Written by corina roberts   

Strong willed and business savvy, Meg Whitman moved boldly into the race for Governor, and she did so with the optimistic support of many Californians. In recent weeks that optimism has been quelled for many. Meg, like many of her peers and predecessors, took the familiar...and inaccurate...position that the importance of the economy eclipses that of the environment; a position which suggests that the two are not inextricably related. Another inaccuracy.

Whitman’s success with the virtual industry of eBay is a story well told in campaign ads, and her prowess in the business arena is laudable. There’s just one problem. The eBay story is one centered around a multi billion dollar industry that exists in cyberspace. California is a giant state that exists in real time and space. It has land, people, air, water and natural resources; it cannot be re-booted by a team of crack technicians or redesigned by IT professionals.

California is a beautiful place, even if embattled by a crumbled state budget, and ravaged by unemployment and all of its attendant evils. Its beauty lies within both its human and its natural resources. These are not somehow separate.

A well known and respected political analyst recently stated that President Obama had been sidetracked from dealing with the economy by environmental issues. The critical disconnect – the belief that the health of the economy and the health of the environment are not related – is a commonly held idea. If the top minds in America can’t see the relationship between the environment and the economy, how can the rest of us be expected to?

And why should Meg Whitman be any better informed than a professional analyst?

Because she is running for Governor.

The concept is simple, actually. It goes like this.

A healthy environment is a rich resource. It provides an abundance of things people need; clean water, healthy air, bountiful food production, building materials, medicines...essentially, everything we need.

In countries and regions where the environment is healthy and the human population is in balance with that environment’s carrying capacity, good things are possible. Because resources are plentiful, they are reasonably priced. People can afford to eat healthy, and as a result they enjoy better health. Unemployment is typically not at epidemic proportions. Housing is generally affordable. Air and water quality is good, and there is less respiratory stress (such as asthma) and less incidence of many kinds of cancer. As a result, medical costs are lower for both individuals and municipalities.

There is also an opportunity for a tourist industry to be developed, which provides income opportunities for local businesses and individuals.

Southern California, with some eighteen million people in the greater Los Angeles area alone, is not in balance with the environmental resources of the region. We have been importing our water for a century; our food comes from around the world. We have converted the most fertile agricultural areas into cities and suburbs. We have created truly overwhelming urban sprawl. And there are side effects.

Once relatively rare, asthma affects urban communities in epidemic proportions. In many areas, drinking tap water is not advised. Our waste treatment plants regularly deposit unhealthy effluent into channels that lead to the ocean, contaminating the aquatic life that once served as a healthy food source. We converted our rivers to concrete channels; you can drive for miles through parts of southern California without encountering a single tree.

Predictably, resources here aren’t cheap. Food and housing are expensive. With so many people pressed into this urban jungle, unemployment has reached a frightening high. It comes with other social evils such as homelessness and crime. It comes with children who aren’t well fed, aren’t healthy, aren’t doing well in school or perhaps aren’t going to school at all. That in turn translates to high costs for municipalities who provide services for those who are unemployed, homeless, need medical care, or all of the above.

So, to say that we can’t afford to worry about protecting the environment because the economy needs to come first is...well, it’s not true. And it’s not very smart.

We need to understand the direct relationship between environmental health and our own health. California is not an entity that exists in cyberspace; it’s a real place, with real people that really need clean air, clean water, and clean jobs. We aren’t saving anything by ignoring our most basic and fundamental relationship – that every moment we are breathing in the air that surrounds us and working in the environments we have created. We cannot expect to lead long, healthy lives if we do not attend to the environment we live in.

Attending to that environment can create jobs, and people have a unique trait that makes us wonderfully adaptable; we can learn new skills and new trades. Currently unemployed Californians could find employment opportunities in new, green fields as a result of legislation such as AB 32. But not if Meg is our next Governor. If Whitman has her way, environmental intelligence will not prevail. She will debilitate it indefinitely, using Proposition 23 to postpone any progress on California’s global warming law.

Can we afford that kind of leadership? No, I don’t believe we can.



Corina Roberts, Founder
Redbird
P.O. Box 702, Simi Valley, CA 93062
www.RedbirdsVision.org
[mailto: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ]
805 217 0364