The Burlingame Voice

B'game Town Hall - COVID-19 local updates

The City Council and City staff ran an hour-long Zoom webinar tonight to update about 175 residents on the status of various actions to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.  I thought it was very well done with kudos to the mayor and especially City Manager Lisa Goldman.  The link to the recording is up on the city website here.

If you don't have an hour, here are a few of my takeaways.  The County website SMChealth.org is "information central" for the most current counts of cases and for the status of shelter-in-place restrictions.  It is usually updated mostly in the morning but the FAQs are continuously updated.  The County is taking a number of steps to prepare for the anticipated uptick in cases.  It has rented a number of B'game hotel rooms for non-hospitalization-needed cases; as well as first responders who may not have the ability to do their regular commutes.  The County is also accepting volunteers' contact info and has about 1,000 volunteers already, but there is not yet a clear direction on what they might do.  The same goes for our favorite local preparedness group BNN and its CERT-trained teams.  More info to follow as recommended actions are decided upon.

The County has set up 211 phone service for those that may not know how or where to look on-line.  I have to imagine that is more of a last resort for more complicated questions.

Similarly, if you see things in town that merit some intervention or seem non-essential--like groups of teens congregating in public or gardeners gardening-- you can call the Non-Emergency BPD phone at 650 777-4100.  Officers will educate them and disperse where necessary and they have a flyer to hand out--so you should not do it yourself if you are not comfortable--and who would be?  Note that housing construction and repair has been deemed an "essential service" by the county, so don't call about contractors.

The County has allocated $3M of Measure K funds to "help out" and is soliciting donations to a 501c3 named SMC Strong--more to follow when details emerge but I'm guessing you have several ideas on who needs support directly.  CallPrimrose is accepting monetary donations, but no food, clothing, etc at this time.

Those are my key findings from the one-hour webcast and I believe we will be seeing more of these.  In the future, we need to incorporate slides (graphics/text) so that items like phone numbers and websites don't have to be repeated verbally--people still don't reliably get them that way.  This is standard stuff in the corporate world and can easily scale to meet municipal communication needs.  All in all, good show.  It's worth you going to view it--you probably have the time ;-(

Coping With Quarantine

I really don't want to add to the concerns that people already have about the Covid-19 virus, the actions we all must take or the longer-term effects on society.  But I do think it would be helpful to local businesses if the word got out on what was open, partially open (e.g. take-out only, curbside delivery sorts of things) and any other tips for coping.  So here is sort of an "open thread".  If you have any helpful tips, please feel free to add them.  I wish Safeway had a webcam upfront so I could check the lines before I walk over.  The shortened hours shown below should help the staff keep up.  Molly Stone's was pacing customers' entry yesterday and I have not been up to the North End yet.

Office Growth Drives Housing Demand, Duh.

It's generally fun to poke fun at EssEff politics, but this Election Day brought a rare instance of sanity out of EssEff voters.  As the Chronicle reported

Also winning was Proposition E, which will limit the amount of office space San Francisco can allow each year if the city fails to build enough affordable housing, based on targets set by the state.  The measure, which needed a simple majority to pass, was leading 54.54% to 45.46% — 130,736 to 108,983.

Prop. E was sponsored chiefly by Todco, an organization that operates and advocates for affordable housing in San Francisco, and its executive director, John Elberling.  Jon Jacobo, Todco’s policy director, said in a statement that voters “have shifted the paradigm of San Francisco. They have declared that we prioritize affordable housing before office development, and that is now the new norm in San Francisco.”

This move won't be a panacea nor will its impact be felt immediately.  In fact, a number of other crosswinds like the macro-economy, availability of leading edge skills, and the perception of quality of life in the Bay Area will all drive the influx or exodus of people.  Over the course of the last 20 years of my professional career I hired, or attempted to hire, dozens of professionals and admin staff into the Bay Area.  It's always been expensive and attractive, but re-balancing the availability of commercial space with residential space should help just a bit with the cost.  One wonders why it took a Proposition to do this in SF and why it isn't happening in other hotbeds like Mountain View or RWC instead of the futile rent control measures?

"A Man's Got to Know His Limitations"

This quote from Dirty Harry in Magnum Force can be applied to all sorts of things and it's generally very good advice.  I don't know Mountain View city councilman John McAlister, but I'd really like to meet him, shake his hand and see if he ever thought of moving to Burlingame.  This piece from the Daily Post is brilliant.

Ben Franklin: Colonial Blogger

I am thoroughly enjoying Ben Franklin: An American Life by Walter Isaacson that was published in 2003.  I enjoy biographies and autobiographies in general, but this one is so well-researched and well-footnoted that it puts what we all learned in high school U.S. history to shame.  During his life, Franklin referred to himself as a printer.  That vastly understates his talents as a pamphleteer and editor of his own newspaper.  One of the themes of the book is Franklin’s use of anonymous essays to make his points.  Here at the Voice we have occasional flare-ups about not requiring commenters to use their real names, but Franklin set the precedent for American journalism by publishing as Homespun, Pacificus Secundus, Busy-Body, Silence Dogood and Alice Addertongue among many, many other names.  On page 227 of Isaacson’s book he notes

As has been frequently noted, Franklin often wrote anonymously or using a pseudonym.  Sometimes, he was trying to to be truly anonymous; at other times, he was wearing only a thin mask.  This practice was not unusual, indeed it was quite common, among writers of the eighteenth century, including such Franklin heroes as Addison, Steele, and Defoe.  “Scarce one part in ten of the valuable books which are published are with the author’s name,” Addison once declared, with a bit of exaggeration.  At the time, writing anonymously was considered cleverer, less vulgar, and less likely to lead to libel or sedition charges.  Gentlemen sometimes thought it was beneath their stature to have their names on pamphlets and press pieces.  The practice also assured that dissenting political and religious writings were rebutted on their merits rather than by personal attacks.

I find Old Ben’s thinking on this quite sound.  I’m sometimes asked why the Voice doesn’t require registration, real names and verification.  There is the answer from 260 years ago.  I highly recommend the book and expect to be taking on other Franklin thoughts relevant to very current issues in the coming weeks and months.

Happy New Year: 2020 Vision

Every New Year's Eve and New Year's Day represents a new beginning.  I read an article today that sought to burst the idea that special days were all that special for resolutions.  The author thinks you can start anew on any given day.  That may be true especially if one has a strong sense of self-discipline to start, but special days are easier for reflection and renewal.  So let's do that--renew--sort of like your old library card.  I'll commit to celebrate all that makes our little burg special.  I'll also commit to fight all that tries to make it just another faceless, joyless patch of earth with no sense of history or livability or neighborliness.  It won't be easy because the joyless, faceless advocates can be desperate and often act desperate, but we have public opinion on our side as shown by elections and by the chats you have on your sidewalk, in the grocery store aisle, in the baseball stands or just reading the comments on the Voice.  Happy New Year.  No need for new glasses--we have 2020 vision.   

Local News: East Bay Decline

Let's go a bit afield of our usual turf to examine an interesting piece from the AP.  Commenting on the state of local newspapers in the "tech capital" of the the East Bay, it notes

Gone is the Oakland Tribune, the Contra Costa Times, The Daily Review of Hayward, The Argus of Fremont and the Tri-Valley Herald, among others. All had tens of thousands of readers during their heyday and served communities populous enough to be among the largest cities in many other states.  Ownership changes and consolidations have left the region known as the East Bay with just a single daily newspaper. The East Bay Times, based in Walnut Creek, attempts to cover a region nearly the size of Delaware with a fraction of the staff of the former dailies.

“It is really shocking that the place with the demographics and the business and the universities and the progressiveness, that this is a news desert ... ” said U.S. Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, a Democrat who represents a significant part of the East Bay.

Perhaps DeSaulnier should question whether the echo chamber of "progressiveness" across so many papers-- and the AP itself--might not account for a wide swath of the reading public choosing to get its news elsewhere.  As we approach 2020, I'm thankful that our two local papers, the Daily Journal and the Daily Post (when you can get one at the Broadway post office or the market on Oak Grove) are at least somewhat balanced.  The columnists span the spectrum and they use more than just the AP and the New York Times as sources for news pieces.  Here's hoping they stay financially healthy for a long time to come.

Staffing Up Locally for the U.S. Census

After a recent conversation with an old B'game friend of mine, I got a real kick out of this Wall Street Journal article titled "Who Will Be the First American Counted in the Census":

TOKSOOK BAY, ALASKA — In this tiny coastal village, five leaders of the Nunakauyarmiut tribe huddled around a table one recent evening to make a decision: Who will be the first person counted in America for the 2020 census?  They wanted to pick the oldest resident of this 659-person fishing outpost. Two of them, Alois Lincoln and Lizzie Chimiugak, both seemed to be 89 years old—but the records aren’t exactly clear on their birthdates. 

In the coming decennial count, the government will ask most Americans to respond online for the first time, starting shortly before Census Day on April 1. The count really kicks off in January, however, in remote parts of Alaska—where internet is spotty and some homes lack addresses. There, census takers must count every household by hand.

Alaska starts early because residents are more likely to be home during winter’s peak, and frozen terrain is easier to cross than the mushy ground of spring. On Jan. 21, specially trained enumerators with paper and pencils (because ink can freeze) will start knocking on tens of thousands of doors.

Those conditions make helping out with the 2020 Census in San Mateo County look like a piece of cake.  My friend, Pat Belding, is also a recent retiree in search of ways to contribute and has taken a position as a Recruiter Assistant with the local census organization.  So I'm helping him out with some free advertising--the only kind we do here at the Voice.  There are several types of jobs available locally including clerks ($24/hr), enumerators like those described in the Alaska article ($30/hr) who verify addresses and help people fill out the forms and some supervisor jobs ($33/hr).  Paid training is included both on-line and two Saturday sessions conducted locally.

If you know someone who is over 18, a citizen with no criminal record who wants flexible work of between 25 and 40 hours per week for eight weeks at a time (renewable) and likes to get out in the neighborhoods, this is a great way to help out the Federal government.  It takes them awhile to process applications, so don't wait because you think the census is a long ways in the future.  In government time, February to June 2020 is just around the corner.  Apply on-line at 2020census.gov/jobs.

Kudos to Pat for taking on this important recruiting role in an economy with 2.3% unemployment!

The Other Burlingame....Kansas

I got a great trip report from local B'gamer Linda Yelnick about her recent visit to Burlingame, Kansas.  The other town named for Anson is about 28 miles southwest of Topeka.  Linda prepped for her visit by contacting the Burlingame (KS) Historical Preservation Society and letting them know she would be visiting so that when she arrived she got the classic friendly mid-western reception.  Linda and her son discovered a number of interesting things about this little town of 934 people from Carolyn Strohm of the BHPS.

The other Burlingame was originally a coal mining town named Council City and is one of the oldest communities in Kansas being founded in 1854 before Kansas was a state.  Anson Burlingame passed through four years later in 1858 and gave an anti-slavery speech that impressed the folks enough to rename the town after him.  Anson never lived in either town named for him.  B'game, KS is known as the place where "rail meets trail" as the Santa Fe rail and Santa Fe trail cross there.

Linda was impressed by the small-town feel where the main street is about two blocks long and everything is closed on Sundays unless the restaurant owner decides to open and make a meal for a visitor as he did for Linda and her son.  The street is quite wide so that the ox caravans of old could make a U-turn downtown.  As Carolyn Strohm told Linda "everybody knows everybody and we feel safe and secure".  Old timers in 94010 remember something similar.  The old Lincoln school building that dates from 1902 has been re-purposed into a impressive historical museum.  Oddly enough, the school mascot is the Burlingame Bearcat!  San Mateans cannot be happy about that.

The other Burlingame also has a prominent citizen named Jerry Hill who is most famous for award-winning kettle corn.  The two Jerry's have been in touch and kettle corn was exchanged.  The next time I see our Jerry I will ask him what he sent out to their Jerry.  Check out the entry sign to Burlingame, KS 66413.  Plenty of room to grow there.

BHS Student Brings it Home

With the election in the rear view mirror, we can get back to regular issues.  The Daily Journal has a nice write-up on BHS student Jeffery Chen

The Burlingame High School senior won first place in the Breakthrough Junior Challenge, receiving a $250,000 college scholarship, $50,000 for his science teacher and $100,000 science lab for his school.  Chen, 17, won the international competition Sunday, Nov. 3, with a three-minute educational video he created about neutrino astronomy, which tracks cosmic events through the capture of galactic particles.

And with the new science learning space to be built at his school, Chen said he is hopeful to inspire other Burlingame High School students to push the boundaries of their imaginations too.

This is a welcome antidote to the recent disappointing news about graffiti at BHS and the subsequent arrest of a local young man.  Kudos to Chen.  You can click through to his video here and while you are there check out all of the local B'game background - the Bayfront, the BHS lawn, and the train station at sunset.