Demonstrators demand statewide fracking ban

About 60 students and community members rallied on Upper Sproul Plaza on Tuesday afternoon in opposition to fracking in California as part of a statewide movement demanding that Gov. Jerry Brown ban fracking.

The demonstrators — who chanted, “Ban fracking now,” and “If you frack, we’ll be back,” among other phrases — carried handmade signs and hosted four speakers during the hour-long rally.

The rally’s coordinators, Students Against Fracking at UC Berkeley and the ASUC Office of Sustainability, are demanding Brown issue an executive order to ban fracking by Nov. 1. Tuesday’s rally follows a larger rally at the state Capitol on Saturday, where thousands of people gathered from around the state to call for a ban on fracking, including some students from UC Berkeley.

Fracking, also known as hydraulic fracturing, is the process of extracting natural gas and oil by injecting water, sand and chemicals underground at high pressures to fracture the rock surrounding an oil or gas well.

“The industry is toxic,” said Kristy Drutman, a UC Berkeley freshman and co-coordinator for Students Against Fracking. “We have the resources. We need people to invest in renewable energy and make it accessible.”

Many rally attendees and organizers cited concerns that fracking uses too much water, especially considering California’s ongoing drought. According to Alastair Iles, a UC Berkeley assistant professor of environmental science, policy and management who gave a speech at the rally, every time fracking happens, up to 10 million gallons of water could be pumped down.

Mac Farrell, global warming organizer for the advocacy organization Environment California, said that although it’s difficult to tell the long-term consequences of fracking, every drop of water used is wasted.

Farrell cited New York’s years-long moratorium on fracking and other similar bans as evidence that the campaign against the technique has escalated.

“We need to move from NIMBY — not in my backyard — to NOPE — not on planet earth,” said David Solnit, Berkeley resident and a volunteer organizer with the Sunflower Alliance, a local environmental justice group.

Some have said, however, that fracking has benefits for the economy. President Barack Obama, in his 2014 State of the Union address, called natural gas a “bridge fuel” that has the ability to power the economy with less of the carbon pollution that causes climate change.

The president has encouraged further research on fracking, and some California legislators are thinking along the same lines, introducing legislation last month that would require additional research into fracking.

Several passers-by stopped to listen to the message presented by the demonstrators and speakers during the afternoon rally.

“Fracking is a buzzword,” said Kayla Friedrichsen, a UC Berkeley senior. “Everyone is going to say fracking is bad. A more well-rounded description of the issues and political facets is necessary.”

Contact Angel Jennings at ajennings@dailycal.org and follow her on Twitter @angeljenningss.

Michelle Rhee's consultant introduces California ballot measure

A ballot measure submitted by a political consultant for education advocate Michelle Rhee seeks to remove seniority as a factor when California school districts lay off teachers, requiring that they instead base decisions on performance ratings. Performance, under the proposal, would be determined in part based on student test scores.

Those policy proposals have been at the core of Rhee's advocacy efforts as head of StudentsFirst, a national group headquartered in Sacramento. Rhee, who is married to Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, has said she established the group to try to counter the influence that teachers unions have in decisions about public education. Unions generally reject the idea that teachers should be rated based on their students' test scores, and prefer contracts that call for the most recently hired teachers to be the first let go during layoffs.
The California ballot initiative was submitted Monday by Matt David, a political consultant to StudentsFirst. David was communications director to Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and worked on the presidential campaigns of Republican Senator John McCain and former Utah governor Jon Huntsman Jr.

David said he submitted the measure on his own behalf and that StudentsFirst has not yet endorsed it.

"I would hope to get their support on this, assuming the language isn't changed (by the attorney general)," David said. "But they haven't taken a position yet and I've advised other groups not to take a position until we get the language finalized."

StudentsFirst spokesman Francisco Castillo said the group has been in talks about advancing a ballot measure in California next year, but hasn't yet decided if this will be it.
"We're currently reviewing the language for this one, and we generally support the concepts behind it, but it's premature to say whether we will take a position on it right now," Castillo said.

The proposed initiative for California's 2014 ballot must receive a title and summary from the Attorney General's Office before proponents can begin gathering signatures from the public to qualify for the ballot.

The measure also would streamline the firing procedures for teachers convicted of sex crimes, setting up a possible conflict with another ballot measure recently proposed by an advocacy group called EdVoice, which generally shares StudentsFirst's anti-union approach to education.

StudentsFirst has been active in several states but has made little headway so far in California, where public employee unions hold big clout in the state Capitol. The organization recently hired labor lobbyist Jovan Agee, who previously represented the AFSCME union, to head up its California operation.

Students First pushed for a bill to add student test scores to teachers' performance evaluations earlier this year, but Senate Bill 441 died in its first committee.
The bill was carried by Sen. Ron Calderon, the Montebello Democrat whose office was raided this summer by the FBI. A sealed FBI affidavit made public by Al Jazeera America alleges Calderon accepted $88,000 in bribes from a hospital executive and an undercover agent posing as a movie studio owner.

In 2012, StudentsFirst pitched a bill in California that sought to remove seniority as a factor in teacher layoff procedures, instead basing layoffs largely on job performance, according to a confidential draft The Bee obtained last year. The bill also would have changed the teacher evaluation system so that at least half the ratings were based on student test scores.

Calderon's brother, Charles Calderon, who was an assemblyman at the time, said he was interested in introducing the bill, but ran out of time during the 2012 session.

StudentsFirst poured more than $1 million into legislative races in 2012, including support for Ian Calderon — the son of Charles Calderon and nephew of Ron Calderon — as well as Assembly candidates Cheryl Brown and Brian Johnson. All are Democrats who faced opponents backed by the California Teachers Association.

Ian Calderon and Brown won their races and now serve in the state Assembly.


Michelle Rhee at Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson's State of the City address in January 2011. The Sacramento Bee/Bryan Patrick

via: http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2013/12/michelle-rhee-pushing-california-ballot-measure-to-change-teacher-laws.html

Only 31% of California students are physically fit

For the second year in a row, California students have tested relatively low in a series of statewide physical fitness tests, the state Department of Education announced Thursday.

About 31% of students received healthy scores in all six of the tested areas, State Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said in a statement.

"When we can call fewer than one out of three of our kids physically fit, we know we have a tremendous public health challenge on our hands," said Torlakson, a longtime cross-country coach. "It affects more than their health — study after study has demonstrated the very clear link between physical fitness and academic achievement."

The fitness score dropped to 31% last year, after years of steady improvement, the study’s results showed. About 1.3 million fifth-, seventh- and ninth-graders were tested. Of those, only 31% were able to score in what state officials call a "healthy fitness zone."

"While I am glad their fitness levels improve as they make their way through school, we owe it to California’s kids to give them more opportunities for exercise, along with better access to healthy foods and clean, fresh water," Torlakson said.

Torlakson’s office is continuing to push a year-old initiative to promote healthy choices in schools.

via LATIMES.com