Badlands Journal
Social, Economic, and Environmental Justice
The Modesto version of the Denny Show sounds about the same as its Merced prototype (see article below): The congressman, local elitists and bureaucrats tell stories that comfort themselves in a setting designed to look like a meeting with the people which prevents the people from speaking directly to the great man without appearing to interrupt the steady flow of self-serving propaganda.
To interrupt:
In the following letter, Merced County Counsel Ruben E. Castillo provides City of Livingston Attorney Thomas Hallinan, Jr. thoughtful instruction on the various laws the city may have broken in approving Ranchwood Home's construction of a sewer trunk pipeline from the city waste water treatment plant in a southerly direction on county land through Gallo and other ranches across several county roads and an irrigation canal toward a 300-acre Ranchwood Homes development in a "conceptual" stage of planning.
From:
Lydia Miller
President San Joaquin Raptor/Wildlife Rescue Center
P.O. Box 778
Merced CA 95341
raptorctr@bigvalley.net
(209) 723-9283, phone & fax
Steve Burke
Protect Our Water
3105 Yorkshire Lane
Modesto CA 95350
Sburke5@sbcglobal.net
(209) 523-1391 phone & fax
The two articles below offer warfare strategies so disparate they could only come from imperial America at a moment when its regime is busy selling the store to military contractors, including, first of all, the University of California-managed national laboratories at Los Alamos and Livermore and to Bechtel, their win-win, private partner.
The two labs “are in a head-to-head competition to offer designs for the first of the new thermonuclear explosives …” Oh boy, ain’t we safer now!
Sea levels likely to rise much faster than was predicted
By Steve Connor, Science Editor in St Louis
The Independent & The Independent on Sunday (UK) -- 17 February 2006
Global warming is causing the Greenland ice cap to disintegrate far faster than anyone predicted. A study of the region's massive ice sheet warns that sea levels may - as a consequence - rise more dramatically than expected.
February 13, 2006
Merced County Board of Supervisors
2222 M Street
Merced, CA 95340
Honorable Chair Nelson and Members Crookham, Kelsey, O'Banion and Pedrozo,
I am writing on behalf of the Central Valley Food and Farmland Coalition to express our concerns of the commulative effect of the rapid growth in Merced County. We urge you to state a moratorium on all General Plan amendment applications and conduct a study of our water resources before any amendment applications are accepted.
February 14, 2006
Merced County Board of Supervisors
2222 M Street
Merced, CA 95340
On behalf of the Northern San Joaquin Valley Chapter of Community Alliance with Family Farmers, which consists predominately of Merced County residents, we would like to enter our comments toward the Agenda Item: General Plan Amendment Policy.
Elections and debate on a new five-year Farm Bill are upon us. The Bee reported last week that members of the House Agriculture Committee will be visiting Stockton in the first week of March to hold hearings on the Bush administration's proposals.
These proposals include taxing dairymen 3 cents per hundredweight, cutting cotton and rice subsidies and a $200-million annual subsidy to promote American agricultural exports. Recent recipients include Blue Diamond Growers, the California Table Grape Commission and Sunkist Growers, the Bee reported. (1)
Coalition Statement on Merced County Planning Process
We call for a moratorium on County General Plan amendments, variances, minor sub-divisions changes to existing projects, zoning changes, and annexations of unincorporated county land by municipal jurisdictions, MOU’s and developments with private interests and state agencies, until a new County general Plan is formulated by a fully authorized public process – and approved locally and by the appropriate state and federal agencies.