Cirrus and Fairness

CIRRUS AND FAIRNESS
It was with amusement and a bit of heartbreak that I listened as my sweet partner Marlie was being interviewed over the phone for a nice long spell about the hospital options. First she would favor one, then another, and then back to the first. The amusement was in realizing how human and honest this was. The heartbreak was a sense of the impending minefield into which the Options Committee, bless their hard working hearts, appears to be going to step once it decides any one way.

The Cirrus proposal, for a medical spa and hospital and office buildings at the corner of 8th Street and Napa Road, like the other options, has many strong points and some detractions. What I'd like to present here, is not an argument for that proposal, but a plea to disband the illogical and unfair arguments that are being used against it. In Measure C I saw both sides resorting to lowest common denominator tactics and I didn't like it then, and I don't like it now.

So here goes.

1) "The Cirrus Proposal" is a wolf in sheep's clothing." This isn't an argument. It's name calling.

2). "The Cirrus Proposal is the same as the Rosewood Hotel overlooking Sonoma." No. The Rosewood Hotel would have ruined the view of the hillside as we came into town, would have ruined a big piece of open and beautiful land and would have contributed immensely to downtown traffic and clutter. The Cirrus proposal destroys no hillside viewscape, takes over land of no particular beauty in its present use, and doesn't mess with downtown traffic at all.

3)There is an innuendo that things from Texas are bad. Not true, think of Austin, a town full of book readers and movie makers to rival Northern California and a music scene to rival Nashville.

4) Well, then, the innuendo continues: big businesses from Texas are bad. While this may be somewhat true, big business that are iffy can probably be found in every state of the union, and fond as I am of Sonoma Market, the people who work there and the high quality of food (though, fellow Chris, I'd love to see the return of the organic raw chocolate nibs, hint, hint), I'm also looking forward to the opening of a store operated by one of the best businesses in this country, for environment, for encouraging worker creativity and for keeping a low rate of pay difference between the highest and lowest paid workers, that company being Whole Foods. From Texas.

5). Well, then Big is Bad, right? Ah, here is an argument close to my heart, but if this is so, why do we encourage a 954 pound gorilla called the Sonoma Jazz Plus Festival to stomp through town once a year, why did we allow the big swath of development out along 5th Street East, why, indeed, did we dismantle our small hometown police and replace them as a subset of the larger (and more efficient) Sheriff's department?

6). Annexing the 73 acres to allow the hospital to be part of city land will inevitably lead to sprawl. False. The City Council has to declare what the land use, i.e. zoning, will be on all the newly acquired land. They can easily zone it agricultural. In fact, I'd love to see them zone it Organic Agriculture, and if the Cirrus Proposal, or some hybrid comes into being at this site, grow, for once, really healthy food for the hospital on this land. And heck, even have some big beautiful organic pathways and gardens nearby for the healing process. Actually, there is a wonderful organic Garden Park out that way, come to think of it.

Anyway: this is enough. Cirrus may not be perfect, but the proposal deserves to be free from this sort of level of argumentation.

Chris Elms
Slowsonoma.com (You're there. Welcome. Please look around,
there are literally hundreds of essays,
many shorter than this one.
See Index of all Postings)

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PLEASE BE WELL:


Pleasure
Ease
Awareness
Sensitive Strength
Enjoyment

BE

Waking up to now.
Embracing Change.
Learning to learn.
Loving to move, improve and transform.

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the Hospital and Civility and Lessons to Learn

HOSPITAL AND CIVILITY
I have two sets of comments about the hospital issue, and they relate deeply to each other.

One set goes like this: If you want a hospital on Broadway: vote for the Parcel Tax.

If you want a hospital in town: vote for the Parcel Tax.

If you want the Cirrus private hospital and medical spa: vote for the Parcel Tax.

If you want a small downsized approach: vote for the Parcel Tax.

Without the tax, the hospital can't keep operating, and all the above options are years from being up and running. They can't take place if we have no hospital that is transitioning to the new hospital, whatever it will be.

Though the temptation is to cast negative feelings about one aspect or another of the hospital's troubled and sometimes bizarre history into a negative spin about the Parcel Tax, don't. I too had my temptations and see the folly.

In short: if you want a local emergency room, vote yes on the Parcel Tax.

The Second set of comments is a refrain that many have heard from me before, and will probably hear again. The refrain is this: if we disagree with others, that's human; even disliking others can happen to the best of us; but to get personally wrapped up in dislike or anger or hatred toward another is, as the visiting folksinger John McCutcheon's father said: "Poisoning ourselves and hoping it will hurt our enemy."

What's this got to do with the hospital? I won't go into all the hospital's troubled history of variations on the theme of attacking your opponents rather than standing up for what is good and positive in your own approach, but want to highlight my disappointment with the resignation of Bob Kowal. He has done tremendous service to this community and this hospital and he seems victim to me of the ancient and regrettable practice of scape-goating, wherein primitive folk would choose a goat and send it through the village to be flayed and attacked as if it represented the sins of all the villages inhabitants.

Frustrations are normal. The attacks of the Measure C days were, to my mind, reason enough for doctors to want to leave a community so little able to restrain the wish to polarize and attack. Now Bob Kowal seems to latest victim.

I, for one, commend his service and am sorry to see him go.

And, don't let this sorry state of affairs be an excuse to do what I spoke of above: take it out on the Parcel Tax.

To learn to love one's enemy is the big human work, and one I've commended people before to study the work of Byron Katie ( she's coming to town Feb. 6, c/o our own wonderful Readers' Books.) This is the big work.

But even before we figure that one out, and we must if life is to be truly civilized, we need to see through our petty fears and confusions and get one thing right: if you want a hospital of any size, stripe, approach, or shape: Vote Yes on the Parcel Tax.

Keep Sonoma a Small Town

Photo: Richard Dale

I was pleased with the results of the recent election, and much to my surprise, I found the election of Aug Sebastiani a bracing delight. I wrote him a congratulatory letter extolling his willingness to say, "I don't know," and the parallel willingness to go find out new information and ideas; praising his eagerness to meet as many people as possible; and lauding his passion about keeping Sonoma a real small town.

To me, this last was a more effective presentation of the Slow Sonoma campaign I was running two years ago, and the strong response I got when I brought this up. One of the nice things about blogs, is you have a record, and in a posting of September 6, 2004 at slowsonoma.com, here's what I had to say: (For the whole thing, try 4 Campaign Pillars, or for amusement the whole month of September 2004, via Sept 04 Archives.)

"Happiness comes from being in the present and being aware of the world. It also comes from learning how to get out of habits that are producing unhappiness, whether it be an uncomfortable movement, or a harsh time in a relationship, or a life that is too busy. If we are in a rush, we miss happiness.

"Slow down traffic, slow down our minds, let’s pause, breathe, enjoy, live a good life!

"Slow down building. We are putting up too much new housing, too fast, too crammed in tight. Human beings are not meant to live like sardines. Make sure there is some open space around all building projects and lower the allowed rate from 100 units a year to 40-50 units per year.

"KEEP OUR SMALL TOWN A SMALL TOWN!!"

And I had the all caps thing back then. I think most of us feel that if we keep pushing Sonoma too hard it's going to end up Marin or Carmel, and I think Aug's success is a reminder of how strong and deep that feeling is.

I want to begin to raise a concept that I think can be extremely useful. I'll articulate it more in the future, because I think it's a crucial idea in the whole density debate, and was hinted at in the third paragraph from my September 2004 posting. The concept is this: HALF HIGH DENSITY.

This has been called other places "cluster housing," and what it means is this. You have 3 acres to build on. You don't do A: put 12 really swank places, each with their own little semi-kingdom. You don't do B: cram in 40 units so you've gotten the most use of the land ( and here in Sonoma a bonus of ten so-called "affordable" unit).

Instead you build on half the land, and that includes the parking. So you make however many units you are going to make, 12, or 20, that's the density decision. BUT you leave and landscape the other acre and a half to be gardens and wild, so that there is open space not just out at the edge of town, but right there as part of every development so children can play in a place with trees and mud, and people can go out and putter in a garden or read a book or roll in the grass and it's part of their direct housing experience, not some park way down the way with swings and everything too tidy.

So, this is an idea that could have made every development of the last 10 years far more appealing, and kept Sonoma a small town instead of a suburb, as some of the developments created, or, as a recent letter suggested, a crammed tight city, as the egregious across from the post office place has done.

Think about it and talk to your council people if you agree: half high density, and half: open space, land, trees, freedom to breathe and move and be a real human being.

Paradigm Shift, the Duck Pond vs. swimming pool

PARADIGM SHIFT, DUCK POND, KIDS’ POOL

In the old paradigm, we see “problems,” we panic and we throw a lot of force “against” the “problem.” If illness comes, we throw a drug against it. If a sore shoulder appears, we give it a shot or a massage or a physical therapy workout. If insects visit the garden or field, zap them with pesticides. If some person is "bugging" us, we get angry at them, or wish they would disappear. At the social level, “liberals” like to throw money at social “problems,” with little success, and “conservatives” like to throw money into war, with even less success.

In the new paradigm, we use our intelligence instead of our anxiety, and look for the systemic ways that the “problem,” now seen as an indicator of the malfunctioning of the whole, can lead us to upgrade the entire system. For dis-ease, we look for food, mental health, fresh air, happiness, and breathing to create well-being. In Feldenkrais, a sore shoulder is not a “bad” shoulder, but evidence of a stuck brain, unable to see the connections that a healthy shoulder needs to have with the ribs, spines, neck, pelvis, even the feet. Insects call for rich and healthy soil. The "annoying" person is an opportunity for us to get clear on how to be happy with ourselves and another when we aren't controlling the world. And social/political problems in these times when oil is going to run out and climate warming is happening (Katrina, 20% of North Pole ice cap gone) call for a bigger understanding.

While small potatoes (or peaches) compared to these issues, here’s a set of problems at the local level in Sonoma, California, and one possible non-paradigm set of solutions. At least it illustrates bringing a larger set of variables into the proposed change. The problems: 1) no pool for kids, 2) duck pond overflows poop into creek in winter (via storm drains), 3) Garden Park back orchard languishing, 4) airplane travel creates a huge CO2 debt ( a couple flying to Europe and back over 8 trees to the Earth).

The old paradigm solution for the duck poop problem is to throw money at it, a lot, almost $700,000. Wow. This route might even eliminate the once a year cleaning of the duck pond and taking of nutrients to the Garden Park, where it hasn’t made it to the back orchard the last two years.

The new set of possibilities: clean out the pond at least 4 times a year, so when the winter rains come it won’t be at its dirtiest. Take this tree food to the back orchard and copy one of the core principles of Nature: one organism’s waste is always food for others. Put the duck pond swimming pool money to use for a pool for kids and assisting the garden be a place where people can learn to grow their own food in the times ahead when everyone will need to know this. Have a voluntary self-tax of lucky far traveling locals to buy trees for their CO2 debt and contribute these trees to the garden and to local schools, so kids can begin to taste food grown close at hand. Charge people twice as much to use the pool if they drove there instead of walking or riding a bike. The big picture is big, and full of possibilities and is always more economical, since one part is helping another.

Chris Elms
996-1437

Why I am running for city council

Why am I running for city council?
By Chris Elms, for the city of Sonoma council.
September 24, 2004

I am running for city council because I love life, I love Marlie and I love Sonoma. Because I love life, I don’t waste my time in a car box when I can be out walking or on a bike, where the ceiling is five miles high, where the air is fresh, where I can see flowers and trees and talk to people I know.

I love Marlie because I’m lucky enough to have figured out how to have a great relationship and lucky enough to have meet another person, who with me takes this responsibility: her job is not to make me happy. My job is not to make her happy. We are happy on our own steam and then come together for glory and friendship and fun.
For the same sort of responsibility reasons I’m running for city council. I wanted to see root, radical, real ideas being brought up. I didn’t see them being brought up. I decided to run and bring them up.

I love Sonoma and see it being ruined by people whose minds are in this box: we have to keep building at the rate of 100 units a year and “that’s only, really, the historical average of 88 units per year.”
That’s turning our small town into a place that is in danger of no longer being a small town.

I’m running to say: let’s stop that nonsense and lower the rate to 50 or 44, and make that building ecological, with green space around us.

I’m running because no one else was or is talking about lowering the speed limit. Don’t we want to get through town quicker? Isn’t it hard to drive by the Plaza on weekends and event days?

No to getting through town quicker. A faster life is a life in rush is a life that is missing the pleasure of the moment. Yes, it’s hard getting by the Plaza. Treat yourself to a bike ride, or staying home and talking to someone you love.

Think of sex. It is now. It is in the body. It feels good.

Think of a fresh peach. It is now. It is sensation in the body. I tastes good.

Think of watching a child laugh or play. It is now. The pleasure, if you notice it well, is in your body. It feels good.

Quality of life is about coming to the now, and being happy in the moment. All the rest is not worth putting on your tombstone.

I’m running because I love to speak in public and want to raise issues of what is happiness, what is a good life, how we can connect to nature as part of who we are as human beings, how we can keep our small town small, how we can take care of each other in humane ways. A living wage law is taking care of each other. Slowing down traffic so it’s more fun and easy to walk and be on a bike is taking care of each other and the earth. Slowing down the rate of building and making it ecological is taking care of each other and the earth.

These are the commandments of permaculture ( a system of design and thinking to promote a permanent culture, like that of native tribes who lived in balance with the earth for thousands and thousands of years):

Care for the Earth.
Care for each other.
Sharing of the surplus.

That’s it, and I’d add: be present. This breath is precious. This trip downtown is precious: don’t waste it in a car box. Get onto your feet or onto your bike.

I truly think being in a car box limits the mind. A roof two inches above our heads is a trapped space, fine for listening to someone else’s ideas on the radio, but poor for thinking new thoughts. Get out under a ceiling five miles high to have real thoughts. I am running to win and I would love your support. Give a call, contribute money, walk a neighborhood. Talk to people. It’s fun. They love hearing my platform: slow down traffic, slow down building, involve ecology in all decisions. And, I should add, take care of each other.
If you join this campaign, you’ll be joining a movement to reclaim our lives from the false promise of happiness later. The false promise of slowing down the building later. The false promise of being happy after you’ve rushed around enough.

Happiness is now. This campaign is for fun and it’s to win, win big so all the dinosaurs in their stuck thinking can wake up and see: oh, my god, the people really do want to change how things are drifting along.

I would love to talk to any group you might want to organize for a little half hour to hour meeting. I will not, however, do a coffee and cookie thing: I will do an organic tea and organic fruit thing. I believe eating organic is good for our bodies, it tastes better and it’s better for the earth. Even better, let’s get together in someone’s garden, chat, pull a few weeds, share what we love about being alive, and then let me tell you about the campaign and answer any questions.

Love, earth and happiness to you all:

Chris Elms
Phone: 707-996-1437
e-mail:
website: slowsonoma.com (calm)

4 campaign pillars

ONE: HAPPINESS/SPIRITUALITY/SLOW DOWN = QUALITY
Happiness comes from being in the present and being aware of the world. It also comes from learning how to get out of habits that are producing unhappiness, whether it be an uncomfortable movement, or a harsh time in a relationship, or a life that is too busy. If we are in a rush, we miss happiness.

Slow down traffic, slow down our minds, let’s pause, breathe, enjoy, live a good life!

Slow down building. We are putting up too much new housing, too fast, too crammed in tight. Human beings are not meant to live like sardines. Make sure there is some open space around all building projects and lower the allowed rate from 100 units a year to 40-50 units per year.

KEEP OUR SMALL TOWN A SMALL TOWN!!


TWO: LOOKING AT THINGS IN A NEW WAY.
A HANDS ON OFFERING. LITERALLY HANDS ON. TRY IT AND SEE !!!!
The habit of seeing if I can see things outside of the habitual ways comes from who I am , and my Feldenkrais training. In the Feldenkrais Method, a sore back or a sore neck aren’t mainly in the back or neck, they are in the brain, and how the brain is organizing the whole being to create and maintain that sore back and neck.
Try this experiment, which I’ve started to do sometimes door to door, and will do at all the debates. Pick up both hands. Wiggle the fingers around, and then interlace your fingers. And then move the now together hands around. Next, look at which thumb is on top, take apart the fingers and interlace them again with the other thumb on top, and all the fingers interlaced, now one notch up or down from usual, and then move your hands around. It feels very strange.

Then goes back and forth and look: from the point of view of two hands and what they can do, it’s 50%/ 50% which way to choose. But from the point of view of the brain and our habits, it’s actually about 100%/ 0% what we choose.

Our ideas about the car, about nature, about how things are done at city hall are all examples of habits that we forget are habits.

THREE: ECOLOGY.
Most of you know I was instrumental in creating what has now become the Sonoma Garden Park. For 4 almost 5 years (some 5000 hours or so of volunteering on this beautiful piece of land) I persisted, often alone, and then with more and more help (thanks to Ken Brown for coming to the rescue at a crucial time; thanks to Richard Dale and the Ecology Center for always being in the background, and helping when the times were desparate). This is now a beautiful part of the city. Come visit it if you haven’t yet, it’s at East 7th and Denmark, on land that Pauline Bond willed to the city as a park. I call it the seventh jewel of Sonoma.

(Aside: the seven jewels of Sonoma:
1) the bike path, Field of Dreams, Depot Park corridor
2) the Plaza, where people can get out of their cars and be a real human for awhile
3) the Overlook Trail, created by a town that reject a hotel up there
4) the Sebastiani Theater
5) Reader’s Books
6) The Community Center
7) The Sonoma Garden Park.
End of aside)

I see nature as a place of coming back to ourselves. I see soil as a place to reconnect with soul. You can read all the ecological programs the first position paper.

Ecology is about connecting to Earth. It's about reversing the upside down world where life is planned around the automobile, where we are forgetting the miracle of having feet and being able to walk. It is about using the resources of nature, the sun and wind and rain, and being in harmony with them. It is about getting out of our car boxes, and our house and office boxes, and out into the fresh world from which all humanity came.

It is about building the soil more than we are using up, creating a relationship where soil and soul build on and nourish each other. It's about living in harmony with trees and soil and other life forms. It is about sleeping outdoors sometimes, and having creeks that we can get to and enjoy and that are alive and full of happy fish. And so on. Your heart knows all this.

Slowing down brings us back to the rate of nature, back to the present, back to pace where we can know we are alive, and know the ones we love are important, and know how much we cherish and value natur



FOUR: DEMOCRACY.
City council meetings are like this (my opinion, which it seems I’m not afraid to give); from 7 to 8 PM, very interesting; from 8 to 9 PM, sort of interesting; from 9 to 9:30 , boring; from 9:30 to 10, really boring; from 10 PM on, deadly boring. So, a lot of people are too worn down to participate.

I see using my email contacts to get information out and back, and want to set up something on the city web site telling the budget, the important issues, and offering a change for them to vote on certain issues (the police/sheriff thing, say). Many of you have met me going door to door; I love this interaction and want to continue this, when and if I get onto council. And, as you know, you can find me pretty easily around town, riding my bike here and there.