All posts by Editor

Air monitoring, Benicia City Council, Industrial Safety Ordinance (ISO)

CALL TO ACTION: Attend Benicia City Council on Tuesday, July 17!

An email from Kathy Kerridge, Benicia
[For meeting agenda and materials, see Benicia City Council to vote whether to reconsider vote on ISO.  For much more, see the Benicia Independent’s ISO page.  If you can’t attend, note below for info on where to write.]

Support a Benicia Industrial Safety Ordinance on 7/17

Kathy Kerridge, Benicia

Come support an Industrial Safety Ordinance at Benicia City Council on July 17 at 7:00 p.m.  This is a chance for the City Council to have staff review a proposed ordinance and move forward with making sure that Benicia has a seat at the table when it comes to safety.

An Industrial Safety Ordinance (ISO) would ensure that Benicia has a network of air monitors, and a robust emergency response plan. Benicia is the only refinery town in the Bay Area without an ISO.

The Council will be reconsidering their decision to kick the can down the road.  Councilmembers Schwartzman, Hughes and Campbell voted at the last hearing to postpone this important decision until after the November election, while Patterson and Young wanted to move forward now.   This is a chance for them to get it right.

If you can’t come, please email (see below).

Kathy Kerridge

WHERE TO WRITE…

EMAIL THE CITY:
Mayor Elizabeth Patterson ([email protected])
Vice Mayor Steve Young ([email protected])
Tom Campbell ([email protected]
Mark Hughes ([email protected])
Alan Schwartzman ([email protected])
City Manager Lorie Tinfow ([email protected])
City Attorney Heather McLaughlin ([email protected])
Fire Chief Josh Chadwick ([email protected])
Police Chief Erik Upson ([email protected])

MAIL / PHONE / OFFICES:
Mail to or visit City Hall: 250 East L Street, Benicia, CA 94510
Phone numbers are listed on the City’s CONTACT PAGE

SEND YOUR THOUGHTS TO THE NEWS MEDIA:

  • Benicia Herald, 820 First St, Benicia, CA 94510, or by email to the editor at [email protected]
  • Vallejo Times-Herald, P.O. Box 3188, Vallejo, CA 94590, Fax: 643-0128, or by email to Editor Jack Bungart at [email protected].
  • Benicia Independent – send to Roger at rogrmail at this URL.

POST TO SOCIAL MEDIA (some require membership):

Meeting notices

PDB Meeting – July 12th, 7:00 PM

General meeting Thursday July 12, 7:00 pm

Dona Benicia Room of the Benicia Library

  • Speaker: Lynette Henley, California Democratic Party (CDP) Region 2 Director.  Lynette has agreed to give her insights and thoughts on the state of the California Democratic Party prior to the general elections, now that the primaries have set the candidates.
  • Agenda (download) Highlights:
    • Flip 14: voter registrations; Benicia ISO next steps.
    • Ms. Lynette Henley, Region 2 Director, CA Democratic Party/Solano Co Democratic Central Committee member: June 6 Primary results. Suggestions on how PDB can best focus its efforts on the races and candidates in the November 6th election.
    • Benicia School Board Trustee elections. Panel discussion.
    • CA-10: Jeff Denham (R) v. Josh Harder (D). PDB support for ongoing operations in Tracy, which resume July 14th, to elect Josh Harder on November 6. (See handout.)
    • PDB Endorsement committee and process for November races and candidates.
  • Invitation letter from PDB Chairperson Ralph Dennis, 7/5/18
  • Draft 6/18/18 minutes – for approval
Air monitoring, Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), Contra Costa County, Industrial Safety Ordinance (ISO), Solano County

Questionable community outreach by Air District for Industrial Safety Ordinance audits

Repost from the Benicia Independent, from local emails…

FIRST ROUND OF EMAILS…

From: Roger Straw
Sent: Friday, July 06, 2018 9:45 AM
Subject: FW: [BAAQMD Coalition] Questionable community outreach for Industrial Safety Ordinance audits

This is amazing – read below, from bottom, up.  (Click on the image for larger display.)  And then come back and ask a couple of questions:

  1. Does Solano County have to report to the public like this now – even under current regulations?  Do they publish a notice like the one Nancy sent from Crockett?  Is this something that our newbie “CUPA” needs to be doing on our behalf?
  2. If/when we have an ISO, what assurances do we have the Hazardous Materials staff (Contra Costa OR Solano) would be any more attentive to Benicia citizens’ needs.  (Randy Sawyer should be embarrassed by this.)

I think the Working Group could be making a big deal out of this!  I think I’ll post about it on the BenIndy.

Roger

Begin forwarded message:

On Tue, Jul 3, 2018, 3:28 PM Nancy Rieser via BAAQMD Network wrote:

The Contra Costa Health Department considers a booth behind an elementary school two blocks away from a street fair in Crockett as a “public meeting..”   They reckon that the booth where they will be twiddling their fingers while the locals drink and dance a few blocks away will meet its obligation to hold a face-to-face public meeting.

Guess we are lucky.  Martinez gets its face-to-face at a Christmas tree farm in August on National Night Out.

I called the Health Department:  The gentleman who answered the phone said that apparently nobody cares enough to hear this kind of information and they won’t hold a meeting unless they can get a guaranteed audience of 25 people.  Neither will they mail notices to individual homes about their meeting to hustle the crowds.  “It is too expensive.”

LATER, VERY INTERESTING!

From: Ralph Dennis
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2018 12:26 PM
Subject: ISO related

I noticed in the Benicia Herald this morning two public notices for Risk Management Plans prepared by Solano County Department of Resource Management, one for Praxair and the other for Benicia’s Water Treatment Plant. These are part of the 5-year audit review process, I believe, the same reports referenced in the Contra Costa County notice you sent around the other day.

I figured there ought to be one for Valero, so I called the Solano County Department of Resource Management. Turns out the Valero plan was filed in Dec. 2017 and is still under review. The staffer I spoke with who is doing the review is suppose to call me about status. Interesting, I guess: no public meetings planned, copies of plans not available in our library (as in Contra Costa County). He seemed surprised at my question about public meetings, said he could check with management.

CCHMP public notice meetings July-Aug 2018