Sunday Reads: Redefining our Monterey Bay ‘home’; pesticide use; PCS pay dispute; Tyre Nichols

This Sunday, you’ll see an important Community Voices article on the ongoing threat of pesticides to farmworkers, their families and those living or working near the berry fields of South Santa Cruz County. It’s an issue Lookout addressed in an editorial at year’s end, and now, Erika Alfaro, a Santa Cruz resident and pediatric nurse case manager, channels her anger at the pesticide use — and reminds of the practical meaning of the term “environmental racism.” “What is the worth of a man or a woman? What is the worth of a farmworker?” she asks, reminding us of Cesar Chavez’s words of three decades ago, as she details what a caravan of farmworkers heard when they visited regulators in Sacramento recently. It’s a must-read.

As we approach the new month, we’ve all become acutely aware that recovery from the recent storm parade will be a long and costly process. So Monday, Lookout launches Storms 2023: Road to Recovery. Just as we did on the storms themselves, our newsroom team of 10 has firmly focused on the many twists and turns of recovery. Check it out and let us know your thoughts as well.

When we consider the storms — and climate change — we can step back a bit and contemplate that larger frame of where we are privileged to live. Bonny Dooners Frans Lanting and Chris Eckstrom have offered us the oh-so-timely way to do that. Their “Bay of Life” exhibition is now open at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History. It’s a stunner, visually and intellectually. “Bay of Life” is a big-picture recasting of what it means to live in the wider Monterey Bay region, relevant to anyone within that region, whether they live in Ben Lomond, San Juan Bautista, Moss Landing or Carmel Valley,” writes Wallace Baine in his Sunday column. “When it comes to elements such as rain and fog, fire and wind, we are all living in the same place.”

Finally, we want to talk with you, our members. We’ve now started up a new round of our Lookout Listens sessions. We’re inviting Lookout members to join one of several upcoming meetings at Lookout HQ, located in downtown Santa Cruz. The format is simple: tell us what you think needs better coverage and how you think we can make Lookout better. Here’s the link: Join us.

‘Bay of Life’ enlarges the vision of what we all call ‘home’

The iconic break at Maverick’s, near Half Moon Bay, illustrates the power of the ocean on the Monterey Bay.

(FRANS LANTING)

“Bay of Life,” a project from Bonny Doon photographer Frans Lanting and writer Chris Eckstrom, is on display at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History with an idea of providing a comprehensive profile of the Monterey Bay.

Wallace Baine writes that: The “Bay of Life” is a big-picture recasting of what it means to live in the wider Monterey Bay region, relevant to anyone within that region, whether they live in Ben Lomond, San Juan Bautista, Moss Landing or Carmel Valley. When it comes to elements such as rain and fog, fire and wind, we are all living in the same place, county jurisdictions be damned. Read Wallace’s story here.

➤ MORE FROM WALLACE: Find all of his columns here

Santa Cruz County should not be using a pesticide banned in 34 countries — that is environmental racism

(Via Erika Alfaro)

Erika Alfaro, a Santa Cruz resident and pediatric nurse case manager, was one of dozens from across California who implored regulators to limit the use of 1,3-dichloropropene on crops during a recent hearing in Sacramento. The regulatory board has proposed “allowing 14 times more cancer-causing 1,3-D in the air that farmworker communities breathe” than the state’s office of environmental health says is safe, she says. “If this pesticide were applied in Los Gatos or Saratoga, where affluent communities reside, would this even be an issue?” she asks. Read her Community Voices opinion piece here.

➤ MORE ON PESTICIDES IN THE PAJARO VALLEY: Find Lookout’s news and opinion coverage here

Pacific Collegiate School board directors, teachers in mediation over new contract

Pacific Collegiate School

(Via Stripe Design Services)

Following months of negotiations and disagreements over pay increases, teachers at Pacific Collegiate School — a charter high school that is widely considered the best in the county — say they’re unable to afford living in the Santa Cruz Area on their current salaries. They say lower pay and burnout has led to turnover rates as high as 34% in the last year. Read more from Hillary Ojeda.

From The Daily Memphian: The fatal police beating of Tyre Nichols

Tyre Nichols is wrestled out of his car in Memphis police body camera video.

(Screenshot)

The Tyre Nichols’ case has newly electrified debate about policing. It’s a national debate, reported widely by national sources. But those on the ground can always provide a unique perspective. In Memphis, Lookout can bring you that reporting and viewpoint from The Daily Memphian, a new company very much like Lookout. Only four years old, but now hosting the largest newsroom in Memphis of almost 40 journalists, the Daily Memphian has covered this story as only a homegrown, mission-driven news source can. You can find all of the Daily Memphian’s coverage here.

This weekend, on Lookout, we republished two stories:

➤ This one, just updated, sorts out the video footage (with warnings in advance about their graphic content), and segments those videos in four parts to help our understanding of the chronology of events.

➤ This roundtable discussion, “Calls for reform in wake of Nichols’ death have roots in George Floyd protests,” in text and video, involving local journalists, puts much of what happened over the last three weeks into a wider perspective, telling us how Memphis specifically has dealt with continuing issues, especially since the killing of George Floyd sparked a national movement.

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