I wrote my very first Letter to the Editor to the Pacifica Tribune in the spring or summer of 1982, not long before leaving for college. It makes me wince now, but I came across it in my old files recently, and decided to share it – documenting my early involvement with controlled growth issues – before we lost. I probably wasn’t much help.
In fact, my mother was initially angry at me for writing it. She had been very involved at the City Council meetings and told me that it “undermined” her because everyone would assume it was written by her husband and not her son. I was actually basking in the sight of my name in print so I didn’t argue with her, but my brother did.
Later she was complaining about it with some friends and they rolled their eyes at her, with one of them saying,”Gee Ethel. Most parents just have to worry about drug use, teen pregnancy, or dropping out of school. But your son, he writes political letters. Boy do we feel sorry for you!” When she got home she told me it was a good letter. Kind of like every picture your five year old draws is a good picture.
The letter was written in response, as you can probably guess, to another letter calling the Friends of Pacifica socialists. I’ve tried to be a little less patronizing ever since, but I doubt I’m always successful. At least I didn’t quote Erich Fromme or Milovan Djilas, which I was reading at the time and thought I had unlocked the secrets of the universe.
I’m pretty sure the council folk knew I was a kid. But the subdivision was built anyway. I hope I didn’t screw it up for the Friends.
Actually, I’ve come across college papers which make me wince even more. Like this letter, they were all typed on an ancient manual typewriter which had been used by my mother in college in the 1960s, complete with the circular eraser and brush, and the apostrophe above the number 8. Memories.
You can click on it to enlarge.
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June 7, 2012 at 4:22 pm
Matt
I rather liked the letter, especially paragraph 5.
June 7, 2012 at 4:25 pm
Eric Kirk
Actually, the portion that makes me wince the most is the last three sentences. They read like some anonymous posts around here.
June 7, 2012 at 6:52 pm
Anonymous
Definitely reads like a young Eric Kirk!
June 7, 2012 at 7:07 pm
anon
that reminds me of my first letter to the editor of our local paper, in 1969 when i was 15–i was protesting the moonshot as a waste of money…
what a spoilsport i was…
June 7, 2012 at 10:04 pm
Anonymous
I actually think your Mom should be quite proud. Involvement in bettering our society in any form is among the greatest gifts children can give their parents. It is the manifestation of the compassion that we show to others as viewed by the little people. Of course most of us outgrow the socialist thing. Still I have no doubt your Mom is smiling.
June 7, 2012 at 10:23 pm
Anonymous
i haven’t thought about Fromme in years. “Beyond the Chains of Illusion” was my first experience with a deeper understanding of the interaction of communities. I remember reading paragraphs with my first “real” girlfriend and arguing the inner meaning. Course this was about the time we were getting stoned, listening to Dylan, and trying to find prophecies for the future in Paul Klee paintings. We did and they weren’t. Thank goodness for the blindness of youth, without it we’d never get anywhere.
June 8, 2012 at 12:39 am
skippy
It’s a toss-up which sentence I liked better: Fear often creates a backlash against those who try to expose it, or the last one, Don’t succumb to the close-minded fanatacism that arises from ignorance.
The title of the letter, however, was an amusing play by a classic copy writer, no doubt.
June 8, 2012 at 4:39 am
Stephen
Classic case of a man who is socialist in his youth and then turns Progressively conservative as he ages.
June 8, 2012 at 5:33 am
Fred Mangels
That’s neat you still have it. I think mine might be gone forever.
My first one was to the Times- Standard in response to criticism of the pepper spray incident at Frank Riggs’ Eureka office. It wasn’t long after I’d gotten my first computer.
The limit was 300 words back then. Mine finished out at 297 and was one of the first of many to be published on the issue. I’m sure I could gut that letter to 250 or less now. I’m also sure I’d cringe if I had a chance to read that letter again.
June 8, 2012 at 10:00 am
Mitch
“Don’t succumb to the closed minded fanaticism that arises from ignorance.”
I like it. Really. Of course, I don’t like this version nearly as much: “Don’t succumb to the closed-minded fanaticism that arises from ignorance, Mitch.”
June 9, 2012 at 6:45 pm
Citizen
“What are the possible consequences of reckless growth?”
Still very timely, especially today in Southern Humboldt, where reckless growth is being touted as anything but what it is. And environmental assessment? Just an impediment to be got around.
It’s all about water, and who gets it for development.
June 10, 2012 at 3:13 am
j67k
An example of someone who is idealistic in his youth & reads actual definitions to words. But, then makes the classic mistake of assuming that other people will care that their statements are based on ignorance.
A lot of people seem to feel that if enough people agree with, or at least accept, their statement that makes it valid. It doesn’t. All it does is make them comfortable with it, blissful even…
It reminds me of that joke – “I want to die peacefully, in my sleep, like my grampa… Not screaming and blubbering like the 3 passengers in his car.”
I wish I could be peacefully serene and ignorant as we careen toward extinction. Why, oh why, didn’t I take the BLUE pill?
June 10, 2012 at 8:49 am
Anonymous
Not many motorcylces’ in Shelter Cove this week end. Quiet. Nice for most of us, not so nice for others.
June 10, 2012 at 12:51 pm
Unk John
Blue was never your color, j67k.
June 10, 2012 at 3:28 pm
Eric Kirk
That’s neat you still have it. I think mine might be gone forever.
I found it crumpled up in a corner of a drawer in my desk. I have no idea how it even got there.
“What are the possible consequences of reckless growth?”
Still very timely, especially today in Southern Humboldt, where reckless growth is being touted as anything but what it is. And environmental assessment? Just an impediment to be got around.
It’s all about water, and who gets it for development.
This was about a large tract put onto a hill at the north end of Linda Mar, with the developer making public promises about paying to pump water up for gravity flow and reneging. And it was about constant pressure as the price of property in the Bay Area increased hugely in just a few years, such that what had been a beautiful coastal city became nicknamed, “Pathetica, where the debris meets the sea.” We haven’t seen anything on a comparable scale in Humboldt County yet, but then we hadn’t seen it in Pacifica up until that moment either. Nor Marin County where the Planning Department allowed Costco to be built on land which is sinking into the water – they’ll probably have to shop in gondolas at some point.
We haven’t seen reckless growth for a couple of decades in Sohum. Hopefully the creation of large subdivisions is over until the science is finished, but just as in Pacifica we had to offer coastal homes because so many people wanted to live near the ocean, we are accused of denying peoples dreams because maybe even more people will want to live that lifestyle. Perhaps. But I suspect that once marijuana is no longer the cash crop it is even currently, the demand will diminish considerably and existing parcels will be more than enough to meet it. But most parcels have their own water sources, more than adequate for household use. It’s not about water. It’s about subdivision.
I like it. Really. Of course, I don’t like this version nearly as much: “Don’t succumb to the closed-minded fanaticism that arises from ignorance, Mitch.”
Some of the anti-FOP’s didn’t like it either. My friend’s father said that I was “full of it.” And I was. But that was besides the point.
June 10, 2012 at 3:54 pm
Sister/Daughter
Well, actually it IS about water. This is California, you know.
GSD is trying to annex at least a thousand acres into their water district which will then be easily subdividable under the GPU as urban growth areas. Urban growth areas – get it? If a thousand acres doesn’t signify reckless growth, what does?
The services districts are designated as urban growth areas in the General Plan Update.GSD pretends the GPU doesn’t exist and claims that there will be absolutely NO environmental impacts from their proposed expansion projects and annexations.
There are many factors at work here, carpetbaggers coming to cash in on marijuana is one, but urban sprawl is in the works, all without acknowledging the environment, the river, wildlife habitat, and the quality of life for all beings.
June 10, 2012 at 5:37 pm
Sally
I wrote my first letter to the editor in 1980, to the LA Times, in response to a book review for Tom Robbins’ “Still Life With Woodpecker”. I titled it: “Even Cowgirls Read Reviews”, and they did print it, but I forget if they changed the header. I had already read the book, but the reviewer included so many spoilers in his review, I had to protest. I mean, what fun is it reading a Tom Robbins book, if some critic exposed the entire plot in a few column inches, calling it a review?
My 2nd letter to the editor was in the 1990′s, in response to something printed in the Eureka Times-Standard, about the “detrimental effect” of the “growing Latino population” in Humboldt. The writer painted the entire Latino community as lazy, on welfare, adding to crime, etc. ad nauseum. My letter rebutted that assessment, and recounted my own years of experience with Latino friends and neighbors as having taught me how hard working, family-oriented and self sufficient they are. That letter was printed, too. At the time, I had an unlisted phone number, but a Latino man living in Eureka found my sister in the phone book (same last name) and called looking for me, to thank me for writing the letter. I didn’t save a “clipping” from either newspaper, so I have no idea what words I actually used in those letters. No doubt, I would wince at some of the language used in both letters, and be a bit embarrassed by my youthful exuberance
But on both occasions, I was writing from the heart (albeit an immature one!) so I have no regrets!
June 10, 2012 at 5:52 pm
Eric Kirk
Sister/Daughter – well, that’s fine actually. If we’re going to have further development, it ought to be within existing service realms. That’s actually consistent with smart growth concepts. But I don’t really expect much more development until demand is back up, and that could be years away. I’m more concerned about the spread out into open spaces.
Sally – Thanks for that story. Cool!
June 10, 2012 at 7:46 pm
Sister/Daughter
You are fine with annexing a THOUSAND ACRES or more into the services district without an EIR? Into the urban growth area?
It is not being covered in the GPU DEIR, because it’s only “in the works,” and it’s not being addressed in a GSD EIR because they do not acknowledge the GPU.
Smart growth has more to do with working and living in the areas where there is public transportation. Chautauqua’s new building is a good example of mixed use within an urban area. If Garberville went up instead of out into a thousand acres of agricultural and rural land, that would be smart growth.
What you are advocating here is reckless growth.
June 10, 2012 at 7:51 pm
Eric Kirk
Actually, I am fine with that. I don’t think an EIR should be required until an actual proposal for construction is submitted, and that’s a long way off. But why eliminate options for development now? Requiring an EIR for every stage is overkill, and is one of those unnecessary regulations which hamper economic growth without much of a trade-off.
Smart growth has to do with much more than public transportation, though it’s certainly a component. And if the growth is focused around Garberville, residents will be within walking distance of public transportation. But the fact is, I don’t think that’s a candidate for growth here, not until there’s an economic base other than marijuana.
June 10, 2012 at 8:34 pm
Sister/Daughter
Why eliminate options for the developers by considering cumulative environmental impacts?Piecemeal it all to hell?
I tell you the river can’t take it.
My good man, your conscience has left you unattended
June 10, 2012 at 8:44 pm
Anonymous
You truly disappoint eric. Annexing that 1000 acres into the GSD should not be allowed.
Oh duh, the park. Should not be allowed.
June 11, 2012 at 7:56 am
Eric Kirk
S/D – the point is that you don’t know precisely what the environmental impacts are until you have a specific proposal. The annexation itself doesn’t cause any environmental damage whatsoever. It simply leaves open the option of development, which may or may not have significant impact, depending on the specifics.
My politics have always been a combination of red and green. The problem with the environmental movement has always been its classism – it’s rigidity without concern for the impact on the economy which they might be able to weather, but for which the burden is most heavily weighed on those at the bottom – the lower 30 percent who depend on jobs to feed their children and keep a roof over their heads. So to eliminate all possibility of development because at some undetermined future someone might propose a development with excessive impact – that to me is raw elitism and is why the environmental movement is facing severe backlash over the past twenty years. Yes, it’s the park. But it’s also the other parcels.
My communist grandfather once said, “ecology is a bourgois science,” which pretty much reflected the sentiments of the socialist movement until Love Canal. And to the degree that I remain a socialist, I believe that environmental laws should be reformed to factor in economic impact as well as environmental impact, the difference of which is sometimes superficial anyway. When the killing of baby harp seals for their pelts was banned, the hunters switch to the otters of the area, which nearly became extinct.
People need housing, especially as California’s population continues to grow. The question is where to do it. And development within the range of existing services is, by definition, “smart growth.”
June 11, 2012 at 7:57 am
Anonymous
Listening to MMM this morning. Tom Grover is arrogant and conceded. Everything is “I did this, I, I, I, me, me, me,” Tom Grover, imo, is tra. His letter to the editor in this most recent of newspapers he called an article. The same as when he called Peter Childs letter to the editor an oped.
He also gave away the fact that Estelle has a big mouth. All the rest of you Humboldt County supervisors had better be aware. Tom Grover said this morning that “Rex Bohn called Estelle and asked her what are we going to do?” Rex doesn’t seem like that kind of man. They will soon learn the kind of gal, and I use that term loosely, Estelle is.
June 11, 2012 at 8:07 am
WTF
That sounds ass backwards Eric, you don’t develop an area until the basic infrastructure (zoning, land use, water, sewer, power, roads) are in the works and the ground work has been laid. The last thing a developer wants is to be involved in the public process, the developer is waiting behind the curtain, pulling all the levers and he doesn’t want to pay for all the environmental prep work. The less people that know about his development plans the better. He meets in private and gets everything done behind closed doors and lets the public agency take all the praise and glory or the heat if the public finds out.
Look at what Garberville Water District is doing, setting the stage for development. Do you thing any of those property owners are paying for these new services they will be include into, NO! Look who all the major players are in this deal, the number one and two men in the Southern Humboldt Development and land speculation empire. Sure looks like development to me!
June 11, 2012 at 8:15 am
Anonymous
>>People need housing, especially as California’s population continues to grow. The question is where to do it. And development within the range of existing services is, by definition, “smart growth.”<<
We don't need housing on the 1000 acres e. Question for you, what % of that 1000 acres has "existing service", and what % has no service at this moment in time?
It seems like there really isn't much existing service, and that most of that 1000 acres is going to be new service.
June 11, 2012 at 8:36 am
Anonymous
Eric it reads like you’re the one allowing “classism” into your own argument against “environmentalism”, when the REAL problem is the impact on the environment. You’ve allowed a false understanding of “the environmental movement” (as you so simply call it) to invade your understanding of the big picture. Your statement that lower “classes” (one can only assume you mean incomes) bear the biggest burden when jumping through financial hoops is true, but it has nothing to do with protecting the environment, and I promise you as somebody within the “lower class” who associates almost exclusively with the same, “environmentalism” is exclusively about the environment, period. They stopped killing seals and started killing otters because of the SNAFU that had been allowed to develop over time by monied interests in the first place. One doesn’t have to blame the victim OR cater to the cause.
“Lower class” people aren’t itching to build houses, we can’t even afford the bare land. There’s plenty to go around as it is already. Don’t let developers fool you into thinking they’re doing poor people any favors. I would also argue against your statement that water isn’t the issue. What’s your big picture of “the environmental movement” look like to suggest such a thing? Most parcels do not have water (I don’t know where you get the idea they do), especially if they’re ever to be further subdivided. Development is a domino effect, you should know that…well enough is never left alone down the line. (200 years of it right outside everybody’s window…chipping away at what’s left, one year at a time, one “project” at a time, one building at a time…)
You have to keep in mind the state of the world 100 and 1,000 years from now. And 50,000 years from now. How important is it all to YOU? You are very literally participating in decision making that is going to have a permanent impact on the planet…everybody’s “environment”…forever. Don’t turn your own religious beliefs into fantasy, your mortal gods of science can only do so much.
June 11, 2012 at 8:50 am
Anonymous
“People need housing, especially as California’s population continues to grow.”
That doesn’t mean we need more buildings, especially as California’s resources continues to diminish.
June 11, 2012 at 10:19 am
WTF
Wow Eric, that 7:56 am post this morning is out of this world. Lets begin with the Park having plans for development and without the Garberville Water District including all 400 acres into their service district boundary for water and sewer what can you do?
And what about right next to the Park, what about that parcel right next to the Park property. Is that the other parcel you talked about: “Yes, it’s the park. But it’s also the other parcels”.
I thought the other Parcels already had service, they had conformity and compliance issues with the Garberville Water District, not development plans?
Let me ask since you said: “The problem with the environmental movement has always been its classism – it’s rigidity without concern for the impact on the economy which they might be able to weather, but for which the burden is most heavily weighed on those at the bottom – the lower 30 percent who depend on jobs to feed their children and keep a roof over their heads”
You feel the environmental movement had it wrong about past logging pratices for pre-1900 to post 1990? That environmental regulation was bad? That rivers benefited from past logging pratices? Clear cutting was good for the economy, jobs etc?
To you, it doesn’t matter what effects development has on the environment, as long as it gives you economic growth? Smart Growth? Wow Eric and people poor mouth Rob Arkley, go figure and who knew………
June 11, 2012 at 12:36 pm
WTF
Eric said above at 7:56 am: “S/D – the point is that you don’t know precisely what the environmental impacts are until you have a specific proposal. The annexation itself doesn’t cause any environmental damage whatsoever. It simply leaves open the option of development, which may or may not have significant impact, depending on the specifics”
Pop quiz Eric, Jim Truitt was on the Dennis Hubris Show last week, and besides Festivals planned for the Park, he talked about 17 acres of Scoccer, Baseball and Football fields planned for the Park, down at the Kimtu Parking Lot area. Now, unless the Park Board has figured out how to change photosynthesis and grow grass without water, I think we have a case that speaks for itself, that is, can the already depleated South Fork Eel River support the Park with its planned development and using even more water included in the Garberville Water District annexation? Too bad mother nature did not build it a gauge for the rivers, or did she? Instead of Empty or Full, its Life or Death!
June 11, 2012 at 12:52 pm
suzy blah blah
If Garberville went up instead of out
-problem with that is there’s no high culture in this cow-town. And so we continue to embrace the pseudo cowboy lifestyle with it’s model of the “ranch style” home with a view, having several cars/trucks in the garage and a sprinkler on the lawn in subdivisions sprawling all over the countryside. If you object –you’re an “elitist”.
June 11, 2012 at 1:08 pm
longwind
I object!
June 11, 2012 at 1:10 pm
Anonymous
The environmental movement has always been an upper middle class dominated movement. Attempts to bring social justice into the mix has always resulted only in lip service. A few organizations such as Earth Island Institute have managed to integrate “environmental racism” into its concerns, but most environmentalists are either unsympathetic or too self-involved to consider the impact of their doctrines on the economy.
It’s not just the old left Eric. We had SDS meetings where we debated whether ecology was a “quality of life issue.” We never even got into the attitude that people below us should abandon their “pseudo cowboy lifestyle” and spend the money they don’t have on expensive “organic” produce.
June 11, 2012 at 2:17 pm
Rancho Murietta
“June 10, 2012 at 3:28 pm
Eric Kirk
It’s not about water. It’s about subdivision.”
Well, yeah, but subdivision is about water. I’m not familiar with the particular bone being picked here, but you can’t have housing development without water. Otherwise, we’d call it dry camping and limit it to self-contained RV’s.
Nice letter for a kid. Better than most I read in the papers today.
June 11, 2012 at 5:42 pm
Anonymous
June 11, 2012 at 7:22 pm
Anonymous
Friend of mine says that the reason the environmental movement is rife with upper middle class types is because that is the educated class, and environmentalism is an informed choice.
June 11, 2012 at 8:06 pm
Anonymous
Degrowth represents a difference of opinion from those who hold that the environmental question has an autonomous significance; environmental economics asks to put the physical and biological world at the centre of every political action.
http://www.extraenvironmentalist.com/blog/2012/05/24/degrowth-american-dream/
June 11, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Sister/Daughter
Fuget about, Jake, it’s Chinatown.
June 12, 2012 at 12:18 am
j67k
“Ecology is a bourgois science”… I think the more accurate statement would be Ecology is perceived as a bourgeois science [I know! I know! Proper spelling is 'bourgeois'].
After all, poor people suffer first, and they suffer more, from ecological collapse. Just because they are unaware of it doesn’t mean they are immune to the effects.
This is why politicians who make decisions that harm people should be punished. If we made them responsible for the power they wield maybe they would be more careful. This would have the added benefit of reducing the number of completely unqualified people in positions of power.
Stupid can be far more harmful than evil, since evil usually has a sense of self preservation. Also, they usually want a planet & people to lord over. And, finally, it’s a lot easier to kill an evil overlord than to create a new ecosphere.
June 12, 2012 at 6:07 am
moviedad
“Ecology is a bourgeois science” Makes total sense considering how it is used today. “Ecology” to a major logging company can be very different than the “Ecology” of a homesteader.
I must say I admire your use of the word: “Socialist” that takes a lot of guts these days in America. It usually takes about a New-York-Minute for the Centurions to start screaming about Soviet Russia. Modern democratic socialist countries like those in Northern Europe, do not really exist in the American psyche.
A screening of US television will show that these successful countries are completely off the radar. They are never, I repeat: never shown in a positive light. Right-wing reactions to Moore’s last film that showed how much better the living standard was in those countries was met with incredulous condemnation.
I heard one weirdo declare that we Americans don’t like to wait, so instead of waiting our turn for a procedure, we’d rather lose our house to medical bills. Yeah, yeah; give all the resources to the a few favored families, let them benefit themselves at the expense of the population. And if anyone dares to point out that socialism gives a bigger share of the national wealth to a larger percentage of the people; just start talking about a hundred years ago, and don’t forget to show the breadlines from 1930′s Bulgaria.
June 12, 2012 at 6:18 am
Rancho Murietta
Bulgaria?
June 12, 2012 at 7:01 am
Erasmus
A fine analysis, Moviedad, save for one important fact: those Nordic countries with their high suicide rates and plush welfare benefits are not socialist (any more than Bernie Sanders is, in spite of the label he applies to himself). Those “socialist” countries are part of the WTO, the IMF, the stock exchanges of every major economy, and their corporations play leading roles in our current neo-liberal world economy. — If you want an example of socialism in the traditional meaning of the word, it’s not necessary to resurrect regimes of the past: just look to Venezuela and Hugo Chavez’s constant refrain of “socialismo”. He’s accomplished some fine things for the poor, and his challenge to neo-liberalism is stark.
June 12, 2012 at 7:37 am
Anonymous
I’m anxious to read eric’s further commentary about his 7:56 post. It’s a real eye opener coming from somebody with a desk job in the park system.
June 12, 2012 at 7:41 am
Eric Kirk
I think the Nordic suicide rates probably predate social democracy.
June 12, 2012 at 8:52 am
Anonymous
The environment also predates what you call environmentalism, eric. Calling for even more economic consideration within environmental concern is crazy. Anybody with a solid head on their shoulders would agree. Profit motive continues to bury us all, first and foremost environmentally.
What says you, eric?
June 12, 2012 at 8:56 am
Anonymous
re moviedad @ 6:07…america, where it’s cheaper just to pay the parking ticket than prove your innocence. And that’s assuming our time is worthless as well.
June 12, 2012 at 10:18 am
Eric Kirk
Calling for even more economic consideration within environmental concern is crazy.
Well, right now there is NO economic consideration in most environmental law. And it’s not just about “profit.” It’s about people being able to feed their children. Call me crazy, but while I’m happy to protect a salamander from needless habitat intrusion, if it’s a choice between a child going hungry and a salamander, I’m personally going to put the child’s interests first. Call me a socialist.
June 12, 2012 at 10:30 am
Anonymous
>>if it’s a choice between a child going hungry and a salamander, I’m personally going to put the child’s interests first<<
It's not that simple eric.
June 12, 2012 at 10:35 am
Eric Kirk
I certainly agree.
June 12, 2012 at 11:30 am
Anonymous
Eric, please spare us the heartstrings about feeding a child vs. saving a salamander…that’s a ridiculous analogy and you know it. And it’s not in line with what’s being discussed. You write:
“Well, right now there is NO economic consideration in most environmental law.”
The likes of environmental impact reports are entirely based on the fact of proposed environmental impact, and there is no case to impact the environment being presented that isn’t centered around economic gain. “feed the child vs. the salamander” in your (lame) analogy, but more accurately “economics vs. ecology”.
June 12, 2012 at 11:34 am
Anonymous
…to put it another way, eric (I’m hoping you’ll go into it further, because your 7:56 comment is a real doozy), to suggest there’s NO (your emphasis) economic consideration in most environmental law is nonsense. There is no need to engage “law” where nothing is being practiced whatsoever. The wetlands in willits do not need protection from the law if left alone, however being as how the state wants to shove a freeway through them (for economic reasons) the “environmental law” is absolutely necessary, and unfortunately stands as its own defense. Do you not see the horse before the carriage? Did I spell carriage right?
June 12, 2012 at 12:40 pm
Eric Kirk
Show me in the regulatory law where economic considerations can be factored into the situation. Show me a provision.
What we need in environmental law are balancing tests – whether the level of ecological impact justifies the loss of livelihood for a given number of people. Let’s take a popular icon. How many spotted owls are worth a hundred thousand livelihoods? A million?
I’m not saying the spotted owl shouldn’t be protected. But I do believe that people should be factored into the equation.
June 12, 2012 at 12:54 pm
j67k
Yes, Anon, that’s an easy one. I admit that I will choose humans every time.
Unfortunately, that is not the choice. The choice is do something now, whatever it takes, or most, if not all, children will go hungry & die in the future.
You can argue the numbers, and people do all the time, but if you keep growing you WILL find the number of humans that the Earth cannot support. That will be bad.
By the way, here’s a little hint… If you need to consume irreplaceable resources to support the number you have, you are getting very close.
June 12, 2012 at 1:15 pm
j67k
Oh, no! That was you Eric?
That salamander is not dying because we are feeding it to a hungry child. It is dying because we are intruding on, and altering, the natural mechanics of how carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, & nitrogen (CHON) is cycled through various organisms.
The more of that we use up, the less will be around for the next generation. If we don’t find some other method for dealing with our needs, that child will have to watch their children starve to death. I’m sure they will be sooo grateful that we let them have that experience…
June 12, 2012 at 1:23 pm
Eric Kirk
Well the salamander is generating CO2, so you might as well eat it.
June 12, 2012 at 2:32 pm
Anonymous
ya know, eric…I was hoping you weren’t “one of those…”….but it disappoints me to fully realize you are “one of those.”
You wrote that letter in 1982, I think the population was around 5 billion. If I would have asked your thoughts on the population increasing by another 2 billion stray cats by the year 2010, what would your thoughts have been? Were the buffalo, the wolves, the bears, the eagles and the other 97% of the nation’s old growth forest worth less than the fortresses built by the hairless apes? What’s wrong with the last sentences of your letter, wasn’t it sincere? You believe you have learned something since then, what do you believe you have also forgotten? What does the catchphrase ‘from the mouths of babes’ mean to you?
June 12, 2012 at 3:02 pm
Anonymous
“Show me in the regulatory law where economic considerations can be factored into the situation. Show me a provision.”
What a thing to ask! What is, and what is the purpose of ‘law’? Instead, you show me a situation utilizing “regulatory law” that isn’t based on what amounts to economic circumstance (and no, court costs don’t count…a statement in itself to have to disclaimer). The “regulatory law” as you call it becomes a declaration of economic (physical) allowance over the common sense of environmental preservation…it’s the very nature of “environmental regulation”.
June 12, 2012 at 3:16 pm
WTF
Eric, show us a case anywhere used by NEPA or CEQA that has caused an economic debockle. Environmental laws are not doing what you keep talking about, if they were, I could find one or two that makes your point.
As to your “salamander” analogue, lets talk about something other than flora and fauna, lets use Prime Farmland, Unique Farmland, or Farmland of Statewide Importance instead of the “salamander” OK? Would your theroy change or say the same?
June 12, 2012 at 4:19 pm
Eric Kirk
Eric, show us a case anywhere used by NEPA or CEQA that has caused an economic debockle.
I don’t know about an “economic debockle,” but plenty of very good projects have been killed by them and while I think the logging industry has overblown the impact of environmental regs on those livelihoods, it’s really hard to argue that they’ve had no impact. I think we need to look at reform, or the current tide of backlash is going to kill CEQA and everything else. I don’t think the Hoover Dam, Golden Gate Bridge, or intercontinental railroad would be constructed in the existing climate. People are hurting.
Yes, I’m “one of those” who believe that in an imperfect world you have to balance one impact with another. Environmental concerns can’t be paramount, because everything we do has environmental impact. Jobs also can’t be paramount. They lost jobs when they closed Auschwitz. But if we don’t reform environmental laws to address economic concerns, the backlash will be profound. And as in the case with the seals and otters, sometimes it can even have unforseen environmental consequences.
When people are poor, they’re more likely to dump old cars into ravines. They’re less likely to support additional regulation.
As for population control, I’m all ears for a good program, but even there, countries with economic development drop in birth rates – particularly where career opportunities for women are expanded. But CEQA won’t address population control.
June 12, 2012 at 4:36 pm
Unk John
I remember a couple of years ago hearing an interview of a person from Denmark. The topic had to do with a report that said that the happiest people in the world were the Danes. The interviewer started with the question, “Why are the Danes so happy?” His immediate response was,”Well, you know it’s not the weather.”
I mention that not so facetiously in response to Erasmus’s comment about high rates of suicide in the nordic countries. I’m simply pointing out that that is a statistic that deserves further analysis.
Having said that, Eric, I must also add that whereas I may agree that regulatory law pays no attention to economics, economic forces do not always pay attention to regulatory law. There are variances, mitigations, and all sorts of other types of legal “things” that are used in the name of providing jobs. The “mitigations” are usually a way to get around a regulatory law by assuring us that we will be poisoned more slowly if we take certain “precautions”. I think you are aware that I have been involved with just such an issue up here with the coal port terminal and its increase in coal train traffic through Bellingham and surrounding area.
The best way to prevent the situation from getting out of hand is to stop the terminal from being permitted in the first place. I think that if that is the sort of thing being pointed out by several of the posters in this thread, then I will have to agree with them.
June 12, 2012 at 4:52 pm
Eric Kirk
Yeah, but do you think you should have been able to kill industrial zoning on the premise that the wrong company or interest might apply for a permit? At least you know what you are opposing. We’re talking about a process long before anybody even thinks of applying for a permit – that the wrong kind of development might be proposed if the Garberville Services District even has the option of offering water to a parcel, and therefor we have to eliminate all of our options now because maybe the county will screw up when somebody applies for a permit to do the wrong thing – thus eliminating any prospects for the other five applicants who might do the right thing.
June 12, 2012 at 6:08 pm
Anonymous
“Environmental concerns can’t be paramount, because everything we do has environmental impact. Jobs also can’t be paramount. They lost jobs when they closed Auschwitz. But if we don’t reform environmental laws to address economic concerns, the backlash will be profound.”
And you think I’m some kind of space cadet, to jump from genocide to the permit process for septic tanks. Environmental concerns can be “paramount” (what planet are you living on that this one isn’t the same one your great great great great grandchildren will hopefully be able to live on? where do you stand in what will be THEIR history?). Right of way to all existing natural open spaces can be given foremost respect in the specific decision making that goes on between real live human beings when they get together to discuss matters like the future of infrastructure versus said open space in an area, resource consumption versus resource reserve, CREATING reserve versus accomodating more waste etc. ad infinitum. You are saying economic concerns are paramount! How do you relate to the lumber baron of the year 1900? 1950?
“spare us the auschwitz, get with the nowschwitz!” (r) (c) tm
June 12, 2012 at 8:27 pm
Anonymous
“Call me crazy, but while I’m happy to protect a salamander from needless habitat intrusion, if it’s a choice between a child going hungry and a salamander, I’m personally going to put the child’s interests first. Call me a socialist.”
Salamanders might see it differently, but they don’t have disneyland, quads, atomic bombs or money. Or earth moving equipment and gravel extraction rights. Or all the power.
I like that… protect a salamander from needless habitat intrusion. ..
needless habitat intrusion…what does that mean? It’s not in your way?
But if a man can make a buck on it? Well yer just a bourgeois baby killer if you think anything else matters.
Take a gander at the GPU DEIR. Here are the choices:
No environmental impacts
Environmental impacts with mitigation
Unavoidable environmental impacts.
And it’s all about development.
Chapter 3, about water. Give it a blast. It’s amazingly readable if someone wants to see how the river is getting sold down the river.
http://www.planupdate.org
June 12, 2012 at 8:37 pm
Anonymous
Some seriously nutty people post here.
June 12, 2012 at 9:01 pm
Unk John
Being nutty isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Nonetheless, I’ll take it.
June 12, 2012 at 9:15 pm
NBBK
” At least you know what you are opposing. We’re talking about a process long before anybody even thinks of applying for a permit – that the wrong kind of development might be proposed if the Garberville Services District even has the option of offering water to a parcel, and therefor we have to eliminate all of our options now because maybe the county will screw up when somebody applies for a permit to do the wrong thing – thus eliminating any prospects for the other five applicants who might do the right thing.”
What crap. ITS ALL URBAN GROWTH once it’s in the district. And all the players in this massive expansion plan know it.
How very coy to pretend “we don’t know what we’re doing.”
June 12, 2012 at 9:37 pm
Unk John
“Yeah, but do you think you should have been able to kill industrial zoning on the premise that the wrong company or interest might apply for a permit? At least you know what you are opposing.”
I see your point, Eric. I understand the difference. I also think that you understand the similarities. In my case, if I speak publicly in opposition to the issue at hand I will give several reasons for my position. However, one that I will probably not bring up is that it’s going to fuck with the lifestyles of a lot of people who live here.
I think that a lot of people in/around Garberville may view the very proposal of any development on that scale as a threat to the way they live their lives. I’m not prepared to disagree with that.
It reminds me of something I was told by a wise person when I was a beginning teacher. He said that if you don’t want a kid to do something, prevent him/her from doing what leads to it. It’s a good strategy.
June 12, 2012 at 10:33 pm
Eric Kirk
Oh, it’s definitely a strategy. Fight it at every step of the way. But as a matter of policy, the community has an interest in keeping the options open.
Of course, the agenda in this particular case isn’t to prevent “growth.” The plan is to install soccer and baseball fields, and we have some grumpy old neighbors who don’t want kids playing on their lawns. They don’t even really care about the other parcels.
June 13, 2012 at 12:39 am
j67k
That’s the point Eric, the options are not open. We have over 7,000,000,000 people on this planet and they all want options. There aren’t enough options left, we consumed too many.
Unless God comes down and gives us another planet (a good one, not crappy dead ones like Mars or Venus) then we have 3 choices. Breed less, let people starve to death, or go extinct.
The common fantasy is that science will somehow save us. Good luck with that, since the highest paid researchers/doctors seem to work on boner pills, face lifts, and tit jobs. Oh, yeah, and weapons development.
June 13, 2012 at 6:29 am
Sister/Daughter
“. They don’t even really care about the other parcels.”
The park owners love to play the victim, but the truth is that GSD has been leapfrogging outside the water district boundaries for years. On the west side of the river, GSD has a contract to provide water service to a 345 acre parcel of AE land, and others, totaling hundreds more acres. Since GSD is a public agency, these are facts that are available to the public, if you know exactly what to ask for.
Now that the bear canyon bridge has replaced the summer bridge, and the sewer treatment plant has increased treatment capacity by 270%, it’s all highly developable, once it’s officially in the district becomes urban growth area under the GPU.
June 13, 2012 at 7:20 am
Anonymous
“How very coy to pretend “we don’t know what we’re doing.”
That’s what disturbs me about eric. His smug rapport is contradictory to what he expects of correspondence in return. It’s also disturbingly unintelligent. One of too many examples already:
“The plan is to install soccer and baseball fields, and we have some grumpy old neighbors who don’t want kids playing on their lawns. They don’t even really care about the other parcels.”
eric, that is not intelligent commentary. If that’s what you believe, it would please those of us who have a heartened appreciation for the parks and what they stand for to quit your job and go find work perhaps in advertising. Your comment at 7:56 and followup is way off the mark of what one would hope and expect a ranking member of the park staff to make.
Not cool at all, eric.
June 13, 2012 at 7:34 am
Anonymous
“do you think you should have been able to kill industrial zoning on the premise that the wrong company or interest might apply for a permit?”
Given the specifics of the land, yes, absolutely, 100%. Specifics, eric, you are too vague when you want to be.
June 13, 2012 at 7:39 am
Anonymous
eric, your blog consists of a bunch of internet addicted dumbasses which includes yourself, erasing the common sense from your brains one trolling read at a time. You wear your ego like your fly’s open, it’s disappointing to say the least, that you so clearly do not practice what you preach. You are a flag waving member of the “us vs. them” club with the additional gall to decry the differences your own mind manufactures.
June 13, 2012 at 8:53 am
Anonymous
yep, yep, and yep.
June 13, 2012 at 9:08 am
Eric Kirk
eric, your blog consists of a bunch of internet addicted dumbasses which includes yourself, erasing the common sense from your brains one trolling read at a time. You wear your ego like your fly’s open, it’s disappointing to say the least, that you so clearly do not practice what you preach. You are a flag waving member of the “us vs. them” club with the additional gall to decry the differences your own mind manufactures.
Do you write messages for fortune cookies?
As for the GSD, my last word on the subject – the park is looking for water access for water faucets and bathrooms. That would be the extent of the use. But then, we’re up against a tiny opposition which says it supports trails, then pressures grant sources against giving us grants – for trails. So yes, it’s good strategy to take every opportunity at bat, no matter what the collateral damage, because as one of the more prominent detractors said at a public meeting, “I don’t want this park.”
No matter. We did some surveying at the Summer Arts Festival about what the community wants to see at the park, and we’re going to continue surveying the community. As did the detractors, we will make the results known.
That’s the last I’m going to say on the subject. It’s one more thread hi-jacked by the park opposition.
June 13, 2012 at 9:36 am
Anonymous
I, for one, am not oppsed to the parks whatsoever, eric. Quite the opposite. If the parks were under sane management (you included) there would be no “opposition” from me. However, your attitude doesn’t fly, your reasoning doesn’t make it off the ground either. You pony up a lot but answer to little. You regurgitate what you believe to be the words and wisdoms of political icons, but don’t answer to them yourself. I know nothing about you in person, but you can read your own words for yourself. You do not respond to sensible questions and concerns.
June 13, 2012 at 10:18 am
Anonymous
…I guess what I really want to know, eric, is what you are going to say when strict water rationing starts going on in this county. Will the people’s rates skyrocket? Will construction projects continue as being planned now? Why are they being planned, when further and permanent resource depletion is inevitable?
I wonder because you are in the position, right now, to make decisions that will forever lead to more water consumption, in the very least a huge spread of acreage completely leveled and stripped of its trees cooking in the sun. Or will it then be paved and become a loading zone for park vehicles as they work on inevitable future projects?
What do you think is going to be the straw that breaks the camel’s back in humboldt regarding the water crisis that the world is very really in? How will you react?
June 13, 2012 at 11:44 am
j67k
@Anon -”eric, your blog consists of a bunch of internet addicted dumbasses… blah, blah”
… “us vs them” CROWD? You manage to be a total prick while spewing the most inane, pedantic rambling imaginable. Fail! Here’s how it’s done, in a reply to your post…
Intellectual conflict is inevitable when dealing with complex social issues… you useless, waste of carbon, douche’-monkey!
June 13, 2012 at 12:12 pm
Anonymous
It doesn’t matter whether I dispute that or not, j67k…intellectual conflict and all. I made my points above about others’ points above, care to address them? Or aer yuo ubnale to raed bteewen teh lnies to udnertsnad tehm?
June 13, 2012 at 12:35 pm
Anonymous
What happened to tra?
June 13, 2012 at 12:37 pm
ICU812
Eric, when you say ~detractors~ you mean Park neighbors who have made a nice quiet place for themselves long before your “Park” was formed and now wants to fill their neighborhoods with traffic, noise and events like Summer Arts and MUSIC Festivals and Youth/Adult Soccer, Baseball and Football tournaments? And with no managing plan, accountability or consequences for your actions? Did you ever sit down with these people and talk it over?
Here is what I take from your one sided view of things. DO TREAD ON ME, is that a fair way of putting what your ~detractors~ are saying? It seems their way of life is being sacrificed for some kind of Park Board greater good, as you have stated many times. For them, this would be there last act of defiance? More power to them, they deserve better than you running the show and telling people what do to. I think you are better than this Eric, at least I hope you are? And at least in this post, we have not talked about the environmental issues yet, just the nuisance part of the show….
To be honest Eric, it doesn’t sound that its worth the struggle for the Park Board to over come so many problems like $$$,$$$.$$
Why did you pick SAMF to do a survey, more people from outside the area that have no idea what the Park Board is about? Can you post your survey so we living here can read what you had asked?
June 13, 2012 at 4:52 pm
Anonymous
“Can you post your survey so we living here can read what you had asked?”
We’ll 2nd that question.
June 13, 2012 at 5:17 pm
j67k
No Anon. Since you are anonymous I have no idea which posts are yours. I was responding to the one that made no point at all, it just insulted everyone.
If I knew which Anon you were I might agree with your points. Or not. But, since you decline to identify yourself, I just mock what I find a shallow, myopic jab at everyone coming from anonymity.
The part that makes me suspect you are functioning a few kegs short of a six-pack, is that you made a generalized attack at people for attacking each other too much…
Possibly this was meant as some kind of ironic humor, but I doubt it.
June 13, 2012 at 5:45 pm
Anonymous
Hm… I’ve attended every open park board meeting and never heard anyone say they didn’t want the park.
At which meeting did that occur?
Anyone know?
June 14, 2012 at 8:26 am
Anonymous
anonymous @ 5:45, I’m going to begin dumping broken refridgerators along your property line. Should you be required to volunteer your time to regularly participate in my work day to prevent the people I work with from lowering your quality of life? Or, now that you are aware of what is going to happen, is your voice of disapproval no longer of consideration?
June 15, 2012 at 9:13 pm
ericsmother
In response to your “version” of the letter concerning the Friends of Pacifica, I would like you to know I have always been proud of you and your brother and always will be. j67k in his post of June 13 says it for me. We are living on a very overcrowded planet and folks will push to have food and shelter which means money can be made. Thus, it is even a larger struggle to keep food and housing safe as that subtracts money from the greedy.
I have heard predictions that future wars will be over water, not oil. Conservatives worry about passing our debt to the next generations. I worry about passing a planet to them that has what is needed for our species to live.
June 23, 2012 at 7:53 pm
Sister/Daughter
“… anyone who puts him/herself out trying to make a difference and opening himself to ridicule deserves credit, and democracy only has a prayer of working with a free and open exchange of thoughts and ideas.