The sirens on the night of Wednesday the 18th sounded eerie and odd. The emergency vehicles weren't moving fast. A muffled, highly amplified voice penetrated the foggy night. Was it an evacuation, a flood, a wall of fire, a killer on the loose? I hadn't heard such confusing and scary chaos in Davis since the evening Natalie Corona was killed.

I ran outside and saw three emergency vehicles in the distance winding slowly onto my street a few blocks north, then slowly winding off of it. The muffled warnings continued, inaudible and invoking concern. None of this was helped by the sonically-delayed echoes of the sirens and muffled voice off the recently-constructed 5-story student apartments behind me.

I ran towards the vehicles, hoping to hear what the emergency was and what we should do. Finally I heard:  "Ho Ho Ho, Merry Christmas".

First of all, I'm Jewish. But no, I was not offended by the lack of a menorah on the hood.  Celebrate Christmas all y'all want.

But I have rarely experienced such a display of tone-deaf foolishness from a local government entity. I mean, nothing says "Peace on Earth" like sirens and emergency lights and what sounded like an amplified public emergency warning. You already got your Davis-subsidized ladder-truck because y'all were awarded for not cooperating with UC's fire department, and now you want a new fire station and the rebuilding of another.

To gain public respect and support please considering how some residents of Davis may react to a "well meaning" act that included the extended presence of emergency vehicles, emergency lights, sirens and amplified warnings in our neighborhoods.

Bah Humbug

OB-GYN Carol Darwish will discuss and answer questions about menopause at the Wednesday, Jan. 8 meeting of Soroptimist International of Davis.

The meeting is from 11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. in the conference room at University Inn and Suites, 1111 Richards Blvd., Davis. Open to the public, this is one of a series of talks on women’s health that the club plans for its 2024-2025 year.

Darwish is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist in practice for more than 20 years. She completed her medical training at Tulane University in New Orleans. She practiced at Kaiser Napa Solano for 11 years and at Sutter Davis for four years. For the past nine years, she has worked in hospital settings throughout the Bay Area, Tahoe and Mammoth Lakes, and most recently in Santa Cruz County, Woodland and San Francisco. She lives in Davis with her family.

Lunch is available for $15. First-time attendees are free. Please RSVP by 5 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 6 for lunch by emailing [email protected]. Guests are welcome to bring their own lunch.

Soroptimist is a global volunteer organization that provides women and girls with access to the education and training they need to achieve economic empowerment. It was founded in 1921 in Alameda County. Soroptimist International of Davis was chartered in 1954. Local members join some 75,000 Soroptimists in 122 countries and territories to contribute time and financial support to community-based projects benefiting women and girls. Its core values are gender equality, empowerment, education, diversity and fellowship.

SI Davis offers cash Live Your Dream Awards to female heads of household seeking education or training, and assists King High students through its Dream It, Be It: Career Support for Girls program. It also funds high school scholarships, and grants to nonprofits that align with the Soroptimist mission.

SI Davis members meet twice a month on Wednesdays – once at lunchtime and once in the evening – and connect for other fun activities and service. Learn more at https://www.sidavis.org/.

From the Department of Shameless Self-Promotion, I bring you an announcement of an upcoming event for my recently-published book: The Land Is Our Community: Aldo Leopold’s Environmental Ethic for the New Millennium (University of Chicago Press).   Mark your calendars now for this free event, one month from today!

Event info:

When Climate Action meets Tech meets Social Justice

By David Abramson

The California Air Resources Board alongside Pedal Ahead, a San Diego-based 501c3 whose stated goal is to ‘foster a transportation system that is both environmentally friendly and accessible to all’ just launched their first program to provide up to $2000 for 1500 low-income folks to purchase eBikes, called the California eBike Incentive Project.

They announced the launch of the program to the public via what appeared to be a quite sizable multi-channel marketing campaign, with applications set to open on Wednesday, December 18 at 6PM. Fanfare and nervous, excited anticipation presumably ensued.

As the local neighborhood techie, I supported a friend and their sibling in shooting their shot to be one of the lucky 1500. First off, my friend’s family comes from a disadvantaged background and economic status for whom this program was presumably intended, and truly needed the money in order to be able to buy an eBike so she and her sibling were quite excited about the prospect of getting support for this!

I knew the odds were stacked against them once I saw how this program was going to go down, but we worked towards having the best chance possible to make it in.

Hello fellow advocates for our homeless neighbors,

Please see the letter below. We have created a "Compassion Fund" to provide motel rooms for people who need them this winter. The letter explains this more in detail, but if you can find it in your hearts to contribute, your donation will go a long way toward getting vulnerable folks off the street and into a warm, safe environment, at least temporarily. Each motel night costs $80-100, depending on size and amenities.  Donate here.

Secondly, Davis Community Meals and Housing and HEART of Davis would like to make Christmas and New Year's Days special for the guests of the congregate Winter Shelter (1111 H Street). Please consider signing up to bring food for lunch and breakfast on those days. More information here:

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0D4CAEAA23A46-53931782-christmas

Additionally, we need 1 volunteer per shift to help out on Christmas day, Wednesday 12/25/2024 and New Years Day, Wednesday 1/1/2025. The volunteers need to be over  the age of 18. Responsibilities will be: passing out food and other resources and making sure no one but shelter guests enter Paul's Place.

The shifts available on the 25th and 1st are:

The following was emailed to Chancellor May on December 11, 2024.

Dear Chancellor May: 

We write with appreciation for the actions campus staff are taking to reduce UC Davis’ greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and to ask you to ensure that UCD sets strong goals for Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions reductions in response to UCOP’s call for campus targets for all UCs to be submitted by 1/1/2025 (for background see here).

Specifically, we would like UCD to officially establish targets of 75% reductions in Scope 1 and 2 emissions below the 2019 baseline by 2030, 81% by 2035, and 95% by 2040, which are the feasible potential reductions identified by our own Fossil Fuel-Free Pathway Plan (FFFPP).

We view the strong intermediate 2030 target from our campus FFFPP as particularly important, given the urgency of the climate crisis. Communicating around near-term goals that are meaningful for our undergraduate students will show them our commitment to leading on the climate crisis. 

We would also like to encourage campus to accelerate the process for tracking and reducing Scope 3 emissions (those generated off-campus, for example by travel and commuting). The state is requiring public and private companies to submit annual reports of such emissions by 2030 (a date which may be moved up to 2027), and strong near-term Scope 3 reductions will be needed to set us on a track toward UCOP’s goal to “reduce total emissions (scope 1, 2, and 3) at least 90% by 2045 without relying on carbon offsets.” We would like to be a part of campus discussions around Scope 3 targets and processes.

Finally, we would like to let you know that a group of us has formally asked the Academic Senate to consider a detailed proposal for a Climate Crisis General Educational (GE) Requirement so that all UCD undergraduates will graduate with some background in climate science, action, and justice concepts. This one-course requirement would probably be allowed to overlap with other GEs so as not to increase time-to-graduation. We are happy to provide further details, and hope we can count on your support to make UCD a climate education leader. UC San Diego adopted such a requirement last year, starting for the class entering Fall 2024.

(From press release - Julie Huang) Unitrans and the Davis Food Co-op will host the eighth annual “Stuff the Bus” event Saturday, Dec. 14, from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the parking lot of the Davis Food Co-op, at 620 G St.

On January 7th, the council will consider a city ordinance to create a Down Payment Assistance (DPA) Program—an initiative that can open doors for firsttime home buyers, particularly young families who can afford mortgage payments but struggle to save for a down payment.

DPA programs bridge this gap, offering loans that help families achieve the stability of home ownership and the potential for wealth building through property appreciation. Proven successful in other cities, DPA programs promote workforce housing, increase diversity, and offer a critical step toward addressing economic inequities.

These programs are flexible—structured as repayable loans or equity-sharing agreements—and recycle the payments plus interest, equity or both are paid back into the City Housing Trust Fund, creating a sustainable cycle of assistance. Prioritizing workforce families who live and work locally could also reduce greenhouse gas emissions by shortening commutes.

With Measure Q’s passage in November, the city will have access to $11 million yearly in new funds. While there are many critical needs in our city, both our Housing Element and the Housing Trust Fund Appendix A of the Housing Element acknowledge the need for supporting first time home buyers. Allocating $1 million yearly to the DPA program could support 50 families with a $20,000 DPA—an impactful investment that strengthens our schools, diversifies our community, and enables wealth-building for those often excluded from home ownership opportunities.

Carpe diem—let’s seize this moment. Urge the council to create and fund a Down Payment Assistance program. Together, we can make home ownership a reality for more Davis families.

Interfaith Housing Justice Davis

The following letter from Dan Carson and Elaine Roberts Musser was sent to the Davisite this morning for posting.

Dear Davis City Councilmembers and Commissioners,

As you know, Agenda Item 06-B on the Dec. 3, 2024 City Council agenda presents the latest proposal by Mayor Chapman and Councilmember Vaitla to control how items are placed on city commission agendas. It is, in our view, an improvement over prior versions of their proposal, in that it creates fewer opportunities for violations of the state’s landmark open meeting law, the Brown Act. However, it does not completely take care of that problem, and it contains other crucial flaws. In particular, this proposed change would improperly and unwisely attempt to micromanage deliberations of the corps of volunteer experts on our city commissions. They have long provided invaluable expertise and perspective free of charge for the benefit of our citizens.

Accordingly, we again urge the full City Council to reject this proposal and adopt an alternative approach we outline at the end of this letter. An approach that we believe would foster a sense of community and collaboration between the Council and its commissions, rather than one that will come across as controlling and condescending.

Unfortunately, this continually-evolving and still-vague proposal was publicly released by Mayor Chapman and Councilmember Vaitla on the city’s website just before the long Thanksgiving holiday weekend was beginning. It is likely that many affected commissioners are unaware of this new proposal. 

But we note that prior versions of this plan were roundly rejected by most of the commissioners who were asked to review it during a series of public hearings held in September, and with good reason.  As detailed in a prior message we shared with you, one commissioner after another voiced their concern the proposal would result in delays that would stifle their ability to conduct the public’s business and render them unable to provide the very advice the council assigned them to provide.  Commissions that meet less frequently could have their ideas sidetracked for months. They would be less likely to bring their ideas forward.  Proposals that were time-sensitive in nature, such as consideration of city budget issues, would die by default.