The Private Participation Work Group

12/2/13 A pre-meeting planning session. From left to right, Lee Ulansey, Bonnie Blackberry, Peter Childs and Dan Taranto.

I can’t emphasize this enough.  Your county government is being run by special monied interests which include or course all the usual suspects, realtors, developers, large property owners/investors, bankers and mortgage brokers, but now includes the HumCo special twist Weed Inc.

One demonstration of this is the Public Participation Work Group (PPWG) which at it’s heart is Bonnie Blackberry and Dan Taranto and Peter Childs.  The poor resolution photo you can see them in a pre-GPU meeting strategy session working out their approach to the day’s meeting which includes nicely, current Planning Commission Member at large and former Supervisor Fennel colleague at Humboldt Coalition for Property Rights Lee Ulansey.

This group is currently working directly with county staff to draft chapters 2 (and 3?) of the General Plan Update.  Their stated goal is to improve public participation.  In practice we can see the actual effect of their work by closely watching how the current BOS handles the GPU and the PPWG’s reactions to it.  The result of their work  is that the Board of Supervisors (BOS) spares no expense when it comes to reaching out to the county’s 5,000 or so property owners.  But on issues that the broader public might be concerned with, say, “protecting agriculture and timberland for the long term”, well, lip service is paid to encouraging public participation, but that is it.

Again, this isn’t public participation, it’s the opposite – it’s private participation.  So what is the confusion?  The confusion seems to be in the definition of public.  I think to 4 of the 5 members of the Board of Supervisors, to Humboldt Coalition for Property Rights founder and current Planning Commission at Large Commission Member Lee Ulansey and to the PPWG “public” is defined as those owning property.  It’s that simple. Everything in this process favors either those who have property or other stakeholders such as realtors, home builders, developers, large corporate interests, etc.  Those who have a financial stake in the process are those who are listened to – very carefully by the way.  This is how something as simple and obvious as “protecting agriculture and timberland for the long term” FULL STOP is not generally accepted as a guiding principle for our county’s plan for the future.

Words have meaning and it’s very interesting if one pays attention to how they are often used to mean their opposite – or in other words deceive.  I think the most significant of these word games, is the Public Participation Work Group.

Next time – PPWG and double jeopardy democracy.

Freedom, Tyranny, and Oppression

I wanted to thank reader and commenter John Vigil for his contributions.  John is a self-described Non Partisan which sounds from his posts absolutely right.  He is fair minded and willing to have a conversation which is to be applauded imho.

But his posts do have that fundamentally conservative vein of cynicism directed toward government.  Dissent and protest is of course bi-partisan and John is right to watch over, criticize and work to improve government, but we shouldn’t work to weaken it just…. because.  I see and understand the arguments behind ideas like term limits and voting to balance the partisanship of the different branches of government, but I find that they are used by conservatives to fundamentally transform our society to this libertarian utopia where private concerns rule.

2010 National Spending per GDP Comparison

Above is a chart from Wikipedia on 2010 Governmental Spending as a percentage of GDP.  Most people are not chart people I realize, but charts are such an effective means of conveying information.  What this chart shows is the US economy is like other countries including Russia, China and Mexico is heavily weighed toward private industry.  The heart of this difference of course is health care, all other wealthy industrialized countries have decided that universal health care should be an essential part of civilization.  We’ve bucked that trend.  But it isn’t just health care, it’s a national argument that conservatives and Republicans are winning that the private sector runs most everything better than government.  They contend government, bureaucrats, politicians, etc are bad words because they are inherently inefficient and usually corrupt.

The truth is government can run many institutions of our society much more equitably and efficiently and these organizations and institutions and individuals are no more corrupt that those in the private sector.  In fact I would argue that we tend to focus on the corruption of government and politicians largely because they are accountable to us and their misdeeds get attention.  A recent TS article quoted a HumCo Sheriff saying we are probably only enforcing 2% of the local illegal marijuana trade, and that is the illegal private sector, think about how much nonsense goes on in the legal private sector that we never hear about.

But any conversation critical of the private sector is difficult to have when framed by terms like Socialism, Communism, and the latest addition,  Tyranny.

So when John says Freedom, Oppression and Tyranny I think we tend to think about Government’s tyranny over us.  My thoughts based on a lifetime’s worth of experience of the more subtle tyranny of the private sector.  Here is a visual representation of one type of tyranny that no one is mentioning.  It is from only very indirectly related story in the New York Times a couple of days ago.

The Tyranny of Sprawl (imho)

John, I hope that was fair.  I really appreciate you contributions and hope we can continue the conversation.  It’s not fair that I get to posts the posts with all the pictures and charts, but I’m happy to continue the conversation on your blog too or whatever.

BOS to Guiding Principles: “We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Principles”

Well, the BOS has decided planning is best done in private,  Both private meaning behind closed doors and private meaning private industry.  Here are my first thoughts on a comment on Sohum Parlance if you are interested.  This little Democrat will not be voting to endorse Supervisor Bass this June.  Actually I don’t have a vote, but if I did I wouldn’t.  I don’t know if she will be beatable, most people I talk to say no.  Supervisor Sundberg just became much more beatable imho.  See you in June.  (We have more time to plan for Supervisor Bohn’s and Fennell’s race)

And don’t forget to honor a landowner today!  They deserve it even if the BOS voted to remove that language.  We can’t expect them to be too honest.  Although I will give props to Supervisor Fennell who stood up for the phrase honoring landowners to the last.  Kudos Supervisor Fennell.

(Sarcasm is hard to get across on the internets.  My tongue was firmly between my cheeks on that last paragraph.)

Times-Standard Covers GPU Guiding Principles

First of all, thank you TS and Supervisors for taking time to cover the GPU GP.  I have been looking all summer long, and this is the first time I’ve found any of the Supervisors addressing their opinions of the Guiding Principles in particular.  As I’ve written before, its been somewhat of a blackout.

Some thoughts…

• First from Supervisor Sundberg.  “They’re so general that they don’t really mean a whole lot.”   OK, so why vote for a change made by two of your colleagues rather than keeping the original Guiding Principles developed with robust public participation?
• From Supervisor Rex Bohn.  “We’re not going to turn into Santa Rosa.  In 1960, the county had a population of nearly 105,000, now we have a population of nearly 135,000.”  It’s not about the number of people.  It’s about the effect that even a small number of people can have on our surroundings.  Whether it is our asphalt footprint, our carbon footprint or the effects of forestry, agriculture and industry, even small populations like ours can have a huge impact on the environment – local, regional, and global.
• Supervisor Bohn again “I don’t have an agenda. There are no hidden agendas. The doors are always open. People can come in, talk and say how they feel. What we’ve done is opened up a dialogue.”  “Maximizing flexibility” is an agenda.  Gutting the democratic process and enacting extremely partisan changes to the Guiding Principles while denying anything is happening is having an agenda.
• Supervisor Bass:  “Some people haven’t brought forward solutions. They’ll say, ‘We shouldn’t do X’ or ‘We shouldn’t do Y,’ but there are some constructive ideas in there.”  *sigh*
• But of course the biggest whopper of them all comes, as usual from Supervisor Fennell.  “It’s important that policies reflect a cross-section of the community.”  Puh-lease.  The only cross-section she seems to be sampling is her friends in Sohum growing weed (still always illegally federally -that is why she can’t bring it up), and her old colleagues at HumCPR.
• Of course, leave it to Supervisor Lovelace to be the only example that I can find of a Supervisor addressing specific principles.  He addressed the 5th and 6th principles.  I recommend heading over to the TS to check out the article.

One note.  I don’t know if this statement from the TS is technically true.  “While the revisions have not been referenced during subsequent General Plan meetings”.  There was one BOS meeting I attended where I heard Supervisor Sundberg reference the Guiding Principles when he was searching for, well, guidance.  I noticed this because I wasn’t sure which set of Guiding Principles he was referencing.

Anyhoo, those are some thoughts.  Hope to see you tomorrow.

3 Days to the GPU Guiding Principles Meeting. Reviewing Supervisor’s Responses and Some Final Thoughts

So, 3 weeks ago I posted a version of a letter I sent to the four Supervisors that voted for a new version of the General Plan update Guiding principles.  The only response I received was from Supervisor Bohn.  My Supervisor, the 4th district’s Virginia Bass, had said she would try to respond, but in the end could not – at least not in a timely manner that would have allowed for dialog.  I don’t really blame any of them, firstly because most of them do not represent me, and secondly because the questions were difficult and I’m sure they would rather not have the answers in writing.

In summary the question where: 1)  Why was the new version superior, principle by principle, phrase by phrase? and 2)  How long should the new guidelines last once passed?

Here is Rex’s (non) answer, but at least he had the courtesy to respond to the question.

There has been quite a bit of public input since the adoption of Guiding Principles in 2004, and in talking with a lot of people their input was not considered or simply ignored in public process pre 2004. There is now a draft set of Guiding Principles that has been presented and straw voted now we will have more input and all will be listened to. I have heard an overwhelming,  enthusiastic  voice of support on the new draft which was not an overwhelming difference as some stayed as written. The whole idea is dialogue and a plan that has Maximum Flexibility, (caps his, underline mine – dJon) protects the environment, and preserves property rights, Let us Hope for the Best,  Rex

Here’s Supervisor Bohn on the purpose of the 6/3 meeting.  “All this is is a point of discussion, this doesn’t mean we are going to print these in stone or anything else.  And obviously we’ve opened up a dialog.”  (2 hr 53 min)  Also, here is where I first heard Supervisor Bohn’s catch phrase.  “Maximize flexibility are probably the two neatest words I’ve heard through this whole process.”(2 hr 54 min)

My question is, if the Board of Supervisors representing the public decides to maximize flexibility, who benefits?  A:  Private interests.

Follow up question…  How is a plan a plan if it allows for maximizing flexibility?  Are not the two concepts contradictory?

As Supervisor Fennell did not respond to my question, here is the best quote I can find for a reason she gives for the changes.  Nothing specific mind you, we will not know why this or that phrase was added, but we do have this catch-all explanation…

“All we are trying to do is to make this work for the majority, for the whole.”  (2hr 49 min)

How do you know this Supervisor Fennell?  How are we to hold you accountable?

Ryan Burns has a good review of this process in the North Coast Journal.  Included is a link to a staff report pdf file that demonstrates the relatively open and transparent decision-making process that resulted in the previous version of the Guiding Principles.  Unless the Board of Supervisors decides to change course, the version we are finally stuck will not made any equivalent effort for public education or participation and will not consist of any paper trail what-so-ever.  But this is the type of public process that in the end the Dan Taranto and Bonnie Blackberry’s of the world really wanted – the type of public process that resulted in the set of principles they preferred.  Whether the public was actually involved is neither here-nor there.

Honoring Landowners; GPU Thread Part v

Please. Please. Please. Please.       Please.      Supervisors, DO NOT remove the one honest addition to the new Guiding Principles.  I know they will, but I hope to goodness they don’t.

Here’s Principle #7, which also guts any principle to protect natural resources for their own sake, but forget that for the moment.  Notice the addition of “honoring landowners”.  How perfect is that?  Especially in a set of principles bought and paid for by HumCPR.  (The PR stands for “Property Rights”).  Really and truly and sincerely, please do not remove the honoring, please.  But they will.

I mean they didn’t choose ‘person’s’ or ‘resident’s’ for example, but ‘landowner’s’.  Perfect AND honest.  And I am pro-honesty in government.

Guiding Principle #7:

Existing principle:

“Protect natural resources, especially open space, water resources, water quality, scenic beauty, and salmonid habitat.”

New version:

“Honor landowners’ right to live in urban, suburban, rural or remote areas of the county while using a balanced approach to protect natural resources, especially open space, water resources, water quality and fisheries habitat in cooperation with state and federal agencies.

Please?

Protest? Would Anyone be Interested in Standing in Opposition to the GPU GP Process With Me?

I don’t want to do it alone, but I think it might add pressure to the Board of Supervisors.

Forget about everything else for a moment.  It is the process that is so surreal.  For years previous to gaining a majority on the board the developer/weed/realtor/property-owner/land-speculator/mortgage-broker coalition was arguing for a more democratic process.  Here is all that is left of what was once a substantial argument from the Section 1500 group in regard to the end-round Supervisors Fennell and Bohn committed with the support of Supervisors Bass and Sundberg.

The Section 1500 group consisted at one point of Peter Childs, Dan Taranto, Bonnie Blackberry, Tom Grover, and Estelle Fennell (before she became Supervisor).  Bonnie Blackberry is closely associated with Charley Custer as they co-host a civil liberties show on KMUD which seems to be 90% complaints about laws against weed, argued under the general umbrella of civil liberties.

Here’s the thing that drives me nuts, and might drive more people nuts if they paid close attention.  Bonnie Blackberry and Dan Taranto at some point formed the Public Participation Work Group and began advocating for 3 new public participation principles added to the existing 9.  When Estelle and Rex and whoever else drafted the new Guiding Principles, which in effect represent a giveaway to private interests of the government’s responsibility to plan for the future to;  when Estelle and Rex did this, they did it in a way ignoring the only 3 principles they did not change.  AND those were the three principles they advocated for and successfully added just prior to being elected.  It is mind numbing and I wish I had the writing skills to better express why.

Also, take a listen to the BOS justifying the changes (around 2 hr 45 min).  You will be amazed by the inconsistency and double speak if you know the whole story.    So, I’d really like to see if anyone else is as frustrated as I am and would care to join me for some good-ole 1st amendment action in front of the Courthouse next week.  I’m thinking 3 to 5 days 2 to 3 hours around lunch time.  Anyone else game?

Bonnie and Dan, I hope to see you out there with me.

A: Greed and Weed. GPU Thread Part iii (16 Days To Go)

Q:  What is driving our current GPU process.

Here are some links to Sohum Parlance threads where I and others (many others at first, later only Cookie and I) were commenting on the General Plan Update in general and often the Guiding Principles in particular.  The first link is very interesting as many of the most influential people in the process weighed in including Peter Childs, Bonnie Blackberry and Dan Taranto of the §1500 group.

Sohum Parlance Links which included Guiding Principle comments.

• June 3rd – “Northcoast Environmental Center on the GPU Guiding Principles” Thread
• June 11th – “Online Petition to the Board of Supervisors“
• July 17th – “Pathetic!“

This is the comment in the Pathetic! thread where Cookie and I started to make an attempt to go through an analysis of each Guiding Principle, one by one.  It was really a useful exercise and I recommend everyone interested to do the same.  Take a copy of the new and old Guiding Principle and ask yourself why make these changes?  The answers you come up with will be as good as any offered by the Board, btw, because they haven’t offered any except Supervisor  Fennell’s declaration that her and Supervisor Bohn’s rewrite was a fair representation of the introduction to the chapter on the Guiding Principles.

I think this one comment, made by “Jane”, back in April 2012 was so insightful given what has happened in Summer 2013 that it is worth a special link.

Estelle, like most politicians without extensive actual experience, can always adopt the feel-good friendly-to-transparency point of view. Those of us who have worked with Estelle in other organizations know this is not always how she manages her own workload.

Remember.  This was written a year plus before Supervisor Fennell worked with the most conservative member of the BOS (as a Democrat mind you) to rewrite the Guiding Principles that had been worked on extensively and with substantial effort at inclusiveness.

More on that post title later.

Focusing on One Post of Many at Lost Coast Outpost Today

 Kym Kemp:   Not many non-profits want to say “Yah, of course, we get the majority of our funds from growers.”

Me:  EPIC maybe? KMUD?

What about commercial? LoCO?

What about political candidates and political alliances?

The problem is Kym, it is still not ok with the majority of society once you lose the environmentalists. I used to be pro legalization and would have been on here cheering you on until this summer when I learned about the direct influence the weed has had through KMUD on our General Plan Update.

The Bohn/Fennell alliance is impossible to understand unless you understand who Bonnie Blackberry, Charley Custer, Tom Grover*, Lee Ulansey and whoever else are. It’s amazing really.

Then you get the silence or self-negotiating stance of EPIC’s Gary Graham Hughes. AHHHH! (Note: Kudos to Scott Greacen. He has been strong and relatively environmentally consistent this summer IMHO.)

Here’s the thing. That Bohn/Fennell alliance is not well understood. If Bohn’s supporters knew what was going on, they would kinda freak out IMHO – at least those who aren’t directly profiting from the GPU GP re-write, lax enforcement, and reduced county regulation.

The bad press and one sided reporting you are complaining about today is partially because it is important for advocates to keep quiet. (Again, IMHO)

Keep quiet or else people will see that this weed train ride we are on is on a downhill slope and we as a society are losing control. Nobody knows where this is headed or what legalization is going to look like. Will it benefit our rivers? I’m starting to believe it probably won’t.

Good for you for publicizing and promoting the weed trade, but your lonesome voice is probably at least partially due to the fact many growers are rightfully shy about the publicity.

Bonnie Blackberry and Charley Custer included. Where are they during the public GPU meetings? Bonnie is there, but not connecting the weed trade to her positions like she does on her KMUD radio show. That would not go over well in the Courthouse.

A bit of bookkeeping –  I repost a bunch of comments here in dHF! that may be hard to notice because they are buried in threads.  (I’m realizing as I type this that I have mistakenly been posting a bunch of the comment’s I’ve been making today at LoCO in the “miscellaneous” thread – they should be in the Cannibis thread.  Oh, well.)

Anyhoo, it is a different and probably confusing way of running a blog – but the long comment threads were characteristic of Sohum Parlance where I first began to actively comment – and I liked it.

A special shout out to Kym Kemp today at LoCO.  She was a trooper and really put up with a bunch of my nonsense.

* 9/2/13 Not sure about Tom Grover right now – I added him t o the list based on an appearance on with the civil liberties group on KMUD.  Based on an appearance on KMUD’s Enviornment Show on 8/6/13 I want to hem and haw a little here.

24 Days to Go…. Here Are Portions of a Letter I Wrote 4th District Supervisor Virginia Bass

I do feel bad sometimes for Supervisor Bass that she has me as a constituent.  I do not have a competent internal editor and the letter I sent her was much longer … Here are portions.

A) I would like to know what your feelings are on each of the Guiding Principles and why? What have you heard from other constituents so far and what version are you going to support on each one? Or, if you are going to support different language in any of them what is it and why? I don’t think it is too much to ask for you to comment on each of the (now) 11 principles. (You probably should also comment on the 12th and why it should be deleted – I think it was number eight) And you of course can include any new ones you might be in favor of. I would encourage you to ask your colleagues to do the same – I think you all owe it to use before the meeting on the 23rd so we know what specifically to address.

For the record I favor the existing – pre-straw vote 12 for the reasons Supervisor Lovelace brought up. Those 12 have a record of the public process involved. The most important changes in the current 11 were made behind closed doors by a fellow Democrat who happens to have incredibly conservative views on property rights issues and arguably the most conservative member of the Board of Supervisors.

Also, please note that although all 5 of you have said they believe in the public process during Board GPU meetings in July. We have no ability to read your minds and e-mails and friends and phone calls, etc. so we the public do not currently have any insight into why each of the 12 principles have changed the way they have.

B) I wanted to ask this prepared statement/question at the last BOS but couldn’t gather the courage. I wonder if you could address it in an e-mail instead.

I have 1 (and a half) questions for you regarding the Guiding Principles.

Once the current Guiding principles are finalized, what is your intention for how long they should hold? a) Should it be as many years as it takes for the majority’s ideology to change, or b) Should they stand for a period of time? and c) if (b) how long should they stand?

My answer would be (b) an allotted period of time and 20 years. No matter the answer, think this process has established a troublesome precedent. Either the principles of the plan are subject to elections and as such are not much of a plan, or b) by the extremely wanting public participation this Board has set up you are sending the message that might makes right. I believe, as a proponent of regional planning or smart growth, that we need plans that are somewhat immune to one or two partisan elections like we have just experienced. Thank you for the time.

…

Don’t forget to write/call/meet with your Supervisor too, no matter your views on the Guiding Principles/GPU.  Time IS running out.  Also, make plans to show of the 23rd.  If travel is a problem I can pick up at least 6, I’m sure we can find other volunteers to pick people up too.  (Again, no matter what your views are – unless I begin to sense funny-business)