[Rachel Golden, ERG graduate student]

My alarm goes off at 4:30 on Saturday morning in a hotel room in Chowchilla, a small city (under 20,000) in the San Joaquin Valley, that feels like a deserted rural town. Unsure if I have slept at all, I slip quietly out of the hotel and slowly drive through a thick darkness. Silently freaking out and cursing Siri, I drive for 20 minutes in the wrong direction on the I-99. My counterparts later teased me that “you city folk don’t know how to drive in the Valley.”  It’s true, I’ve gotten lost twice in 24 hours.

Once I reorient and backtrack, I begin to see cars lined up like a silent train along the side of the road, about a mile from the Chowchilla fairground. The fairground parking lot is where Valley Clean Air Now (ValleyCAN) will be hosting the “Tune In and Tune Up” event in a few hours.  Hundreds of people spent Friday night in their cars alone, with loyal friends, or with their families to get a place near the front of the line. Several people even arrived at noon the day before in order to ensure entrance to the event. The lined-up cars are old. Really old. Most are “pre-OBDIIs,” (made before 1996) and are classified as some of the most polluting cars on California’s roadways.  It is said that cars are born in California’s coastal cities (like the Bay Area) and come to die in the Central Valley. Only, they don’t die. These cars clunk around for well beyond their expected lifespan on expensive life-support, because people have few options for transportation and depend on these wheels for groceries, work, and taking kids to school.

Jose in the early morning directing cars into the parking lot from where they were parked (and slept in) overnight

The people in line aren’t sleeping in their cars to get Taylor Swift tickets. Or a selfie with Barak Obama. They are there for a free smog screening and a $500 voucher to get the needed car repairs for passing the smog test—a prerequisite in California for keeping your car registered. Wait, this is a story about SMOG TESTS? No! Okay, yes. Well, sort of. It’s really a story about much more. This is a story about community groups coming together from all parts of life to make living a bit easier and healthier.

Some quick stats to set the context:

• Smog (i.e. ground level ozone), which is just one of the forms of air pollution caused by cars, can cause asthma, hurt the linings of lungs, aggravate chronic lung diseases such as emphysema and bronchitis, and reduce the immune system’s ability to fight off bacterial infections in the respiratory system.
• The San Joaquin Valley is home to the worst air quality in the country and has some of the highest rates of childhood asthma in California.
• Those most impacted by smog are children, adults who exercise or engage in outdoor physical labor (think agricultural and construction workers), and those with continued exposure (think everyone who lives in the Valley).
• Smog’s not all. These nearly 2-decade old cars also produce considerable hazardous air pollution, contributing to increased risk of cancer, heart and lung diseases, and diabetes.

I pull up to the fairground gates at 5:45am to see Tom Knox standing in the dark wearing his white ValleyCAN t-shirt and holding a bottomless cup of black coffee. Tom seems to be in a long-term relationship with caffeine, and this event, “Tune In and Tune Up,” is their baby. Tom is the executive director of ValleyCAN and has generously met with me weekly for my research. I spend the next hour discussing the day’s logistics with him and the event manager Jose Martin, a community organizer from outside of Guadalajara, Mexico. Jose tirelessly travels up and down the Valley, building support from community groups for these events, which occur every other weekend as far north as San Joaquin County and as far south as Kern County.

At 6:30am the sun starts to rise and Jose opens the gates to the fairground parking lot. We see the silent train come to life as over 500 cars turn on their engines one by one and roll into the lot, which is lined with orange cones and tents staffed by people in orange vests. Many of the cars are without license plates, about half are unregistered, yet most people are smiling because they are a few feet closer to getting that voucher to clean up their cars. 

Lideres Campesinas, the women who cook lunch for all participants and provide community education for farmworkers about sexual assault and abuse

To a bird in the sky, this event just looks like a parking lot. But on the ground, there is more than meets the eye. The traffic is directed and the event managed by local community groups, like gang prevention groups, who get a modest payment and work experience. The cars are screened by local, top smog testers and students from community colleges across the Valley. In school, the students only see one car a day, but out here they see up to 550 in a day. The students soon become experts, able to open up their own local smog test shops and return here as teachers. Women from the group Lideres Campesinas get paid to cook a free lunch for all participants and set up their table of educational flyers for agricultural workers about sexual assault and violence. Three radio stations set up their tents to blast music and broadcast live from the fairground parking lot to cover the event.

Veronica, who manages a pilot program funded by the San Joaquin Valley Air District that gives qualifying low-income Valley residents up to $5,000 to retire their old car and purchase and lease a new cleaner model

And in a small tent off to the side sits Veronica, who manages a pilot program funded by the San Joaquin Valley Air District that gives qualifying low-income Valley residents up to $5,000 to retire their old car and purchase and lease a new cleaner model. Paired with California’s Clean Vehicle Rebate Program, low-income drivers can get up to $12,000 to purchase or lease an advanced car like a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEVs). Since there are no PHEVs in dealerships in the Central Valley and inadequate chargers to keep these cars moving, most drivers opt for a smaller rebate for a less advanced vehicle, like a used minivan or occasionally maybe even an early-model Prius.

I can’t help wondering if some Berkeley environmentalists’ eyes are rolling. Cars are evil. Why aren’t they getting electric vehicles? What about public transit? We shouldn’t even be farming in the Valley anyway.

Yes, I know. Maybe I’m just sleep deprived, but the way I see it:  People live here, in the Valley. For their livelihood they need to drive long distances.

• Until we can make major system-wide changes so we can live in balance with the natural environment…
• Until state regulators (CPUC and CEC), utilities, and industry groups get EV charging stations installed at scale…
• Until the California Air Resources Board deploys hundreds of millions of dollars of cap-and-trade revenue to counties and community groups to increase low-income people’s access to EV cars, buses, and trucks…

Until any of this happens, simply retiring the oldest fleet and getting people into cleaner cars is the best game in town.

Until any of this happens, simply retiring the oldest fleet and getting people into cleaner cars is the best game in town.

Although it may make many environmentalists queasy, getting cars built in 1995 and earlier off the road for good, and replacing them with LEVIIs (cars made since 2008) will bring considerable air quality benefits to the Valley (i.e. reduced NOx, SOx, smog, particulate matter), improve fuel efficiency, and ease the financial burden for low-income people who are car dependent. This is just one first step in a longer-term game plan towards turning over the fleet and making way for near-zero emission vehicles.

In the meantime while the low carbon solution is being simmered and seasoned in state agencies and prodded by green groups, an under-the-radar smog event — which under most circumstances sounds like the last place to spend a Saturday afternoon — actually feels like a community party with music trumpeting, free food sizzling on the grill, and a team of unlikely partners bonding over a job well done.


Note: The views expressed here belong solely to the author of each entry and are not representative of the position of the Energy and Resources Group, UC Berkeley.

[by Sharada Prasad CS, ERG PhD Candidate] 

 

Please watch the below video and make a note of your reaction.



Either you were amused by it or you felt a pain deep inside your heart.

Who are the people who pee in public? It’s mostly the people who work in the informal sector i.e. people who don’t work in offices or inside any building for eight hours. 94% of India’s workforce is linked to informal sector which includes construction workers, rickshaws pullers, coolies, courier boys, drivers, roadside vendors ( the list is endless) . The people who laugh (mock?) in the above video might not have engaged themselves in any activity that keeps them outdoor 8-10 hours in a day. They all appear to be either middle or upper class Indians who have the luxury of toilet access both at their residence and workplace. If empathetic enough, one can see harassment, borderline violence rather, in the above video instead of the intended amusement.

In a country with 400 million people working in un-organized sector, public toilets must be found within minutes of walking distance. The problem with urban India is that sanitation is never a priority. The municipality or corporation has no pressure from the public, especially middle class and upper class, to maintain the existing toilets, and has no money to buy/rent space in a newly developed financial neighbourhood to install toilets.

Even the toilets in railway stations and bus stations are not well maintained as there is no accountable structure in the organization to provide basic sanitation services. You will not see the phone number of any officer who is responsible to keep the toilets clean. The officials hide behind the thick veil of bureaucracy.

Yes, providing good sanitation facility comes at a cost. But lack of provision costs much more to the society. The social and health cost of lack of sanitation is not borne by all sections of society equally. The poor mostly bear the burden while the middle class or upper class insulate themselves from such woes. India cannot come out of the mess of lack of sanitation in public areas unless there is focus on accountability and enough political pressure from upper and middle class.

Dear “Pissing tanker” – Your understanding of public urination is distorted and your actions perverted. Please stop making fun of people who don’t have access to toilets. Your insensitivity towards the helplessness of people is appalling. Most people who are peeing in public are already vulnerable. You don’t have any right to humiliate those people further. If you can, please give them directions to the nearest decent public toilet, if you can find one. If you are so inclined to pee, try peeing inside a public office instead of aiming water cannons at people. You might get the attention of right people!

Cross-post from Sharada's personal blog.

Note: The views expressed here belong solely to the author of each entry and are not representative of the position of the Energy and Resources Group, UC Berkeley.

[by Yang Ruan, ERG MA/MPP Student]  

 

The Atlantic has published another great article by Ta-Nehisi Coates called "The Case for Reparations."

The wealth gap and continued segregation of African Americans is the legacy of centuries of exploitation by white Americans.

"When we think of white supremacy, we picture Colored Only signs, but we should picture pirate flags."

The exploitation starts with slavery but continues via housing practices and other predatory activities. In the meantime it seems like the continued de facto segregation is causing all non-African Americans to be completely ignorant of and detached from African American communities. They point to the handful of successful black Americans as proof that racism is no longer an issue rather than correctly recognizing them as the exceptional.

"...They ignore the long tradition of this country actively punishing black success"

"Some black people always will be twice as good. But they generally find white predation to be thrice as fast."

"...for all our exceptional ones, for every Barack and Michelle Obama, for every Ethel Weatherspoon or Clyde Ross, for every black survivor, there are so many thousands gone."

Coates' article calls for passing HR 40, the Commission to Study Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act, a bill by Congressman John Conyers Jr., who represents the Detroit area. The commission would study slavery and its lingering effects as well as recommendations for “appropriate remedies.”

I really hope people read this, including immigrants who need a deeper understanding of the historical context for the social issues in the US.

Even though I am fairly aware of many problems black Americans face, I was jarred by the specifics detailed in the article. It highlights the importance of having patience for people you don't understand and communities you aren't immersed in. Also, the article illustrates that many problems are systemic just as fairness is systemic. One person's success or failure cannot prove that America is finally fair or not. America will be fair only when a person gets as much encouragement, opportunities regardless of their race, class, or gender, but also no more likely than the next to get swindled or judged.

Cross-post from Yang's personal blog.


Note: The views expressed here belong solely to the author of each entry and are not representative of the position of the Energy and Resources Group, UC Berkeley.

[By Pierce Gordon]  

A packed house for Inequality for All screening, with Reich, Kornbluth, and Brady on the stage, fielding questions.

In a way, Robert Reich has been trying to do so for his entire career, as a Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy, and previous secretary of labor in the Clinton Administration. His recent movie, Inequality for All, which was shown on February 5th, 2014, to a sold out crowd of 700 people in the Wheeler Hall Auditorium. The director Jacob Kornbluth, and the Dean of the Public Policy School, Henry Brady, moderated the after-movie discussion.

After the movie, the crowd asked Reich about many questions about the many different social intersections of economic inequality: racial inequality, the true potential impact of labor unions, the presence of inflation, and many other concepts. One thing was apparent during the question-and-answer portion of the night; even off the big screen, Reich can command a room, even one as large as Wheeler Auditorium.

Over his experienced profession, Reich has used many tools at his disposal to get out his message about fixing the American economy. If you visit his website, you’re instantly bombarded with his blog posts, his television appearances with the Colbert Report and the Daily Show, and his own personal explanatory videos about low wage workers, inequality, immigration reform, and many other topics.

The movie, which won both the Special Jury prize at the Sundance film festival and the Audience Award for the Best Documentary at the Traverse City film festival, deftly mixes Reich’s expert economic opinion about the current and historical state of the political economy, with the teaching of the Berkeley class, Inequality and Poverty, alongside aspects of his own personal memoir.

What’s the most artistic part of the movie? In fact, it’s the way these three seemingly unrelated topics come together to tell a whale of an economic tale. To the average movie goer, Inequality for All might contain more graphs, develop more relationships, and explain more about money, than any event they've seen. And yet, somehow the movie fits it all together using Reich’s natural stage presence and their constantly evolving storyline. These separate parts of the narrative become deeply ingrained cogs of an economic engine: economic inequality, labor unions, tax policy, globalization, technological development, and many other parts. Interestingly, the confluence of Reich’s experience, his life story, and his Berkeley course functions just as effortlessly.

Such quality, however, is not due to Reich’s life work and nimble delivery; for this, the genius of the director cannot be overstated. Though it seems to be a party where Reich is the master of ceremonies, if one looks deeper, one can find out how much influence the director had on the movie’s progression. Kornbluth explains his main motives on the Inequality for All website: “I decided my goal with this film, first and foremost, was to take a conceptual and abstract topic and find a way to tell an approachable and human story about it.” In his words, during the question portion, he stated "You have to believe in the messenger to believe in the message." That belief is necessary, then, to incite a movement to jump-start our economy.

Reich stated that he understands that economic change of which he advocates for requires conversation with, and motivation from, diverse communities. In the same breath, he goes from lecturing to his UC Berkeley course, to conversing with Republican laborers about the importance of worker lobbying, to chopping it up with venture capitalists. In a way, it’s a visual example of one particular thing; for our economy to work, we need buy-in from each of these disparate groups, to move forward towards common goals.

Even if one doesn’t agree with Reich’s suggestions, you must agree that inequality has become a massive issue in our society. Reich includes conversation about the passionate Occupy Wall Street and Tea Party protests, and adds such protests are symptoms of our communities being upset with inequality on large scales. Even President Obama recently stated in his recent State of the Union address, that 'Inequality is the defining issue and challenge of our time.' Needless to say, this isn’t an issue to take lightly.

The solutions to these issues, however, won't come as easy. He states: "The issue is at a point where there is a possibility...It can be tackled. It's not an easy answer; there has to be a movement..."

Well, one thing can be made for sure: whether Democrat, Republican, or otherwise, the points made in the new movie are hard to put down. Watching the movie, might be your first step.

Interested in learning more about Inequality for All? Check out the website here.

The views expressed here belong solely to the author of this entry and are not representative of the position of the Energy and Resources Group, UC Berkeley.