STANISLAUS CONNECTIONS

Working For Peace, Justice, and A Sustainable Environment

A Modesto Peace/Life Center Publication

May, 2001

Living Lightly

By DAN and BARBARA POLLOCK

Dear Friends and Fellow Gardeners,

Recently, Barbara had the occasion to buy a book of poems for me by Robert Browning. The book is published by Dover Thrift and is called My Last Duchess and Other Poems.  A short but meaningful poem called ‘Song’ gave me pause to think of some of our present day conditions.

Song, from Pip pa Passes
by Robert Browning.

The year’s at the spring,
and the day’s at the morn;
Morning’s at seven;
The hill-side’s dew pearled;
The lark’s on the wing;
The snail’s on the thorn;
God’s in His heaven-
All’s right with the world!”

For Browning, the world was right because he lived a life that allowed him to observe the world, feel his place in it, and connect with its creation. Oh how different our world would be, if we could be as Browning.

Is our world right? To mention a few wrongs:

• The earth’s forest’s timber is being cut for short term profits and to raise cattle for fast food restaurants.

• Greenhouse gases from internal combustion emissions are upsetting weather patterns, and our president refuses to participate in an international accord to limit greenhouse gases.

• One of the last true wilderness’s areas, the Arctic Refuge, is under siege by oil companies to drill for oil and is supported by the president.

There is much to be concerned about; how can we effect changes that will result in preserving the quality of life for ourselves and the natural world.

Perhaps the first step is simply to remove ourselves from the TV and step out into the real world. Rejoice in the sunrise and sunset, gaze at the stars, listen to the lark's song, sleep on a beach to the sound of the surf, grow a garden, ride a horse, take a bike ride, take a walk in the mountains, prairies, foothills, canyons, and deserts. Above all take your kids if you have them.

Do we really see the world as it is? In the fast paced world in which we live, do we even give thought to our place within the natural scheme of life?

To know our place and how we connect to it has always been vital, but now it is becoming critical. If we are to survive in a healthy sustaining environment, we must learn our place and live responsibly within boundaries that earth has taken millions of years to evolve. Living in boundaries means taking control of our actions, and using our resources wisely.

In the April issue of the California Farmer Magazine, the Helena Chemical Company is advertising (full page) a new insect repellent called ‘Allityn.’ What caught my attention was their statement, “Allityn is Helena’s new organic insect repellent. It’s manufactured from garlic cloves, yet does not affect the flavor of fruits and vegetables”. Wow! I never thought I would see the day a major pesticide manufacture would be formulating a garlic spray! Great! 

Don’t forget, write or email your legislative representative to oppose oil drilling in the Arctic Refuge. Let the president know your feelings on the Greenhouse issue.

Until next Month, Peace and Good Gardening

At the last meeting of the Solid Waste Executive Committee, it was explained that the County only has to divert 10% of its solid waste to the WTE plant to get the state credit for recycling. Therefore, the rest of its capacity is “excess” and can be used to import solid waste from other counties, so they, too, can claim their recycling credit, and we can make a profit.

Creation of this artificial “excess capacity” would result in about half of our solid waste being displaced to the landfill.

County Solid Waste Management Plan Raises Local Concerns

By CAROLYN MITTON and STEVE BURKE

(For clarity’s sake, note that county with a small c means the geographic area, whereas County with a capital means Stanislaus County government.)

A county-wide 5 year review of the solid waste management plan as mandated by the California Integrated Waste Management Board is currently in process. The plan, agreed to by all nine cities and Stanislaus County five years ago, stated that its policy was to maintain the best interests of all the county residents. As per state statutes, it listed waste management practices in order of priority: 1) Source reduction; 2) Recycling and composting, 3) Environmentally safe transformation (burning waste to generate electricity) and 4) Landfill (for what can’t be disposed of in any other manner).

Stanislaus County is proposing to import solid waste from other counties to use the “excess capacity” of our waste-to-energy (WTE) plant. This is a puzzling notion since the plant has run at full capacity for some time now, turning away solid waste until it can process what it has already collected,

At the last meeting of the Solid Waste Executive Committee, it was explained that the County only has to divert 10% of its solid waste to the WTE plant to get the state credit for recycling. Therefore, the rest of its capacity is “excess” and can be used to import solid waste from other counties, so they, too, can claim their recycling credit, and we can make a profit. This reasoning does not take into account that the WTE plant was intended to serve the residents of THIS county, not necessarily others. For those who may not be aware of it, this plant is being paid for with public money (to pay off bonds) and, amazingly, when the bonds are retired, ownership of the facility will rest NOT with the public, but with Ogden Martin. Cost to the taxpayers: more than $100 million.

Creation of this artificial “excess capacity” would result in about half of our solid waste being displaced to the landfill. The City of Modesto says this is inconsistent with the letter and intent of AB 939, the state mandate to divert 50 % or more of our solid waste from landfills. The county says that since sharing of recycling credit is a basic premise for the regional agencies, it is consistent with the plan. AB 939 recognizes that as a society we produce too much waste, and its goal is to reduce the amount of waste generated; its purpose to serve as an incentive for achieving that goal. Schemes to simply help each shuffle waste disposal methods serves neither of these, and runs counter to the “reduction hierarchy” noted above.

There is more to this picture. Even though this 5 year update is not completed, the County has already purchased (in 1997) approximately 2100 acres of land adjacent to the existing Fink Road Landfill. Money for the purchase came from the “Enterprise Fund” built up with the proceeds from the operation of the Fink Road landfill, or more precisely the overcharge on “tipping fees” (cost per ton to dump garbage). The price the County paid for the land was $14 million of the total of $19 million in the fund at the time.

There are many troubling concerns. All nine county cities paid into the fund, yet they had no say in the $14 million purchase. The price paid was fully $2 million more than the $12 million appraisal. And the County is now attempting to retrofit the necessary legal documents guiding solid waste handling in this county in order to justify their actions.

But why was the land purchased at all? Currently there are about 271 tons per day disposed at Fink Road, because most of the garbage disposed of in the county is burned at the WTE plant. At this rate, the EXISTING Fink Road acreage has a 95 year life. This life will only be shortened if there is LESS of this county’s garbage burned, which will create “excess capacity” referred to above. Under this scenario, garbage from other counties will then be burned.

The question is: why do this? This county would then become the disposal site for counties all over the state. And we would also have to expand our landfill. Is this what the citizens of this county want? Is this what the citizens of the West Side of the county want, already impacted by the garbage burner, the existing landfill, and the tire burner?

So let’s run a scenario that assumes the decision is made to leave things as they are, which means we would not divert more of this county’s waste from the WTE plant to the landfill. Then there would be no need to expand our landfill for 95 years. We would not become the dumping ground for other counties. Is this a scenario you prefer?

If this is what prevails, then what happens to the 2100 acres already purchase for expansion?

More questions: why did the County make the unilateral decision to spend money belonging to all the cites as well? Why was this money not spent, as dictated by statute, on 1) Source reduction; 2) Recycling and composting, and (only then) burning and disposal? Imagine the programs that could have been created with $14 million to promote # 1 and #2.

For a sane and sustainable policy on solid waste management, consider the Sierra Club’s, which states in part: “Waste should be managed as close to the point of generation as possible. Export of wastes or incinerator ash to other counties is not acceptable because it poses significant health and environmental threats, and is unnecessary and unethical. … Effective waste management should be based on communities, industries and individuals taking responsibility for their own wastes.”

Clearly the plans and activities of the County are diametrically opposed to such an ecological (and legally required) policy, as well as raising a host of other concerns.

Anne's Artichoke Dip
Submitted by Dorothy Griggs in memory of a friend

1 14 oz can artichokes (not marinated)
1 cup mayonnaise (regular or low fat)
1 cup grated parmesan cheese
1 four oz. can chopped chilies
a pinch of garlic powder

“ The automobile has not merely taken over the street, it has dissolved the living tissue of the city.  Its appetite for space is absolutely insatiable; moving and parked, it devours urban land, leaving the buildings as mere islands of habitable space in a sea of dangerous and ugly traffic.”

•  James Marston Fitch

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Book review: Married to dysfunctional transportation
or
Book review: Pollution mandates divorce
By DON MCMILLAN

Katie Alvord. Divorce Your Car! Gabriola Island, BC, Canada, New Society Publishers: 2000. 305 pages. Paper. ISBN 0-86571-408-8.

Northern San Joaquin Valley readers might gasp if they thought seriously of the command of this book's title. Yet Alvord apparently isn't kidding, and this book strives both to demonstrate the urgency of the divorce and to ease the changes that such a divorce implies. Before you dismiss the book as extreme, you might consider that for Alvord, divorcing the automobile doesn't mean in every case dumping one's own car and never again riding in a car. Instead, she suggests options between what she calls "car-lite" and "car-free." Reassurance in considering an automotive divorce comes from evidence Alvord presents that one needn't undergo the divorce alone.

Divorce Your Car! breaks nearly evenly between two sections describing our increasingly dysfunctional dependence on cars and a final section dedicated to ways out of the unhealthy relationship. Its first part narrates how what's glibly and uncritically been called industrial nations' "love affair with the auto"—severely limiting non-auto transportation choices for their people—degenerated to an unhealthy monogamy. The second part enumerates the abuses that this marriage imposes from farmland paved over for parking to the headaches of disposing of tires and the cars themselves. Taking up nearly half the book's pages, the last part details how to proceed with the needed divorce, restoring a wide range of choices for mobility without cars or with fewer car trips.

Alvord gives full approval to walking, cycling, carpooling, transit, and trips that combine two or more such modes. She raises critical questions about the desirability of simply replacing gasoline and diesel models with "clean" cars, and she cautiously recommends telecommuting as a car divorce tool. Yoking this discussion is Alvord's pervading metaphor of ending an unhealthy relationship; cheeky chapter titles suggest the swagger of a partner learning to thrive independently of a domineering ex.

For me, Alvord's car divorce manual sagged most in its analysis of phony images that spinmeisters exploit in pitching cars. "The setting shown with a given vehicle was often beyond the means of target buyers, but associating a certain car with high-class settings inferred that if you bought one, you'd raise your status …," she writes. This mercifully brief section reminded me all too drowsily of high school communications classes devoted to teasing apart advertising.

On the other hand, Alvord touched on exhilarating possibilities in a chapter whose title plays on codependent—"Car-Dependent no More." Here she envisions what might happen when citizens, acting independently, shrug off their respective shackles imposed by unquestioned marriage to automobiles. "If … there truly is a critical mass of people wanting freedom from car-dependence, small changes such as the many examples in this book—Walking School Buses, bike delivery services, more telecommuters, efforts to limit sprawl—could … become components of a bigger shift." Alvord imagines that through such a shift "[c]ities … become so pleasant that fewer people feel the need to flee them, taking pressure off wilderness parks and habitat. In response to popular support, governments have essentially stopped building new roads. Money has been re-routed into maintenance of existing key roads; … pot-holes have become a thing of the past." Individuals' choices for greater auto-independence can generate momentum towards such a societal divorce from cars, Alvord believes. "If enough environmentally concerned North Americans responded to the finding that car driving is their most environmentally harmful activity and decided to divorce their cars, going either car-lite or car-free, we might move a long way toward the visions above."

This vision animates my own choices. By progressing in my own car divorce, I may be contributing to something synergistic and highly desirable and much larger than any immediate snags my divorce poses. It is as though Alvord's manual at its best had banished enough smog and snuffed enough highway and parking lot lighting to reconnect me with guiding stars.

Reviewer Don McMillan marked four years car free—defined in this case as not owned by an automobile—on March 17.

“Viewed from the distance of the moon, the astonishing thing about the earth….is that it is alive…Aloft, floating free beneath the moist, gleaming membrane of bright blue sky, is the rising earth, the only exuberant thing in this part of the cosmos….It has the organized, self-contained look of a live creature, full of information, marvelously skilled in handling the sun.”   

•  Lewis Thomas

Cycle Modesto!
By GEORGE OSNER

 The Annual Bike to Work Day and Family Cycling Festival returns to Modesto this May with great opportunities to ride, win prizes, and learn more about cycling in Modesto.

 Bike to Work Day will be on Thursday, May 17, with the morning event held on the Courthouse lawn at 11th and I Streets in downtown Modesto from 6:30 to 8:30 am. Members of the Modesto Police Department Bike Patrol will lead escorted commutes from various parts of town into downtown—here’s your chance to learn a new route. Dust off that bike that’s been sitting in the garage all winter (or longer!) and try a ride to work. Continental breakfast will be provided to all riders compliments of local businesses, and the first 100 riders will receive a free goodie bag including bike-related items.

The Modesto Family Cycling Festival returns this year on Saturday, May 19, also at the Courthouse lawn at 11th and I Streets in downtown Modesto. This is a full day of cycling fun, featuring once again the GT Stunt Team flying through the air in their spectacular acrobatic show. The event kicks off with a Criterium race through and around downtown, not to be missed for fast-paced excitement. Unicyclone will present a stunning demonstration of single-wheel virtuosity, with an opportunity for you to try your skill in the Unicycle Zone. A hands-on bike safety course for children will be available. Local police bicycle patrols will present the Cop-etition on their challenging obstacle course. In the expo area, see the latest in bikes and equipment and pick up on bike literature. Free prize drawings held throughout the day.  

ACTION: For information, call Barbara Denlis at 209-577-5276.

Modesto Farmers Market opens for 23rd season

Cherries, berries, lots of leafy greens, breads still warm from the oven. The original Modesto Certified Farmers Market will open Saturday May 5th for the 2001 season. On 16th Street next to the library, the Saturday and Thursday markets are held weekly from 7 am to 12:30 pm.

The popular weekly chef demonstrations will continue to be held each Saturday as will the drawing for a beautiful and abundant produce basket.

New this year is a Profiles of Modesto booth highlighting a local group or agency.

Enjoy fresh food and support local farmers.

ACTION: For more information, phone Steve Christy, MCFM manager, at 632-9322, or check out the new website(!)