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Ballot-box budgeting: Vote NO on Props 6 and 9 Re-elect Vegas, Hampton to KHSD board Those were mighty pricey bricks Open season on campaign theft No on Proposition 7 How does Interstate 7 sound? Quit posturing and get it done Modified bailout must go forward Tonight’s debate must go forward Safety must be top concern June 06 July 06 August 06 September 06 October 06 November 06 December 06 January 07 February 07 March 07 April 07 May 07 June 07 July 07 August 07 September 07 October 07 November 07 December 07 January 08 February 08 March 08 April 08 May 08 June 08 July 08 August 08 September 08 October 08 June 06 May 06 April 06 March 06 February 06 January 06 December 05 November 05 October 05 September 05 August 05 July 05 June 05 May 05 April 05 March 05 February 05 Blog RollAsk The Californian Editorials Entertainment Eye of Bakersfield Faith Forum Fired Up! Inside Sports Neighbors Right Thinking Sound Off Talk of the Town 
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PUBLISHED 10-31-07
The blustery winds, the October chill, the waning autumn moon, the discarded candy wrappers skittering across rye-grass lawns — it can all only mean one thing: Halloween is upon us.
The annual festival of goblins, superheroes and fairy-tale princesses comes around again tonight, and lest you dismiss the informal holiday as an exercise in triviality, bear in mind that, according to the National Retail Federation, total Halloween spending for 2007 is expected to...
PUBLISHED 10-30-07 ----
There seems to be an uproar about “mandatory” curbside recycling in Bakersfield, an inevitability that moves closer to reality with every passing day.
“You can’t make me recycle,” a fair number of letter-writers and assorted other critics say. “I just won’t do it.”
Rest assured, nobody will try. Just because Bakersfield seems likely to join the rest of the civilized West by establishing a more complete...
PUBLISHED 10-30-07 -----
ATV riders and other off-road enthusiasts may actually finally agree with their environmentalist adversaries on something — a new law that recasts the Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Commission.
And while neither side is jumping for joy, the new law beats the alternative — how the commission was established.
The new law, which takes effect Jan. 1, strips the soon-to-be-revamped commission of most of its funding authority and gives the governor a bigger...
PUBLISHED 10-30-07 -----
Kudos to Gov. Schwarzenegger for giving the major cities of the Central Valley more say on the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District Board — and two new seats to experts in a position to make policy decisions based on their specific areas of expertise.
Schwarzenegger recently signed state Sen. Mike Machado’s SB 719, a move that clean-air advocates have every reason to cheer. The new law makes room on the expanded board for a doctor and a...
As the embers begin to cool at some of the devastating Southland fires, the criticism and second-guessing of responses and preparedness are surfacing.
What isn’t being second-guessed is the effectiveness of stricter building standards and fire-protection strategies required in some of the newer subdivisions that survived the flames.
Consider Santa Clarita’s Stevenson Ranch. Threatened by an earlier wildfire that came within reach, the homes survived. That survival scene was...
Chad Vegas may be on to something after all. The Kern High School District trustee, who wants to see the slogan “In God We Trust” posted in each of the district’s 2,375 classrooms, has proposed a followup proposition that has merit — if it’s massaged a bit.
The school district, Vegas says, should require that all 2,375 classrooms also display the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence.
If that sounds like a lot of patriotic...
Many Kern County voters received their “permanent absentee voter” applications this month. No doubt the completed application forms are starting to pour back into election central.
Voting by mail has increased in popularity over the years, and it’s been no different in Kern County. The county registrar has already issued some 85,000 permanent absentee-voter applications, assuring that the number of vote-by-mail citizens will dwarf the total of 20,000 from the November...
Kern County is pitching in to save San Diego County and the rest of the threatened Southland — and no, not just with firefighters.
Defense technology developed to help fight wars has been adapted to fight the raging home-front war against wildfire.
NASA’s unmanned Predator B aircraft, outfitted with high-tech imaging equipment, was dispatched Wednesday morning from Edwards Air Force Base on a fire flyover.
The Ikhana aircraft, modified for civil science and research...
Hundreds of thousands of people homeless. Hundreds of homes and businesses destroyed. Thousands of firefighters from throughout the state and nation, including some from Kern County and Bakersfield, on the front lines.
Southern California is ablaze. With strong Santa Ana winds and other fire-fueling weather conditions predicted to continue through today — and maybe days ahead — the property destruction and human tragedy mounts.
This time it is Southern California. But...
Now you’re talking! The alternative design for Bakersfield’s entrance signs is much better than the existing, muddy, impossible-to-read signs. It is better than earlier proposal for unimpressive aluminum replacements.
And best yet, the price is right. StructureCast, the company that built the current signs, has offered to donate four new signs to Vision 2020, the Bakersfield group heading the effort to spruce up the city’s entrances.
Two of the signs will replace...
PUBLISHED 10/23/07 ----
It’s too bad that some cows — and some dairymen — aren’t happy these days. But we should be more concerned about making the people who live and breathe in Kern County happy.
Earlier this month, a group of dairymen complained to Kern County supervisors about the county’s delay in processing their permits to construct new mega-dairies.
After receiving about two dozen applications to build additional mega-dairies in 2004, county...
PUBLISHED 10/23/07 ----
U.S. dentists are earning more money than ever. Meanwhile, more than a quarter of the population is dealing with untreated cavities — the largest percentage of dentally deprived Americans in two decades. Something is seriously wrong here.
The New York Times reports that dentists’ fees are rising far faster than inflation, and at the same time some 100 million Americans are going without dental insurance. The trend reverses a half-century shift...
It’s time for Bakersfield to adopt univeral curbside recycling. All Bakersfield city residents need to receive and pay for curbside pickup of cans, bottles, plastics and other household discards for recycling.
While we continue to pack our landfills, the market for products made in whole or in part from recyclables continues to grow. Meanwhile, the state continues to monitor cities’ compliance with mandates for limiting household waste.
The time is right.
We’ve got...
The city of Bakersfield may soon require that all residents pay for curbside recycling, but there’s no reason local folks who may not already have requested the blue toters shouldn’t try to beat the rush and act immediately.
Recycle now. Call the city’s Waste Management Department and find out how you can jump on board the curbside recycling bandwagon before the city requires it.
Only about 5 percent of the city — roughly 4,300 of Bakersfield’s 85,000...
More and more pharmacies are starting to take on passing resemblances to medical clinics or doctors’ offices. At many drug counters around the country, customers can check their blood pressure, monitor their cholesterol, even learn about blood-sugar meters if they are diabetics.
The trend could accelerate to a whole new level if the Food and Drug Administration approves a proposal to allow patients to obtain selected routine medications after consulting with a pharmacist...
The landslide that damaged some 111 homes in La Jolla Oct. 3 reinforces the wisdom of Bakersfield’s hillside development ordinance, enacted last year.
Streets in the San Diego County community buckled, foundations slipped and water lines erupted, sending homeowners packing, lawyers scurrying and insurance companies ducking.
Weather, erosion and other natural phenomena routinely trump the best-engineered plans of humans, and the La Jolla slide was only the most recent example.
...
The big mess on northeast Bakersfield’s Oswell Street is a virtual petri dish for the conflicting sentiments every driver must feel when confronted with construction delays.
“Thank God they’re finally fixing this! But do they have to tear it up so badly — especially when I’m trying to get through?”
General speaking, motorists need to lighten up when they’re confronted with construction delays. We don’t get better roads without a little...
Traffic was flowing again Monday over Interstate 5 near Santa Clarita. The damaged freeway reopened much sooner than expected after the Friday night fiery collision of 30 big rig trucks and a passenger car.
Highway crews worked around the clock to reopen the state’s vital north-south route by Monday morning. Their heroic effort is applauded. But in the aftermath, the questioning is only beginning.
Temperatures in the 550-foot long tunnel, used to divert truck traffic around...
One of Kern County’s more distant neighbors to the north is getting serious about fighting sprawl.
Stanislaus County may have two anti-sprawl measures on the February ballot, one backed by a pair of Modesto city councilmen (one current and one former), the other written at the direction of the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors.
The councilmen’s version, dubbed the Stamp Out Sprawl measure, would prohibit the rezoning of unincorporated farmland for residential...
PUBLISHED 10/16/07 ---
The sickening sound of grinding metal and glass. A deadly crash on Stockdale Highway near Fairway Drive. One woman dead. Her husband in critical condition. A toddler injured. Two men have been arrested on criminal charges.
Sunday night’s fatal accident was no accident. It was just plain stupidity, negligence, and reckless, unlawful behavior.
It is an all too familiar story — one being played out with increasing frequency throughout California.
...
PUBLISHED 10/16/07 ---
No wonder California high-school students don’t seem to stack up as well academically, on average, as students from other states.
California’s standardized achievement tests are tougher than the standardized tests administered in almost every other state. That might help explain why fewer than half of California’s students score “proficient” in math and English.
At least that’s what a new study finds. The Thomas B. Fordham...
PUBLISHED 10/12/07 ----
Kern County District Attorney Ed Jagels has a solution to the problem of conflicting federal and state laws regarding medical marijuana dispensaries: revoke the county’s oversight or ban dispensaries altogether.
California law authorizes the establishment of local rules to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries and cooperatives. Federal law treats marijuana use, sales and cultivation as illegal activities.
After California voters passed an initiative...
PUBLISHED 10/11/07 -----
The Kern County Library needs your help. A vandal broke into the northeast Bakersfield branch late last month and damaged nearly the entire collection of 50,000 volumes in the nine minutes it took police to arrive and put a stop to it.
Before the 16-year-old vandal was apprehended, he smashed his way through a set of windows, overturned bookshelves and emptied two fire extinguishers — leaving a fine coating of irritating chemicals — on thousands of...
PUBLISHED 10/11/07 -----
What monetary value would you place on having an extra hour added to your waking life? What worth would you assign to the opportunity to skip most of your daily commute to spend time with your kids, write your screenplay, or recline in your La-Z-Boy?
The city of Santa Cruz asked commuters in a recent online survey. About a quarter of the estimated 10,000 to 20,000 commuters who travel into the Silicon Valley each day would take a pay cut to work in Santa...
PUBLISHED 10-10-07
If you’ve ever hesitated to toss that bag of pre-cut spinach or lettuce medley into your shopping cart, you’ve cast a vote for tougher regulation of leafy-green growers.
As outbreaks of E. coli and salmonella continue to erode consumer confidence, the outcry for a mandatory recall protocol and other oversights grows louder. And the louder it gets, the more urgent it becomes for growers to get on board.
We’ve had two fresh-produce recalls in the...
PUBLISHED 10-10-07 ----
The advent of cooler autumn weather means it’s time for homeowners to cut back the watering times on their automatic sprinklers. Lawns of most varieties can survive quite nicely in winter-long dormancy.
This might also be a good time for us to consider other landscaping options, however. Like no lawn at all.
The West is an arid place and lawns suck up an inordinate amount of water. Most people are loath to allow their lawns to go brown, as lawns...
PUBLISHED 10-09-07
The Onion, that bastion of tasteless parody, seems to have come nauseatingly close to forecasting an actual news event.
When supporters of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani announced plans for a Northern California fundraiser they’d clumsily dubbed “$9.11 for Rudy” — yes, the admission charge was to be nine dollars and 11 cents — they came close to validating a February satire piece from The Onion.
Giuliani, the parody Web site...
PUBLISHED 10-9-07
Flipping off the light switch as you leave the room might save a penny or two. Imagine what the savings might look like if hundreds of thousands of people flip the switch — and leave it flipped for an entire hour.
We’ll find out Oct. 20, when San Francisco goes dark from 8 p.m. until 9 p.m. The plan is to turn off as many lights as possible in homes, offices and government buildings across the city — with only essential lighting such as street lights...
PUBLISHED 10-07-07
It’s most unfortunate that President Bush used his veto power last week to deny health care to 3.8 million children from working-class American families.
Many of these are the children of “tweener” families — the kids whose parents are not poor enough to qualify for free medical care, but unable to afford to buy their own. So these children go without — or they wait until serious injury or illness strikes. Then they’re rushed to an...
PUBLISHED 10-05-07
Hey you! The guy with the can of spray paint. Smile for the camera.
Anti-graffiti units in the Bakersfield area haven’t quite been introducing themselves that way, but the effect is the same.
For nearly three years now, officials with the Kern County General Services department, working in concert with the Sheriff’s department, have been using stationary digital cameras in the fight against...
PUBLISHED 10-04-07
The American Red Cross-Kern Chapter has been helping people overcome danger, inconvenience and outright tragedy for 90 years now.
The people of Kern County need to step up and return the favor, and soon. The local chapter is in dire financial straits, and while officials from the nonprofit agency say bankruptcy is unlikely, they portray a grievous set of circumstances.
The solution shouldn’t be too tough. When we write our donation checks — and Kern...
PUBLISHED 10-04-07
We may change our minds about a lot of things — paper or plastic, decaf or high-caf, jazz or blues, sugar-free or sugar-coated, Britney or Lindsay, Hillary or Mitt — but here’s one thing we’re not likely to budge on, no matter which way the wind blows.
Do not call me at home.
The national Do Not Call list, created in June 2003 to protect people from receiving unsolicited sales calls at home, will start expiring next summer after its initial...
PUBLISHED 10-03-07
Clearly, Kern High School District trustee Chad Vegas doesn’t have enough to do. Perhaps he is satisfied with lagging district test scores, troubling dropout rates, the scarcity of vocational ed opportunities, the dismal percentage of students going on to get four-year degrees and the multitude of other issues that challenge educators regularly.
How else to explain his willingness to introduce a new church-vs.-state debate into the business of managing our...
PUBLISHED 10-02-07
The safety campaign intended to prevent deaths among field workers and others who labor in the summer sun appears to have paid off. That’s not to say it can’t improve.
Thanks largely to an increased number of state inspections, deaths have dramatically decreased since California’s Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board launched a campaign two years ago requiring access to adequate shade and clean water for workers.
Cal-OSHA is on track to...
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