Today, December 15th, is Bill of Rights Day. These 10 amendments to the Constitution protect our most basic rights, including: freedom of speech, religion, the right to bear arms, and have a fair trial. Ironically, in this evening's Sacramento City Council meeting our representatives voted to support Chicago in a Supreme Court Case (McDonald v. Chicago) which would allow cities to ignore the 2nd Amendment. The 2nd Amendment reads: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." The City Council Proposal "Discuss and consider whether to authorize the City Attorney's Office to take the neces

As the capitol city, Sacramento has a dependent relationship on the state government. We've let the state government fill our core with monolithic government buildings. The incentive has been to keep jobs and development, but the cost has been the soul of the city. Contrary to the state employee work week, on any Saturday or Sunday you can ride your bicycle down the middle a street in downtown with hardly any cars to worry about. Many restaurants on K Street and around downtown are closed on weekends. This is not a new problem. A 1987 Sac Bee article wrote "It's 10 p.m. in downtown Sacramento, and light rail is making its last run along the K Street Mall, temporarily bathing the deserted

Sacramento is the "City of Trees". For better or worse that also means city of leaves. While suburban areas put their green waste in bins, the denser central neighborhoods have leaf piles picked off the street regularly and seasonally by the "leaf claw". This is how it's been done for years, and how many other cities do it. However, recently a few local bureaucrats have been pushing to move the entire central city to containerized bin pickup. In the suburbs, containerized green waste bins make sense. Big bins are wheeled into big backyards for weekend yard work year-round. It also makes pickup more efficient since suburban homes are sprawled out. However, in the city containerized bins ar

You've probably heard - but in case you haven't, there are reports that Kevin Johnson's previous alleged misuse of federal funds may jeopardize the City of Sacramento's receipt of federal stimulus money. If this happened, it would be a serious handicap for Sacramento because the city could be denied the expected tens of millions from the hundreds of billions of federal dollars.  According to Kevin Johnson, the city won't be denied funds. There doesn't seem to be much certainty at this point, so I won't speculate on what will happen. However, an important question to ask is what is the best thing for Sacramento if the mayor's predicament causes denial of funds? If Sacramento is denied ten

This past Tuesday, March 24th, the Sacramento Board of Supervisors adopted ordinance SCC-1419 "Ordinance Related to Physical Contact Dance", proposed by the Sheriff. The Supervisors, Don Nottoli, Susan Peters, Roger Dickinson, Jimmie Yee (Roberta MacGlashan was absent), voted "yes" unanimously. The new rules: No patron shall be permitted within six feet of the stage while the stage is occupied by entertainer(s). No entertainer shall perform within six feet of a patron or customer. No entertainer shall have physical contact with any patron or customer and no patron or customer shall have physical contact with any entertainer. If patrons wish to tip entertainers, tips shall be placed in re

Lincoln is overrated.

Kudos for summarizing and sharing this important information. This clearly shows the massive hurdle that anyone faces when trying to unseat an incumbent, even for an office as minor as city council. The challengers were outspent at least 2:1, and as much as 20:1... with the winning campaigns funded by trades & interests instead of individuals. All the more reason to question council meddling in the affairs of local businesses and individuals. Thw government which governs best governs least.

Excellent! The City Utilities are out of control. Water meter scandal, Green waste bins forced on us. Somebody fire someone already! Take back those freakin' green waste bins too.

I would vote for Lungren... at least over Bera.

Let's not forget wasting money on lame green waste bins that downtowners don't want! Will someone please fire the green waste bin fools already?