California Media Collaborative Rethinks News Media Deployment

From David Simon, formerly of the Baltimore Sun, to Joe Rodriguez of the Mercury News, reporters, media executives, and observers suggest that we either need to bail out the newspapers, change corporate practices, or invent some a form of media or expand an existing one to distribute the news in a responsible and orderly way.

This post comes to us from Louis Freedberg, the founder and director of the California Media Collaborative, an inter-sectoral project to try and rethink the deployment of news media. They have a new project for investigative journalism on issues facing our state. Take a look at Freedberg’s announcement below.–ed.

****

Dear Friends:

I wanted to pass on some good news.

As many of you know, over the past year my colleagues and I at the California Media Collaborative have been developing a plan for a new reporting venture in California, in response to the multiple crises facing the news media

We have now joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, the nation’s oldest investigative journalism organization, which is also making California a major focus of its work.  CIR is led by Robert Rosenthal, the former managing editor of the San Francisco Chronicle and executive editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Together we will be launching a new California-focused reporting venture at CIR, with major support from The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and The James Irvine Foundation. We’ll be hiring a small group of reporters to do in-depth, watchdog and investigative journalism, focusing on issues such as education, immigration, criminal justice and the impact of the recession on  Californians.   Much of it will be data driven in order to show how state level issues affect people in their own communities, and we’ll be using Web-based technology in new and creative ways.

Many of these ideas were first discussed at the landmark Travers Program conference at UC Berkeley to which many of you made such valuable contributions about 18 months ago.

This project is at its core a collaborative one  – which will mean collaborating not only with other media outlets, but with non-profit organizations, academic and public policy institutions, foundations, civic leaders and others who care about how Californians will be informed and engaged on critical issues facing the state and the nation.

I also encourage you to take a look at the Collaborative’s blog site, http://californiamedia.org as well as CIR’s website, http://cironline.org.  We are developing an entirely new Web site for our new California initiative.  In the meantime, the blog site is intended to be an online convenor of discussion and comment on the state of the news media in California — and to highlight new media innovations.   Please participate!

I look forward to being in touch with you as we move forward with this exciting opportunity

Regards,

Louis Freedberg

 

New Book on Prop. 13 from IGS at UC Berkeley + Companion Conference Online

Our colleague, Ethan Rarick, the director of the Center for Politics and Public Service at the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, sends us information on IGS’s publication of this new book on Prop 13. Ever timely, revisiting Prop 13 is especially critical now with rumbles of a constitutional convention and new tax policies reverberating through the state. The book contains articles from several friends of the California Studies Association.

In addition to the book, take a look at IGS’s recent conference on Prop 13: the conference is available on several video sites linked from this site where  you can also view slide presentations. IGS has other publications here.

After the Tax Revolt: California’s

Proposition 13 Turns 30

Jack Citrin and Isaac William Martin, editors

A New Examination of the Legacy of a California Political Milestone

In 1978 California voters shocked the political world by approving Proposition 13, a strict limit on local property tax rates. No state had ever approved such a far-reaching constitutional limitation of the power to tax. And Californians did not just approve it; they embraced it, rejecting dire warnings of doomsday from the state’s political, business, and academic leaders. Voter turnout was the highest recorded for any off-year election in the history of California and the tax cut won in a landslide, with 65 percent of the vote. Thirty years later, Proposition 13 remains firmly entrenched in California’s constitution, but what has it meant for politics and public policy in the state?

On June 6, 2008, the thirtieth anniversary of the adoption of Proposition 13, a group of scholars, journalists and policy experts gathered to assess the legacy of this groundbreaking measure. Their mandate was a simple one: assess what we have learned about the political, economic, and fiscal consequences of Proposition 13 over the last 30 years.

After the Tax Revolt: California’s Proposition 13 Turns 30 is a result of that conference, and an attempt to summarize the state of our knowledge about the consequences of this critical event in the history of California and the United States. This collection of essays constitutes a cutting-edge and timely review of one of the most important reforms in California history, and will be crucial for anyone trying to gain a full understanding of politics and policy in the Golden State.

Order at igs.berkeley.edu/publications or by calling 510-642-1428

Contributors include:
Mark DiCamillo, Field Poll
David Doerr, California Taxpayers Association
William Fischel, Dartmouth
Joel Fox, Fox and Hounds Daily
John Fund, Wall Street Journal
David Gamage, UC-Berkeley
Jean Ross, California Budget Project
Terri Sexton, California State University, Sacramento
Steven Sheffrin, UC-Davis
Kirk Stark, UCLA

About the Editors:
Jack Citrin is Heller Professor of Political Science and the director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley.
Isaac Martin is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, San Diego.

--
Ethan Rarick
Director
Robert T. Matsui Center for Politics and Public Service
Institute of Governmental Studies
University of California, Berkeley
111 Moses MC 2370
Berkeley, CA  94720
510-642-5158
erarick@berkeley.edu

 

Calbuzz: New Blog from Jerry Roberts and Phil Trounstein on California Politics

Just in time for the special election circus and governor’s race side show, two longtime political journalists and commentators have teamed up to form Calbuzz, a new blog about the Golden State’s pu . . . pu . . . pu . . . political scene. Trounstein was recently on the CSA’s radar for our most recent conference on the Silicon Valley because he co-authored, with San Jose State professor Terry Christensen, one of the seminal books on politics in  San Jose, Movers and Shakers: The Study of Community Power (1983).

“About Us

Jerry Roberts is a California journalist who writes, blogs and hosts a TV talk show about politics, policy and media. Former political editor, editorial page editor and managing editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, he serves as student adviser for the Daily Nexus newspaper at UC Santa Barbara. He is the author of “Never Let Them See You Cry,” a biography of Senator Dianne Feinstein.

Phil Trounstine is a communications consultant, pollster and political writer. He is the former political editor of the San Jose Mercury News, former communications director for California Gov. Gray Davis and was the founder and director of the Survey and Policy Research Institute at San Jose State University. He is co-author of “Movers and Shakers: The Study of Community Power.”

via Calbuzz.

 

100 Years Since Allensworth: Is California Living up to the Legacy? A conference May 4 at USC

The inaugural conference in the Hidden Stories Series of the California State Parks Association will take place May 4 at the Doheny Library at USC; the conference title is: “100 Years Since Allensworth: Is California Living up to the Legacy?”

The conference will commemorate the centennial of the founding of Allensworth, a town in Tulare County founded in 1908 for and by African Americans, with the idea that they could own property, learn, thrive, and live the American Dream.  The site of the town is now a the Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park.

The day will includes panels, lunch, and a post-conference reception in the new Visitors Center at the Baldwin Hills Scenic Overlook in Culver City.  The keynote speaker will be the Hon. Willie L. Brown, Jr.

The deadline for registration is April 28.  For more information, and to register, click here.

 

Mark Baldassare: PPIC Comment: From CA Crisis to Innovation

Reproduced from PPIC website

COMMENTARY

From Crisis Comes Hope for Innovation

By Mark Baldassare, president and CEO,
Public Policy Institute of California

This opinion article appeared in the
Sacramento Bee on February 24, 2009

Like earthquakes, wildfires and droughts, California’s budget crises are perennial plagues in this state, though budget problems are happening with more predictability.

In 2003, a budget deficit of $38 billion resulted in the history-making recall of Gov. Gray Davis, who was replaced by action movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger. This year, the sequel played for nearly four months as California state legislators scrambled to fill a $40 billion-plus budget gap.

Why is the world’s eighth-largest economy so prone to budget dramas, and what will be the political repercussions of the latest fiscal meltdown in California? Unlike other large states, California requires lawmakers to operate under three tough conditions: a two-thirds vote for passing state budgets and taxes, legislative term limits, and the citizens’ initiative process. Let’s look at the impact of these conditions.

First, the two-thirds vote threshold sets a very high bar for bipartisan compromise, often leaving tax increases and spending cuts off the table in favor of budget gimmicks and borrowing as lawmakers search for a two-thirds consensus. The track record in this decade readily calls into question the belief that a two-thirds vote leads to sounder fiscal policies.

Second, term limits have stripped the legislative bodies of two important ingredients needed to forge complex budget deals: a deep bench of fiscally knowledgeable legislators and long-term, trusting relationships. In the two decades since term limits took effect, the Legislature has struggled to pass a budget on time.

Third, the initiative process has made it easy for voters to restrict lawmakers’ abilities to raise revenues and make spending decisions – most famously through Proposition 13. In the past 30 years, the voters have enacted many ballot measures that lock in spending and tax decisions, leaving the Legislature with less wiggle room for making adjustments.

Another key factor in producing large budget gaps is that California’s fiscal system has not kept up with the new economy. The state today relies too heavily on volatile personal income taxes and capital gains as revenue mainstays. We also focus revenue collections narrowly on a state sales tax for goods even as we have moved to a service-based economy. We dramatically lowered the property tax and vehicle license fees without indentifying sources for replacing the money or lowering spending. Efforts to improve government efficiency and create a rainy day budget fund have remained on hold for years.

However, there is a silver lining in the current fiscal crisis. Recent polling by the Public Policy Institute of California finds that Californians are, for the first time, amenable to lowering the two-thirds majority vote for the state budget and taxes. This shift in opinion comes just five years after voters soundly rejected a ballot measure that would have changed the two-thirds threshold to 55 percent.

Currently, a flurry of activity is springing up around reform and restructuring proposals. Today, business and civic leaders will gather in Sacramento to discuss plans for a state constitutional convention that could overhaul the entire governance system. The Legislature will soon hold informational hearings on reforming the initiative process. Moreover, the governor and Legislature have convened a bipartisan commission on tax reform, which is scheduled to provide its recommendations by April 15.

In 2003, the budget crisis focused Californians on changing their political leadership. This time, under a much more severe economic downturn, Californians are attacking the state’s fiscal problem in another way – with a multitude of reform plans. Last fall, voters surprised the political establishment by passing an independent redistricting measure. Now, fiscal proposals and an open primary measure are headed for the ballot as part of the budget agreement. Will these reforms lead to a more efficient, effective, and responsive government? Stay tuned. Given the burst of creativity and the desire for change, California is becoming an incubator for innovati

 

Silicon Valley Green Economic Development

BELOW, you will find our preliminary organizing principles and research questions into the project on the Silicon Valley green economy. CLICK here for more information about this project at the Center for Community Innovation and the Department of City and Regional Planning at UC Berkeley.

FIND BELOW:

* Research Questions

* Bibliography

* Webography

Contact:

aaronwilcher AT gmail DOT com (Aaron Wilcher, MCP student researcher)

smontero AT berkekey DOT edu (Sergio Montero, MCP student researcher)

Research Questions: Silicon Valley’s Economic History and Innovation Assets

* Social Networks (see Saxenian, Castells, Rhee, and Joint Ventures annual reports)
–leadership organizations and associations (Joint Ventures, SV Leadership Group [formerly Manufacturing Group]), American Leadership Forum
–industry associations (see Saxenian, 1994)
–neighborhood associations
–community organizing groups (People Acting in Community Together PACT)
–labor groups: South Bay Labor Council and Working Partnerships
–nonprofit and volunteer associations

* Industrial Development (Saxenian, 2 books; see also Walker, Rhee, and Benner; Castells, Pincetl)
–How did flex-spec evolve and diversify? Where does the Valley stand in relation to broader national and international materialist developments in industrial production practices: social networks, spinoffs, flexible employment? With what cities does it share economic-industrial development practices? (see O’Mara’s current work: Bangalore, Shenzhen, Silicon Valley)

* Labor Markets (see Benner, Zlolniski, Pitti, Alarcon, and Saxenian)
–evolution of flex spec and polarized income-wealth distribution
–migration patterns international and domestic-regional
–visa labor markets and illicit markets
–industrial relations: while high tech emerged unorganized, Working Partnerships has led some innovative policy initiatives and been a power broker in the Valley

* Geographic Factors (Spatial Political Economy) (see O’Mara, Matthews, Winner, Findlay, Pitti, Trounstein and Christensen, Rhee, esp. Ch. 4; in general, see Pincetl; see land use reports from the SVLG and Joint Ventures annual reports)
–Political economy of land use
–Stanford’s networks and the political economy of “cities of knowledge”
–in the context of the rise of the Sunbelt
–evolution of economic development factors
–Identify political regimes and their impact on land use and economic development (see especially Trounstein and Christensen; Rhee, Walker 2002, O’Mara)

* Economic Development and Regulatory Contexts (Pincetl, Saxenian, O’Mara)
–crossover with political economy of landuse and development, but specifically, how did city and state policy affect the economic development climate?
–“good business climate”?
–What kinds of policies lay the groundwork for “green economic development”?
–with whom has the Silicon Valley competed and with whom is it now competing (see O’Mara’s current work: Bangalore, Shenzhen, Silicon Valley)
–How have/will regional consumer practices influenced/been influenced by

* Environmental History (see David Pellow, Pincetl, Walker)
–the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition; Superfund sites
–how has the interaction of EJ, environmentalists, federal cleanup, and business corrections and abuses affected the political economic context for developing a green economy?

* Education Institutional Framework (see Saxenian, O’Mara, Walker, 2002; Findlay)
–community colleges, state colleges and research universities, Stanford
–How were these institutions both power brokers in the political economy of land use, but also engines for economic development with employment-education agreements?

* Finance Capital (see Saxenian, Castells)
–how did VC evolve and what did its presence do for the evolution of the Valley
–Can we place this VC market in the context of other global knowledge cities? How might these relationships change? How do these investment patterns model other places? Who are the players and what are their portfolios? Are the major finance brokers betting on other places? If so, how?

Bibliography

Adams, Stephen B. “Regionalism in Stanford’s Contribution to the Rise of Silicon Valley.” Enterprise Soc 4, no. 3 (September 1, 2003): 521-543.

Alarcon, Rafael Guadalupe. “The migrants of the Information Age: Foreign-born engineers and scientists and regional development in Silicon Valley.” Dissertation, Dept. of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, 1998.

Arbuckle, Clyde. Clyde Arbuckle’s history of San José : the culmination of a lifetime of research. San José: Smith & McKay Printing Co., 1986.

Beers, D. Blue Sky Dream: A memoir of America’s Fall From Grace. New York: Doubleday, 1996.

Benner, Chris. Staircases or Treadmills?: Labor Market Intermediaries and Economic Opportunity in a Changing Economy. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2007.

—. Work in the New Economy: Flexible Labor Markets in Silicon Valley. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub, 2002.

Berlin, Leslie. The Man Behind the Microchip: Robert Noyce and the Invention of Silicon Valley. Oxford University Press, USA, 2006.

Brook, James. Resisting the virtual life: the culture and politics of information. San Francisco  ;Monroe  OR: City Lights, 1995.

Brown, John Seely, and Paul Duguid. The Social Life of Information. 1st ed. Harvard Business School Press, 2002.

Canty DJ. “At Home In San-Jose + Architect-Directed Redevelopment Program Transforms The Center Of California 3rd Largest City.” Architectural Record 178, no. 10 (September 1990): 132 -137.

Canty, Donald J. “At Home in San Jose.” Architectural Record 178, no. 10 (September 1990): 132.

Castells, Manuel. The Rise of the Network Society (New Edition). 2nd ed. Wiley-Blackwell, 2000.

Christensen, Terry, and Tom Hogen-esch. Local Politics: A Practical Guide To Governing At The Grassroots. 2nd ed. M.E. Sharpe, 2006.

Claiborne, J. “Rebuilding Downtown San Jose: A Redevelopment Success Story.” Places 15, no. 2 (Winter 2003): 4-11.

Cornford, D. Working People of California. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1995.

Cronon, William. Under an Open Sky: Rethinking America’s Western Past. W. W. Norton & Company, 1994.

Egan, Timothy, and Timothy P. Egan. Lasso the Wind: Away to the New West. Vintage, 1999.

English-Lueck, J. A. “Silicon Valley reinvents the company town.” Futures 32, no. 8 (October 2000): 759-766.

Findlay, Jonathan. Magic Lands: Western Cityscapes and American Culture After 1940. Berkeley; Los Angeles; London: Univeristy of California Press, 1992.

Hackworth, Jason. The Neoliberal City: Governance, Ideology, and Development in American Urbanism. 1st ed. Cornell University Press, 2006.

Hall, Peter. Cities in Civilization. Pantheon, 1998.

Hall, Tim, and Phil Hubbard. “The entrepreneurial city: new urban politics, new urban geographies?.” Progress in Human Geography 20, no. 2 (June 1, 1996): 153-174.

Hansen, D. The New Alchemists.

Hayes, Dennis. Behind the silicon curtain: the seductions of work in a lonely era. Boston  MA: South End Press, 1989.

Hossfeld, K. “Why Arent High-Tech Workers Organized?: Lessons in Gender, Race, and Nationality from Silicon Valley.” In Working People of California, 405-432. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1995.

Jackson, Kenneth T. Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States. Oxford University Press, USA, 1987.

Jiménez, Francisco. Ethnic community builders: Mexican Americans in search of justice and power : the struggle for citizenship rights in San José, California. Lanham: AltaMira Press, 2007.

Kriken,  J. “Lessons from downtown San Jose.” Places-A Forum Of Environmental Design 15, no. 2 (WIN 2003): 30-31.

Lessig, Lawrence. The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World. Vintage, 2002.

Lewis, Michael. The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story. Penguin (Non-Classics), 2001.

Logan, John R. “Logan on Molotch and Molotch on Logan: Notes on the Growth Machine-Toward a Comparative Political Economy of Place.” The American Journal of Sociology 82, no. 2 (September 1976): 349-352.

Markusen, A. The Rise of the Gunbelt.

Matthews, Glenna. Silicon Valley, Women, and the California Dream: Gender, Class, and Opportunity in the Twentieth Century. Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press, 2003.

Matthews, Glenna Christine. A California Middletown: The Social History of San José in the Depression, Dissertation, Dept. of History, Stanford University, 1976.

Molotch, Harvey. “The City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place.” The American Journal of Sociology 82, no. 2 (September 1976): 309-332.

Nguyen, Vu-Bang. “Vietnamese-American Community Outreaching: West Evergreen in San Jose, California,” 2004. Berkeley Library Catalog.

O’Mara, Margaret Pugh. Cities of Knowledge: Cold War Science and the Search for the Next Silicon Valley. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 2005.

Park, Lisa Sun-Hee, and David N Pellow. “Racial Formation, Environmental Racism, and the Emergence of Silicon Valley.” Ethnicities 4, no. 3 (September 2004): 403-424.

Pellow, David, and Lisa Park. The Silicon Valley of Dreams: Environmental Injustice, Immigrant Workers, and the High-Tech Global Economy. NYU Press, 2002.

Pincetl, Stephanie Sabine. Transforming California: A Political History of Land Use and Development. Baltimore, Md: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999.

Pitti, S.J. The Devil in Silicon Valley: Northern California, Race, and Mexican Americans. Princeton; Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2003.

Rawls, James and Walter Bean. California: An Interpretive History. Boston, MA: McGraw Hill, 1998.

Reisner, Marc. Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water, Revised Edition. Revised. Penguin (Non-Classics), 1993.

Rhee, Nari. “Searching for working class politics: Labor, community and urban power in Silicon Valley.” Dissertation, Dept. of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, 2007.

Saxenian, A. Regional Advantage: Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press, 1994.

—. The New Argonauts: Regional Advantage in a Global Economy. Harvard University Press, 2007.

Scott, A.J. Technopolis: High-Technology Industry and Regional Development in Southern California. Berkeley; Los Angeles; Oxford: University of California Press, 1993.

Self, Robert O. American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland. Princeton University Press, 2005.

Shih, Johanna. “Circumventing Discrimination: Gender and Ethnic Strategies in Silicon Valley.” Gender & Society 20, no. 2 (April 2006): 177-206.

Siegel, Lenny, and John Markoff. The high cost of high tech: The dark side of the chip. New York: Harper & Row, 1985.

Stanford Environmental Law Society. San Jose: Sprawling City; a Report on Land Use Policies and Practices in San Jose, California. Stanford, Calif., 1971.

Trounstine, Philip and Terry Christensen. Movers and shakers : the study of community power. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1982.

Turner, Fred. From Counterculture to Cyberculture. Stanford University Press, 2006.

Langdon Winner. “Silicon Valley Mystery House.” In Michael Sorkin, ed. Variations on a Theme Park: The New American City and the End of Public Space. 1st ed. New York: Hill and Wang, 1992.

Walker, Richard A. The Country in the City: The Greening of the San Francisco Bay Area. University of Washington Press, 2008.

—. Silicon City: The Evolution of an Electronics Mecca. Unpublished manuscript, 2002.

White, Richard. “It’s Your Misfortune and None of My Own”: A New History of the American West. University of Oklahoma Press, 1993.

Zlolniski, Christian. Janitors, Street Vendors, and Activists: The Lives of Mexican Immigrants in Silicon Valley. 1st ed. University of California Press, 2006.

Webography

Bay Area Alliance for Sustainable Communities
http://www.bayareaalliance.org/

Building Partnerships USA
http://building-partnerships.org/

BVN San Jose 1975-2006
http://www.bvnasj.org/SanJose19752006.htm

b l a n c a ~ a l v a r a d o
http://www.blancaalvarado.org/mainpage.html

California Redevelopment Association
http://www.calredevelop.org

Central Valley Partnership
http://www.citizenship.net/partners/pan_valley.shtml

CJTC — The Center for Justice, Tolerance and Community
http://cjtc.ucsc.edu/

CommuniverCity
http://www.communivercitysanjose.org/

Conference Program SJSU Immigration Conference
http://www.sjsu.edu/depts/SocialSciences/socsci_files/Conf_program.htm

Opportunity Fund
http://www.opportunityfund.org

Enter the World of Eichler Design
http://totheweb.com/eichler/

green planning facilitation education
http://www.greenplanning.org/contact.html

Institute for the Study of Social Change (ISSC) UC Berkeley
http://issc.berkeley.edu/

Interview with Ted Smith SV Toxics Book
http://www.temple.edu/tempress/authors/1788_qa.html

Joint Ventures: The Index of Silicon Valley
http://www.jointventure.org/publicatons/siliconvalleyindex.html

Knowledge Cities
http://depts.washington.edu/kcrg/silicon.php

Leadership Institute | Urban Habitat
http://urbanhabitat.org/li

Manuel Pastor Presentations in pdf
http://people.ucsc.edu/~mpastor/presentations.htm

Margaret O’Mara – Home
http://faculty.washington.edu/momara/

Mysteries of the Region Knowledge Dynamics in the SV Paul Duguid
http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~duguid/SLOFI/Mysteries_of_the_Region.htm

Oanh Ha won a 2003 award for reporting on Mayfair
http://www.gradethenews.org/pages/SPJ%20awards03.htm

Professor Langdon Winner – Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
http://www.langdonwinner.org/

Resources : SV Modern | Celebrating the Silicon Valley’s Mid-Century Past
http://www.svmodern.com/sv-modern-resources.html

San Jose Redevelopment Agency
http://www.sjredevelopment.org/aboutsjra.htm

San Jose Underbelly Cool historic al photos
http://www.sanjose.com/underbelly/unbelly/Sanjose/sjsigns/signs4.html

Santa Clara County Archives – County Clerk-Recorder (DEP)
http://www.sccgov.org/portal/site/rec/agencychp/?path=%2Fv7%2FCounty%20ClerkRecorder%20(DEP)%2FCounty%20Archives

SiLiCoN vAlLeY dE-bUg
http://www.siliconvalleydebug.com/index.html

Silicon Valley Community Foundation – Publications & Research
http://www.siliconvalleycf.org/newsResources_pubsResearch.html#pubs

Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits
http://www.svcn.org/

Silicon Valley History
http://www.netvalley.com/svhistory.html

Silicon Valley History
http://people.seas.harvard.edu/~jones/shockley/sili_valley.html

Silicon Valley History Online
http://www.siliconvalleyhistory.org/

Silicon Valley Local History Resources
http://www.sjsu.edu/~jwhitlat/svlh.htm

Silicon Valley Online: Silicon Valley Economic Development Alliance
http://www.siliconvalleyonline.org/

Silicon Valley Prospector: Economic Development Available sites, buildings, demographics, businesses and GIS mapping–
http://www.siliconvalleyprospector.com/ed.asp?bhcp=1

Silicon Valley Workforce Investment Network, connecting job seekers and businesses.
http://www.work2future.biz/

SJSU Communiversity
http://www.communivercitysanjose.org/

Somos Mayfair
http://www.somosmayfair.org/community.htm

Sourisseau Academy
http://www.sjsu.edu/depts/history/Resources/Sourisseau.htm

South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council
http://www.atwork.org/

Stanford Silicon Valley Archives
http://svarchive.stanford.edu/main.html

Sustainable Silicon Valley
http://www.sustainablesiliconvalley.org/

SVTC: Silicon Valley Toxic Tour
http://www.etoxics.org/site/PageServer?pagename=svtc_silicon_valley_toxic_tour

The Regional Advantage of the Silicon Valley and Its History
http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/regadv.htm

Thrive Alliance of San Mateo County Nonprofits
http://www.thrivealliance.org/

Transweb – Mineta Transportation Institute
http://transweb.sjsu.edu/mtiportal/index.html

UC berkeley Labor Center Leadership Schools
http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/leadershipschools/

UCB Guides to City & Regional Planning Research
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/ENVI/cityguid.html

University of Minnesota Syllabus on Silicon Valley History
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~jbshank/syllabus.html

Working Partnerships USA
http://www.wpusa.org/

Working Partnerships USA Reports
http://www.wpusa.org/Publication/index.htm#ev

 

Book Event: “Beyond the Fields: Cesar Chavez, the UFW, and the Struggle for Justice in the 21st Century”; at the Berkeley YWCA Jan. 22

The UC Berkeley Labor Center, Institute for the Study of Social Change, Institute of Governmental Studies, and Chicano Studies are sponsoring an evening with Randy Shaw, author of the new book Beyond the Fields: Cesar Chavez, the UFW, and the Struggle for Justice in the 21st Century. In Beyond the Fields, Shaw reveals the untold story of how the spirit of “Si Se Puede” that began with Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers in the 1960s still sets the course for today’s social justice movements. Shaw finds that the influence of Chavez and the UFW has ranged far and wide: in labor campaigns like Justice for Janitors, in the building of Latino political power, in the fight for environmental justice, in the growing national movement for immigrant rights, and even in Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. In fact, many of the ideas, tactics and strategies that Chavez and the UFW so skillfully employed, like grassroots organizing and the cultivation of young activist talent, were integrated into the Obama campaign and overseen by former UFW disciples like Marshall Ganz.

Thurs., Jan. 22, 2009, 6:30 p.m.

YWCA Berkeley
2600 Bancroft Way
Berkeley (2 blocks from the Labor Center)

For more information contact Andrea Buffa, andreabuffa@berkeley.edu, 510-642-6371.

 

CENTENNIAL: William Saroyan Centennial Celebration – Reception, Concert, New Heyday Book, and Huge, Year-Long Fresno Celebrations, Stanford, Fresno (Fri., Sept. 5, Stanford; Ongoing, Fresno)

Below I first pasted the Stanford Announcement. Below that is the Heyday book description and announcement. In addition to this event, there’s a slew of events in Fresno here.

William Saroyan Centennial Celebration – Reception & Concert

2008 marks the 100th anniversary of William Saroyan’s birth, and Stanford is celebrating. In an afternoon reception in Green Library, we will simultaneously celebrate the launch of Heyday Books’ compilation “He Flies Through the Air with the Greatest of Ease: A William Saroyan Reader”, and recognize the winners of the 2008 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing. Malcolm Margolin and Herbert Gold will speak at the event.

Following the reception, an evening performance showcasing Saroyan’s musical talents and collaborations will be held in Kresge Auditorium. Gregory Wait, Senior Lecturer and Director of Vocal Studies at Stanford University, and Music Director of Schola Cantorum, will direct the program, which will feature a world premier of Girakgi Picnic, a piece by William Saroyan and Alan Hovhaness that was recently discovered in Stanford’s William Saroyan archive.

Friday, September 5, 2008.  3:00 PM.

Approximate duration of 3.5 hour(s).

Stanford University, Green Library East (3:00-4:30) Kresge Auditorium (5:30-6:30)

http://library.stanford.edu/saroyan/centennial.html

Stanford University Libraries Contact:

725-5813

mcalter@stanford.edu

Free to the public

********

He Flies through the Air with the Greatest of Ease: A William Saroyan Reader

A Great Valley Book

In celebration of one of America’s literary greats

“Through the air on the flying trapeze, his mind hummed. Amusing it was, astoundingly funny. A trapeze to God, or to nothing, a flying trapeze to some sort of eternity; he prayed objectively for strength to make the flight with grace.”—From “The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze”

Published for the centennial celebration of the iconic author’s birth, this collection of William Saroyan’s writings overflows with exuberance, explodes with flashes of pure brilliance and literary daring, and brings to life an Armenian American voice unique and unforgettable. A careful selection of known and loved short stories along with plays, novels, letters, essays, and previously unpublished works, this volume allows readers to discover afresh the many aspects of a complex, engaging, and sophisticated writer.

For more information on the William Saroyan Centennial, visit these websites:

• www.saroyancentennial.org
• www.saroyancentennial.org/Cal_OctNovDec.html
• http://events.stanford.edu/events/117/11755

 

NEWS: CSA Announces Partnership With Art California, A Major Internet Resource

The CSA has partnered with Art California, a major internet resource for the arts across the state. Judy Malloy, a journalist on and advocate for the arts, has managed the Art California site since 2004, compiling thousands of links related to film, painting, music, museums, archives, writers in the web directory portion of the site. She has also maintained a significant calendar on events across the state.

Art California is an achievement that will benefit CSA members and constituents. Ms. Malloy will collaborate with Aaron Wilcher, the CSA blog editor, to keep the CSA informed on news, events, and resources on California arts through our calendar and news page. This, in turn, will inform our partnership with the H-California discussion network.

We encourage you to visit her site and use it in your research, education, and writing projects.

 

NEWS: CSA Announces Partnership With the H-California Discussion Network

The CSA and H-California (Humanities Discussion Network, California) are proud to announce a new partnership to advance their missions to serve the communities of scholars, activists, and professionals who rely on scholarship in the humanities for their work. We are joining forces to strengthen the service we provide our communities.

In the last year, the CSA has undertaken a more robust approach to its use of the internet to serve its members by adopting a new website and a blog. These projects will be enhanced by collaborating with the editors at H-California who run a listserv (an email list), and an online forum with resources, through the international Humanities Network, h-net.org.

H-California functions as a way for scholars, activists, and nonprofit professionals to communicate about scholarly projects about California. Many of the postings are book reviews, calls for papers, event announcements, queries for projects, new resources, and so forth.

The CSA will collaborate with H-California in the following capacities:

* Shared news items, syndicated between the CSA blog and the H-California listserv.

* Promoting resources, events, and projects between the two resources.

We strongly encourage CSA members and our community to join the H-California listserv, an automated email discussion board of all news and events related to humanities scholarship in California. The CSA will list all our news, events, blog postings, and official communication on the H-California listserv.

 

ANTHOLOGY: 1 in 4 Drop Out of High School in California

An LA Times editorial reported that 30% of Latinos and more than 40% of African Americans do not complete high school in California.

Howard Blume and Mitchell Landsberg gave an overview in the LA Times of the figures, the data gathering, and a hint of the political wrangling.

In early 2006, Mitchell Landsberg wrote a lengthy series of think pieces for the LA Times called, “The Vanishing Class.”

Dana Hull and Sharon Naguchi reported on the state’s data for the Mercury News and the South Bay Area stats.

Nanette Asimov gave the report for the Chronicle and included a searchable stats finder for Bay Area schools.

KQED’s Forum hosted a discussion on the issue when the reports were coming out around July 19. The discussion included an official from San Francisco Unified and state superintendent Jack O’Connell.

The California Dropout Research Project at UC Santa Barbara’s School of Education has resources and news.

The Policy Analysis for California Education at UC Berkeley published a report explaining their methods of data gathering and processing. The report is a collaboration among several of the state’s urban school districts: Long beach, LA, San Francisco, San Diego, and Fresno.

You can easily search stats at the CA Dept. of Education by ethnicity and grade.

 

ANTHOLOGY: The California Peripheral Canal and the recent PPIC report

Read about Steve Greenberg’s comic from 1982 here.

The Public Policy Institute of California recently issued a report renewing the call for a peripheral canal that has plagued California politics and environmentalism for so long.

View video and audio of a July 18 presentation in Sacramento by two of the report’s authors, Ellen Hanak of the PPIC and Jay Lund of UC Davis.

View the PPIC report, “Comparing Futures for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta” with interactive maps of projected Delta flooding with and without levee repairs.

The UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences has some good explanations and resources. Jay Lund is here.

View presentations of the state’s second strategic plan draft of the “Delta Vision.”

Search no more, PeripheralCanal.com has a comprehensive feed listing of news reports on the peripheral canal as well as great links to maps, stats, and other resources.

Kelly Zito reported on the PPIC report for the Chronicle. She lays out the 1980s north-south debate over a peripheral canal, how the debate has evolved, and what environmentalists are saying about the potential effects for fish populations.

Tami Abdollah gives a brief overview of the PPIC report with some key quotes in the LA Times blog, “Greenspace.”

Peter King reports in the LA Times on the peripheral canal in the context of the drought.

 

ANTHOLOGY: California Fires: Maps, Photos, and Resources

Photo by Vern Fisher, Monterey County Herald. Because the situation is so volatile, I chose not to include news items in the following summary, except a couple audio reports–ed.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection has up-to-date information on the fires, including info by county. The map below is linked to from this page.

The USDA Forest Service has a daily map of active fires burning nationally. The regional map of the West is here.

Here is an interactive map of the fires in the state from the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.

UC Berkeley’s Center for Fire Research and Outreach has some good resources, including news and an etensive links page to local and national resources.

The University of California Press recently released this primer on California fire by David Carle, part of their California natural history guides series.

The UC Press also recently published Living with Fire: Fire Ecology and Policy for the Twenty-first Century, by Sara E. Jensen and Guy R. McPherson.

Amazing images at boston.com from a Chico paper photographer and a Monterey County paper photographer.

The National Geographic had this photo essay by Mark Thiessen from the 2007 fire season in the West.

NASA Earth Observatory, Natural Hazards satellite images, updated twice daily.

NASA satellite images of fires in Southern California in October and November 2007.

6/27/08 NPR National report on California wildfires. Interview with a man from Big Sur who had to evacuate his home.

The California Report gave an overview on 6/24/08 and remembered the Angora fire in Lake Tahoe of one year ago.

 

CALL for Submissions/Proposals: California Council for the Humaniteis Oral History and Documentary (Deadlines July 1 and Oct. 1)

The California Council for the Humanities offers grants in three areas: the “California Stories” oral history grant, the California Documentary Project, and the Youth Digital Filmmakers. They are currently accepting submissions for the documentary and oral history projects.

Youth Digital Filmmakers is our grant line supporting projects that engage California youth in creating short films about how they see California. Eight projects received funding in June 2007. The films will be screened in spring 2008. The program is part of the Council’s youth-based campaign, “California Stories: How I See It.”

The California Story Fund is our grant line supporting public humanities projects that bring to light new and compelling stories from California’s diverse communities. The guidelines for the July 2008 round of funding for the California Story Fund are now available. An online application will be posted on June 2, with proposals due July 1

The California Documentary Project supports documentary film, video, radio and new media projects that explore and interpret subjects relevant to California’s past, present or future. Applicants may apply for a Research and Development Grant, a Production Grant, or a New Media Grant. The deadline for each grant is October 1, 2008.

 

NEWS: May Day in California: A Snapshot

Louis Sahagun and Ronald D. White reported in the LA Times on the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s (ILWU) West coast work stoppage yesterday in protest of the Iraq war.

Watch and listen to Democracy Now’s report on the ILWU’s West coast shutdown.

Mike Rhodes’ reported and took photographs for IndyBay on a march in Fresno.

Swati Pandey commented on the last two May Days in LA in the LA Times.

Swati Pandey reviewed LA Times editorials from May Days past.

Joel Rubin and Anna Gorman reported for the LA Times on LAPD’s preparation training for May Day protests.

LA Times blog tracked the hour by hour protests and gatherings: many reports remark on the small turnout this year in LA.

Truthout’s report on the May Day violence and staff shakeup in the LAPD last year, 2007. Wikipedia has a report and a large newspaper bibliography of LA’s May Day last year.

David Swanson reported for the California Chronicle on the ILWU’s May Day work stoppage and the history of the May Day’s origins from 1886 Haymarket Revolt: “Watch this video. Clarence Thomas, National Co-Chair of the Million Worker March Movement and Executive Board member of International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 10, spoke on April 24th, 2008, at the Iraq Town Hall meeting, in the Grand Lake Theater, Oakland, CA. The ILWU has committed to blocking ports on May 1st in opposition to the occupation of Iraq.”

Chronicle staff writers reported on May Day in the Bay Area. The big story is the ILWU’s work stoppage in protest of the war in Iraq.