Still reeling from a wild weather season, California chalked up a fourth request for federal disaster aid, as Gov. Jerry Brown lodged the request en route to Washington earlier this month.

“Putting the price tag of California’s brutal winter storms at $569 million, Gov. Jerry Brown asked President Trump […] for a fourth federal disaster declaration to help speed up recovery and repairs across the state,” the Los Angeles Times noted. “The estimate of damages, a number calculated jointly by state and federal teams, was accompanied in Brown’s letter by a long list of storm damage that left Californians fleeing flood waters and a number of roadways damaged by slipping hillsides and erosion.”

Despite some friction between Brown and Trump over changes to federal law that could cut against the grain of state Democrats’ priorities, the president hasn’t hesitated to grant the governor’s wishes for relief. “Brown’s request for a federal disaster declaration follows three similar requests this winter amid widespread weather-related damage. The three earlier appeals were granted, expediting assistance for flooding, problems on roads and bridges and other issues,” the San Francisco Chronicle recalled. “The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services has also requested assistance from the U.S. Small Business Administration for individuals in Colusa, Lake, Lassen, Plumas, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties, where the flooding from February storms damaged more than 200 homes and businesses.”

The most recent grant came mid-month, in the midst of Brown’s latest request. “President Donald J. Trump declared a major disaster exists in the state of California and ordered federal assistance to supplement state, tribal and local recovery efforts in the areas affected by severe winter storms, flooding and mudslides from January 18 to January 23, 2017,” the White House announced.

Careful politics

Visiting FEMA acting administrator Bob Fenton in D.C., Brown struck a conciliatory tone, but limited it sharply. “Brown, who put the storm damage at well over $500 million, said he came away from the meeting feeling positive after being told that Trump is ‘very concerned’ about disaster relief for California,” according to the Sacramento Bee. “But Brown also stood by his recent denouncement of the Trump administration’s decision to review federal greenhouse gas standards, a move the governor recently characterized as “an unconscionable gift to polluters.”

Brown’s posture chimed closely with public sentiment in the Golden State. “Fifty-three percent of California voters say state leaders should try to work with Trump on areas of disagreement, even if it requires compromises, while 47 percent of voters say California leaders should oppose the president even if it risks losing federal funding to the state,” according to a poll conducted by the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley and reported by Politico. “The preference for compromise comes despite Trump’s deep unpopularity in California,” the site added. “Yet in two major areas — the economy and jobs and improving roads and infrastructure — more Californians say Trump administration policies will have a positive than negative effect.”

A cracked mirror

Previously, the administration joined a broader effort in Washington to reckon with the consequences of California’s sometimes crumbling infrastructure. “Trump declared a presidential emergency during last month’s crisis at Oroville Dam,” the Sacramento bee noted. Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, lawmakers broadened their view of similar challenges nationwide. “The recent events at the Oroville dam in California, together with ice jam flooding on other major waterways and other flooding events, has forced the Environment and Public Works Committee to take up the status of U.S. dam, levee and other flood control infrastructure,” the Washington Examiner reported. “The new chairman of the committee, Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyoming, has made infrastructure development a top issue for the panel this Congress, in light of President Trump’s focus on infrastructure and job development.”

Since then, it’s come to appear that the Brown administration’s rhetoric is tougher than its actual policies. Late last week, state regulators announced that they were considering significantly relaxing the rules for some water districts.

The proposed changes to California’s emergency drought regulation reward water districts for investing in new local supplies and allow for adjustments to savings goals based on a district’s climate and population growth.

 

Friday’s proposal also allows water providers to reduce their “conservation standards” by as much as 8 percentage points.

That’s from The Los Angeles Times’ coverage. It comes on top of a previous plan announced a month ago that allowed some water districts to get credits of 4 percentage points for their positive actions; it also gave districts credits of up to 7 percent for adding new supplies, a big plus for districts like the San Diego County Water Authority, which finished building the Northern Hemisphere’s biggest desalination plant last year, a $1 billion project on the Carlsbad coast.

“Godzilla El Nino” may be coming to pass

The two rounds of changes easing up reductions might solely be seen as about fairness to better-run districts that diversified supplies and promoted conservation before it became mandatory. But there’s a chance they also reflect increasing confidence that the El Nino storms that began in recent weeks are just a harbinger of what a NASA climatologist suggested in August could be a “Godzilla El Nino.” Previous fears that Northern California wouldn’t benefit from storms nearly as much as Southern California appear to be easing. This is from Friday’s San Jose Mercury-News:

El Niño conditions may have peaked in the Pacific Ocean, federal scientists said Thursday, but powerful weather systems — like a new series of storms on track to soak the greater Bay Area over the next five days — have only just begun and will likely continue at least through May.

 

“This is the time of year when El Niño acts the most reliably,” said Mike Halpert, deputy director of the climate prediction center for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in College Park, Maryland. “So we would certainly expect the impacts to continue well through the rest of the winter and into the early part of the spring.”

 

There is a 96 percent chance that El Niño conditions will remain through March, scientists at NOAA and Columbia University reported Thursday, and a 62 percent probability they will continue through May.

 

Simply put, that means the likelihood of regular storms across California and heavy snow in the Sierra Nevada will continue to be greater this year than in regular years, offering hope that 2016 may finally be the year that the state’s four-year drought — now starting its fifth year — is broken.

‘Exceptional’ drought conditions over in Northern California

The U.S. Drought Monitor website, run by scientists at the University of Nebraska, said Northern California had received enough rain that it no longer qualified as being in an “exceptional” drought condition. But the website’s Jan. 14 report also had words of caution:

In California, even with the rain and snow received over the last several weeks, many areas are still running below normal for precipitation and snow for the current water year. Wells, reservoirs, ground water, and soil moisture are all recovering slowly, which is to be expected after three-plus years of drought. Precipitation in northern California eased some of the exceptional drought. The consensus from California experts is that recovery will be slow, and many more storm events are needed through the rest of winter to really put a dent in the drought.

By Katy Grimes

Is it any surprise that sports, weather and traffic now account for 40 percent of the content on television newscasts? “In 2012, a continued erosion of news reporting resources converged with growing opportunities for those in politics, government agencies, companies and others to take their messages directly to the public,” reports a new study from the Pew Research Center’s project for excellence in journalism.

Most interesting however, is who is leaving news outlets: “People who said they had forsaken a news outlet were more likely to be men than women, older than younger, richer than poorer and Republican or independent rather than Democratic. While about one-third of Republicans and independents stopped turning to a news outlet, just one-quarter of Democrats did,” the report found.

“The primary concern for people who gave up on an outlet seems to be quality,” the report found.

Surprise, surprise.

“When asked which they noticed more, fewer stories or less complete stories, far more people said the latter (24 percent to 61 percent). While reduced thoroughness in stories was the more prevalent response among adults overall who were aware of the struggles, the split was not nearly as wide – 48 percent versus 31 percent.”

The report found that thoroughness in the stories was the biggest problem. People want complete stories and are fed up with media not asking questions.” 61 percent of them said stories were less complete than they had been versus just 24 percent who complained there were too few stories,” the study found.

This is what I rail on constantly. Too many members of the dwindling media are skilled stenographers, and don’t bother to ask “who, what, when, where, why, and how?” The questions not asked are apparently what has so many Americans leaving news broadcasts in search of thorough content.

Take a look at the report – share your thoughts.

The State of the News Media 2013

By John Seiler

The only reason anyone in his right mind lives in California and pays massive high taxes is for the great weather.

But the weather has been terrible. I live half a mile from the beach in Huntington Beach. Unlike Gov. Jerry Brown and other rich folks, I don’t have air conditioning. Here’s what I’m putting up with at 2:30 pm:

And it looks like we’re going to have thunderstorms tonight.

Hot, muggy, stormy. That’s what I left in Michigan! Where the taxes are lower and you can get a decent house in a great neighborhood for $100,000. And Michigan’s unemployment rate, 9 percent, now is much lower than California’s staggering 10.7 percent.

Here’s the weather in my home town at 5:30 Michigan time (2:30 California). It doesn’t start getting cooler there for about an hour, so this is an apt comparison:

For days like this, all state taxes should be canceled. No sales taxes. And income and property taxes should be cut by 1/365th for each day the weather is horrible.

If they don’t, I’m calling U-Haul.

Today, January 17, the Year of Our Lord 2011, in Huntington Beach it was Fahrenheit 78 degrees, the most beautiful day I’ve ever seen. It was July in January.

That’s why we Californians put up with the sky-high taxes, the exorbitant housing prices (from government-caused shortages), the most incompetent and repressive state government in the Union, a state Legislature out of touch with everyone except those who bribe it with campaign contributions, and a steroid-pumped Austrian governor who “terminated” the state.

I don’t care about anything else, I’m not leaving!

New York, Illinois and Ohio are nearly as badly governed — with snow.

Florida is warm and has no income tax, but humid and buggy.

California — if  you can make here, you won’t want to make it anywhere else!

Jan. 17, 2011