The Burlingame Voice

High-Cost Rail - Part 90 Partisan Update

Rest assured I was planning this post as a natural follow-up to the one right below--and before the discussion in the comments on the one right below this so you should read it first if you haven't already done so.  Out in the San Joaquin Valley, cherry farmer Andy Vidak has won the special state Senate election to replace Michael Rubio.  Rubio was the deciding vote to move ahead with high-cost rail that then left to work as a lobbyist for Chevron.  According to a Wall Street Journal editorial on May 25th

While Mr. Rubio cited personal issues for leaving the legislature—he has a daughter with special needs—another likely concern was the realization that his career and clout in Sacramento were limited by who he was and where he came from. Unlike his coastal counterparts, Mr. Rubio supported exploiting the rich hydrocarbon and shale deposits that underlie his Valley district.

The oil industry, he told a local TV station in February, shared his view "that we need to provide an opportunity for people to go to work and provide for their families"—a statement that borders on heresy in California's Democratic Party.

That's all well and good--and far more insight that one could get from any of the local reporting on the election.  But here is the kicker on how Republican Vidak campaigned

Meanwhile, California's bullet train, beloved by liberals, will slash through Mr. Vidak's district and raze hundreds of farms, homes and businesses.

"We don't have clean drinking water in some areas of our district," Mr. Vidak says. "And they want to build an $80 billion bullet train!"

THAT is the sort of commonsense that is lacking in Sacramento.  The final kicker comes from the on-going hearings on high-cost rail.  Check out this YouTube video where Congressman Valadao asks HSRA Chair Richard if he would build the section from Fresno to Bakersfield even knowing "there would never be further funding".  Richard, pauses a bit and then say "yes"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXntBBqum6s

It's about a minute and a half that shows us just what the mindset is right now.

Energy Update - Ripped From the Headlines

Here are some thoughts derived from the front page of the Wall Street Journal today--along with a bit of Bon Jovi--think of it as musings at 11:30pm.  The Journal led with

The American energy boom is deepening splits within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, threatening to drive a wedge between African and Arab members as OPEC grapples with a revolution in the global oil trade.

Turns out the US shale oil is about the same, slightly lower quality as the African oil and cheaper, so we get to recoup some of our losses over the last couple of decades.  Meanwhile, another WSJ article notes that we are cutting down swamp forests in North Carolina and shipping the wood pellets to Europe because they are slightly cleaner burning than European coal.  I would like to see the full calculation on that carbon footprint!

And the Journal reporting finishes off today by noting that "electric car venture Better Place filed for liquidation in a blow for Renault, which had championed the Israeli company's technology".  So with Fisker and the Renault deals dead, it looks like only hybrids and Tesla will survive.  I'm seeing more Teslas around town and I just wish the US Government had invested in it instead of losing massive amounts of our money in Fisker!

So, in the meantime, what is our own Gov. Moonbeam spouting off about today?  Here's the SacBee report

Gov. Jerry Brown complained bitterly in a speech last week in Mountain View that the news media ignore the risks of climate change.   "If you take a look at Google and type in 'global warming news,' I venture to say on most days in the news, 20 to 30 percent, if not more, of the news will be by climate deniers or skeptics, whatever you want to call them," Brown said Thursday at a conference with climate scientists at NASA's Ames Research Center.

I only see one "denier" in the bunch-- Jerry Brown.  I doubt the buffoon even reads the Journal nor does he give a damn what gas costs these days since he is expensing his tankfulls to the California taxpayer.  Are you accustomed to $4-plus gas?  I am, but that doesn't mean I like it.

Let's finish with a lyric from Bon Jovi that I happened to hear tonight.  The song is called "Dry County" from their 1992 album "Keep the Faith":

Now there's nothing in this paydirt

The ghosts are all I know

Now the oil's gone

The money's gone

And the jobs are gone

Still we're hangin' on

That sounded reasonable in 1992, but in 2013 we see that it is absurd, unless like Gov. Moonbeam, you ain't actually following the news.

Memorial Day Parading

The annual Memorial Day parade in Hillsborough is a fun event and it must be the only one around because it drew in all of the local politicians--Speier, Hill, Yee, H'borough councilmembers, school trustees, college trustees and it had horses, too

This year the proceedings worked their way up the hill from H'borough Town Hall.  I especially liked that city manager Randy Schwartz had his own sign and car--he never got that in B'game!  The Wells Fargo stagecoach was beautiful--I had not seen it before either!

A Brush With Fame

"A brush with fame" was how my Voice colleague Russ Cohen introduced Lee Mendelson at last night's Historical Society meeting.  As a San Mateo High School graduate, USAF veteran ("worst navigator ever") and television producer for more than 50 years, Lee is perhaps best known for the Charlie Brown shows that are still hugely popular today.  He admitted to being nervous in front of the crowd because his family, neighbors, classmates and his first attorney were all in the audience.  I can't relay all of the funny and impressive stories Lee told but here are three:

His first brush with real fame came when he convinced Willie Mays to allow him to follow The Say Hey Kid around with a camera and produce a documentary.  Willie would only do it if Henry Fonda would narrate.  When Lee expressed some doubt about being able to get Fonda, Willie picked up the phone, called Fonda and sealed the deal in a minute.

Mendelson got the idea to do a Charlie Brown show while reading the cartoon strip in Towle's (now The Melt on the Avenue).  He called Charles Schultz up and while trying to convince him to do it, he mentioned the Willie Mays piece.  Schultz said, "If Will Mays can trust you with his life, I guess I can too."  He sold the idea to Coca-Cola (as a sponsor) before it was even written and when Schultz asked how they would do it, he replied "It's something you are gonna write tomorrow".  Schultz said yes as long as Linus got to read from the Bible in the script.

Another idea was to do something with John Steinbeck, but Lee was afraid to call him until his son, local guy Glenn Mendelson, said "you weren't afraid to call Willie Mays or Charles Schultz, why are you afraid to call John Steinbeck?"  That got the phone into Lee's hand.

There's more, lot's more and the Historical Society filmed the talk, but these were some of the highlights for me.  Here's Lee and the crowd last night in the Lane Room.

Lee is hard at work on the 50th anniversary show of Charlie Brown's Christmas, so we all have something to look forward to. 

Hold the Fire Station Move

It looks like the new Fire Chief is willing to take a second (or maybe it's a third) look at the idea of a new, consolidated station up on Skyline Blvd.  The Daily Journal has the latest turn of events here

Plans to build a temporary fire station — a move toward exploring additional shared services between Peninsula cities — were put on hold after Burlingame and Millbrae residents at community meetings asked if it was possible to maintain services the way they are now.

There have been a few of us who have been thinking that for some time and the new city manager and fire chief apparently want to start fresh

During the Burlingame meeting, residents questioned whether the budget was such that closing a station was still a financial necessity. In Millbrae, some in the community asked if a higher fire tax was possible to allow the current station to stay open. Between now and December, both cities will have a chance to explore the idea further before finalizing plans for the temporary station.

Burlingame City Manager Lisa Goldman said the city’s budget is in a better shape than it was a couple of years ago when the temporary station idea first came up, but the city is always looking to save taxpayer money. Further shared services savings would accrue as a result of the station.

That last statement will certainly bear another look since it depends on what costs and risks one looks at and what services (e.g. crew size, response time) one is considering. 

Burlingame Lion.

Actually, it's lion meat on sale in Burlingame.

http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/peninsula&id=9107970

Bummer, Dude!

I can't make it over to the old Hyatt Cinema this weekend for the pot fest, but if any of you get a chance please let us know how it goes, OK?  Here's the Daily Journal description

Some of the world’s greatest and most passionate medical marijuana advocates will be in Burlingame this weekend at the International Cannabis and Hemp Expo — a first-of-its-kind event to take place in the heart of San Mateo County.

Should be "interesting"

Watching the Planning Commission

This past Monday's Planning Commission meeting was the first one to be broadcast on television the way the City Council meetings are broadcast.  The recorded video all lives in an archive on the City website here.

This is progress!  Kudos to the City for further opening access!

Killing the Golden Goose?

I don't know Belmont city councilmember Coralin Feierbach.  We may have met on the hotel chicken council circuit, but I absolutely love the piece she wrote in the Daily Journal about the over-development being rammed down the Peninsula's throats by a bunch of bureaucrats with control over our money.  Here is a pretty lengthy excerpt.  Please do click through this link and read the whole thing.

This is in response to the May 1 article in the Daily Journal, “What is Plan Bay Area? Region Adopting Strategy for Future Growth.” The article states that San Mateo plans to add 10,000 new housing units by 2040. To paraphrase futurist Paul Saffo when he spoke before the Council of Cities 10 years ago, San Mateo County is in the process of loving itself to death.

Peninsula cities are continually inundated by pro-growth voices from the San Mateo County Economic Development Association, the Association of Bay Area Governments, building trade unions, developers and Realtors, “building more new housing” proponents, state legislators and their lobbyists and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.

If it were only voices, that would be one thing. But now the deck is being stacked so if cities don’t build more housing then grant money may not available for road or other infrastructure improvements. In the post-Proposition 13 era, property taxes on housing units have not been sufficient to pay for all city services, including infrastructure maintenance, used by residential property owners. So adding more housing comes at a cost to cities’ infrastructures — a cost that is not funded by state or regional agencies.

ABAG issues mandates for each city for a number of additional housing units they must enable via zoning increases. These mandates have so far not been enforced, but proposed state legislation may soon change that. The very qualities that attracted us to Belmont are threatened.

Will local cities be forced to convert suburban single-family neighborhoods to urban multi-family condos and apartments? Will we be forced to sell our open space to developers to make up for sales tax money the state can potentially deny us? Will we be forced to build high-rise apartment buildings and condos along the “transportation corridor” as ABAG and MTC wants, destroying the view of the Bay for many Belmont households?

......

Belmont has about 350 acres of open space. Previous and present councils made that happen with strength, courage and conviction. Yes, there will be some new development in downtown Belmont on El Camino Real but not the kind of massive development some cities like Millbrae, Redwood City and San Bruno have generated and San Mateo is about to generate. Massive housing is not a sustainable solution. New Belmont development will be done with care and with consideration of long-term sustainability, consultation with residents and in cooperation with neighboring cities as well.

We moved to the San Mateo Peninsula because it was suburban, not urban. Yet outside agencies continually pressure us to urbanize. It’s time for our voices to be heard in Sacramento. Let us not die of a thousand cuts.

Right on, Coralin.  I'll go a step further and suggest that the Peninsula city councils need to band together in a similar fashion to the PCC group that formed to stop the high-cost rail monstrosity.  This group should get themselves a good lawyer and start now on prying the grant money, tax money and any other funding source away from the likes of ABAG and the MTC.

Hometown Airline

The Wall Street Journal is reporting on some capital structure and route changes at our hometown airline, Virgin America.

The closely held carrier, which is based in Burlingame, Calif., said late last year that it was ending its breakneck expansion, hoping to shore up its finances by letting its new routes mature. It also has canceled orders for 20 of 30 Airbus jets and deferred delivery dates on another 30 planes.

Mr. Cush said in an interview Friday that Virgin America's investors recently agreed to convert $290 million of the carrier's $800 million of debt into equity that they would own once the company went public and the stock hit certain targets.

In the first quarter, when air-travel demand is seasonally low, Virgin America's loss narrowed to $46 million from $76 million a year earlier and its revenue rose 13% to $301 million. Unit revenue, the amount taken in for each passenger flown a mile, rose by 16.5% from a year earlier, outpacing its larger rivals.

As a regular Virgin customer (America and Atlantic) I can say it's a pretty well run airline and I appreciate their approach of having a bit of personality and trying to inject some fun into what has become a dreary air travel business.