Kenneth “Pops” Yarber became homeless in 1995, not long after a brain aneurism put him in a wheelchair. Suddenly, he was forty years old and on disability. Not long afterward, the bank foreclosed on his house on 4th Street in Modesto, and he began bouncing from the streets to short stays with friends and relatives. […]
Homeless: Are Shelters Obsolete?
The rise in numbers of homeless shelters in the United States coincided with deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill in the late 1970s. During the same decade, runaway inflation—especially rising costs of living—left some members of the economy unable to keep up. The result was more homelessness. Over the years, socio-economic factors have continued to contribute […]
Water and the River: Upping the Ante
Those who attended last Tuesday’s afternoon session of the Federal Energy Regulation Comission (FERC) at Modesto’s Doubletree Hotel listened to people who use and love the Tuolumne River explain why their needs should be represented in decisions about relicensing Don Pedro Dam’s hydroelectric project, which is powered by the Tuolumne River. The chief issue for […]
Water: “We farm, you pay.” Subsidence and Socialism in the Valley
Among the more persistent mythologies of the American west, few are as enduring and erroneous as those about water, especially here in the San Joaquin Valley. The one consistent element in all of them is that no matter what’s wrong, “It’s all government’s fault.” So it is that when California became the last state in […]
Homeless: Frank Ploof Reflects on Beard Brook Village
Frank Ploof’s last job before retirement was at the Lawrence Livermore National Lab. He was a Computer Scientist by classification but spent most of his career defining and building information systems. Working with scientists got him accustomed to information systems, critical thinking, testing theories, and working with data. For well over the last five years, […]
“Why do we wait for occasions like this?”
An overflow crowd packed Modesto’s Islamic Center Monday night, as speaker after speaker emphasized the need for unity and love in the aftermath of the slaughter of fifty worshippers at a mosque in New Zealand last Friday. Muslim leaders apologized several times for not having a facility big enough to accommodate everyone, and earlier on […]
Beard Brook Village: The End Game
The last days of Beard Brook Village were like the aftermath of a natural disaster— people pawing through the rubble of discarded clothing, bicycle parts and cooking utensils, a stream of humanity pushing shopping carts, baby strollers, and wheel chairs to and fro, and loose dogs everywhere. The debris-strewn chaos of Beard Brook was in […]
Subsidence? Socialize it!
Subsidence and socialism are two “S” words that wouldn’t seem to have much in common, especially here in the San Joaquin Valley. Nevertheless, for insiders in the Valley’s intricate water game, the words are inextricably linked. Subsidence is caused by overpumping groundwater. Pump too much groundwater and the land sinks. Pump too much water over […]
Fallow Me to Water? Not Likely
For the better part of thirty years, Modesto’s Vance Kennedy has been trying to tell people we don’t have enough water. Now in his mid-nineties, Kennedy is a retired hydrologist who received the highest possible service award from the Environmental Protection Agency when he was with the United States Geological Survey. In an announcement bound […]
Leaving Beard Brook Village: The Crucible
Fear, rumors and resistance rippled through Beard Brook Village prior to this week’s scheduled relocation to a site just a few hundred yards away. The wildest rumor was that the new location was actually a FEMA camp. Some villagers had more reasonable concerns, especially about the size and placement of the tents. “Camp Mom” Melanie […]