6-25-09

 
6-25-09
Merced Sun-Star
After County Bank's demise, another Valley bank set to open Merced branch...SCOTT JASON
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/167/v-print/story/918502.html
Another bank has announced plans to expand into Merced to help fill the chasm left by the demise of County Bank earlier this year.
Central Valley Community Bank President and CEO Daniel J. Doyle said Wednesday that a full-service branch would open in the Bear Creek Galleria in August. The space used to be occupied by Washington Mutual.
Rabobank N.A. has opened two branches in Merced, and one each in Atwater and Los Banos.
While establishing a Merced branch has been part of Central Valley Community Bank's longterm strategy, the failure of County Bank and its takeover by Westamerica left Doyle believing that this was the best time to expand.
"In reality, there will be some void with the loss of County Bank," he said from Fresno. "We hope to fill some of that."
In mid-2008, County Bank had 38 percent of Merced County's banking market share, representing $676 million in deposits. It was closed in February and its business was transferred to Westamerica.
To boost the transition, Central Valley Community Bank tapped three former County Bank employees to run the branch.
Susan Armstrong will serve as vice president branch manager, Tom Crawley will serve as vice president commercial loan officer and Michael German will serve as assistant vice president/SBA loan officer.
Central Valley Community Bank has $760 million in assets, or loans, and $630 million in deposits. The bank, based in Fresno and traded on NASDAQ, was founded in 1979. The Merced office represents its 16th Valley branch.
Doyle joined the bank in 1998, a time when it was distressed by a loan portfolio that was hammered by a real estate downturn. He's kept the bank from investing too heavily in real estate as a result. Agriculture loans represent about 10 percent of its portfolio. Most lending goes to small businesses.
The bank accepted $7 million in Troubled-Asset Relief Program funding last year for four reasons, he explained.
One is that the market wanted to know what banks were on solid footing. The program was one way the U.S. Treasury Department could show confidence in such institutions.
Second, Central Valley Community Bank just finished its acquisition of Stockton's Service 1st Bancorporation and saw the program as a way to boost its capital.
Third, the country's economic uncertainty led the bank to believe it was wise to have some extra cash on hand.
Fourth, the Federal Desposit Insurance Corp., which regulates the bank, thought the added cash would be good in case Central Valley Community Bank was tapped to take over a troubled bank. So far no attractive opportunities have presented themselves, Doyle said, though the bank is on the FDIC's list of suitors.
A June 19 investment report by Sandler O'Neill + Partners gave the stock a hold recommendation.
"Despite facing some real challenges related to market conditions," the analysts wrote, "we believe the company should survive the cycle and ultimately thrive once the economy stabilizes and starts to recover."
California weighs global warming fee on industry...SAMANTHA YOUNG,Associated Press Writer
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/109/v-print/story/917843.html
SACRAMENTO - Nearly three years after California adopted its landmark global warming law, the state is poised to impose the nation's first statewide carbon fee on utilities, oil refineries and other industries.
The money will go toward funding a regulatory bureaucracy that will oversee the law and ensure the state lowers its greenhouse gas emissions.
The California Air Resources Board on Thursday is expected to vote for the carbon fee, an action that comes as the state is mired in recession and experiencing its highest jobless rate - 11.5 percent - in modern times.
The timing of the air board's action has prompted concerns that the fee will impose yet another burden on California's businesses.
It would be imposed beginning in 2010 and would raise $51.2 million annually during its first three years, an amount that would level off at $36.2 million during the fifth year. The average cement plant would pay about $200,000 a year, while the average oil refinery would pay about $1.3 million a year.
Industry groups say the proposal unfairly singles them out to pay for the law, which has been championed by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
"Whether the economy is good or bad, any time you impose a fee, it goes against the cost of doing business," said Dorothy Rothrock, vice president of government relations at the California Manufacturers & Technology Association. "We're always struggling here to remain competitive."
The air board targeted the fee to industries it considers the starting point for roughly 85 percent of California's greenhouse gas emissions. For example, refineries and utility plants are the first handlers of the fuel and electricity that Californians consume every year.
About 250 businesses in California that make, sell or import gasoline, diesel, natural gas and coal would be charged roughly 12 cents per ton of carbon dioxide that they and their customers emit.
Cement plants also would be subject to the fee because the chemical process to make cement produces greenhouse gases. The charge would drop to 9 cents per ton of carbon dioxide in 2014.
Industry representatives said the air board's approach unfairly holds them accountable not just for their own emissions but also for those generated by the millions Californians who use their products. They would like the fee spread across a broader cross-section of the economy.
Air regulators say they need the fee to carry out the California Global Warming Solutions Act, which seeks to reduce emissions in the state to 1990 levels by 2020. It is intended to cover the salaries of 174 people hired since Schwarzenegger signed the law.
"Consumers won't notice this fee," said Bill Magavern, the California director of the Sierra Club. "From a taxpayer point of view, Californians should be glad that the big polluters rather than the taxpayers will be charged."
Others disagree. Dan Kammen, a professor of energy and public policy at the University of California, Berkeley, said he expects the costs will be passed along to consumers.
The air board staff projected those costs would be minimal if spread throughout the state.
The average restaurant, for example, would see an increase of roughly $14 a year in its electricity and natural gas costs, said Jon Costantino, manager of the climate change section at the air board. The cost to each Californian would amount to between $1 and $1.50 a year.
A few local government entities have adopted similar fees. Last year, air regulators in the San Francisco Bay area imposed a 4.4 cent per-ton carbon fee on businesses that emit greenhouse gasses. In 2006, voters in Boulder, Colo., imposed a carbon tax on their own energy use.
Our View: Disgusted yet? Look at jobless fund
Projections show state's program will be in $18 billion hole by end of 2010.
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/181/v-print/story/918508.html
Californians are right to be disgusted with the way the Legislature and the governor have managed the state's general finances.
But if you really want to get sick, take a look at the unemployment insurance fund.
The latest projections suggest the program that provides aid to the jobless might be $18 billion in the hole by the end of 2010.
Despite this looming debacle, California's million-plus unemployed needn't worry, for the moment.
The red ink is automatically covered by loans from the federal government. But if the state does not balance the books and begin repaying those loans by 2011, the feds will start charging interest -- to the tune of more than $600 million a year.
Given California's unemployment rate of 11 percent, the fund would be in trouble even if it had been managed well. But it is far worse off because it was run into the ground before the economy tanked.
The trouble began in 2002 when then-Gov. Gray Davis, running for re-election, agreed to a labor-backed proposal to nearly double unemployment benefits. They rose from a maximum of $230 a week to the current maximum, $450 a week.
The Democrats who control the Legislature were able to increase benefits on a majority vote. But an increase in the tax that employers pay to finance the benefits would have taken a two-thirds vote, and with Republicans opposed, that never happened.
The Democrats and their allies in organized labor argued at the time that California paid some of the lowest benefits in the nation.
But they also downplayed the fact that the state had some of the loosest eligibility rules, so more people were able to take advantage of the benefits.
And they ignored warnings from the business community that increasing the payouts would eventually bankrupt the fund. And that is exactly what happened.
The same practices helped lead to the massive deficit in the state's general fund. Democrats want to provide more generous services. Republicans won't agree to pay for those programs. So the Democrats expand them anyway and hope for the best.
What happened next is also part of a pattern.
Seeing a storm brewing, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last year proposed cutting benefits to the jobless while increasing taxes on employers, a compromise designed to return the fund to solvency.
But Democrats, naturally, balked at benefit cuts and Republicans opposed the taxes.
Nothing was done. The problem grew worse.
Over the next two years, the state expects to pay $29 billion in unemployment benefits while collecting just $11 billion.
That's unsustainable. Something must give.
But no one in the Capitol, except perhaps Schwarze-negger, has the guts to confront the problem. So it festers.
Eventually, once the federal aid runs dry, the problem will explode into a crisis.
Then, maybe, legislators will begin paying attention.
Modesto Bee
Study: Job losses to top 1M...Jim Wasserman
http://www.modbee.com/business/v-print/story/757842.html
SACRAMENTO — California, which has lost 800,000 jobs in this recession, will lose 200,000 more before it ends late this year, University of the Pacific forecasters said Wednesday in Stockton.
The university's Business Forecasting Center predicted California unemployment will peak at 12.3 percent in early 2010 and remain in double digits through the end of 2011.
Officials singled out the Central Valley for an especially hard knock from tax hikes and massive expected state and local government budget cuts.
"The state budget crisis is a dangerous aftershock to a region still reeling from the foreclosure earthquake," said forecasting center director Jeff Michael.
He said job numbers will return to pre-recession levels in mid-2012 in the Bay Area. It will take longer elsewhere, with Sacramento reaching pre-recession employment in late 2013, he said.
Statewide unemployment stood at a modern record of 11.5 percent in May, the state Employment Development Department reported. The jobless rate was 16.3 percent in Stanislaus County.
Other highlights of the forecast:
• Housing starts statewide will hit bottom this year at 36,000 residential units. They'll rise past 100,000 units in 2011 and exceed 150,000 units by 2013. The most recent high was 212,960 in 2004, according to the California Building Industry Association.
• New car and truck sales will fall to nearly 1 million this year, down from 2 million per year for most of the past decade. Sales will reach 1.5 million in 2010 and 1.7 million in 2011.
• Retail sales will take until 2011 to return to 2007 levels.
• Health care is the only economic sector that will not contract this year.
New jobless claims rise unexpectedly to 627K...CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER, AP Economics Writer
http://www.modbee.com/business/v-print/story/758284.html
WASHINGTON -- The number of people filing new jobless claims jumped unexpectedly last week, and the total unemployment benefit rolls rose to more than 6.7 million.
The Labor Department data released Thursday show jobs remain scarce even as the economy shows some signs of recovering from the longest recession since World War II.
The department said initial claims for jobless benefits rose last week by 15,000 to a seasonally adjusted 627,000. Economists expected a drop to 600,000, according to Thomson Reuters.
Several states reported more claims than expected from teachers, cafeteria workers and other school employees, a department analyst said.
The number of people continuing to receive unemployment insurance rose by 29,000 to 6.74 million, slightly above analysts' estimates of 6.7 million.
The four-week average of claims, which smooths out fluctuations, was largely unchanged, at 616,750.
Economists expect the number of initial unemployment insurance claims, which reflects the level of layoffs, to slowly decline over the coming months as the economy bottoms out.
Still, claims remain far above levels associated with a healthy economy. A year ago they were 392,000.
Economists say any recovery is likely to be weak, and the unemployment rate, currently at 9.4 percent, is expected to top 10 percent by the end of this year.
Millions of Americans also are receiving jobless benefits through a federal extension enacted by Congress last year. For the week ending June 6, more than 2.4 million people received benefits under the extension, which adds 20 to 33 weeks on top of the 26 weeks typically provided by states.
About 288,000 people also are receiving benefits under state emergency programs, bringing the total jobless benefit rolls to nearly 8.8 million that week. The extended benefits data lags initial claims by two weeks.
Other recent reports indicate the economy could be bottoming. The Commerce Department said Wednesday that orders to factories for durable goods such as computers, machinery and aircraft increased 1.8 percent in May, much better than analysts expected.
But sales of new homes fell 0.6 percent last month, the government said, as the housing sector remains weak. Analysts had expected an increase in sales.
The Federal Reserve said Wednesday that the recession is easing, though the economy will remain weak enough to keep inflation in check. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has said the economy will begin to recover by the end of this year.
Companies have cut a net total of 6 million jobs since the downturn began in an effort to reduce costs.
Still, job cuts are slowing. Employers eliminated 345,000 positions in May, about half the monthly average of jobs lost in the first quarter.
Troubles in the automotive sector also may cause unexpected fluctuations in the claims. General Motors Corp. filed for bankruptcy protection June 1, joining Chrysler LLC, which filed April 30.
Companies are still shedding jobs. Monsanto Co., the world's biggest seed maker, said Wednesday that it will lay off about 900 workers, or about 4 percent of its work force, as its third-quarter profit fell 14 percent.
Among the states, Florida had the largest increase in claims of 8,383, which it attributed to greater layoffs in the construction, trade, service, manufacturing and agriculture industries. The next largest increases were in Pennsylvania, Missouri, Puerto Rico and California. The state data lag initial claims by a week.
Michigan had the largest drop in claims of 5,414, which it attributed to fewer layoffs in the auto industry. The next largest decreases were in New York, North Carolina, Tennessee and Ohio.
Fresno Bee
Bay Area water hypocrisy exposed...Bill McEwen
http://www.fresnobee.com/columnists/mcewen/v-print/story/1495408.html
One of these days, a water-starved farmer will walk into federal court and demand that O'Shaughnessy Dam come down, finally restoring glacial Hetch Hetchy Valley to its natural grandeur and releasing a natural flow into the Tuolumne River.
Such a lawsuit wouldn't get the farmer more water. But it would expose the hypocrisy of Bay Area environmentalists who depict San Joaquin Valley residents as ignorant hillbillies making a mess of the desert and the Delta with their irrigated farms.
Hetch Hetchy -- the twin to Yosemite Valley -- should have been restored decades ago, say many environmental groups, including the Sierra Club.
But the only way the dam falls is if a federal judge orders it. And no environmental group will sue. Why?
They say it's better handled with cooperation and education. My explanation is simpler: it's because the dam holds some of the best drinking water on earth -- granite-filtered water reserved mostly for the allegedly environmentally conscious folks of San Francisco and other Bay Area cities.
Amazing, isn't it?
Environmentalists sue to restore the Owens River and Mono Lake. Environmentalists sue to restore the San Joaquin River and bring back its salmon run.
But they won't unleash their lawyers on Hetch Hetchy, one of the world's great wonders, or demand that San Francisco surrender its drinking water so that the Tuolumne River can teem with salmon again.
Can I prove that environmental groups are picking other battles to avoid a backlash among their Bay Area supporters? No. But it sure looks that way.
Here in the Valley, east-side farmers are giving up, on average, 170,000 acre-feet of water each year for the reintroduction of salmon into the San Joaquin.
Shouldn't Bay Area residents forfeit a similar amount -- about half of Hetch Hetchy's storage capacity -- to recharge the Tuolumne, the San Joaquin and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta with cold Yosemite water?
Shouldn't we enjoy Hetch Hetchy Valley, as it was before powerful San Francisco interests stole Tuolumne water rights -- and broke John Muir's heart -- in the early 1900s?
San Franciscans beg to differ. They claim that the dam has created a beautiful lake and Hetch Hetchy Valley was overrated -- its spectacular vistas mere figments of Muir's imagination. Two of the loudest opponents against restoring Hetch Hetchy are Sen. Dianne Feinstein and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Three years of drought and the dramatic degradation of the Delta are hog-tying west-side farmers. They are trying to survive with a fraction of their usual water deliveries.
What are San Franciscans giving up? Not their precious Hetch Hetchy tap water.
Let's give the San Francisco greenies a dose of aggressive environmentalism. Let's sue to restore Hetch Hetchy.
Sacramento Bee
UC campus chiefs escape budget pain...Diana Lambert
http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/1975302.html
The budget-tightening under way at the University of California has not trickled up to salary and benefits packages for the system's top executives.
Linda Katehi, the incoming chancellor at UC Davis, is getting a $100,000 relocation allowance, as well as reimbursement for the cost of moving. If she decides to step down to a faculty position later, Katehi will earn another relocation allowance. And, if she wants to buy a house to rent or live in later, she's eligible for a low-interest mortgage.
The 10 UC chancellors earn between $295,000 and $450,000. Katehi will earn $400,000, 27 percent more than her predecessor. Chancellors also get free housing, a $9,000 annual car allowance, paid club dues, life and disability benefits, travel reimbursement and lifetime health benefits. They are offered tenured professorships when they step down.
The salaries and perks continue despite cuts to freshman enrollment next year, fee increases at some professional schools of as much as 50 percent and student fee hikes of nearly 17 percent over two years
"Most people will agree that large packages of perks and substantial salary increases are sending the wrong message to the people of California," said Joe Kiskus, vice president of external relations for the Council of UC Faculty Associations.
He said the salary increases aren't substantial in comparison to the university's budget deficit, but state legislators – and the public – have been unhappy about UC executive salaries for some time.
Salaries and incentives are necessary to attract high-caliber individuals to the universities, said Peter King, University of California spokesman.
"You don't want to put the lowest bidder at the helm of one of the crown jewels of California," King said.
The quality of UC campuses compares to Ivy League schools – six are among the top 60 universities in the nation, he said. But compensation in the UC system is comparatively low, according to King.
"The question should be 'How does Cal manage to keep attracting these people?' " King said.
Noteworthy among the system's recent chancellor hires is Susan Desmond-Hellmann at UC San Francisco. She left a job at Genentech that paid a $725,000 salary and $1.3 million in incentive compensation. Her salary at UCSF is $450,00, the highest in the system.
"The $450,000 base salary for this position is still substantially below the going rate for leaders of academic medical centers in the United States," said a statement UC released when the hire was announced in May.
UC officials said they look at 26 universities when making salary comparisons for chancellor positions. They include private universities such as Johns Hopkins, Yale and the University of Chicago, as well as public institutions such as University of Illinois at Urbana, University of Colorado and University of Texas.
University policy requires that chancellor salaries stay within the mean of this group, said UC spokeswoman Leslie Sepuka.
The policy, however, allows this amount to vary depending on the "scope, size, complexity and quality of each campus" as well as the "performance and experience of the incumbent," according to a 2004 report by the California Postsecondary Education Commission.
President or chancellor salaries at 184 public universities averaged $368,411 in 2008, with an average total compensation, including benefits, of $460,383, according to a salary survey by the Chronicle of Higher Education.
Many of the universities in this survey pay their presidents with a combination of private and public funds. UC chancellor salaries come from the university's general fund, which includes money from the state general fund, student fees and nonresident tuition revenue, King said.
Chancellors and other senior managers can negotiate additional recruitment incentives such as hiring bonuses. No current UC chancellors have been given this bonus, Sepuka said.
Chancellors, senior managers and members of the Academic Senate are eligible for reduced-interest mortgages for recruitment or job-retention purposes.
The same positions, along with cooperative extension specialists, are eligible for a program that helps find employment for spouses of new hires, although jobs aren't guaranteed.
Katehi's husband, Spyros Tseregounis, holds an adjunct faculty position at the University of Illinois. He will be considered for a similar appointment at Davis.
The couple will live in a 7,000-square-foot house at 16 College Park, near the campus border. There Katehi will host fundraisers, dignitary dinners and recognition events.
These fundraisers may become more important as state funding is slashed and the university relies more heavily on donations and student fees.
University officials increased tuition 7.4 percent in the 2008-09 school year and 9.3 percent for the 2009-10 school year.
After Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed cutting $800 million in state funding from the university system, UC President Mark Yudoff sent a letter to the joint legislative budget conference committee on May 29 saying UC may consider increasing the fee hike to as much as 25 percent.
There has been no written proposal for additional fee increases at this time, Sepuka said. "It's still a possibility, but we're looking at other options first."
In his letter, Yudoff said the university has reduced its work force by 30 percent and more layoffs, furloughs and salary reductions are being considered.
UC Chancellor Pay...Source: University of California
http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/1975302-a1975178-t46.html
Stockton Record
Pacific forecast sees distant recovery
S.J. job losses projected to last into 2010...Reed Fujii
http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090625/A_BIZ/906250321
STOCKTON - Two years of recession will cost California more than 1 million jobs before the bleeding stops sometime near the end of the year, the University of the Pacific's Business Forecasting Center said Wednesday.
That prediction and others are similar to the outlook painted in the center's last quarterly report, as the state remains on the same general economic trajectory, only now seen as slightly weaker, forecast director Jeff Michael said.
Recent reports of job losses greater than expected led to the more negative outlook.
"We're still on track to bottom out this fall," Michael said.
The state's unemployment rate, now at 11.5 percent, should peak at 12.3 percent early next year.
But beyond that, it will take at least three years before the state's economy fully recovers.
"This is a deep, deep hole," Michael said. "We have a lot of ground to recover."
In San Joaquin County, severely affected by the housing and construction downturn, job losses are expected to continue into 2010 until its recovery begins in the third quarter. At that point, employment opportunities are expected to appear in education and health services; leisure and hospitality; trade, transportation and utilities; and financial activities.
In the California & Metro Forecast released Wednesday, Michael considers at some length whether the San Joaquin Valley qualifies as an economic disaster area, a designation being sought by some political leaders in order to qualify for federal aid.
"I've mixed feelings about it," he said.
While there could be some benefits, such as short-term aid and increased awareness of a region's challenges, in the long run, such a label could be misleading or discourage investment.
"Undoubtedly, the San Joaquin Valley is a housing disaster area with the nation's highest foreclosure rates and largest declines in real estate values," the forecast says. The Valley also has some of the nation's highest unemployment and poverty rates.
But the challenges facing the Valley are different than those seen in other economically distressed areas and, in many cases, the opportunities are greater.
The San Joaquin Valley is not Appalachia, which has seen no growth in decades and has a stagnant, aging population. And while the foreclosure crisis has caused widespread family dislocation and hardship, it is unlike the natural disaster Hurricane Katrina brought to New Orleans in rendering entire neighborhoods uninhabitable.
Unlike Detroit - which is in the midst of the permanent, wrenching loss of its high-paying auto industry - the Valley's downturn is largely cyclical.
"The biggest driver on unemployment in the region has been construction," Michael said. "This is the biggest cyclical downturn that we've seen in a cyclical industry, but it will come back."
While today's reality may indeed be an economic disaster, the forecast also says the Valley is an area of opportunity "with enormous potential for positive growth."
"The California location, young work force, growing cultural amenities and business services, and relatively low cost of living create opportunities for entrepreneurship and investment," the report says.
San Francisco Chronicle
State sues Pleasanton over housing limit...Bob Egelko
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/06/25/BAA618DBHK.DTL&type=printable
State Attorney General Jerry Brown joined a legal challenge Wednesday to Pleasanton's 13-year-old limit on housing construction, arguing that the East Bay community is defying state housing laws and adding to urban sprawl, vehicle use and greenhouse gas emissions.
"Pleasanton's draconian and illegal limit on new housing forces people to commute long distances, adding to the bumper-to-bumper traffic along (Interstates) 580 and 680 and increasing dangerous air pollution," Brown said in a statement after filing suit in Alameda County Superior Court.
He said Pleasanton's housing shortage will worsen if the city adopts a revised general plan that calls for more office construction and the creation of 45,000 jobs by 2025 without allowing any additional housing to accommodate the employees. The City Council is scheduled to consider the plan July 21.
The suit is the second to seek repeal of a ballot measure Pleasanton voters approved in 1996 that allowed no more than 29,000 housing units in the city, which already had 21,180 homes, apartment units and condominiums and now has 27,000. The nonprofit Urban Habitat Program and a schoolteacher seeking affordable housing filed the first suit in October 2006 and persuaded an appeals court last year to reject the city's claim that they should have sued a decade earlier.
Both suits contend the city of 66,000 people is violating state laws that require communities to take on their share of regional housing needs. Environmentalists and advocates for the poor have lined up against city governments in the litigation.
"Our concern is that in Pleasanton and other suburban communities, workers and their families are being excluded from opportunities there because they are blocking the construction of affordable housing," said attorney Richard Marcantonio of Public Advocates, the San Francisco firm representing the 2006 plaintiffs.
Brown voiced other concerns, saying the city is forcing other communities to sacrifice farmland and open space to house people working in Pleasanton. Their long-distance commutes, in turn, add to emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants, Brown said.
City Attorney Michael Roush said Pleasanton officials believe the housing limit is "a valid exercise of our land-use authority."
Under state law, each city's minimum share of housing needs is determined by state officials and regional agencies such as the Association of Bay Area Governments.
Brown's suit said the 29,000-unit limit will leave Pleasanton 1,270 housing units short of the minimum that state and regional agencies have determined the city will need through 2014. Even if the limit were repealed, the suit said, a separate city ordinance would prevent Pleasanton from issuing enough building permits to accommodate the housing requirements.
By maintaining its housing limit while encouraging commercial development in its revised general plan, Brown's suit said, "the city will worsen the current jobs/housing imbalance and the negative environmental impacts that come with that imbalance."
New York Times
From the Ashes of ’69, a River Reborn ...CHRISTOPHER MAAG...6-21-09
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/21/us/21river.html?sq=clean water act&st=cse&scp=5&pagewanted=print
CLEVELAND — The first time Gene Roberts fell into the Cuyahoga River, he worried he might die. The year was 1963, and the river was still an open sewer for industrial waste. Walking home, Mr. Roberts smelled so bad that his friends ran to stay upwind of him.
Recently, Mr. Roberts returned to the river carrying his fly-fishing rod. In 20 minutes, he caught six smallmouth bass. “It’s a miracle,” said Mr. Roberts, 58. “The river has come back to life.”
Monday is the 40th anniversary of the Cuyahoga River fire of 1969, when oil-soaked debris floating on the river’s surface was ignited, most likely by sparks from a passing train.
The fire was extinguished in 30 minutes and caused just $50,000 in damage. But it became a galvanizing symbol for the environmental movement, one of a handful of disasters that led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and to the passage of the Clean Water Act.
“The Cuyahoga River fire was a spark plug for environmental reforms around the country,” said Cameron Davis, who was recently appointed to become the special adviser to the E.P.A. on Great Lakes environmental issues.
The fire turned Cleveland into “The Mistake by the Lake,” a national punch line that would endure for decades. Meanwhile, the city worked to reclaim its river.
Today, the Cuyahoga is home to more than 60 species of fish, said Jim White, executive director of the Cuyahoga River Community Planning Organization, a nonprofit group that coordinates cleanup efforts. Beavers, blue herons and bald eagles nest along the river’s banks. Long sections of the Cuyahoga are clean enough that they no longer require aggressive monitoring, regulators said.
“We’re very impressed with the progress made in the Cuyahoga,” said John Perrecone, a manager of Great Lakes programs for the E.P.A.
Other rivers in industrial cities have experienced similar rebirths, said Matthew Doss, policy director for the Great Lakes Commission, which oversees development and environmental efforts in the region for the United States and Canada.
“The Cuyahoga’s progress is notable because of how infamous it was,” Mr. Doss said. “This 40th anniversary gives us an opportunity to celebrate the progress we’ve made nationwide.”
The 1969 fire was tiny compared with those that engulfed the Cuyahoga and other rivers that received large amounts of industrial pollutants from the 1800s through the 1950s. One reason it received national attention, including a prominent article in Time magazine, was that the problem of rivers catching fire was mostly solved by then, said Jonathan Adler, an environmental law professor at Case Western Reserve University.
The outrage caused by the fire was a symptom of a society starting to leave its industrial identity behind, Professor Adler said.
“In the 1930s, when most people in Cleveland worked in factories, a fire on the river was considered just a nuisance,” he said. “By the ’60s, there was a hunger for symbols of humans’ insensitivity to the environment.”
The cleanup of the river advanced on many fronts. A year before the fire, Cleveland residents voted to tax themselves an additional $100 million for river restoration. Since then, local industries and the Northwest Ohio Regional Sewer District have spent $3.5 billion to reduce sewage and industrial waste pollution, Mr. White said.
The sewer district built miles of subway-tunnel-size tubes beneath the city. The tubes hold excess rainwater until it can be processed by treatment plants, reducing the number of times that plants become overwhelmed and spew sewage into the river.
In the next 30 years, Cleveland-area residents will spend about $5 billion more on the wastewater system, said Julius Ciaccia Jr., sewer district director.
“This didn’t happen because a bunch of wild-haired hippies protested down the street,” Mr. Perrecone said. “This happened because a lot of citizens up and down the watershed worked hard for 40 years to improve the river.”
Local governments removed dams, which trapped pollution and impeded fish migration. In 1974, President Gerald R. Ford created the Cuyahoga Valley National Recreation Area, which became a national park in 2000. The park saved miles of the river from suburban development.
Problems remain, however. The E.P.A. sued the City of Akron in February for dumping excessive amounts of sewage into the Cuyahoga. Along the last 5 of its 100 miles, the river is enclosed by steel walls and dredged regularly for commercial ships, making it difficult for habitats to recover.
“The good news is that we know what the problems are, and we know what the solutions are,” Mr. Davis said. “Now it’s a matter of getting the funding, rolling up our sleeves and doing the work.”
On Monday, people who have worked for years to clean the Cuyahoga will celebrate at its banks. “It’s just remarkable,” said Steve Tuckerman, the Cuyahoga River specialist for the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. “I never thought I would see in my lifetime, let alone in my career, such an amazing comeback of a river.”
One More Threat to Clean Water…Editorial
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/25/opinion/25thu2.html?_r=1&sq=mining&st=cse&scp=7&pagewanted=print
Thanks to the Bush administration’s industry-friendly rulings and a Supreme Court determined to ignore the plain language of the Clean Water Act, America’s waterways are at risk of becoming industrial dumps.
The latest indignity was a 6-to-3 decision on Monday that will allow an American gold mining company to discharge 210,000 gallons a day of potentially toxic mining waste into a 23-acre lake near Juneau, Alaska. A joyous Sarah Palin, Alaska’s governor, called the ruling a “great victory” for Alaska and, astonishingly, “a green light for responsible resource development.”
What it is, rather, is a green light for the extinction of every fish in the lake. The mining company says it will pretreat the waste and restore the lake’s vegetation down the road, but we’re not betting on it.
The decision was based in part on a 2002 Bush rule that cleared the way for the dumping of mining waste in previously protected waters. Until that rule, the Clean Water Act had stipulated that the Army Corps of Engineers could place “fill material” in waters when it was building bridges and levees. The Bush administration enlarged the definition of fill material to include contaminated mining waste, in clear violation of the law’s intent. This is the same regulatory trick the corps relies on to allow coal mining companies in Appalachia to dump the waste from mountaintop mining into the valleys below — a practice that has obliterated 1,200 miles of streams.
Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy argued that the court had little choice but to “accord deference” to the corps’ reading of the law. To which Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg replied, in effect, what about paying deference to the Clean Water Act?
The act, she rightly argued, states plainly that waterways cannot be used for waste disposal. The court’s job, she suggested, is not to take refuge in ambiguities but to reaffirm the clear purpose of the law.
Fortunately, the ruling does not have to be the last word. The Obama administration can save that Alaskan lake — and other threatened water bodies — simply by reversing the Bush “fill” rule. Congress could also step in; a House bill that would reverse the rule already has 151 co-sponsors. Before any more damage is done, a way must be found to protect America’s vulnerable waters.
 
6-25-09
Meetings
MCAG...July Calendar
http://www.mcagov.org/
July 02 - Technical Planning Committee Meeting
              http://www.mcagov.org/tpc.html
July 08 - Technical Review Board Meeting
July 10 - Citizens Advisory Committee Meeting
July 16 - Governing Board Meeting