I’ve been thinking about pools this sunny California March. One reason is that I’ve decided to plunk myself back in the chlorinated waters of the slow lane at master’s swim. But the bigger reason is that I’ve been reading Heather McGhee’s The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and Read more
Healthy urban areas are important national assets. As Farhad Manjoo notes in The New York Times, “… neither the United States nor the world can do without cities. They are indispensable as engines of economic growth, catalysts of technological and cultural innovation — and they are one of the most Read more
In December the California Department of Finance announced in this press release that the state grew more slowly in percentage terms than at any time since 1900. Yes, that’s 1900, not 1990. The July to July growth rate was 0.05 percent, down from 0.23 percent the previous year, also a Read more
“Regardless of the possible errors in this study, we have to conclude that prehistorically a large amount of California burned every year. From 1950-1999 the average annual area burned by wildfire in all vegetation types in California was approximately 102,000 ha/year. This amounts to 5.6 percent of what would have Read more
I am starting to see the signs. They are sprouting in my neighborhood against something called Measure A, which is designed to strengthen the role of the mayor in local government here in Sacramento. One of the signs is in the yard of my councilman, a hardworking public servant with Read more
The photograph above is of the protest I went to with my two teenage boys in late May. I’ve only been to the one protest so far, but like many, I’ve been doing some quiet thinking about the movement for racial justice now coursing through American society. To a large Read more
Paid sick leave was one of the very first policy issues to surface here in the US when in February it became clear to the public at large that we were facing a pandemic. This was right about the time when I decided to make a new beginning on prospericity, Read more
Sacramento’s downtown has the distinction, from the photographic if not the economic standpoint, of having quiet spaces to its immediate north and west. The former Southern Pacific railyard site to the north receives a lot of attention in the media, but the best view, and probably the greatest economic potential, Read more