Way back in February, we took a fairly thorough look into the things that make a transportation sales tax measure successful Read the rest of this entry »
Measure Z Fails
November 18, 2008
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Posted by xasauan
Moth Spray Blowback Begins
April 25, 2008Yesterday might have been the beginning of the end for the California Department of Agriculture’s Light Brown Apple Moth Spraying program. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by xasauan
More Impact Fee Antics
April 8, 2008We wrote in February about the City of Salinas trying to kill Monterey County’s long overdue regional development impact fee by linking it to the (highly unlikely) passage of a transportation sales tax measure. Since then, things have only gotten stranger Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by xasauan
Apple Moth Update
March 15, 2008Don’t you just love how the State of California, which doesn’t have enough money to fix its roads, maintain its schools, or keep its State Parks open, can still find the cash to fly around in planes spraying untested chemicals on you and your property and can even find a little more of your tax money to use to pay people to lie to you about it?
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Posted by xasauan
More Dark Days for TAMC’s Sales Tax
February 29, 2008Only a few days ago, we pointed out how the Transportation Agency of Monterey County (TAMC) is driving their campaign bandwagon off course and why their chances of actually passing a transportation sales tax measure in November are diminishing.
We noted that transportation sales tax measures too heavily focused on road projects are failing at the polls and deplored TAMC’s short-sightedness in deleting rail funding from their measure at the ill-considered request of the Farm Bureau.
Now, a new battle over linking a regional development impact fee to the passage of the measure threatens to send TAMC’s plans completely into the ditch. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by xasauan
Raise High the Sales Tax, Road Builders
February 26, 2008The Transportation Agency of Monterey County (TAMC) is nothing if not persistent. Although efforts to raise the sales tax to pay for transportation projects were rejected by County voters in 1992, 1998 and, most recently, in 2006, they are once again preparing a sales tax measure for the ballot. Today we take a look at what it takes to win a transportation sales tax election and at how TAMC’s current effort has headed off the tracks. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by xasauan
The Apple Moth Menace
February 23, 2008We were a bit surprised to wake up in the middle of the night last fall to find a plane relentlessly passing back and forth over our house spraying moth pheromones. Especially, since we don’t even live in the area that was supposed to be sprayed. But hey, nobody’s perfect and even in the age of GPS units and so on it’s still probably more than a little confusing to go flying around so close to the deck on a dark night. We’re just happy they didn’t fly into our house.
All this midnight spraying of people and property, was bound to attract attention and it sure enough did. Far more attention than the California Department of Food & Agriculture had been expecting, apparently. And people had questions. Questions like:
Where did the Light Brown Apple Moth come from and how great a danger does it pose to our crops?
How likely is it that the pheromone spray will actually eradicate the moth?
Is the pheromone spray toxic to people?
Is it toxic for plants or other animals?
Will it disrupt the lifecycle of other (native) species with possibly serious consequences?
And, of course, what, exactly, is in the spray anyway?
Had the Dept. of Ag been able to provide some hard facts in answer to these questions, they might have gained public trust and headed off at least some of the controversy now dogging their Apple Moth Eradication Program. But they were monumentally unprepared for the task. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by xasauan
Xasáuan Today 