Safety is a two-way street. First responders are on our state’s highways aiding people along roadsides, but also rely on safe drivers to protect them when they are clearing crashes or responding to other incidents.
To raise awareness about the safety of first responders, the California Highway Patrol, California Department of Transportation, or Caltrans, and California Office of Traffic Safety, or OTS, are joining to promote “Crash Responder Safety Week” beginning today.
Nearly every week throughout the country, a first responder is killed while helping clear a roadway crash, and many more sustain life-altering injuries.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration established this week to bring attention to the dangers of working at traffic incidents and to promote compliance with “Move Over” laws.
Crash Responder Safety Week reminds drivers to safely move over for crash responders or slow down when approaching crash scenes if it is unsafe to change a lane.
California’s “Move Over” law has been in effect for 15 years, but nearly 25% of people surveyed by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety were unaware there was a Move Over law in their state.
The lives of crash responders — law enforcement, fire and rescue, emergency medical services, public works, transportation, towing and other roadway workers — are put at risk due to speeding, distractions, and careless drivers.
These personnel provide critical aid as first responders and are called to duty at all hours of the day and night, in adverse weather conditions, and next to traffic moving at high speeds.
In California, from 2017 through 2021, three CHP officers were killed and 146 injured — nine severely — while on the freeway shoulder or median performing their job.
Nationally, in 2019 alone, 11 officers were struck and killed while conducting traffic stops or other law enforcement activity, accounting for 41% of all emergency responders killed on the job.
In addition, five officers were struck and killed while working motor vehicle crash scenes, and two officers were killed while assisting motorists with disabled vehicles.
Also in 2019, 14 tow truck operators and three mobile mechanics, and nine fire/EMS personnel were struck and killed by vehicles, according to the Emergency Responder Safety Institute.
“Each day our officers put their own safety at risk conducting traffic enforcement duties, investigating a crash, or assisting the public alongside our busy freeways statewide,” said CHP Commissioner Amanda Ray. “Tragically, many have been killed or injured merely performing their job. This week and throughout the year, we strive to raise awareness of these risks so our personnel return home safely to their families each day.”
“First responders work tirelessly and risk their own safety to save lives at collision scenes,” said Caltrans Director Tony Taveras. “We need motorists to do their part to protect responders by slowing down, moving over a lane, and staying alert when approaching traffic incidents.”
“First responders put themselves in harm’s way to help strangers,” said OTS Director Barbara Rooney. “But they also have loved ones who need them to come home. We want drivers to understand the risks that they take every day, and the importance of slowing down and moving over for first responders so they can do their job safely.”
Motorists should be extra careful when approaching flashing emergency lights — red, blue and amber — on stopped emergency vehicles working at roadway incidents.
Avoid distractions like phones while driving and don't drive if you're tired or have been drinking or are under the influence of any drugs.
Help protect the first responders who are working to protect you and other motorists on the highway.
For more information about Caltrans safety campaigns, visit BeWorkZoneAlert.com.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Board of Supervisors this week will see the county’s new website as it prepares to launch and consider awarding a bid for a security project at the county jail.
The board will meet beginning at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 15, in the board chambers on the first floor of the Lake County Courthouse, 255 N. Forbes St., Lakeport.
The meeting ID is 978 1805 4172, pass code 124753. The meeting also can be accessed via one tap mobile at +16694449171,,97818054172#,,,,*124753#.
All interested members of the public that do not have internet access or a Mediacom cable subscription are encouraged to call 669-900-6833, and enter the Zoom meeting ID and pass code information above.
At 9:15 a.m. Tuesday, staff will present to the board the redesigned county website.
Staff reported that the redesigned CivicPlus-supported website is expected to launch publicly that morning at https://www.lakecountyca.gov/.
In an untimed item, the board will consider awarding a bid for $449,900.00 to R&B Electronics-Electrical Contracting for the Hill Road Correctional Facility Tower Electronics Security Systems Upgrade Project.
The full agenda follows.
CONSENT AGENDA
5.1: Approve continuation of proclamation of the existence of a local emergency due to pervasive tree mortality.
5.2: Adopt resolution amending Resolution No. 2022-119 establishing position allocations for Fiscal Year 2022-2023, Budget Unit No. 1012, Administrative Office.
5.3: Approve Board of Supervisors minutes for Oct. 25 and Nov. 1, 2022.
5.4: Approve continuation of resolution authorizing teleconferenced meetings during a state of emergency continue to exist.
5.5: Approve continuation of a local health emergency related to the 2019 Coronavirus (COVID-19) as proclaimed by the Lake County Public Health officer.
5.6: Approve continuation of a local emergency due to COVID-19.
5.7: Approve Continuation of an emergency declaration for drought conditions.
5.8: Approve a multi-year agreement with Peterson Tractor Co. for the servicing and repairs of county-owned heavy equipment used at the Eastlake Landfill for an annual amount not-to-exceed $300,000, and authorize the chair to sign.
5.9: Adopt resolution expressing support for the Lower Lake Light Parade and Street Fair, and temporarily authorizing a road closure, prohibiting parking and authorizing removal of vehicles and ordering the posting of signs.
5.10: Approve amendment four to the agreement between the county of Lake and Quincy Engineering Inc. for engineering services for replacement of Bartlett Creek Bridge at Bartlett Springs Road (14C-0099) and rehabilitation of Cache Creek Bridge at Bartlett Springs Road (14C-0107) in Lake County and authorize the chairman to execute said amendment.
5.11: Approve and sign the agreement between county of Lake and Creative Resources Strategies LLC. for the development of an invasive mussel introduction rapid response containment transition plan for Clear Lake in Lake County.
TIMED ITEMS
6.2, 9:15 a.m.: Presentation of redesigned county of Lake website.
6.3, 9:30 a.m.: Public hearing, request for hearing (appeal) by Thomas D. Humphrey (property owner) 13231 Second St., Clearlake Oaks, CA / APN#035-412-16.
6.4, 9:40 a.m.: Public hearing, request for hearing (appeal) by Thomas D. Humphrey for:13221 Second St., Clearlake Oaks, CA / APN#035-412-15.
UNTIMED ITEMS
7.2: Consideration of the following Advisory Board Appointment: Lower Lake Cemetery District.
7.3: Consideration of the award of Bid No. 22-30 for the Hill Road Correctional Facility Tower Electronics Security Systems Upgrade Project in the amount of $449,900.00 to R&B Electronics-Electrical Contracting, and authorize the chair to sign the agreement and notice of award.
CLOSED SESSION
8.1: Conference with legal counsel: Existing litigation pursuant to Gov. Code Sec. 5456.9(d)(1) – City of Clearlake v. County of Lake, et al.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
David Howell, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
The repeat concussions suffered by Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa less than a week apart in September 2022 have brought the seriousness of traumatic brain injury back into the public eye and triggered scrutiny of the NFL’s concussion protocols. And the upcoming World Cup soccer competition, which begins Nov. 20, 2022, will likely include highly visible head injuries.
The Conversation asked David Howell, director of the Colorado Concussion Research Laboratory at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, to explain the latest science behind concussions and why a recently injured brain is more vulnerable to repeat injury. Howell’s work focuses on the many different areas of concussion-related dysfunction and recovery, including movement deficits, sleep problems and rehabilitation.
How widespread are concussions?
The word concussion can evoke a variety of different images for different people. While concussions are most visible during high-profile sporting events, they can also occur on the playground, during the junior varsity football team practice or on the ski slope. The effects can be just as severe for children and teens as for high-profile athletes.
Concussion effects range from mild to severe, from short term to long term, and can affect many different facets of life. A concussion is defined as a traumatic brain injury caused by an impact to the head, resulting in an alteration of brain function. A concussion often leads to disruptions to everyday life – whether it be a job, academics, sports, physical activity or sleep. Given how unique people’s brains are and how differently they may respond to the injury, concussion recognition, diagnosis and treatment remain challenging for patients and clinicians alike.
What happens to the brain during a concussion?
There is a complex set of events that occur within the brain during and after a concussion occurs.
As a result of the trauma to the brain, brain cells – or neurons – stop functioning as they typically do when healthy. Generally there is not one specific area of the brain that is affected by a concussion. Instead, the injury can affect a widespread set of brain regions, not necessarily at the impact point. Thus, each person may experience a unique set of symptoms or functional problems following the injury.
One main problem that arises following a concussion is an energy crisis of sorts. This occurs when the brain requires a large volume of energy, in the form of glucose delivered by blood flow to the brain, to restore the injured processes. The body also may have trouble delivering blood to the brain because of a brain blood flow disruption caused by the injury, at the very time the brain needs extra energy to restore the injured areas. This mismatch can produce a variety of different symptoms people experience following a concussion.
What signs should you look for if you suspect a concussion?
Concussions produce a wide range of signs and symptoms, such as problems with walking and balance, dizziness, mood changes, disruptions to sleep and more.
Some of the main signs that health care providers look for following an impact to the head or body include unsteadiness of gait, loss of consciousness, seizures or other concussion symptoms like headache, cognitive impairment or problems with vision or balance.
It is critical that if a concussion is suspected, individuals cease playing their sport or activity. A simple mantra of “If in doubt, sit them out” should always be applied, regardless of the setting.
Why is the injured brain more vulnerable to repeat injury?
Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, who was carted off the field in late September 2022 after his second head injury in less than a week, serves as an example of how vulnerable the brain can be to additional trauma following an initial concussion.
While athletes of all ages may want to continue competing after a concussion, relying on a person with an injured brain to determine whether their brain is healthy enough to continue playing is flawed logic. Qualified health care professionals should always make these sorts of decisions for an athlete, rather than someone with a vested interest such as the athletes themselves or their coaches.
Given the energy crisis described above that occurs following a head injury, the brain simply cannot handle the added and cumulative stress of two injuries occurring in short succession. A second insult to the brain is often simply too much for the brain to handle, and the brain will preserve its most basic functions, such as breathing, above all else.
This is why it is imperative that athletes who experience a concussion be removed from the field of play and allowed to recover fully before returning to unrestricted sport participation. This often involves a stepwise reintegration approach, which allows for a gradual and safe reintroduction into physical activity at first, and an appropriately safe return to play under medical care.
You’ve had a concussion – now what?
The first step following a concussion is to stop playing sports and to rest for a day or two. Sleep is critically important in the days following a concussion.
A myth that continues to persist is that a person should be woken up every hour following a concussion. This is simply not supported by science. In fact, poor sleep after a concussion has been widely documented as being a predictor of poor outcomes, including longer recovery times and more severe anxiety, depression or cognitive symptoms. Waking someone up every hour applies to more severe brain injuries that would be ruled out by a health care provider during diagnosis.
Therefore, it is important to keep a balanced approach in mind. Following a day or two of physical rest, people with a concussion should begin resuming light physical and cognitive activity that does not provoke or exacerbate ongoing symptoms.
When a person begins to feel better following a concussion, they should gradually add in higher intensity and greater amounts and duration of exercise, dictated by whether their symptoms are not significantly provoked. Recent studies have focused on the value of an individualized aerobic exercise program in the week following a concussion. Past work suggests that performing aerobic exercise at a heart rate just below the level at which symptoms are exacerbated is safe and effective for recovery.
It is important to note that the effects of a concussion may also result in secondary conditions, such as anxiety or depression due to the biological, social or psychological effects of the injury. A recent study showed that adolescents who sustained a concussion have a higher risk of mental health issues compared to those with an orthopedic injury.
Yet it seems like no one wants to talk about what I see as the root cause of America’s economic malaise – work under contemporary capitalism is fundamentally flawed.
As a political philosopher studying the effects of contemporary capitalism on the future of work, I believe that the inability to dictate and meaningfully control one’s own working life is the problem.
Democratizing work is the solution.
The problem of work
What can be said about the malaise surrounding work under capitalism today?
There are at least four major problems:
First, work can be alienating. Workers are often not in control of how they work, when they work, what is done with the goods and services they produce, and what is done with the profits made from their work.
This is particularly evident in the rise of precarious forms of work, like those that are found in the gig economy.
Fourth, automation puts jobs and wages at risk. While technological innovation could in theory liberate people from the 40-hour workweek, as long as changes aren’t made to the structure of work, automation will simply continue to exert downward pressure on wages and contribute to increases in precarious employment.
Ultimately, the potential of automation to reduce working hours is inconsistent with the profit motives of capitalist companies.
Humanize work or reduce it?
On the one hand, many people lack work that is personally meaningful. On the other hand, many are also desperate for a more complete life – one that allows for creative self-expression and community-building outside of work.
So, what is to be done with the problem of work?
There are two competing visions of the best way to arrive at a solution.
The first is what Kathi Weeks, author of “The Problem with Work,” calls the “socialist humanist” position. According to socialist humanists, work “is understood as an individual creative capacity, a human essence, from which we are now estranged and to which we should be restored.”
In other words, jobs often make workers feel less human. The way to remedy this problem is by re-imagining work so that it is self-determined and people are better compensated for the work they do.
The second is what’s known as the “post-work” position. The post-work theorists believe that while doing some work might be necessary, the work ethic, as a prerequisite for social value, can be corrosive to humanity; they argue that meaning, purpose and social value are not necessarily found in work but instead reside in the communities and relationships built and sustained outside of the workplace.
So people should be liberated from the requirement of work in order to have the free time to do as they please, and embrace what French-Austrian philosopher André Gorz called “life as an end in itself.”
While both positions might stem from theoretical disagreements, is it possible to have the best of both worlds? Can work be humanized and play a less central role in our lives?
Democratic worker control
My own research has focused on what I see as a critical answer to the above question: democratic worker control.
In contrast to how work is currently organized under capitalism, democratic worker control humanizes work by allowing workers to determine their own working conditions, to own the full value of their labor, to dictate the structure and nature of their jobs and, crucially, to determine their own working hours.
This perspective recognizes that the problems people face in their working lives are not merely the result of an unjust distribution of resources. Rather, they result from power differentials in the workplace. Being told what to do, when to do it and how much you will earn is an alienating experience that leads to depression, precarity and economic inequality.
On the other hand, having a democratic say over your working life means the ability to make work less alienating. If people have democratic control over the work they do, they are unlikely to choose work that feels meaningless. They can also find their niche and figure out what’s fulfilling to them within a community of equals.
But work should not be confused with the whole of life. Nor should it be assumed that a sense of purpose, a sense of belonging and the acquisition of new skills can’t occur outside of work. Playing, volunteering and worshipping can all do the same.
However, in capitalist companies, labor-saving technologies do not afford workers with more leisure time. Instead, labor-saving technologies mean workers are more likely to face unemployment and downward pressure on wages.
Under democratic worker control, workers can choose to prioritize values that are consistent with themselves rather than the dictates of profit-seeking shareholders. Labor-saving technologies make it more likely that leisure time can become a choice. Workers are free to assert their own values, including that of less work and more play.
A mosaic approach
Of course, democratic worker control is not a silver bullet to economic discontent, and these changes to the workplace can’t occur in a vacuum.
For instance, trials of a four-day workweek without a reduction in pay are increasingly popular, and they have had resounding success in both the United Kingdom and Iceland. Workers report feeling less stressed and less burned out. They have a better work-life balance and report being just as productive, if not more so. Federal legislation to reduce working hours without a reduction in pay, such as through the implementation of a four-day workweek, could accompany a movement for democratic worker control.
The expansion of social services, the development of a public banking system and the provision of a universal basic income may also be important components of meaningful change. A broader movement to democratize the U.S. economy is needed if society is going to take the challenges of work in the 21st century seriously. In short, I believe a mosaic of approaches is necessary.
But one thing is clear: As long as work remains the dictates of shareholders rather than the workers themselves, much work will remain a source of alienation and will persist as an organizing feature of American life.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has a mix of adult dogs and puppies waiting to be adopted this week.
Dogs available for adoption this week include mixes of basset hound, German shepherd, hound, husky, Labrador retriever and pit bull.
Dogs that are adopted from Lake County Animal Care and Control are either neutered or spayed, microchipped and, if old enough, given a rabies shot and county license before being released to their new owner. License fees do not apply to residents of the cities of Lakeport or Clearlake.
The following dogs at the Lake County Animal Care and Control shelter have been cleared for adoption.
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online for information on visiting or adopting.
Female husky
This 2-year-old female husky has a short brown coat with white markings.
She is in kennel No. 11, ID No. LCAC-A-4269.
Male pit bull puppy
This 3-month-old male pit bull terrier has a short brown and white coat.
He is in kennel No. 24a, ID No. LCAC-A-4118.
‘Chief’
“Chief” is a 4-year-old male pit bull terrier with a brown and white coat.
He is in kennel No. 28, ID No. LCAC-A-4169.
‘Ruby’
“Ruby” is a 6-month-old female hound mix with a brindle coat.
She is in kennel No. 5, ID No. LCAC-A-3753.
Female pit bull
This 3-year-old female pit bull terrier has a fawn-colored coat.
She is in kennel No. 8, ID No. LCAC-A-4210.
‘Arlo’
“Arlo” is a 3-year-old male basset hound-Labrador retriever mix with a short brown coat.
He is in kennel No. 9, ID No. LCAC-A-4164.
Female Labrador retriever
This 3-month-old female Labrador retriever has a short black coat.
She is in kennel No. 13, ID No. LCAC-A-4162.
Male Labrador retriever
This 2-year-old male Labrador retriever has a short black coat.
He is in kennel No. 14, ID No. LCAC-A-4112.
Male Labrador retriever
This 3-month-old male Labrador retriever has a short black coat.
He is in kennel No. 15, ID No. LCAC-A-4163.
Male hound mix
This 2-year-old male hound mix has a short tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 20, ID No. LCAC-A-4176.
Female pit bull puppy
This 2-month-old female pit bull puppy has a short white and red coat.
She is in kennel No. 24b, ID No. LCAC-A-4121.
Male German shepherd
This 1-year-old male German shepherd has a short black and tan coat.
He is in kennel No. 33, ID No. LCAC-A-4204.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — A proposal to build 176 new housing units — including apartments and houses — next to Westside Community Park will return to the Lakeport City Council this week.
The council will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 15, in the council chambers at Lakeport City Hall, 225 Park St.
The council chambers will be open to the public for the meeting. Masks are highly encouraged where 6-foot distancing cannot be maintained.
If you cannot attend in person, and would like to speak on an agenda item, you can access the Zoom meeting remotely at this link or join by phone by calling toll-free 669-900-9128 or 346-248-7799.
The webinar ID is 973 6820 1787, access code is 477973; the audio pin will be shown after joining the webinar. Those phoning in without using the web link will be in “listen mode” only and will not be able to participate or comment.
Comments can be submitted by email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. To give the city clerk adequate time to print out comments for consideration at the meeting, please submit written comments before 3:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 15.
On Tuesday the council will meet new Public Works employees Cody Morland and Lucy Avilez.
The meeting’s main item will be the public hearing on Waterstone Residential’s plan to build 128 apartments and 48 cluster homes at 1310 Craig Ave., next to the original Parkside subdivision near Westside Community Park.
The council had discussed the matter in September and held off on a decision to give the developer additional time to speak with neighbors about their concerns.
Staff is presenting the council with the option of adopting a mitigated negative declaration and mitigation monitoring and reporting program for the Parkside Residential Project’s general plan amendment, zone change and other necessary entitlements for the project based on the information and findings contained in the initial study/environmental review.
The council will consider the project’s general plan amendment revising the existing land use classification of residential for a 3.42-acre portion of the property to high density residential.,
Council members also will consider introducing a proposed zone change that will revise the property’s base zoning from low density residential to high density resident and schedule a public hearing for the second reading of the zone change on Dec. 6.
In other action on Tuesday, the council will hold a public hearing to introduce the draft ordinance modifying city guidelines for outdoor dining design and set a second reading for Dec. 6 and adopt the draft resolution establishing the outdoor dining design guidelines.
Under council business, the council will consider adopting a resolution authorizing the city to submit an application to the California Department of Housing and Community Development for funding under the CPLHA Competitive Permanent Local Housing Allocation Program, and, if selected, authorize the city manager to execute the agreement and other necessary documents and approve the corresponding budget revenue and expense amendments.
On the consent agenda — items usually accepted as a slate on one vote — are ordinances; minutes of the regular council meeting on Nov. 1; adoption of a resolution authorizing continued remote teleconference meetings of the Lakeport City Council and its legislative bodies pursuant to Government Code section 54953(e); confirm the continuing existence of a local emergency for the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency; conduct a second reading and adopt the ordinance amending Chapter 15.04 of the Lakeport Municipal Code regarding the text of the 2022 Building Code Adoption; adoption of a resolution approving a memorandum of understanding with the Lakeport Police Officers’ Association for the period of Nov. 15, 2022, to June 30, 2025; and authorize the recruitment of an administrative specialist or permit technician in the Community Development Department.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has half a dozen cats ready for adoption.
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm for information on visiting or adopting.
The following cats at the shelter have been cleared for adoption.
‘Mom’
“Mom” is a 2-year-old female domestic shorthair cat with an orange and white coat.
She is in cat room kennel No. 3, ID No. LCAC-A-4080.
Female domestic shorthair
This 2-year-old female domestic shorthair cat has a gray tabby coat.
“She is an adult cat with some playful kitten tendencies when toys are brought out. She has a sweet little meow and likes to have playful chats with you,” shelter staff said.
She is in cat room kennel No. 10, ID No. LCAC-A-3661.
Male domestic shorthair
This 3-year-old male domestic shorthair cat has an orange tabby coat.
“This guy can be shy at first, but once he knows that you are all about the pets, he will roll right over and start his purr machine. He has a unique curly tail which he flicks around when curious,” shelter staff said.
He is in cat room kennel No. 13, ID No. LCAC-A-4021.
Female domestic shorthair kitten
This 3-month-old female domestic shorthair kitten has a gray and white coat.
Staff said the kitten is outgoing and all about fun and games. “She loves to play with toys and enjoys cuddle time. She also enjoys playing with the other kittens and cats.”
She is in cat room kennel No. 36, ID No. LCAC-A-4085.
Female domestic shorthair
This 2-year-old female domestic shorthair cat has a Siamese coat with reddish points and blue eyes.
Shelter staff said she came in as an injured stray. “When we met her, even in obvious distress, she was purring and happy to see us.”
After successful surgery to repair a rectal prolapse due to a large bladder stone, “she has continued to have a wonderful attitude and would make a lovely cuddle partner,” staff said, noting she is very sweet and talkative.
In her adoptive home, staff recommends she continue on a specific bladder health diet in order to prevent the possibility of future bladder stones.
She is in cat room kennel No. 73, ID No. LCAC-A-4090.
Male domestic longhair cat
This 1-year-old male domestic longhair cat has a black and white coat.
“This guy had a hard start, but has a lot of love to give once he warms up to you,” shelter staff said.
Staff said he also loves brushing and shows his appreciation with purring and head bumps.
He is in kennel No. 107, ID No. LCAC-A-4023.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Herman Daly had a flair for stating the obvious. When an economy creates more costs than benefits, he called it “uneconomic growth.” But you won’t find that conclusion in economics textbooks. Even suggesting that economic growth could cost more than it’s worth can be seen as economic heresy.
The renegade economist, known as the father of ecological economics and a leading architect of sustainable development, died on Oct. 28, 2022, at the age of 84. He spent his career questioning an economics disconnected from an environmental footing and moral compass.
In an age of climate chaos and economic crisis, his ideas that inspired a movement to live within our means are increasingly essential.
The seeds of an ecological economist
Herman Daly grew up in Beaumont, Texas, ground zero of the early 20th century oil boom. He witnessed the unprecedented growth and prosperity of the “gusher age” set against the poverty and deprivation that lingered after the Great Depression.
To Daly, as many young men then and since believed, economic growth was the solution to the world’s problems, especially in developing countries. To study economics in college and export the northern model to the global south was seen as a righteous path.
But Daly was a voracious reader, a side effect of having polio as a boy and missing out on the Texas football craze. Outside the confines of assigned textbooks, he found a history of economic thought steeped in rich philosophical debates on the function and purpose of the economy.
Unlike the precision of a market equilibrium sketched on the classroom blackboard, the real-world economy was messy and political, designed by those in power to choose winners and losers. He believed that economists should at least ask: Growth for whom, for what purpose and for how long?
Daly’s biggest realization came through reading marine biologist Rachel Carson’s 1962 book “Silent Spring,” and seeing her call to “come to terms with nature … to prove our maturity and our mastery, not of nature but of ourselves.” By then, he was working on a Ph.D. in Latin American development at Vanderbilt University and was already quite skeptical of the hyperindividualism baked into economic models. In Carson’s writing, the conflict between a growing economy and a fragile environment was blindingly clear.
After a fateful class with Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen, Daly’s conversion was complete. Georgescu-Roegen, a Romanian-born economist, dismissed the free market fairy tale of a pendulum swinging back and forth, effortlessly seeking a natural state of equilibrium. He argued that the economy was more like an hourglass, a one-way process converting valuable resources into useless waste.
Daly became convinced that economics should no longer prioritize the efficiency of this one-way process but instead focus on the “optimal” scale of an economy that the Earth can sustain. Just shy of his 30th birthday in 1968, while working as a visiting professor in the poverty-stricken Ceará region of northeastern Brazil, Daly published “On Economics as a Life Science.”
His sketches and tables of the economy as a metabolic process, entirely dependent on the biosphere as source for sustenance and sink for waste, were the road map for a revolution in economics.
Economics of a full world
Daly spent the rest of his career drawing boxes in circles. In what he called the “pre-analytical vision,” the economy – the box – was viewed as the “wholly owned subsidiary” of the environment, the circle.
When the economy is small relative to the containing environment, a focus on the efficiency of a growing system has merit. But Daly argued that in a “full world,” with an economy that outgrows its sustaining environment, the system is in danger of collapse.
While a professor at Louisiana State University in the 1970s, at the height of the U.S. environmental movement, Daly brought the box-in-circle framing to its logical conclusion in “Steady-State Economics.” Daly reasoned that growth and exploitation are prioritized in the competitive, pioneer stage of a young ecosystem. But with age comes a new focus on durability and cooperation. His steady-state model shifted the goal away from blind expansion of the economy and toward purposeful improvement of the human condition.
The international development community took notice. Following the United Nations’ 1987 publication of “Our Common Future,” which framed the goals of a “sustainable” development, Daly saw a window for development policy reform. He left the safety of tenure at LSU to join a rogue group of environmental scientists at the World Bank.
For the better part of six years, they worked to upend the reigning economic logic that treated “the Earth as if it were a business in liquidation.” He often butted heads with senior leadership, most famously with Larry Summers, the bank’s chief economist at the time, who publicly waved off Daly’s question of whether the size of a growing economy relative to a fixed ecosystem was of any importance. The future U.S. treasury secretary’s reply was short and dismissive: “That’s not the right way to look at it.”
But by the end of his tenure there, Daly and colleagues had successfully incorporated new environmental impact standards into all development loans and projects. And the international sustainability agenda they helped shape is now baked into the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals of 193 countries, “a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity.”
I knew Herman Daly for two decades as a co-author, mentor and teacher. He always made time for me and my students, most recently writing the foreword to my upcoming book, “The Progress Illusion: Reclaiming Our Future from the Fairytale of Economics.” I will be forever grateful for his inspiration and courage to, as he put it, “ask the naive, honest questions” and then not be “satisfied until I get the answers.”
Below-normal rainfall and above-average temperatures intensified drought conditions, broadening the geographic areas of drought across the U.S. in October 2022.
Those dry conditions were also felt along the Mississippi River, where some locations reported their lowest water levels in 10 years.
Here are more highlights from NOAA’s latest monthly U.S. climate report:
Climate by the numbers
October 2022
The average October temperature across the contiguous U.S. was 55.3 degrees F, 1.2 degrees above the 20th-century average, ranking in the warmest third in the climate record.
Several states had a top-10 warm October. Looking at the western U.S., Washington saw its warmest October on record, Oregon its second warmest, and California its seventh warmest. Along the eastern U.S., Maine had its sixth-warmest October.
The average precipitation was 1.66 inches — 0.50 of an inch below average — placing the month in the driest third of Octobers on record.
Florida had its eighth-driest October on record while California and Minnesota each saw their 11th driest. Conversely, an abundance of precipitation during the month gave New Jersey its 10th-wettest October on record.
Year to date (YTD, January through October 2022)
The average U.S. temperature for the YTD was 56.7 degrees F, 1.7 degrees above the 20th-century average, ranking as the 13th-warmest such YTD in the climate record. California saw its third warmest while Oregon saw its sixth warmest.
The U.S. precipitation total for the YTD was 23.19 inches — 2.17 inches below average — ranking as the 15th-driest such YTD on record. California had its driest, Nebraska ranked fourth and Nevada saw its eighth driest on record for this 10-month period.
Other notable climate events
The Mississippi River ran historically low: The Mississippi River dropped to its lowest water levels in a decade near Memphis, Tennessee, and Vicksburg, Mississippi, closing off a vital channel to barge traffic at a crucial time of year for crop transportation. In October 2022, the U.S. Coast Guard reported a total of eight barges that ran aground, along with a long backup of 144 vessels and 2,253 barges trying to access narrow river passages.
More of the nation impacted by drought: According to the Nov. 1, 2022, U.S. Drought Monitor report, about 62.8% of the contiguous U.S. was in drought, up approximately 11.9% from the end of September. Drought conditions expanded or intensified across much of the Southeast and Mississippi, Ohio and Tennessee valleys, and parts of the Plains, central Rockies and Northwest. Drought conditions shrank or were eliminated across portions of the Southwest, southern Plains, Northeast and Hawaii.
BERKELEY, Calif. — Weather and climate modelers understand pretty well how seasonal winds and ocean currents affect El Niño patterns in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, impacting weather across the United States and sometimes worldwide.
But new computer simulations show that one driver of annual weather cycles in that region — in particular, a cold tongue of surface waters stretching westward along the equator from the coast of South America — has gone unrecognized: the changing distance between Earth and the sun.
The cold tongue, in turn, influences the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), which impacts weather in California, much of North America, and often globally.
The Earth-sun distance slowly varies over the course of the year because Earth’s orbit is slightly elliptical. Currently, at its closest approach — perihelion — Earth is about 3 million miles closer to the sun than at its farthest point, or aphelion. As a result, sunlight is about 7% more intense at perihelion than at aphelion.
Research led by the University of California, Berkeley, demonstrates that the slight yearly change in our distance from the sun can have a large effect on the annual cycle of the cold tongue. This is distinct from the effect of Earth’s axial tilt on the seasons, which is currently understood to cause the annual cycle of the cold tongue.
Because the period of the annual cycle arising from the tilt and distance effects are slightly different, their combined effects vary over time, said lead researcher John Chiang, UC Berkeley professor of geography.
“The curious thing is that the annual cycle from the distance effect is slightly longer than that for tilt — around 25 minutes, currently — so over a span of about 11,000 years, the two annual cycles go from being in phase to out of phase, and the net seasonality undergoes a remarkable change, as a result,” Chiang said.
Chiang noted that the distance effect is already incorporated into climate models — though its effect on the equatorial Pacific was not recognized until now — and his findings will not alter weather predictions or climate projections. But the 22,000-year phase cycle may have had long-term, historical effects. Earth’s orbital precession is known to have affected the timing of the ice ages, for example.
The distance effect — and its 22,000-year variation — also may affect other weather systems on Earth. The ENSO, which also originates in the equatorial Pacific, is likely affected because its workings are closely tied to the seasonal cycle of the cold tongue.
“Theory tells us that the seasonal cycle of the cold tongue plays a key role in the development and termination of ENSO events,” said Alyssa Atwood, a former UC Berkeley postdoctoral fellow who is now an assistant professor at Florida State University in Tallahassee. “Because of this, many of ENSO’s key characteristics are synced to the seasonal cycle.”
For example, ENSO events tend to peak during Northern Hemisphere winters, she said, and they don’t typically persist beyond northern or boreal spring months, which scientists refer to as the “spring predictability barrier.” Because of these linkages, it is reasonable to expect that the distance effect could also have a major impact on ENSO — something that should be examined in future studies.
“Very little attention has been paid to the cold tongue seasonal cycle because most people think it's solved. There's nothing interesting there,” Chiang said. “What this research shows is that it's not solved. There's still a mystery there. Our result also begs the question whether other regions on Earth may also have a significant distance effect contribution to their seasonal cycle.”
“We learn in science classes as early as grade school that the seasons are caused by the tilt of Earth’s axis,” added Anthony Broccoli of Rutgers University. “This is certainly true and has been well understood for centuries. Although the effect of the Earth-sun distance has also been recognized, our study indicates that this ‘distance effect’ may be a more important effect on climate than had been recognized previously.”
Chiang, Atwood, Broccoli and their colleagues reported their findings last week in the journal Nature.
Two distinct yearly cycles affect Pacific cold tongue
The main driver of global weather changes is seasonal change. Earth’s equator is tilted relative to its orbit around the sun, so the Northern and Southern hemispheres are illuminated differently. When the sun shines directly overhead in the north, it’s warmer in the north and colder in the south, and vice versa.
These yearly changes have major effects on the Pacific equatorial trade winds, which blow from southeast to northwest across the south and equatorial Pacific and push surface waters westward, causing upwelling of cold water along the equator that creates a tongue of cold surface water that stretches from Ecuador across the Pacific — almost one-quarter the circumference of the planet.
The yearly hemispheric changes in seasonal temperature alters the strength of the trades, and thus cause a yearly cycle in the temperature of the cold tongue. This, in turn, has a major influence on ENSO, which typically peaks during Northern Hemisphere winter.
The occurrence of El Niño — or its opposite, La Niña — helps determines whether California and the West Coast will have a wet or dry winter, but also whether the Midwest and parts of Asia will have rain or drought.
“In studying past climates, much effort has been dedicated to trying to understand if variability in the tropical Pacific Ocean — that is, the El Niño/La Niña cycle — has changed in the past,” Broccoli said. “We chose to focus instead on the yearly cycle of ocean temperatures in the eastern Pacific cold tongue. Our study found that the timing of perihelion — that is, the point at which the earth is closest to the sun — has an important influence on climate in the tropical Pacific."
In 2015, Broccoli, co-director of the Rutgers Climate Institute, along with his then-graduate student Michael Erb, employed a computer climate model to show that the distance changes caused by Earth’s elliptical orbit dramatically altered the cold tongue yearly cycle. But climate modelers mostly ignored the result, Chiang said.
“Our field is focused on El Niño, and we thought that the seasonal cycle was solved. But then we realized that the result by Erb and Broccoli challenged this assumption,” he said.
Chiang and his colleagues, including Broccoli and Atwood, examined similar simulations using four different climate models and confirmed the result. But the team went further to show how the distance effect works.
Earth’s ‘marine’ and ‘continental’ hemispheres
The key distinction is that changes in the sun’s distance from Earth don’t affect the Northern and Southern hemispheres differently, which is what gives rise to the seasonal effect due to Earth’s axial tilt. Instead, they warm the eastern “continental hemisphere” dominated by the North and South American and African and Eurasian landmasses, more than it warms the Western Hemisphere — what he calls the marine hemisphere, because it is dominated by the Pacific Ocean.
“The traditional way of thinking about monsoons is that the Northern Hemisphere warms up relative to the Southern Hemisphere, generating winds onto land that bring monsoon rains,” Chiang said. “But here, we’re actually talking about east-west, not north-south, temperature differences that cause the winds. The distance effect is operating through the same mechanism as the seasonal monsoon rains, but the wind changes are coming from this east-west monsoon.”
The winds generated by this differential heating of the marine and continental hemispheres alter the yearly variation of the easterly trades in the western equatorial Pacific, and thereby the cold tongue.
“When Earth is closest to the sun, these winds are strong. In the offseason, when the sun is at its furthest, these winds become weak,” Chiang said. “Those wind changes are then propagated to the Eastern Pacific through the thermocline, and basically it drives an annual cycle of the cold tongue, as a result.”
Today, Chiang said, the distance effect on the cold tongue is about one-third the strength of the tilt effect, and they enhance one another, leading to a strong annual cycle of the cold tongue. About 6,000 years ago, they canceled one another, yielding a muted annual cycle of the cold tongue. In the past, when Earth’s orbit was more elliptical, the distance effect on the cold tongue would have been larger and could have led to a more complete cancellation when out of phase.
Though Chiang and his colleagues did not examine the effect of such a cancellation, this would potentially have had a worldwide effect on weather patterns.
Chiang emphasized that the distance effect on climate, while clear in climate model simulations, would not be evident from observations because it cannot be readily distinguished from the tilt effect.
“This study is purely model based. So, it is a prediction,” he said. “But this behavior is reproduced by a number of different models, at least four. And what we did in this study is to explain why this happens. And in the process, we've discovered another annual cycle of the cold tongue that's driven by Earth's eccentricity.”
Atwood noted that, unlike the robust changes to the cold tongue seasonal cycle, changes to ENSO tend to be model-dependent.
“While ENSO remains a challenge for climate models, we can look beyond climate model simulations to the paleoclimate record to investigate the connection between changes in the annual cycle of the cold tongue and ENSO in the past,” she said. “To date, paleoclimate records from the tropical Pacific have largely been interpreted in terms of past changes in ENSO, but our study underscores the need to separate changes in the cold tongue annual cycle from changes in ENSO.”
Chiang’s colleagues, in addition to Broccoli and Atwood, are Daniel Vimont of the University of Wisconsin in Madison; former UC Berkeley undergraduate Paul Nicknish, now a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; William Roberts of Northumbria University in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the United Kingdom; and Clay Tabor of the University of Connecticut in Storrs. Chiang conducted part of the research while on sabbatical at the Research Institute for Environmental Changes of the Academia Sinica in Taipei, Taiwan.
Robert Sanders writes for the UC Berkeley News Center.