Menu Labeling
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Beginning July 1, 2009 California requires sit-down chain restaurants (Denny's, IHOP, Chili's, etc.) to display information about salt, fat, nutrition, reports Roger Sideman (The Mid-County Post, August 28).
Some question the actual affect this law will have on behavior, but Sideman quotes Harry Balzer, a food researcher who has studied American eating habits, who stresses "It is for our children."
Fast food restaurants in California must comply by 2011.
The last major change in nutrition labeling law (why not nutrition full-disclosure law?) was 19 years ago and is what is used on packaged goods. Sideman's article also references a NJ lawsuit, a state which does not have restaurnant labeling law, about excessive salt in a particular meal offered by chain restaurant; reministent of tobacco litigation?
Full article here (see paper version, not yet online)
More on the California menu labeling law SB 1420
Nutritional background, Center for Science in the Public Interest (good newsletter) and the NJ lawsuit.
Real Food in Schools
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On Labor Day (Sept 7, 12-1 pm) ,Slow Food Santa Cruz and Santa Cruz Education Foundation will hold a picnic "eat-in" at San Lorenzo Park, byo brown bag. One of 250 such events around California that day is to improve school lunch programs and align national goals with healthy nutiritional guidelines (speakers, petitions, children activities)
Build a Stronger Soquel and Live Oak - workshops
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Santa Cruz Redevelopment Agency will be hosting community workshops in September on topics related to affordable housing, safe walking and biking, safety, youth activities. The workshops, seeking Soquel and Live Oak community input, will be offered on 4 different days and influence redevelopment projects for next 5 years. More here.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Santa Cruz Restaurant Inspections
Good background article by Catherine Viglienzoni in yesterday's Mecury News about Santa Cruz County's 3 year old program to put restaurant health inspections online.
SCC Environmental Health Services - Consumer Protection Program does the restaurant inspections about twice a year. Los Angeles gives a letter grade (A, B, C) which must be posted in the restaurant's window, but since most score A there seems to be either grade inflation or LA has extremely clean restaurants. SCC reports show the type of violation and history.
How difficult would be to grade Santa Cruz restaurants in other categories: nutrition claims (Is 'frozen desert' really yogurt?), sustainability, energy efficiency, etc.
SCC Environmental Health Services - Consumer Protection Program, Restaurants
Here's the restaurant inspection list in .pdf format.
Looks like Zoccoli's, Woodstock, Marianne's Ice Cream and others have had some vermon problems.
Thanks to John Hodges, the county's consumer protection program manager, Robert Smith who manages the websites and the invisible inspectors who have tough job.
Full Mecury article is here.
SCC Environmental Health Services - Consumer Protection Program does the restaurant inspections about twice a year. Los Angeles gives a letter grade (A, B, C) which must be posted in the restaurant's window, but since most score A there seems to be either grade inflation or LA has extremely clean restaurants. SCC reports show the type of violation and history.
How difficult would be to grade Santa Cruz restaurants in other categories: nutrition claims (Is 'frozen desert' really yogurt?), sustainability, energy efficiency, etc.
SCC Environmental Health Services - Consumer Protection Program, Restaurants
Here's the restaurant inspection list in .pdf format.
Looks like Zoccoli's, Woodstock, Marianne's Ice Cream and others have had some vermon problems.
Thanks to John Hodges, the county's consumer protection program manager, Robert Smith who manages the websites and the invisible inspectors who have tough job.
Full Mecury article is here.
Friday, August 28, 2009
City of Santa Cruz Greenhouse Gas Emissions (update)
As a followup to this earlier post, I received a nice note from Ross Clark, city of Santa Cruz's climate action coordinator who gave me a few links to city of Santa Cruz greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). He is now in the process of updating the 2005 numbers to 2008.
Santa Cruz city has committed itself to reduce GHG emissions by 30% of 1990's total (by the year 2020). Under Kyoto, which the US did not sign, the country as whole should reduce GHG by 7% of 1990 (by the year 2020).
[Remark1, some people feel California should be a leader in reducing GHG because of relatively mild winters and summers, compared to, say, cold Chicago or steamy New Orleans.
Remark2, China, which refuses to accept any reduction in its GHG, has a stated position that developed countries should reduce GHG by 40% of 1990 by 2020.
Remark3, China + US comprise 40% of world's total GHG emissions.]
City of Santa Cruz Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventor (October 2008, based on 2005) (pdf)
Interesting Sentinel Article (February 12, 2009) Tom Rosewall is a member of Santa Cruz County's Environmental Commission. Anyone know if his software has been adopted?
Santa Cruz city has committed itself to reduce GHG emissions by 30% of 1990's total (by the year 2020). Under Kyoto, which the US did not sign, the country as whole should reduce GHG by 7% of 1990 (by the year 2020).
[Remark1, some people feel California should be a leader in reducing GHG because of relatively mild winters and summers, compared to, say, cold Chicago or steamy New Orleans.
Remark2, China, which refuses to accept any reduction in its GHG, has a stated position that developed countries should reduce GHG by 40% of 1990 by 2020.
Remark3, China + US comprise 40% of world's total GHG emissions.]
City of Santa Cruz Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventor (October 2008, based on 2005) (pdf)
Interesting Sentinel Article (February 12, 2009) Tom Rosewall is a member of Santa Cruz County's Environmental Commission. Anyone know if his software has been adopted?
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Sustainable Transportation at UCSC Summer Sustainability Lecture Series
More town cyclists than academics attended the final lecture in the 2009 UCSC summer sustainability lecture series on August 25, Sustainable Transportation (Elizabeth Deakin, City & Regional Planning and Urban Design, UC-Berkeley) [although academics can certainly also be cyclists]
All of the lectures in the series have been excellent, but Ms. Deakin was unusually pragmatic, down-to-earth and filled the lecture with clear examples of how to combine land use with transportation, from her work in Latin America, US (California, Houston) and now China. Clearly an expert, with a breadth of topics ranging from GHG, high speed rail, tax models to design of spaces which encourage mass transit use.
One of her main points is to focus on the first and last mile when planning for mass transit use. By this she means the mile or so getting from home and the final mile to the office. If the path from home to transit doesn't cross any large arteries, desolate strips, and people find it inviting to walk or bicycle to transit, then they do so. But add ugly overpasses, wide treeless streets, pedestrian unfriendly sections and people will opt to take the car the first mile and, once in the car, go all the way to work. And - crucial - if transit is 'almost' close to downtown, that's not good enough.
So she considers land use - its design, aesthetic appeal, walkablilty, etc. - as tightly tied to transit, something that makes immediate sense but I never fully connected the dots. Not too many people like to walk on the nicest sidewalk if it has a high wall on one side and busy traffic on the other.
Ms. Deakin also stressed the need to work with cities early in the planning. If city policy is to encourage turning green fields at the end of the line into box stores, then don't expect downtown to thrive. If you want a vibrant downtown with high transit use be sure to infill downtown, have the right density, and avoid have gaps and 'missing' teeth, all of which may cost more than using green fields.. She showed examples from Fresno (gaps) and the Central Valley cities (she showed the welcoming effects of putting trees in the center of street too wide). San Jose is a city with too much sprawl to make transit work.
She endorsed California high speed rail but is concerned again that "almost" downtown is not good enough. The stations and related development, that first/last mile, just all work together.
I paid a lot of attention to her work in Jinan, China.
Blocks in China are very large, perhaps because of ancient circuitous paths and neighborhoods that eventually were fitted into city grids or because the former state-owned enterprises were cities themselves, with schools, housing, daycare (yes) hospitals and the factory all occupying a large, contiguous plot. That was good for planners, but modern China is rapidly becoming a commuter centered, with poorer workers being pushed out of downtown and needing to travel to get to work. With streets built long before cars, there is little parking and (terrible!) now the sidewalk is used. And, as vehicle traffic increases, ugly overpasses are being built and bicycles are being pushed off the streets. (I recall a college student in Fuzhou, a city of several million, explain a game she and her used to play when she was little (only 15 years ago?) and rode on the back of his of bike. There was so few cars you could here it coming long before it arrived. They had time to discuss if it was a car or truck or bus. Not today!)
Ms. Deakin's examples, insights and clarity make an extremely valuable resource. I'll have to ask more about China and she what she's written.
All of the lectures in the series have been excellent, but Ms. Deakin was unusually pragmatic, down-to-earth and filled the lecture with clear examples of how to combine land use with transportation, from her work in Latin America, US (California, Houston) and now China. Clearly an expert, with a breadth of topics ranging from GHG, high speed rail, tax models to design of spaces which encourage mass transit use.
One of her main points is to focus on the first and last mile when planning for mass transit use. By this she means the mile or so getting from home and the final mile to the office. If the path from home to transit doesn't cross any large arteries, desolate strips, and people find it inviting to walk or bicycle to transit, then they do so. But add ugly overpasses, wide treeless streets, pedestrian unfriendly sections and people will opt to take the car the first mile and, once in the car, go all the way to work. And - crucial - if transit is 'almost' close to downtown, that's not good enough.
So she considers land use - its design, aesthetic appeal, walkablilty, etc. - as tightly tied to transit, something that makes immediate sense but I never fully connected the dots. Not too many people like to walk on the nicest sidewalk if it has a high wall on one side and busy traffic on the other.
Ms. Deakin also stressed the need to work with cities early in the planning. If city policy is to encourage turning green fields at the end of the line into box stores, then don't expect downtown to thrive. If you want a vibrant downtown with high transit use be sure to infill downtown, have the right density, and avoid have gaps and 'missing' teeth, all of which may cost more than using green fields.. She showed examples from Fresno (gaps) and the Central Valley cities (she showed the welcoming effects of putting trees in the center of street too wide). San Jose is a city with too much sprawl to make transit work.
She endorsed California high speed rail but is concerned again that "almost" downtown is not good enough. The stations and related development, that first/last mile, just all work together.
I paid a lot of attention to her work in Jinan, China.
Blocks in China are very large, perhaps because of ancient circuitous paths and neighborhoods that eventually were fitted into city grids or because the former state-owned enterprises were cities themselves, with schools, housing, daycare (yes) hospitals and the factory all occupying a large, contiguous plot. That was good for planners, but modern China is rapidly becoming a commuter centered, with poorer workers being pushed out of downtown and needing to travel to get to work. With streets built long before cars, there is little parking and (terrible!) now the sidewalk is used. And, as vehicle traffic increases, ugly overpasses are being built and bicycles are being pushed off the streets. (I recall a college student in Fuzhou, a city of several million, explain a game she and her used to play when she was little (only 15 years ago?) and rode on the back of his of bike. There was so few cars you could here it coming long before it arrived. They had time to discuss if it was a car or truck or bus. Not today!)
Ms. Deakin's examples, insights and clarity make an extremely valuable resource. I'll have to ask more about China and she what she's written.
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