Sustainable Groundwater In The Salinas Valley
Monday, November 2, 2015 / 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. |
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Let’s talk about groundwater. It’s an important topic, and the Board of Directors of the Monterey County Water Resources Agency will discuss Salinas Valley groundwater issues during a Special Meeting being held today. You can find out more by going online at kusp.org/landuse. There’s a link to a Draft Comprehensive Sustainability Program, outlining strategies to deal with groundwater overdraft in the Salinas Valley.
"Overdraft” means that more water is being pumped out of the aquifer than is going into it, so the water level in the underground basin goes down. The "kicker” is that as the level of fresh water goes below sea level, ocean water flows in, contaminating the fresh water basin. That’s called "saltwater intrusion,” and that kind of contamination has been going on since the 1930’s in the Salinas Valley. Saltwater intrusion threatens the county’s agricultural economy and the domestic water supplies of those who use groundwater. It’s not a problem easily solved, with no solution having been implemented despite over eighty years of ongoing contamination. The Pajaro Valley has the same problem. And tomorrow, the Monterey County Board of Supervisors is expected to approve a Proclamation of a Local Emergency due to conditions of saltwater intrusion near Moro Cojo Slough, causing conditions of <quote> "extreme peril” to the safety of persons and property.
This is Gary Patton.
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Highway Hijinks
Wednesday, November 4, 2015 / 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. |
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It’s time to talk about highway projects! KUSP listeners in Santa Cruz County should know about the meeting, tomorrow, of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission. The Commission will meet in Watsonville, starting at 9:00 a.m. On the agenda? Highway One, heading from Santa Cruz south towards Watsonville, and Highway 17, heading from Santa Cruz over the hill to the Silicon Valley.
Tomorrow, the Commission is going to hear about a Highway 17 Access Management Plan. This will be a status report, so now would be a good time to check out what might be proposed, so your comments can be considered before new plans and policies are finalized. Here is a for instance. Should it be possible to turn left at the Laurel Curve, from Highway 17 going south? That used to be possible. Now it’s not. And what about left turns at Vine Hill Road, just a bit further along, going south towards Santa Cruz?
The possible widening of Highway One is also on the agenda. The Commission is expected to launch an environmental impact report process related to highway widening proposals. Widening Highway One would seem to have a great appeal, considering the backups that occur on the highway. However, experience elsewhere shows that widening actually "induces demand,” which means that after widening more people caught in the same kind of traffic tie-up.
If you care, now’s the time to start paying attention.
This is Gary Patton.
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A Visit To Utopia
Friday, November 6, 2015 / 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. |
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Today, I’m talking about "utopia.” At Stanford University, I spent two years in an Honors Program in Social Thought and Institutions, and the focus of this honors program was "utopia.” I guess I’m kind of an undergraduate expert on utopia, or at least I used to be.
Today and tomorrow, the University of California at Santa Cruz is hosting a conference that focuses on utopian thinking in the face of environmental threats. Titled, "Utopian Dreaming: 50 Years of Imagined Futures in California and at UCSC,” the conference will celebrate the 40-year anniversary of Ecotopia, a novel by Ernest Callenbach that imagined Northern California, Oregon, and Washington breaking off from the rest of the country to form an ecological new nation. I have a link to the book, and to conference information, at kusp.org/landuse.
Let me tell you, there would be a lot of land use changes required to go from our unsustainable present to a "utopian” future like the one Callenbach imagined might be possible. Highway widening projects would not be on the agenda, and we would be taking steps to eliminate past abuses of the environment, like groundwater overdraft.
I’m hoping some listeners will be able to attend the conference. It never hurts to dream. As my father said, "if you don’t have a dream, you can’t have a dream come true.”
This is Gary Patton.
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Dog Park Ruminations
Sunday, November 8, 2015 / 7:30 a.m. |
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Today, let’s do a bit of retrospective rumination on the fate of the Carmel Valley Canine Sports Center. On October 27th, the Monterey County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to turn down the project. This unanimous "No” vote came after a unanimous "Yes” vote by the Planning Commission. That’s pretty strange. It may be that the Planning Commission’s "Yes” recommendation reflected the fact that the project applicant was actually a member of the Commission. Not a member who voted on the application, of course, but nonetheless a member. Still, some consistency ought to be expected as policies are applied to project proposals.
KSBW television said that the applicant spent one million dollars going through the process. If so, couldn’t the County’s procedures have given the applicant a better "heads up,” saving the applicant money and the public lots of time and energy?
The answer is "yes.” The County could establish policies making clear that some projects will just not be approved. Such projects would then be turned down at the start, rather than at the end of the process. A LandWatch Monterey County publication called Land Use And The General Plan outlines how this approach could work. The County has chosen the opposite procedure: we will consider anything, but no guarantees!
It’s worth thinking about which land use philosophy is really more fair to all concerned.
This is Gary Patton.
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