polling location after the voter registration deadline, up to and including Election Day (Sept 14).

    Voting is easy!  In Davis, there are several voting assistance centers and ballot drop boxes.  See the graphic at the top or this page for details.  Or you can mail in your ballot – it has to be postmarked by Sept. 14. Each ballot will come with prepaid postage. So no excuses not to vote.  If you're not in Davis, check out your local options.

    And your vote really matters in this election – even more so than usual – so please take the time to vote!

    The biggest challenge that Governor Newsom has to overcome is voter apathy – people thinking they don’t need to vote because Newsom is a slam dunk (how’d that work out for Gray Davis?) or who just aren’t that excited about Newsom.  Well, I have to admit I’ve not always been happy with his decisions, either.  But then again, I can’t think of any politician in my lifetime I’ve been totally happy with. 

    Governor Newsom has done nothing bad enough to deserve a recall and the candidate everyone thinks will most likely win, Larry Elder, would be terrible.  Elder thinks that people who are concerned about climate change are “alarmists,” he supports overturning Roe v. Wade, and he wants to eliminate the minimum wage (link).  He would be terrible for California, especially if he had the opportunity to appoint a Senator if Senator Feinstein were to retire.

    Davis tends to overwhelmingly vote Democratic, as does California as a whole.  So if we mobilize to vote “NO” on recalling Governor Newsom, we can help make sure that California doesn’t head down a dangerous path.  So please vote “NO” on question 1 on the ballot.

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  • Three petitions = three frustrated and unheard constituencies

    Three-petitions

    By Roberta Millstein

    What do trees being cut down at Sutter Davis Hospital, the Mace Mess, and Cannery traffic safety have to do with one another?

    At first glance, not much.  They are in three entirely different parts of town.  Two of them do have to do with traffic and safety in part, but each has its own features.  For example, residents near Mace Boulevard are concerned about the addition of over-engineered road structures they were not consulted on, and in light of increased traffic and other problems, would like them removed.  And neither traffic safety at the Cannery nor the Mace Mess seems to relate to the removal of mature trees done without any input from the relevant City Commissions.

    But those who have been following the Davisite might have noticed a commonality: in all three cases, citizens felt strongly enough about the issue to create a petition, as described in the following articles:

    When citizens are moved to create and sign petitions, it’s a signal that they feel that their voices aren’t being heard through normal channels, such as comments at the City Council or letters to the editor of the local newspaper. With a petition, citizens are trying to speak loudly, with one voice.

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  • Call on City Manager to immediately BAN leaf blowing! RIGHT NOW!

    AirNow080620212pm, Davis – The air is now nearly twice as bad as what requires a ban on leaf blowing. The City updates its notification as needed at 730am. This morning the air was good…

    Yesterday weather forecasters predicted that the smoke from various fires to the northeast would circle counter-clockwise at high elevations and then slowly descend on the north Bay Area and our area.

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    Yolo-Solano AQMD issued an alert in mid-morning.
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    This morning the smoke was easy to see, but the AQI was still good here as the smoke had not reached lower elevations. It started to do so in the early morning in Lake County, then soon in Napa and west Yolo.

     

    DavisAir8620211125am

    Late this morning…
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    Quite curiously the Airnow distribution of data from the same monitors showed a lower AQI by half two hours ago, and at about 2pm nearly the same, getting close to 200 AQI.on Purple Air…
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    The consistently cleanest part of the area right now – at lower left, just south of West Village, earlier today. This is the location of the City's only official AQI monitoring station. This is what the City uses to determine a leafblowing ban.
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    It's been well over 100 AQI for at least two hours, and is the source of the image at the top. So why isn't the City issuing a ban? Click on image to read the City's explanation…

    The Council and Staff would be singing us this fine song if we were making this up…. this threat to our health. But surely they realize that is extremely dangerous, a matter of equity, and of health as serious – at least temporarily – as COVID.

    It's been nearly a year since the City issued conditions for a temporary ban on leaf blowing. I've asked and have never seen any data on how many warnings or fines were issued. The Natural Resources Commission's poll on leaf blowing only ended at the end of July, and they might not see what the staff has processed until late September, and might not make recommendations until late October, while we're already in the season of falling leaves… and four months into the wildfire fallout season :-(. (Oh, by the way… today is the 76th anniversary of the beginning of the first nuclear war.)

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  • Smoky Days Ahead!?! Leafblowers, Buses and Climate Shelters.

    7.27-28_windsI just sent the following to the City Council, relevant Commissions (BTSSC, NRC and SSC), County Supervisors and Yolo Solano Air Quality Management District…

    Per Weather.com the winds will shift to the north (and variants) at least part of this Tuesday and Wednesday. The prevailing south winds (from the south) have until now seem to have helped spare Davis and the immediate region (esp. to the west) from wildfire fallout from the huge fires east of Chico.

    As the wind may not just shift until late Monday or early Tuesday, I hope that Staff will be prepared to put the leaf blower ban into effect. (Note that most of the combined air region has had Spare the Air days for most or all of last week, if only for ozone)

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    Davis is in the lower left corner – https://fire.airnow.gov

    Spare the Air means that Unitrans is free. Possible smoke and almost certain heat (esp on Wednesday through Friday) will in my understanding open our "Climate Shelters" at Vets and the Mary Stephens Library. As 14th Street is served by Unitrans buses (1 to 3 lines depending on the time of year and day of the week) it seems like a good and free way for many to get to the Climate Shelters, yes? It seems likely that Climate Shelters disproportionately serve lower income people who have less access to not only modern HVAC but also personal motor vehicles.

    Unfortunately the free Unitrans service is in tiny print at best on the Share the Air notices (email or website), and as far as I recall has never been mentioned in the City's notices about the Shelters. All of these programs are happening, but the communication is not joined up, and few know about them

    SparetheAir-Unitrans

    Beyond this, I don't understand why Yolobus doesn't have free service during Spare the Air days. Do I understand this correctly? Can people in Davis get to Climate Shelters (or anywhere else urgent) during a smoke and/or wildfire fallout event by free public transport, but not anyone else in Yolo County?

    Thanks for taking immediate action when necessary…. or preemptively!

  • Vague lanes solving regional pains?

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    Not the Caltrans project! This is the author's concept for a bypass to and from the Bypass.

    On July 1st Davis Vanguard covered the announcement of Federal funding of 86 million dollars for the Yolo-80 Managed Lanes project.

    I appreciate most the comments of Alan Miller, Alan Pryor and Richard McCann. I hope I can add something below.

    The MTC area gets a lot of income from its bridges, and uses it for public transportation. Consider that Davis and SACOG-area drivers pay into this when driving south to San Jose, west to Oakland and San Francisco, and so on, but people from those areas make no similar contribution our region – really, the east side of the Northern California Megaregion – when traveling to Davis or Sac or of course towards Lake Tahoe.

    Caltrans dropped the long-promised new bike-ped bridge across the Bypass, replaced by some improvements on the west side of the Bypass. Combined with new infrastructure such as separated lanes and a lot of shade trees in West Sac,  the  whole corridor could be optimized for faster e-bikes and provide a good alternative for many, especially in east and the east part of South Davis. But… nope! Or so it seems.

    The graphics in the Caltrans presentation on the Yolo 80 Corridor planned for the BTSSC meeting this Thursday show only buses in the managed lanes, which is not what’s really planned for the managed lanes. Nasty! The managed lanes are mostly in added lanes, and if these lanes are available for private vehicles off-peak, for a premium, or free for a carpool then induced demand happens – see also Alan Pryor's comment in the Vanguard article – and we eventually lose.

    It’s also not clear how this project interfaces with the 80-Richards project.

    It’s not clear how much congestion there will be during the long construction period.

    It’s not clear if any general re-paving will decrease noise (new technology makes this possible).

    It’s probably unlikely that Caltrans will support a discount on Capitol Corridor during the construction period.

    But yeah, rail. What’s up with the future Capitol Corridor improvements? How does this project related to our impending new General Plan? My favorite idea is to build a highway bypass south of town and then put the railway below grade so that it also no long splits the City in two (in retrospect, it would probably have been better to not build anything south of the 80-rail corridor). Anyway, all the new space roughly in the center of Davis could be the location of a lot of new dense, mixed-use development which could facilitate low-vehicle ownership or at least use, as it would eventually be convenient to UCD and Downtown by bike, to both Sacramento and especially the Railyards, and to points to the west by rail. It would also be much quieter in parts of the City with this sort of ring-road solution. In general terms it would complement my concept for building above 113 roughly between Russell and Covell. I've also proposed a noise-mitigation and solar-generation project for the I-80 corridor through Davis.

    Related to this whole thing and that next to last point, over three years ago when I was on the BTSSC I initiated a sub-committee on 80 and related. It never went anywhere and was dissolved as the other Commissioner who joined it moved to Sacramento and no one else on the Commission wanted to pursue this… route. Sigh. Please demand that BTSSC members ask some hard questions this Thursday!

     
     

  • What is a Housing Trust Fund, and how can we strengthen Davis’s?

    3 categories of housing needs

    This diagram shows the continuum of housing needs  and some possible priorities for programs under each of the 3 needs categories

    Background: On May 20, the Housing Element Committee (HEC) voted in favor of 10 recommendations, two of which related to Davis’s Housing Trust Fund, based on a draft document from Davis’s Social Services Commission (SSC). On May 9, the Planning Commission voted in favor of these two recommendations (and none of the other HEC recommendations). On June 15, members of the City Council expressed support for these proposals, although they did not vote on them officially.

    By Georgina Valencia

    The City of Davis has a Housing Trust Fund (HTF).  There are a number of cities throughout the State that have Housing Trust Funds.  The funds that go into the HTF account is designated for services and programs related to affordable housing.  Currently, the City has no designated plan with priorities and related programs as proposed by the SSC.  More specifically there is no sustainability planned into the programs the city currently offers.  Programs to date have been Ad Hoc and directed by the funds and programs the State decides that Cities should pursue.

    Current funding sources for our City HTF come from: in-lieu fees, 1% fee from the sale of affordable homes, State Grants for CDBG and HOME funds, SB2 funds, rent from City owned affordable housing and more.  At any given time there is approximately $500,000 plus or minus in the HTF.

    A few examples of real world issues that programs and funding in our HTF could correct:

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  • Why eliminating single-family zoning is a terrible idea

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    By Dan Cornford

    On May 20, the Housing Element Committee voted in favor of 10 recommendations, one of which was the elimination of R1 (aka Single Family Housing, or SFH) zoning. Neither the Planning Commission nor the City Council weighed in on this recommendation as a body in their recent meetings concerning the Draft Housing Element, although some members of both bodies expressed interest in pursuing at least some weakening of R1 zoning. On the state level, SB 9 and SB 10 would eliminate R1 zoning.

    Is this a good idea? Will it lead to affordable housing? Would it be good for the environment?

    In short: No, no, and no.

    Here are five reasons why eliminating R1 zoning is a bad idea:

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  • Care Not Cops Protest

    IMG_20210615_192926344(From press release) For over a year, the Davis community has been demanding changes to how the city approaches public safety, including the creation of a new independent Department of Public Health and Safety that emphasizes preventive solutions instead of the reactionary and punitive measures employed by police officers. To accomplish this, the community has asked the City of Davis to reduce the police budget and transfer those resources to properly fund this new department. After reviewing this year’s proposed budget, Davis community leaders are disappointed by the complete lack of consideration for community demands regarding increased health and safety resources. The city is considering hiring more police officers, and this year’s budget includes no new funding for social services and actually increases the police budget. 

    A new department could employ social workers, civil servants, and mental healthcare professionals to take on tasks like mental and behavioral health calls, welfare checks, code enforcement, traffic enforcement, noise complaints, and more.

    This Tuesday, June 15th,  Yolo Democratic Socialists of America held a car caravan through downtown Davis ending with a protest at City Hall to pressure Davis City Council to adopt a budget that reflects the community’s values. The budget is set to be adopted on June 22nd.

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