Category: Misc

Mrs. Williams Goes to Washington

The starring role at yesterday’s Board of Supervisors meeting was played by Margaret Williams of Tahoe Park (what up TP!!) who trotted her two young boys to the County building to ask her county supe, Roger Dickinson, if he could explain to her sons why “mommy should invest in an arena instead of their milk.”

Before you jump up and down at your keyboard because milk is a non-taxable grocery item, consider that when your budget is necessarily tight, the extra tax burden has to come out of somewhere. Consider the much-talked about impending $5 gallon of gas. They roll the sales tax into the pump price so you never really get to consider it, but that’s a major hit we’d take. (And not to spread the snark too thin, but I’d suggest that the kids milk should be very low on the list of things that get cut back.)
Continue reading “Mrs. Williams Goes to Washington”

Arena tax measures survive MacGlashan head-butt


Roberta MacGlashan,
District 4 Supervisor

The votes have been cast and as of this afternoon the arena tax ballot measures are going forward, the ordinance having passed 4-1 in the Board of Supervisors. The one nay vote came from District 4 supervisor Robert MacGlashan. (District 4 includes Antelope, Orangevale and Citrus Heights.)
Continue reading “Arena tax measures survive MacGlashan head-butt”

How do you beat the heat?

Let’s not beat around the bush here, Sacramento: it’s hot. But life goes on. If you aren’t a shut-in, chances are you can’t spend 24/7 laying on your kitchen floor or in an ice bath. So let’s hear it; how are you beating the heat, Sacramento? Here are some of our favorites, but we’d love to hear more. Read on.
Continue reading “How do you beat the heat?”

Top off your tanks & get some cash

With the threat of rolling blackouts and with some areas experiencing power outages, take a few minutes today to hit the ATM and gas station. I tried to get gas at the 76 on Fair Oaks & Watt this morning, but they were completely shut down due to a power outage earlier this morning. Even though they had power when I went there, their computer systems still were not working. Luckily, the Shell across the street was able to gas me up since I was running pretty low, but the clerk indicated that they’d had some issues in the power outage aftermath too.

This isn’t exactly a newsflash, but if we do have widespread blackouts, we won’t have access to basic things like gas stations, ATMs, and just about any other business that is dependent on computer systems. Not that people can actually count change, but it would be advantageous to have some extra cash on hand should you need to make purchases for which you’d ordinarily use your debit or credit card and to have a full tank of gas no matter where you need to go.

Old Sacramento

We took a frantic run to the river just after dawn yesterday, in hopes of taking the edge of the energy levels of the two youngest retrievers with an hour or so of running, swimming and fetching.

It was already hot, and my glasses wouldn’t stop steaming up. We spent an hour or so there in the company of many others — runners, hikers, other dog-lovers — all desperate to get in some physical activity before the oppressive heat drove us all inside.

By 10 a.m., dogs exhausted, errands run, I was hunkered down in my air-conditioned bunker, hoping to heavens that the state had enough power and that my aging AC unit can hang on for another season. Using energy conservation as an excuse to skip the laundry, I cracked the cover of Joan Didion’s “Where I Was From” and settled down onto the couch.

The title refers more to California in general than to Didion’s home town of Sacramento in particular, but there’s plenty in the book about her growing up here as a member of a pioneer family. She herself may be one of the most famous natives of Sacramento, but she couldn’t say much about the place now: She left for Cal in the ’50s and never came back.

Still, I had to laugh at one passage where she writes about her father:

My father did not believe in air conditioning.

My father in fact believed that Sacramento summers had been too cold since the dams.

Joan Didion’s father died in 1992, but i bet these last few days would have had him re-appraising his beliefs.

The Maloofs’ share of construction costs: Zero

As blogged by the irreplaceable Argus, an important detail as yet unspecified by the politicos has come out of the nuts and bolts of the arena deal: The “26-30%” figure cited as the Maloofs share of building the arena is actually the calculated cost of their rent payments over the 30 year loan (half of which would be paid after the tax is phased out) plus the other stuff they promised to pay, like the campaign fund, the capital costs and the loan they already have on the books with the city. You have to look closely to realize that they will not pay a cent for the concrete and steel to build the building. What they will pay is “a figure equalling 26-30% of the construction costs of the arena.” The JPA will be building the arena with tax money.

“Half* the money* goes to parks*”

*Results not typical.

Just two tidbits about the details of the arena deal reached yesterday:

  1. None of the promised “half” of the revenue from the sales tax hike will go to local governments for “about seven years.” Until then every red cent will go to the arena. I assume this means that after that, still only half of every dollar will go to local governments. The way the numbers line up, I assume they still intend for half of the overall take to go to non-arena spending. But clearly the door is open for that seven year … window to become 8 years, or 10. This is one more confusing point that will probably lead to a defeat for the tax increase in the fall.

    2. Continue reading ““Half* the money* goes to parks*””

Arena deal reached

The Bee is reporting that an arena deal was reached right about noon today. Apparently the Maloofs agreed to pay between 25-30% of the cost and the sales tax would bank about $1.2 million (does that mean it’s for 20 years?).

As previously assumed, the city and county would co-own the arena and Maloof S&E would sign a 30 year lease. It would presumably take a pretty massive batch of cookies to get out of a lease that size. Perhaps something on the order of a pair of Kings tickets? As John (Uneasy Rhetoric) points out, the fact that it will definitely be going down in the Railyard was stated only in accompanying photo caption.

For more info, read other websites for cryin eye. I’m sick of thinking about having to pay a few extra bucks a month for an arena I’ll see the inside of once every 4 years.

Housing markets: Sacramento vs. 25 other cities

The Wall Street Journal has a nifty chart online spotting housing trends in 26 cities, Sacramento included. Although most of the WSJ content is available only to subscribers, it appears this piece is open to all, at least for now.

The chart lists Sacramento as a falling market with a 136 percent change in inventory of available homes. What struck me, though (although it didn’t come as a surprise, really) is how relatively low-priced many other cities are. Example: Three bedroom, two bath “lakeside lodge” in Jacksonville, FL, for $195,600. In Houston, $139,900 will get you four-bedrooms and 2,392 square-feet.

But having spent time in both Jax and Houston, I have to say: If you think summer in Sacramento is miserable, try north Florida or Houston. C’mon, you know it! Let’s have the Sacramento motto:

It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity.