Highlights, lowlights from the week’s news
HIT >> How about some good news on the upper education front for a change?
It was great to hear this week that the California State University system — which includes Chico State — features the most-affordable higher education available in the United States, according to a report presented by the Chancellor’s Office staff to CSU trustees this month.
The CSU system’s 23 schools have the nation’s lowest average tuition and fees — an attractive selling point as it recruits high school graduates as well as transferring students.
The annual tuition for a
CSU undergraduate is $5,742, which grows to an average of $7,520 when campus-based fees are added.
And you can add to that, the agreement between Butte College and Chico State for acceptance and the ease of transition from Butte into Chico State. How many places can you live and work at, surrounded by all that we have in this beautiful place … and enjoy this level of affordable higher education at the same time?
All in all, another nice reminder that by just about any comparison, this is still a pretty great place for young people to live and learn.
MISS >> As if we needed further proof that some initial reports need to be taken with about a gallon of salt these days, Friday’s release of the Paul Pelosi/ intruder video should do it.
For months, some people (mainly in the unchecked, often unhinged world of social media) spread unfounded rumors that the attack on Pelosi by hammer-wielding David DePape was not as it seemed, that Pelosi wasn’t quite an innocent victim in the grand scheme of things.
But the 911 call, and the release of the police video, proved Pelosi’s version of the story was on the mark. A deranged man seemingly intent on causing harm to Pelosi’s wife, then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, broke into their home. Pelosi was able to call 911 and did a good job of basically speaking in code to the dispatcher, who had help at the front door within a couple of minutes. And that’s a good thing, because the video shows DePape attacking Pelosi with the hammer within seconds of the officers’ arrival.
Maybe this will teach a few people to avoid jumping to conclusions before learning all of the facts.
Hey, we can dream, can’t we?
HIT >> It didn’t rain a drop this week, but we still got some good news on the water front.
First, the weeks of historiclevel rainfall means our public agencies that supply water to 27 million people will get five times more water from the state than they were scheduled to get just a month ago.
The Department of Water Resources announced Thursday that public water agencies will get 30% of what they had asked for, up from the 5% that had been planned in December. That’s a big step in the right direction; on the other hand, we can’t help but wonder how much bigger of a step we could take if the state had done anything to increase its water storage capacity in the past 50 years.
Meanwhile, as too much of that long-overdue rainwater goes racing downstream and into the ocean, it’s good to know a Chico-based firm is among those doing its part in helping to make sure that water doesn’t cause any unavoidable floods.
River Partners has supplemented repairs to levies by restoring watersheds in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. The group, in cooperation with state and federal agencies and some other nonprofits, has rehabilitated 13,500 acres of river corridors since 1998.
Unfortunately, budget cuts may be slowing the progress. River Partners has restoration sites near Chico and Hamilton City along with three near Colusa and Princeton, and will be left in the position of trying to find federal grants and fundraising to offset cuts from the state, should the legislature approve the governor’s budget.
Just a year after our state boasted a $100 billion surplus, it’s incredible to see we’re already in a position of cutting back on necessary flood control work — and still haven’t turned a single shovel of dirt at the much-needed Sites project.
MISS >> We’ll begin by reminding everyone that the progress made on the Chico homeless front in the past year — especially the construction and operation of the Pallet shelter — has been astounding.
On the other hand, the lack of progress usually caused by legal wrangling is exasperating.
Enforcement at Teichert Ponds will finally begin next week, according to a release send by the city Thursday. The latest delay was caused by a disagreement between the city and plaintiffs, who (long story short) haven’t been able to agree on how to assess the available shelter spaces before the city is able to begin enforcement.
That delay meant the Teichert Ponds area turned into a Comanche Creek Greenwaysized mess over the past couple of months. It didn’t do any good for the people stuck camping there, and it didn’t do much for the neighborhood and its residents either.
There’s got to be a better way — or, at the very least, a faster resolution to these disagreements. The status quo, again, isn’t working for anybody.