Links:
• The Sac Bee has a good video and story about the fight for clean water, especially in the Central Valley. Runoff from farms and other agricultural uses puts pesticides and other contaminants into the water, and nobody has yet been able to tackle the issue. We keep hearing that there will be movement on the water issues, but we’ve been kicking this one down the can for decades. At this point, it is difficult to see what will be different this year. Especially if the Governor demands a multi-billion dollar bond for dams as part of any bill.
• Teach to the test! What we’ve learned in the years since No Child Left Behind is that the test scores are a fairly obtuse method of testing student achievement, and a relatively inefficient means of spending our money. But test away, the government loves them some data. Even the fact that California improved test scores over the past couple years doesn’t do anything to bridge the achievement gap, nor does is bring back the billions in per-pupil spending that will probably serve to erode these improvements over the next few years.
• Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, the results of test scores represent something of a failure for Antonio Villaraigosa to live up to his rhetoric about “saving the schools.” Also, the Locke charter school in South Los Angeles showed the same inconsistent results as the rest of the city – charter schools are not a magic bullet.
• John Garamendi’s Clean Seas Coalition released a radio ad as well as a YouTube spot (to the right) focusing on an oil severance tax as an alternative to offshore drilling.
• State politicians are pressuring UC-Berkeley to return bones of Japanese war dead from the battle of Saipan. The remains have been stored in the anthropology museum for over sixty years.
• I’m going to love having TBogg comment on the Carly Fiorina candidacy for the next year: “Hi. I’m Carly Fiorina. I laid off 15,000 people at Hewlett-Packard and walked away with a 21 million dollar check and on the day that I was fired HP’s stock jumped 6.9%. So….um…well…. Jesus, 9/11, freedom, success! Also. Wolverines!”
• Lesson learned: don’t put your 30,000 marijuana plants next to a raging wildfire, where they may get noticed by authorities. It appears the fire in the Los Padres National Forest may have been caused by a campfire put together by pot growers.
• The LA County Board of Supes unanimously voted to reopen King hospital, provided that the UC partner with the county. The ball’s in the regent’s court now.
• A non-native Asian clam has invaded Lake Tahoe. They are principally around Zephyr Cove and South Lake Tahoe, but have been gradually gaining territory. They encourage the growth of algae and could threaten native species.
is “indoor gardening”.
This puzzled me for a long time. How did people start fires with tomato starts, I wondered. And then finally, I came to understand (and felt mighty slow).
It turns out that the biggest problem with pot isn’t related to users, but to organizations trying to hide it. They bring in diesel generators that run 24×7 and spill fuel everywhere, including into creeks, so they won’t generate a suspicious PG&E bill, or because they’re off grid. They do hokey electrical that isn’t inspected. They’re generally remote and hard to get to, and don’t necessarily call the fire department right away.
Oh, and they steal water, too.
We don’t have these problem with grape growers, even though their product is also intoxicating.
For example, our very successful 30 year old individual reading program – really important for getting the kids going.
Gone in the budget cuts.
Good news, the STAR tests stay, so we’ll be able to see just exactly how much difference the program made. Woo, I guess.
… but not teachers. Because what they do isn’t that important and doesn’t take up more of our budget than any other department.