Mayday! Mayday!

 As I write this it is May Day, May 1^st. When I was a child attending San Joaquin Elementary School, we’d celebrate May Day with a May Queen and we’d dance around a pole weaving colored streamers. I wonder if anyone does that anymore? It was a time when lack of water supplies and an avalanche of governmental/regulatory paperwork were not the biggest considerations a farmer had to face. The small cities and towns of the Valley resembled Mayberry with the spice of Mexico, and skin color was becoming less of an issue instead of more. 

Like the climate, things change. May Day marks the date halfway between the Vernal Equinox and the Summer Solstice and was a celebration of the crops being planted. This was before the communists glommed on to it and the lefties and EJs turned it into a neopagan holiday. 

Take Notice Give Notice 

Checking my May Day email this showed up from the State Water Resources Control Board:

“Reminder: Deadline to submit written comments on SGMA Tule Probationary Hearing Draft Staff Report is May 7, 2024, at 12:00 noon.

“Thank you to those who participated in public workshops on April 5 and April 8, 2024, regarding possible state intervention in the Tule groundwater subbasin under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA). Slides from the workshops and a recording of the staff presentation are available on the State Water Board’s Tule Subbasin webpage.

“The public may still submit written comments on the Tule Probationary Hearing Draft Staff Report, which outlines staff recommendations to the Board. A shorter Executive Summary is also available in both English and Spanish.

“Comments on the Draft Staff Report must be submitted by May 7, 2024, at 12:00 noon. Staff will consider all comments heard at the workshops or received in writing by the deadline when developing the final staff report and recommendations. Instructions on how to submit comments electronically, by hand delivery, or by mail are available in the public notice. Information regarding how to comment on the final staff report will be provided after the final staff report has been made available.

“On September 17, 2024, the State Water Board will hold a hearing to consider designating the Tule subbasin as a probationary basin under SGMA. If the State Water Board designates the subbasin probationary, it will identify deficiencies (issues) and potential actions that the groundwater sustainability agencies in the basin could take to address the deficiencies.

“More information: Visit https://bit.ly/swb-sgma-tule Questions? Contact the SGMA Program at sgma@waterboards.ca.gov or 916-322-6508.”

Homonyms

There’s also a homonym for May Day, Mayday. Repeat it two or three times and you have a distress signal. According to www.ScienceABC.com, “The word Mayday is actually an anglicization, or in simple words, the English approximation of a French phrase “m’aidez” or “m’aider,” which literally means “help me.” It’s said to have originated with a senior radio officer at Croydon Airport in London named Frederick Stanley Mockford in 1923. He was asked to come up with a word that could be used in distress signals that could easily be understood by all pilots and support staff at airports. Since much of the air traffic at that point was between Croydon and Le Bourget Airport in Paris, he proposed the word “m’aider”, which is actually a shortened version of “venez m’aider.”

Mayday Mayday

Have you heard of the 30×30 Plan coming soon to a neighborhood near you? The California Natural Resources Agency, the state version of the federal Department of Interior, sent me notice that it’s Celebrating the Earth! by setting aside through durable conservation 30 percent of California’s natural lands and waters permanently. This is in the name of “biodiversity, access and climate change mitigation and resilience.” The 30×30 bunch also gave away $100 million taxpayer dollars, “. . . to California Native American tribes to support habitat restoration and ancestral land return!”

It goes on to state, “As part of a first-in-the-nation effort to address historical wrongs committed against California Native American tribes, Governor Gavin Newsom announced that the State awarded more than $100 million for 33 tribal land projects. The funding, which was appropriated as part of the 2022–23 and 2023–24 budgets, will be used for ancestral land return, implementation of Traditional Ecological Knowledge and tribal expertise, habitat restoration, climate and wildfire resilience projects, and more.”

I’m glad the tribes got some money out of a budget billions of dollars in the red. Good for them. I also, and I’m serious here, hope they can determine who had first claim to the ancestorial lands. Tribes didn’t always get along nicely and stay in only one location. I also hope their property isn’t considered natural lands or they may not be able to develop it for any use other than looking at it. 

And what is natural lands? I think I know – anything not in a major urban area. You hear about the need to preserve land and I’ve seen it stated in official state government documents due to farming the San Joaquin Valley is the state’s most altered habitat. I’m sorry I didn’t save it to cite it but I read it. It made me wonder if whichever bureaucrat wrote that ever gazed across the expanse of the Los Angeles Basin. Or if they’d ever peered at the Bay Area from the apex of the Bay Bridge. Or the sprawl of the Sacramento metropolitan region that turns the freeways there into parking lots for hours on a daily basis was ever noticed. I guess these areas of the state are unnatural lands. 

CalEPA also has an Earth Day Hub you can visit “to learn more about what you can do every day to make the Earth a better place.” You might not be surprised when you get there to find the page covered with photos of happy children. 

Here’s something else, there is a state sponsored California Biodiversity Network and it was seeking nominations for its steering committee. But I’m sorry to report the deadline was April 30^th. The CBN appears to be part of the California Climate Action Corps which is part of California Volunteers under the office of the Governor. 

To learn more about how the folks who brought us critical race theory as a lens for determining water rights and environmental justice action grants you can attend a May 22^nd webinar from 10-11:30am on the 30×30’s Pathway 6. By the way the United Nations is also on board with the goal of conserving and protecting 30 percent of the land and sea areas globally through equitable management. This includes moving $200 billion to developing countries. And let’s not forget they have a 50×50 Plan waiting in the wings. 

Hot Off the Press Release

I know I’ve recently poked some fun at Governor Newsom’s penchant for prolific press releases but I’ve got to include this one that showed up today with the headline, “Governor Newsom Proclaims Small Business Month.” 

Newsom proclaimed May as small business month stating small businesses make up 98 percent of total businesses and employ more than seven million people in California. The proclamation didn’t mention 2.5 million folks work for the government. That means there are 2.8 people in the private sector creating the wealth taxed to pay for one employee in the public workforce. This figure doesn’t include the number of people receiving government subsidies. I don’t feel strong enough at the moment to find out how including that would skew the amount of people each private sector employee is supporting.   

Well, that’s enough of that for now. Please comment on the State Water Board’s plans for the Valley’s ag based economy in the Tule Subbasin. Remember for California’s farmers and ranchers – every day is Mayday – and to quote Governor Newsom, “Whether you like it or not.”