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HomeMy WebLinkAbout11.10.20 Board Correspondence - FW_ Please forward the attached letter to Butte County Board of Supervisors From:Schuman, Amy To:Alpert, Bruce;Bennett, Robin;Clerk of the Board;Connelly, Bill;Cook, Holly;Lambert, Steve;Lucero, Debra; McCracken, Shari;Paulsen, Shaina;Pickett, Andy;Ring, Brian;Ritter, Tami;Rodas, Amalia;Sweeney, Kathleen; Teeter, Doug Subject:Board Correspondence - FW: Please forward the attached letter to Butte County Board of Supervisors Date:Thursday, November 12, 2020 7:57:47 AM Attachments:11-11-2020 DECLARATION OF A CLIMATE EMERGENCY.pdf Good morning, Please see the email correspondence below and attachment. Amy Schuman Associate Clerk of the Board Butte County Administration 25 County Center Drive, Suite 200, Oroville, CA 95965 T: 530.552.3308 | F: 530.538.7120 Twitter | Facebook | YouTube | Pinterest From: Sascha Sarnoff <sarnova@gmail.com> Sent: Wednesday, November 11, 2020 6:11 PM To: Clerk of the Board <clerkoftheboard@buttecounty.net> Subject: Please forward the attached letter to Butte County Board of Supervisors ATTENTION: This message originated from outside Butte County. Please exercise judgment before opening .. attachments, clicking on links, or replying. Dear Clerk – Please forward the attached letter to Butte County Supervisors. Please also put a copy of this letter into the public record. Thank you for your kind assistance! Sascha for Ruth Sarnoff A review of C ITY OF C HICO R ESOLUTIONS E NDORSING THE D ECLARATION OF A C LIMATE E MERGENCY AND R EQUESTING R EGIONAL C OLLABORATION ON AN I MMEDIATE J UST T RANSITION AND E MERGENCY M OBILIZATION E FFORT TO R ESTORE A S AFE C LIMATE Review is by Ruth Sarnoff. I will underline passages where I believe the Chico City Council has not fulfilled its pledge to the people of Chico. My commentary will be started and ended by RS. WHEREAS, it is commonly agreed that global warming and climate change are increasing global temperatures more rapidly than previously anticipated, and current human activities and technologies are accelerating the pace of global temperature increase, and the current trajectory of temperature increase threatens our modern way of life; and WHEREAS, all people desire clean water, clean food and soil, and public safety & good health and to pass on to posterity a sustainable economy and healthy planet; and WHEREAS, adaptation of current technologies and economic investment is necessary to mitigate loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of rapidly rising global temperatures including increasingly long and more frequent and widespread drought, and a three-fold increase in intensity and the magnitude of wild fires, heat waves that threaten the lives of vulnerable people RS-- I already happened. Many cities and towns in Butte and other counties no longer exist. I see rd NO signs of adaptation, as referenced in 3 WHEREAS. It was, and is now, an uninterrupted process of the race to approve, with a (25yr. old) Consent Agenda Items I reference during my review, will have documents you most likely are already familiar witht because I was part the drafting of the Resolutions. I was Public Record. Much has changed since 1996. My views are mine. I can only share my life experiences. Everyone is different. Thousands living in Chico, Butte County, north counties and even other states, have ideas about what direction Chico should take. RS Unfulfilled Promises and City and County Budgets, and Airport Expansion/Uses of Adjacent Land, and Scarcity/Pollution/of Water Sources: and an Audit of Vacant, Sturdy, Buildings (ie. brick, marble, concrete) Renovating/Space on the Inside to create Shelter. Months of Renovation in Downtown Chico is a good example. Housing is needed for Thousands of Homeless on the streets NOW It is 55 degrees F outside right now, at 4:46 pm. That means some people living on the streets, will die tonight of Hypothermia. I plan to call the City th Clerk Office at 8:00 am., Monday, November 9, to see if Climate Emergency Measures in effect and where I can go on your website for details. I am inserting your website on the reating. My old body says it is time to close for the night. RS https://www.epa.gov/superfund-redevelopment-initiative/superfund-sites-reuse-california th DR The 4 WHEREAS, numerous international agencies have corroborated these dangers, including:--world leaders from 196 nations met in December 2015 to address this threat, and signed the Paris Climate Accord and agreed to keep warming to well below 2 degrees C over pre-industial levels; and a failure to implement these plans has resulted in an increase in global temperature that at the current rate will exceed the goal set by this Accord by 2026 https://unfcc.int/process-and-meetings/the-paris-agreement/what-is-the-paris-agreement; and--the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)report of the (October 2018), warns that there are only 12 years to keep warming at a maximum of 1.5 and avoid catastrophic breakdown; the authors of the IPCC said urgent and unprecedented changes, which are affordable and feasible; are needed to th reach the target https://www.ipcc.ch/ andthe 4 Annual National Climate Assessment (November 23, 2018), warns that extreme weather and climate-related events in the U.S. are worsening; this report also predicts increased drought cycles and heat waves in the Western U.S with a resulting three-fold increase in intensity and magnitude of wildfires, unless greenhouse gas emissions are curbed https://www.globalchange.gov/nca4; and a 2015 special report in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society found the increase in fire risk in California is attributable to human-induced climate change https://www.ametsoc.org/ams/index.cfm/publications/bulletin-of-the-american- meteorological-society-bams/explaining-extreme-events-from-a-climate-perspective/ and a 2016 study in the Proccedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that human- caused global warming doubled the area burned by wildfires in the Western U.S. over just the past 30 years Https://www.pnas.org/content/113/11770; RS A quick look at the U.N. is important. Why? Its history, and its predecessor history are important. The League of st Nations founded in 1918 after the 1 World War to try to prevent future wars. It did not succeed. The United Nations, founded in 1945 has also failed to prevent wars. In 1945, countries that had colonies wrote the rules. These once large and all powerful countries could no longer hold onto colonies in the same way. To this day we have 2 wings of the U.N. One wing has the World Bank & International Monetary Fund (IMF) and speaks for Global Corporate Interests. The other wing, the General Assembly, has heads of state represent 200 countries (former colonies). The U.N. has an International Court and Agencies to coordinate activities that could only happen globally like coordinating of flights, (time zones, many - region and countries talk to each other. A Treaty that bans the use, manufacturing, sale, th and maintenance of nuclear weapons has just received 50 ratification needed to make nuclear weapons for the affirming nations illegal under international law for the first time in history. Among the ratifying nations are regional influencers including Nigeria, Thailand, th South Africa, Mexico, Austria and New Zealand. Honduras, the 50 ratifying nation, put pen th to paper Saturday, on the 75 anniversary of the founding of the United Nations. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the treaty It includes mechanisms that will allow these nations to hold each other accountable should a breach in the treaty be found. The International Campaign to Abolish NucleSetsuko Thurlow, 88, one of the last survivors of the bombing of Hiroshima is and has been a strong campaigner for the treaty as the founder of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). ICAN won th th that we reached our 50 head in my hands and cried tears of joy. I have committed my life to the abolition of nuclear weapons. I have nothing but gratitude for all who have worked for the success of our RS-- new nuclear funding of $95.8B for WAR be a priority, when survival needs of people in Chico and Fire and Flood weary nearby cities and counties are facing freezing 32F temperature here in Chico. Now we have a newly-elected congress? A high-profile discussion on cutting the U.S. military budget to begin now in local communities. People in local communities, the 99%, ultimately pay for , including past, present and future wars through income taxes and lost dollars for the things people really need to survive. Weapons producers usually get what they want for research, development, design and production and fighting proxy wars. RS RSA , still endangering communities, is urgently needed. Smoke from fires, with lighter than air tiny particles, can be found all over the planet, even in the Arctic. Prevention of fires, rather than massive response strategies would be helpful. Prevention is less costly in dollars and respectful of the lungs fire-fighting teams. emphasis on prevention. Climate disasters as referenced in the Climate Emergency Plan (CEP) are materializing before my eyes. Articles in a variety of media, especially in AP articles which follow more national and international news are import. Any argument that says a New City Plan, -to-the-drawing-is not needed begs the question. RS RS My review of the Chico City Plan of 1996 goes only as far into all the WHEREASs I get. Wednesday, 11/11/20, and mid-afternoon. Perhaps members of the council could look back st to pre-1996 records? Many questions are still unanswered. When was the 1 Chico City Airport Plan approved? Did it include public participation? Did it include an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) which provides the public a role in looking at everything? Traffic, air quality, housing, water issues, trends dealing with homeless people and shortage of low-cost shelter could have been addressed, or maybe not. Poverty rates, health care, care of the elderly, may have been on the table for city evaluation, or maybe not. One thing is for sure, if we were to look at the last full EIR of both the Chico City Plan, and Airport Complex Plan, we might find it originally did not have an adjacent Manufacturing Complex, or it did. And st when did Chico decide to have its 1 City Manager/s? What year was that? Old high school senior Yearbooks might be useful, if you really want to know your own history. Whatever answers to questions about Chicos history unveil themselves, one thing is for sure, life in Chico was a whole different scene. When compared to November, 2020, Chicos environment is very DIFFERENT now! Airliners for Passenger flight; Military Airliners and Jets; Small Planes and Helicopters hovering overhead for Purposes Unknown is the new NORM. Freight Trains with Boxcars passing thru Chicos Railroad Station with Highly Flammable cargo is another new NORM. A new CHICO CITY PLAN is not an unreasonable request, especially as extreme weather is becoming even MORE extreme. Another NORM is that many who have evacuated and lost homes have done so multiple times. Questions council members might ask of themselves are: When did the Chico Airport first begin Manufacturing on what is now the Airport Complex? Has it always been a site partially run by the Department of Defense (DOD)? Whats being stored & manufactured only a couple or three miles from downtown Chico? Im not the only one who is anxious to know.--RS RS -- o th Weapon during the same time period that ICAN (Hiroshima survivors) got its 50signature so 50 countries could sign their own agreement to ban Nuclear Weapons and for legal status in International Courts. I helped to collect signatures on the Stockholm appeal as a teen, before I was able to vote. I share this story at this time to encourage local elcoming -to- st 51U.S. State, January 1, 2021. The past struggles for Statehood by people enslaved for 401 years, has come to fruition. I hope there will be a re-consideration of the decision to end the Councils AD HOC Committee on POLICING. If re-consideration happens, then the 11 hours (7 meetings) could be a force for change. The joy of D.C. celebrations should not bring death or injury to anyone. This Review is being shared widely and 4 pages so far. I hope participation rd innext Tuesdays Council Meeting will be good. SHARE THIS REVIEW ASAP. Nov 3 meeting is on line. Watch last part, with no public. Enlightening, a Brown Act no-no, and funny. -- RS