Vanguard Radio May 27: Marriage Equality
May 27, 2009 show – The Vanguard spoke with longtime civil rights activists Shelly Bailes and Ellen…
Vanguard Radio May 20: Budget Crisis
May 20, 2009 show – The Vanguard spoke with Elaine Roberts Musser, chair of the Davis Senior…
So Now UC Davis Facing Furloughs and Pay Cuts
In a week that featured a major press conference led by Senator Leland Yee and featuring Democrats and Republicans from both houses in the legislature introducing a constitutional amendment that would open up the University of California to oversight from the state legislature, now we have two letters, one from President Mark Yudof and the other from Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Enrique Lavernia. The letters warn of the possibility of furloughs, pay cuts, and a loss of 20 percent of the state general fund support for the UC Davis campus.
Vice Chacellor Lavernia writes:
Are City Budget Assumptions Too Optimistic?
This week begins the long process of looking at the city budget where the City Council along with City Staff must deal with the short-term budget deficit and hopefully deal with the longer term structural issues dealing with employee compensation.
This article will simply look at the overview presented this week and wonder whether the numbers presented here are simply too optimistic. Part of these figures are based on projected outcomes from negotiations with the bargaining units. That process is ongoing and does not figure to be resolved prior to the budget’s passage on June 23, 2009.
Toughest Ten: James Hammond and Bruce Colby
The latest segment of the Toughest Ten asks DJUSD Superintendent James Hammond and Associate Superintendent Bruce Colby about the district and particularly its budget challenges. One point of clarification is that while these are the two top staffers in the District, they are not Board Members and thus are not the ultimate decision makers on policy matters in the district.
1. Back in March, it was suggested that if the Propositions failed and the budget picture statewide continued to deteriorate, we would face about an additional $3 million budget shortfall—what changed and could the projections presented last week still change this summer?
Will New Target Be in Violation of Development Agreement?
When the new Target was set to be placed on the ballot, the city went to great pains to assure existing neighborhood grocery stores that Target would not be a new competitor. Indeed Target specifically was forbidden from containing more than 20% food services in a specific effort to avoid competition either with the South Davis Nugget Market or the nearby East Manor Shopping Center which is now bare.
However, in the Sacramento Bee yesterday, the article suggests a new emphasis on food sections at the Davis Target.
Legislators Seek Constitutional Amendment to Rein in University of California
Yesterday a bipartisan group of State legislators introduced a Constitutional Amendment to allow greater public oversight and accountability of the University of California in response to a number of egregious actions by the UC Board of Regents, including recent exorbitant executive pay hikes.
SCA 21, authored by Senators Leland Yee (D-San Francisco), Roy Ashburn (R-Bakersfield) and Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles) and ACA 24, authored by Assemblymembers Brian Nestande (R-Palm Desert) and Anthony Portantino (D-La Cañada Flintridge), would remove the Regents autonomy and allow the Legislature to enact statutes affecting UC policy, similar to authority granted over the California State University. If approved by two-thirds of the Legislature, the measure would be put before the voters for final approval.
Why Do Firefighters Make Substantially More Than Police Officers in Davis?
Last night at the Davis City Council meeting, the city unveiled the budget. Because the budget itself did not get to council until late in the afternoon, the city generally spoke in generalities rather than specifics. In the coming days and weeks, we will look at the budget itself more closely. For now, we want to focus on one particular issue that arose during the course of council discussion.
Finance Director Paul Navazio suggested that part of the more than three million dollar budget deficit will be closed through contract negotiations. Mr. Navazio is proposing somewhere around 860,000 dollars or so of the budget will be closed through contract negotiations. The question then comes to where should that come from and how should the city proceed with negotiations.
Hundreds Gather At Central Park to Protest Supreme Court Decision on Prop 8
by Jeremy Ogul –
More than 200 people gathered in Central Park last night to protest the California Supreme Court’s ruling on the Proposition 8 cases.
The overall tone of Tuesday’s gathering was positive and motivational, with UC Davis law professors joining clergy from local faith groups and musicians to bring a message of hope and resolve to those in attendance.
BREAKING NEWS: California Supreme Court Upholds Prop 8 Ban on Same Sex Marriage
The California Supreme Court by a 6 to 1 vote today, with the only dissenting Justice, Carlos Moreno, also the only Democrat on the court, upheld the ban on Same Sex Marriage that was passed by the voters last November in Proposition 8.
Justice Moreno in his dissent argues that enforcing equal protection requires protection for all aspects of the law.
How Council Quietly Approved a 10 Million Dollar Water Project
The Davis City Council recently approved a ten million dollar water project that was on the consent agenda with no discussion of the costs of the project, its design, size, impact or alternatives. When Councilmember Sue Greenwald pulled the item from the consent agenda, the discussion was delayed until the end of the meeting, by that point the council was so tired they refused to discuss it and simply approved it.
The genesis of this approval began on July 15, 2008 with another consent item. The council at that time approved a consultant agreement with West Yost Associates to prepare plans, specifications and estimates for the subject project. The consultant agreement was not to exceed $600,724.
DANG and City Council Keeping the Pressure on Westlake
The month of May marks the third year in which the space at Westlake Plaza that used to be occupied by Rays and then Food Fair lay vacant. In this space we have criticized the city of Davis for dragging its feet in terms of putting pressure on the owners to comply with current zoing and general plan requirements that the space be occupied by a grocery store.
That has slowly changed with the efforts of DANG (Davis Advocates for Neighborhood Groceries) and articles that have been run by the Vanguard to put pressure on the city of Davis and ownership to finally bring a store there.
City Unveils Guiding Principles for Employee Negotiations
Last Tuesday, the Davis City Council passed and read these principles into the record. One thing that has become clear is that the Davis City Council is now under a tremendous amount of pressure to appropriately deal with the ongoing labor negotiations.
For the first time, the Davis City Council really acknowledges some of the problems that it faces in long-term, not just short-term fiscal stability and addresses key issues that are facing it as it attempts to go into good-faith labor negotiations. The first step is always to define the problem. However, the key will be to not just acknowledge the problem, but to actually hold employee groups and city staff posing as negotiators to the fire with regards to compensation packages.
Analysis: Results of Election Should Not Be Interpreted As A Tax Revolt
Many on the right have argued the results of this election should be interpreted as an extension of the Tea Parties that emerged in April and a revival of the tax revolt from the 1970s. The problem with that interpretation is that many of the people who voted against the ballot propositions were actually political liberals who had a very different reason for voting against it.
An additional problem with this interpretation is that of the propositions, only Proposition 1A impacted taxes and even that only two years down the road and only to continue already implemented tax increases for an additional two years.
Townhall Meeting Responses On Public Participation
On Wednesday evening at the Veteran’s Memorial Center, the Davis Neighborhood Coalitions and the People’s Vanguard of Davis hosted a townhall meeting on the budget. The panel consisted of City Finance Director Paul Navazio, Budget and Finance Commission Chair Johannes Troost, and past chair of that commission and Sac State Professor Mark Siegler.
In addition to asking the panel eight preset questions, and taking questions from the audience, we also asked the audience a key question and had them submit the answers to be posted on the Vanguard today.
Federal Stimulus Money Enables District To Avoid Further Cuts This Year
Associate Superintendent Bruce Colby delivered a mix of news on Thursday night, most of it bad, but there is enough good news to enable the district to avoid more cuts for 2009-10.
The bad news is that state revenues continue to fall and there is no apparent end in sight. The state’s budget propositions failed which from the perspective of schools meant additional cuts likely immediately. As we’ve discussed the state will have a July 1 cashflow crises. Instead of being able to restore programs with the Federal Money, all we will be able to do is avoid further cuts. And it will get worse.
The De-Greening of Davis
Davis Should Implement a Ban on All Non-Recyclable Takeout Containers and Impose a Fee on Plastic Bags used at Retail Stores
Davis Should Implement a Ban on All Non-Recyclable Takeout Containers and Impose a Fee on Plastic Bags used at Retail StoresBy Pam Nieberg –
Introduction
We are polluting the world’s oceans with petroleum based materials that take hundreds to thousands of years to decompose. Sixty to eighty percent of marine debris overall and up to ninety percent of floating debris is plastic. In at least one area in the Pacific, plastic debris outweighs plankton by a factor of six. This debris is carried across the globe by ocean currents, and, as it is broken down by the sun, it joins the huge masses of plastic particles in our oceans that threaten marine wildlife. According to the California Coastal Commission, more than 1 million sea birds, 100,000 marine mammals, including filter feeding whales, and countless fish are killed annually in the north Pacific alone from ingesting or becoming entangled in marine debris. Furthermore, due to their chemical composition, plastic particles can accumulate toxins on their surface which then poison the animals exposed to them.
Word To The Wise: Food For Thought
By E.A. Roberts –
Item 1. In the Sunday, May 17 Davis Enterprise appears an editorial entitled “Those at the top are easy targets”, defending recent pay raises to the wealthiest public employees. What is interesting to note is another article “They’ll drink to that” announcing UCD’s plan for its new cutting-edge winery, along with a front page headline screaming “Budget is in hands of angry electorate”. Apparently no one at the Davis Enterprise put two and two together. Perhaps the electorate is angry because they see fat cats at the top levels of state government still pigging out at the public trough as per usual, while the state budget takes a nose dive into deep, dark oblivion.
In the past several weeks, the Enterprise has reported on the following:
Commentary: For California It’s May 20th and the Sky is Falling
In most ways, what happened at the polls yesterday (or perhaps what did not happen as most people did not vote) is only symbolic in terms of the bigger scheme. The voters were asked in a way to codify an imperfect and in the end insufficient budget deal from February to balance the budget shifting, borrowing, repaying, and eventually capping future spending.
The voters rejected such overtures and probably Assembly Majority Leader Albert Torrico hit the nail on the head when he said last night:
Davis Shown A Way Forward on Water, but Will They Take It?
The Davis City Council on Tuesday night heard a presentation from Dr. Ed Schroeder and Dr. George Tchobanoglous that has the potential to change the way we proceed on the water project, but only if the council majority will let it. That became more clear after their presentation was over and the council proceeded to approve by a 3-2 vote a resolution authorizing the City Manager to Execute Consultant Agreement with West Yost Associates for Wastewater Reclamation Alternative Analysis as a SOLE SOURCE AGREEMENT.
This means they are essentially allowing West Yost to have non-competitive bids for conducting Wastewater Reclamation Alternative Analysis. What is left up in the air now is how much this changes what seemed to be a very promising development earlier in the evening when Drs. Schroeder and Tchobanoglous made their presentation following the April 14 release of their consultant study.