Unconventional Sources

It always seemed unsustainable, the idea of a progressive voice for Irvine, California. If you’ve ever been to Irvine, you know what I mean.

Irvine isn’t so much a place as a collection of almost places. Glass towers are circled by streets that lead to streets that never really get to anywhere, and before you know it, you’re out of Irvine, and into another ill-defined Southern California Communitee(TM). There are places in Irvine where it’s actually illegal to cross the street.

Yet, while it lasted, IrvineProgressive.com was a strong voice for progressive interests, coming right out of Irvine, California.

IrvineProgressive is now gone. Although you can still visit the domain, it’s just a place filler that sells real estate and cosmetic dental services. The holder of the domain name is hoping to sell it at a premium price. I’m betting that they don’t have any takers for a long, long time.

A note that makes me wish I were in California – and that’s a rare thing:

May 11-15 is California Bike Commute Week this year. That means that you’ve got less than two weeks to prepare for that week of bike commuting, so maybe you want to get a bit of practice in – a day or two of bike commuting between then and now.

Map out you route, and take a bit of extra time, and enjoy yourself. You’ll be saving money and helping the clear the air in the process.

There’s bad news for bighorn sheep tonight, at least for the peninsular bighorn sheep that live to the south of Palm Springs in California. The Obama Administration just slashed their protected habitat to a third of its previous level.

Here are a few sources you can use to learn more about the peninsular bighorn sheep and the efforts to protect it:

- Bighorn Institute
- Center for Biological Diversity
- Desert Survivors
- Zip Code Zoo profile

The Marine Mammal Center of California does important work rescuing and rehabilitating stranded marine mammals on the beaches of California. They’ve recently been profiled by the PBS show Nova, and I don’t blame the Center for linking to the show itself.

However, I’m suspicious of the show itself. The show is called Ocean Animal Emergency, and it describes the work of the Marine Mammal Center dealing with seals that are stranded after encountering a natural toxin called domoic acid. That’s interesting, but it pales in comparison to the Ocean Animal Crisis that’s going on with huge numbers of animals dying because of the human consumption of fossil fuels.

Fossil fuels are extracted, refined and delivered by companies like Exxon-Mobil. Exxon-Mobil helps to fund the PBS program NOVA, which in return advertises for Exxon-Mobil.

When will NOVA run a documentary on the ethical implications of that toxic arrangement?

I found the activist site Petaluma 4 Change when I was searching for information about the latest activities of U.S. Representative Lynn Woolsey.

They had a link to a letter written by Woolsey to Nancy Pelosi, asking for cuts to health care and kids’ education to be restored.

Thanks, Petaluma, for working for change – the real part, after the hype.

I’m glad to see the bike commuting promotional site Bike Commute Week, which seems to be connected to another site at the address of MayIsBikeMonth.com – but isn’t really about May being Bike Month at all. That second site is just a commuter club site for the Sacramento area.

A little quibble about the Bike Commute Week site too – it doesn’t say when the Sacramento area’s Bike Week actually is. Small detail.

On to the positive: What I love about this site is its inclusion of this one fact, from the Sacramento Air Quality Management District, on the air quality impact of last May’s bike-to-work program there:

“The number of commute and errand miles ridden last May saved 366,551 pounds of global-warming CO2 and 5,092 pounds of other air pollution from our atmosphere. The cyclists also saved 18,854 gallons of gasoline (worth about $65,047).”

366,551 pounds of CO2 not pumped into the air just from one city’s efforts in one week. That’s a good confirmation that if we could have a sustained transition to a bike commuting lifestyle in the USA, we could save ourselves an awful lot of trouble.

A sad statement on the state of bicycling as a form of regular transportation is made over at California Bike Commute, which is sponsorinng the California Bike Commute Week this May (I’ll have a reminder again in a couple of months). The site advises that when you prepare to commute by bicycle,

“Inform your supervisor that you will be commuting by bicycle. Ask where the bicycle can be parked during working hours, and what, if any, advance arrangements need to be made.”

Think about the implications of this. How many businesses can you think of, outside of a place like Manhattan, that don’t have any place to park a car for customers and workers? Now, try to think of more than two or three businesses that do have bike racks, or other places for people to park their bikes when they come to work or shop.

Business owners can make a clear statement in support of sustainable transportation, and in support of worker health: Put a bike rack outside your front door.

What? Watch the garden? But it’s the middle of winter!

No, no. Don’t watch the garden. Watch The Garden – a film about a community garden in Southern California that’s threatened by double-dealing local government.

See Black Valley Films for more information.