Point of View Archives - ChicoSol News

A plea for real gun control The question is whether leaders "have the guts to act"

by George Gold
guest commentary posted June 14

There’s an epidemic in America that came, not from a laboratory test tube and not from some animal-to-human transmission, but that was created here, by us.

Guns are everywhere and they’re being used to kill people. They’re killing us in schools, supermarkets, even cemeteries. So is this the best we can do? The level of anger that seemingly is coming from so many parts of our society is frightening. But we have to start somewhere.

In an era of disinformation, any lie can find traction in the circles of the very people who are already angry about the unfairness of life. They then take their frustrations out on the rest of us with their guns. Life isn’t fair, but perhaps we can work to make it … umm … more fair. read more

Police don’t need military-grade weapons "Chico is not in a war zone"

by George Gold
guest commentary posted April 1

In 1987, there was a bank robbery in North Hollywood, California. I remember it because I used to live in North Hollywood. I remember it because the bank robbers were heavily armed, were dressed in body armor, and the police on the scene were, as they say, out gunned. As the shootout went on for some time, some of the cops on scene actually went to nearby gun stores to obtain some more powerful weapons.

This event has been used by police departments across the country to arm themselves with ever more powerful weapons. This bank robbery was tragic and horrible. But there has never been another event like that since 1987; certainly never in Chico. And yet police departments have continued to arm themselves, and then we, as law abiding people, are treated as if we are aligned with the bank robbers of North Hollywood. read more

Settlement ends lawsuit against City of Chico Vice mayor makes 11th-hour bid to postpone settlement

photo by Karen Laslo

Evicted campers leave their site after a sweep.

by Leslie Layton / commentary
posted Jan. 15

A settlement agreement in the lawsuit related to the city’s treatment of unhoused people, signed Friday by a federal judge, could end the spectacle of chaotic mass evictions that stranded campers who had nowhere to go.

Early last year, a newly-installed City Council began a series of sweeps in parks, near waterways and on patches of grass on public land.

Journalists watched as workers came in atop tractors, rumbling through encampments where displaced people had pitched tents and had failed to move their few belongings to who knows where – until we weren’t allowed to watch. read more

Break the “local silence” on Covid Chico teen says youth need "dialogue of healing"

by Maya Klein
guest commentary
posted Dec. 10

Ed. note: This is a condensed version of a presentation made by Chico’s Maya Klein at a Dec. 7 statewide Ethnic Media Services briefing.

My high school — Inspire School of Arts and Sciences — is a bubble within Chico. Our student vaccination rate is 82%, and our population generally follows mask and hygiene guidelines.

Our 2020-2021 school year remained almost entirely on Zoom classes, following a 1×8 schedule in which we delved into a single class for each month until the end of the school year. During this time, other high schools within Chico had returned to in-person learning, and as a result, student Covid cases began to increase. read more

Lucero: Public discourse on Tuscan Water District comes — but late "The public had not been part of the formation process"

photo by Karen Laslo

District 2 Supervisor Debra Lucero

by Debra Lucero
guest commentary

The Tuscan Water District story is unfolding in Butte County. This isn’t the first time large landowners have joined together to try to “preserve their way of life and heritage.” It has happened all over the state and more recently, in San Luis Obispo where the proposition to form a new, powerful California Water District failed.

So, how did this current effort in Butte County get birthed?

The former Butte County Water Conservation & Resource Department director, Paul Gosselin, (now the State of California’s deputy director of SGMA – Sustainable Groundwater Management Act) and a former longtime Sacramento Local Agency Formation Commission executive officer, John O’Farrell, came up with another idea — one that could circumvent the arduous San Luis Obispo process and even the Board of Supervisors. read more

“Crimes against humanity” underway in police killings George Gold: Reform must proceed

by George Gold
guest commentary

We live in unprecedented times. Pandemic. Impeachment. Insurrection. Police across the United States killing American citizens, repeatedly.

In Chico, the killings must be properly named: Desmond Phillips, Tyler Rushing, Stephen Vest. According to the United Nations, crimes against humanity are defined as “… certain acts that are purposely committed as part of a widespread or systematic policy, directed against civilians, in times of war or peace.”

These days, with so many opportunities, people often say, I want justice for Desmond, or justice for Tyler, or justice for Stephen, but rather than some sort of homily of sorrow or regret, justice will be served when we have change. The Chico Police Department must change its tactics, its operating procedures, its mindset, its culture, its behavior. Stephen Vest was shot and killed by Chico police eight seconds after they arrived on the scene; he was shot 11 times. read more