The Prospector

By Carolanne Boughton, Staff Writer

Starting on Saturday, September 27, thousands of people packed the streets of the Capitol Mall in support of the Farm-to-Fork movement. The event was packed with organization tents, food trucks, and live performers. Admission to the event was completely free and several booths offered free food. The celebration was the second year of the festival, illustrating Sacramento’s desire to rebrand itself as the farm-to-fork mecca of the country.

Less than twenty-four hours before the event began on Saturday, Governor Brown signed a bill establishing a California farm-to-fork office. A goal of the office is to help school nutrition directors find agricultural products from local sources that meet the new guidelines set by the USDA for school food. Another focus of the office will be to help neighborhoods, usually in low-income areas that lack the access to fresh produce and groceries, find locally-sourced food. Governor Brown, with the establishment of this office, hopes to improve nutritional understanding and acceptance of the importance of a balanced diet among children. The goal is to develop lifelong healthy eating habits through awareness and education. This bill was one of seven bills related to agriculture and food that the Governor signed on the 26th.

The Farm-to-Fork organization “is a year-round endeavor and collaborative process with the area’s chefs, farmers and growers.” The campaign states its mission to be “to bring awareness to the Sacramento region’s local food production, consumption and sustainability as well as the contribution and exportation of sustainable products to the rest of the nation and world.” The movement in Sacramento is meant to form a regional identity, by having the greater Sacramento area connected by its “local sustainability and food production.”

The organization thinks Sacramento is a worthy leader of this movement because it is the capital city to the largest producing state of agriculture in the country. Sacramento prides itself on being “home to the largest Certified Farmers’ Market” in California and offers “the most ethnically diversified market in both produce offerings and customer demographics.” Local restaurants take advantage of the vast availability of local produce. Farms also provide for businesses and establishments across the country.

The festival drew a huge crowd to Sacramento, which provided a boost in business for local restaurants and hotels in the area. Hopefully the movement will continue to grow, with Sacramento as the epicenter. Farm-to-Fork is bringing people from the greater Sacramento area closer to their agricultural community and better informing them of where their food comes from. Through awareness and community development, the lifestyle of Sacramentans has an opportunity to improve and become more sustainable.

 

By Carolanne Boughton, Staff Writer

On October 2nd, Sacramento’s California Museum opened its doors for this years inductees to the California Hall of Fame. They are the eighth group of additions to the Hall, an exhibit that commends “legendary people who embody California’s innovative spirit.” All the inductees are accomplished in their particular field and are somehow connected to California.

Kareem Abdul Jabbar is one of the most recognized and accomplished basketball players in California.The California Museum gloats that at his retirement, “no NBA player had ever scored more points, blocked more shots, won more MVP Awards, or played in more All-Star Games than Kareem Abdul Jabbar.” Jabbar attended UCLA, played for the Lakers from 1975-1989, and currently lives in Los Angeles.

Charlotta Bass (1874-1969) was a civil rights advocate. After moving to California in 1912, Bass became the first African-American woman to own and operate a newspaper in the United States. In 1952, Bass became the first African-American woman to be nominated for the Vice Presidency of the United States. Bass resided in the Los Angeles area from 1912 until her death.

Francis Coppola, yet another of this year’s inductees, is considered one of the leading motion pictures directors of the twentieth century. After graduating from the Theater, Film, and Television program at UCLA, Coppola made his directorial debut with You’re A Big Boy Now (1966). Coppola is most known for The Godfather (1972), which he co-wrote and directed. The movie transformed the gangster genre and for a time was the highest grossing movie ever made. With the sequel, The Godfather Part II (1974), Coppola cemented his position as one of America’s top directors as the second director to win three Academy Awards for the same film. Coppola now resides in the Napa Valley.

Joan Didion has been recognized as one of America’s leading authors since the 1960s. She is a fifth-generation Californian and has lived in Southern California for 25 years. Didion is especially significant to our community because she attended C.K. McClatchy. Didion is not only widely popular, but her work is also highly critically acclaimed. The California Museum website gushes that her concise prose “explores contradictions and seeks truths beyond the accepted mythology of the state.” Didion’s work depicts a picture of Californians and the Californian lifestyle to readers around the globe. More recently, Didion has published essays that have explored the universal themes of life, love, and loss.

Fred Ross, Sr. (1910-1992), born in San Francisco, was recognized as a trailblazer for social justice. He began his activism in the late 1930s, when he organized Dust Bowl refugees. Ross was a manager of one of California’s migratory worker camps and wanted to help the camp’s residents form camp councils and achieve self-governance. He was the only manager of one of the migratory worker camps to challenge racial segregation. Ross passed away in 1992, leaving a legacy of social change behind him.

Stephen Schneider (1945-2010), is still thought of as one of the world’s top climatologists. Schneider played a leading role in educating the public about the danger of greenhouse gas emission in global warming and promoted a switch to clean energy. Later in his life, he served on the faculty of Stanford University from 1992-2010.

Mimi Silbert is the co-founder, president, and CEO of the Delancey Street Foundation, which is a residential educational community that serves ex-felons, substance abusers, prostitutes, and others in crisis. Silbert earned her Master’s and Doctorate degrees at UC Berkeley and has lived in California for fifty years. She has been called a “pioneer of social entrepreneurship.” For forty-three years, Delancey Street has provided residents with academic, vocational, and social skills, at no cost to the client or taxpayer. The organization also provides clients with the discipline and values they need to live successfully in modern society. There are currently over 18,000 successful graduates from Delancey Street.

Andre “Dr. Dre” Young was recognized for his contribution to the entertainment field. Young was born in Los Angeles and now resides there. With his participation in one of the most-revolutionary groups of all time, N.W.A., Dr. Dre changed the world of music. He incorporated his innovative production of a “dense but funky beatscape that became the foundation of a new genre of music: gangster rap,” according to the museum’s website. In his first solo album, Dr. Dre brought hip-hop into the mainstream. The album went triple platinum and earned him a Grammy Award. Dr. Dre served as a mentor for many top rappers, such as Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and 50 Cent. He was the first hip-hop producer to win a Grammy for Producer of the Year.

Jimmy Iovine started his career as a studio go-fer (an employee who specializes in delivery of special items to their superiors) in the 1970s. He quickly gained recognition for his engineering and producing. Iovine co-founded Interscope Records in 1990. The record label became the hottest label of the decade because of its daring choice to bet on gangsta rap acts, including Dr. Dre. He stood as the longtime chairman of Interscope Records, where he mentored U2 and Eminem. Iovine now resides in Los Angeles.

This year’s inductees illustrate the range of talent that Californians have. The California Museum gives the state a communal sense of pride for the accomplishments of its people. With new inductees added each year, the California Hall of Fame will serve as a lasting legacy for individuals who are connected to California and have revolutionized their line of work or study.

By Abby Douglas, Staff Writer

Recognize this guy? If you do, it’s probably because it’s Mr. Tagg, McClatchy’s resident rock star. For those of you who have had Mr. Tagg as an English teacher, his musical career as a bass player in the band Bourgeois Tagg may not be big news. No matter if you’ve been in his class or not, there are probably still a few things you don’t know. So, we at The Prospector dug a little deeper.

For starters, will you tell us a little bit about your role in the band?

Brent Bourgeois and I were in a previous band together. We moved to California with this band, Uncle Rainbow. One of the guys in the Doobie Brothers, Michael Hossack (the drummer) moved us out to California because he wanted to record us. One thing led to another and Brent and I broke away from that group and formed our own group. That was in the early 80’s. We actually had the luxury of writing our own songs first. There was a guy who rented us a house so we could work—we didn’t have to work for a while. So we called him an angel. He allowed us to write material for about a year before we even got started. We recorded our demos and then we put the band together to do the material. The band was in town, in Sacramento, and northern California for about a year and a half before we got signed. We got signed in the old fashioned way—there was an agent that came up from Los Angeles and sat in this place downtown and we didn’t even know he was there. Then we got a call a couple days later saying, “We’d like you to sign with Island Records.” So Brent and I wrote the music, we sang the music, and we were just kind of the band leaders.

Was there a specific instrument that you played?

Yeah, bass guitar. When we went down to sign the record contract we really thought we ought to change the name of the group [Bourgeois Tagg]. The head of the record company said, “Oh no, I love that name.” For what reason, I have no idea. It ended up being the name of the group, and that’s how it worked.

Was Bourgeois Tagg your first band?

No, I’d been at it quite a while. I’d been in a lot of original bands trying to get signed. Not a lot, but two or three. It wasn’t my first time trying to do it. Uncle Rainbow, for instance—they were trying to get signed.

Would you say that you were pretty well known?

Well, yeah, we were well-known in our heyday, but it only lasted for three years. But yeah, we would go to Europe, for example, and I was in London one time and someone walked up to me and said, “Aren’t you Larry Tagg?” So, that’s kind of an indication

Was that fun—being well known?

Oh, yeah. Absolutely it was a fun time.

What was the best part about being in the band?

Traveling. I loved to travel. The other good thing was the respect from your peers. You know, you run up against somebody that you already know, and he knows you, and he says, “I love your stuff.” That was the big payoff—when your peers know who you are and like your stuff.

What was the worst part?

Things with the band tend to get a little, you know…inside the band, when there’s so much money to be made, people start getting kind of grudge-y. That was the only downside I can see. Otherwise, it was a good time.

Can you tell us a story that you particularly remember from your musical career?

The one story that I think about is when I was auditioning for Hall & Oates, another group. It was in Central Park and they told me I was going to be playing with them during the Earth Day concert. So I thought about forty people on blankets. They flew me into New York and they rehearsed me for a couple weeks so that I would be ready for this Earth Day thing. As it turns out, Earth Day was the first day of spring—they had had a really long, cold winter—and everybody showed up in Central Park. There were a million people in front of the stage. It was the Great Meadow stage. People were all the way into the woods on the far end of it. Even the guys in the band, even Daryl Hall, who had seen a lot of big crowds, was backstage going, “I can’t believe the people that are here.”

I remember last year you told us about how you carried a dictionary around on the bus while you were touring. Did any of your band mates or any fans ever make fun of you for being a nerd?

Always. Always. But it’s just who I was. I was always that guy. They had these tour buses that had bunks in them so we could sleep on the bus. And rather than being in the TV room with everybody else I was always in my bunk reading my little books and stuff, and looking up my words. The fans didn’t know about it, so they didn’t really give me a hard time. But the guys in the band, always.

It was obviously a big transition to go from being a full time musician to being an English teacher. Why did you do that?

By the time I made the transition, I was actually a staff songwriter with a publishing company, and you know what? It just wasn’t that fun. But that’s just a part of it. The main thing was that I had kids, and being away from my family was also not fun. So when you’re unmarried it’s one thing, and you can travel around and be the free agent. But once you’re married, things are a little different. That’s the main answer.

Do you ever regret leaving your musical career behind?

No, I never do. As a matter of fact, I see my friends that are still musicians and I feel so lucky. Because you know, there’s kind of an arc to a [musical] career, and once you’re on the downside of that, it’s not that much fun. It’s great when you’re looking at the audiences getting bigger, and then when you see the audiences getting smaller it’s really not that much fun. Plus I love being with you guys [my students]. It’s just fun to me. I come out of a classroom with you all, and I think, there’s no better job than this. I love this so much. Just because we’d had a really good discussion. Plus my wife is a teacher, we have so much to talk about. I have such a full life at this point. And you know, I did that [music]. And I’m glad I did it. But I’m happy that I’m not still doing it.

So you’re happy to be a teacher.

Absolutely.

By Lily Milholm, Staff Writer

For the past thirty-two years, schools, libraries, and bookstores have banned books that they feel are unsuitable. Since 1983, over 11,300 books have been banned or challenged. Parents, teachers, administrators, or religious groups find these many literary works offensive because they explore a  number of “taboo” subjects: sex, profanity, violence, race, religion, and politics.When a person feels uncomfortable that a certain literary work is available to the public, he or she writes to the library or school in which they found the book, requesting its removal. This book is now challenged.

Classics like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Great Gatsby, and The Lord of the Flies are banned from libraries and book stores all over the world. And why? Because they discuss “inappropriate” material. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn contains racially explicit descriptions and is considered “trash and suitable only for slums.” How dare Twain point out the hypocrisy of the white man dehumanizing the black man! The Great Gatsby was banned at a South Carolina Baptist College for sex references and “vulgar” language. Sex can not be discussed in the audience of those who have not experienced it, as it might inspire curiosity, and we mustn’t have any of that.   The Lord of the Flies was banned from libraries nationwide for the animalistic traits displayed by the boys because heaven forbid we godly humans are reminded that we are, in fact, animals.

In all seriousness, books like these matter. It’s not important that they display intense scenes and it doesn’t matter that they are unsuitable for children under a certain age.   Stylistically, authors use the many aspects of literature (diction, symbolism, imagery, characterization, etc.) to convey issues that they feel are important. Issues that they feel need to be discussed publicly.  Graphic scenes can be very useful. Often times, they advocate truth that might otherwise not be addressed.  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn created a new era of literature. Mark Twain wrote with a certain honesty that is not mirrored in many other novels of the time. The racial remarks used are intentional. They remind us of a time when black slaves were dehumanized by the white world. They humble us and stress the importance of equality. Yes, The Lord of the Flies is an intense read, but it discusses substantial matter that is important to explore. Often times, we forget that somewhere, buried deep under advanced technology and social norms, we are primal beings. The Great Gatsby tells of a time post-World War I and pre-stock market crash. People blindly enjoyed themselves, and indulged in premarital sex and day-drinking. It was a time of naivety, but proved to be a socially revolutionary time, as so many standards changed.

By sheltering the people from the vulgar language, bloody scenes, sex, religious or political viewpoints in these works of literature, these parents, teachers, administrators, or religious groups shelter them from real issues in the real world. Writers discuss issues they feel are important. Readers absorb their work and are able to gain knowledge and form opinions and beliefs. They see the beautiful sentences so delicately and deliberately put together, or they envision the intense scenes,  and are able to perceive a concept in a way that they otherwise wouldn’t have.  Literature is purposeful art. No one has the right to limit the people’s exposure.

By Shradha Singh, Staff writer

How is it that just one man with a lighter is able to delay flights all across the country? This is the question that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is currently pressed to answer after this exact incident occurred in the Chicago Air Route Traffic Control Center on September 26, 2014. What resulted was a huge aviation mess that delayed or canceled flights all over the nation, including right here at Sacramento International Airport.

On September 26, a contract employee for the FAA, Brian Howard, walked into the Chicago air traffic control tower, and set fire to the key center. This immediately affected two nearby airports, Midway International Airport in Aurora, Illinois, and O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois. The latter airport is the world’s second-largest airport, and the disruption of its normal schedule created a domino effect which delayed flights all across the United States. This included three flights at Sac International, two of which were supposed to depart for the crippled airports.

As reported by CNN, the fire forced air traffic controllers to transfer flight data manually rather than by computer. It also damaged the telecom line that allows flight plans to be conveyed from the airlines directly to the control center. Instead, airlines had to fax flight plans to the tower, and with so much manual data to be managed, two controllers were needed for each position. Eventually the FAA had to bring in extra technicians in order to effectively handle the situation.

Police report Howard’s actions occurred as part of an apparent suicide attempt. According to an affidavit, first responders arrived at the tower to find smoke and a trail of blood that led to Howard in possession of two knives and a lighter, and seemingly in the process of trying to cut his own throat. Paramedics took the knife and sent a resistant Howard to a hospital in Aurora for treatment. He now faces a charge of one count of destruction of aircraft or aircraft facilities, which, if he is convicted, could ultimately lead to a sentence of twenty years in prison.

Though authorities managed to get the major airports affected up and running from only sixty percent to very near full capacity within a span of two weeks, critics still expressed concern about how this one incident was able to wreak so much havoc. Technicians have defended themselves, saying that although they are prepared for this sort of situation, the process to restore the system to its original state is not instantaneous. Luke Drake, vice president of Region 1 of the Professional Aviation Safety Specialists, also said that the response to the sabotage was a “tremendous success.”

Still, that does not erase the fact that numerous previous aviation and airline mishaps and safety issues have occurred in the United States in a relatively short period of time. In August of this year, a passenger, 53-year-old Eric Slighton, was able to pose as an airport security officer at San Francisco International without raising suspicion. Just a few months earlier in April, a 15-year-old, Yahya Abdi, was able to climb over the fence at an airport in San Jose, find his way into a plane’s landing gear, and staying in there, travel all the way to Maui, with no one finding out until after the flight was over. Though these incidents are admittedly nothing like the events of this past September, the increasing number of individuals able to get past airport, airline, and aviation security is becoming an alarming trend in the United States, one the FAA and its related counterparts need to be able to stop soon, in order to keep travelers safe, secure, and unconcerned about the status of their flight.

By Shradha Singh, Staff writer

Indecision and confusion seem to be popular emotions in the U.S. Supreme Court as of late. Perhaps the best example of this can be seen in the erratic behavior of the Supreme Court and one of its justices, Anthony Kennedy.

Just over a year ago, Kennedy ruled with four other justices to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which prohibited the recognition of same-sex marriages granted by other states. This ruling allowed married same-sex couples to receive benefits. Yet on October 8, the judge ordered a temporary stay on same-sex marriages in the state of Idaho, after the state asked for a delay. Then the Supreme Court followed up just two days later striking down the stay, and allowing licensing for gay marriage to occur in the state. And, to make things even more complicated, the state of Nevada was caught in the middle, unclear whether Justice Kennedy’s stay applied to them, as Idaho had cited court cases from Nevada in its appeal.

The bewilderment of states like Idaho and Nevada is not new, and unfortunately over the past few months, has not become uncommon. The Supreme Court has long been reluctant to make a clear, definitive ruling on same-sex marriage, even when the issue finds its way to its own courts, as it famously did in June of 2013. Although the Court ruled five to four in favor of same-sex marriage rights at the time, the Court has still remained unclear on the constitutionality of same-sex marriage itself, a hesitancy not unlike that present in the 1960’s on the debate of interracial marriage, which was ultimately resolved in the now-historic Supreme Court case, Loving v. Virginia.

Instead, it has kicked the issue down to lower federal courts such as the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has recently repealed several gay marriage bans brought to its table. But as conservative states increasingly turn towards the highest court of the land, and the Supreme Court remains increasingly unresponsive, or in the case of Idaho and Nevada, dizzyingly active, the result has been mass confusion, both on the part of states trying to retain ideas of traditional marriage between just a man and a woman, as well as states attempting to be a bit more liberal in their policies.

So far, same-sex marriage is legal in thirty-three of the fifty states, including California, where the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has also been active, overturning a five year-old gay marriage ban in the state in 2013. This is a sharp increase from the only thirteen states that allowed same-sex marriage at the beginning of October. Part of the reason for this big jump is because of the surprising recent refusal of the Supreme Court to even hear appeals supporting gay marriage bans from several states, forcing them to provide marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Three more states, including Kansas, Montana, and South Carolina, are also in the process of legalizing marriage between same-sex couples, as they continue to fumble their way through the federal appeals process. Even Texas, traditionally one of the most conservative states in the country, is beginning to come around, with gay couples challenging the state’s ban of same-sex marriage in a court case to be heard late November or early December. Only time will tell whether the repeals against gay marriage bans will continue, or whether the Supreme Court will once again confuse others by staying bans, removing bans, and repeating the process.