Tuesday on page 7A of the Enterprise Record there was a full page ad for the Oriental Buffet at the corner of East Avenue and Esplande that touted a copy of the most recent Butte County Health Department inspection with the words in bold “Compliance Achieved” on the newspaper ad.

You may remember the previous restaurant left an indelible mark in the minds of many Chicoans when it was closed down over a year ago due to massive health violations. Here is the ER Article.

Everybody deserves a chance to succeed, but I have to wonder about the wisdom of opening a door like this by putting your health report in a newspaper ad because it invites people to take a further look. It was the topic of my morning discussion group on Tuesday, so I decided to look for myself.

You can see Food Facility Inspection Reports for the Chico Area online here

And the inspection reports starting 5/07/07 for the Oriental Buffet are here:
( you’ll need Adobe Acrobat PDF reader to view these – its free here )

Oriental Buffet, 2539 Esplanade, Chico 05/07/07 Inspection

Oriental Buffet, 2539 Esplanade, Chico 05/08/07 Re-Inspection

Oriental Buffet, 2539 Esplanade, Chico 05/09/07 Re-Inspection

Oriental Buffet, 2539 Esplanade, Chico 05/11/07 Re-Inspection

On the first inspection on 5/07/07 there were 7 major violations and 14 minor ones, for a total of 21 violations. The inspector made 22 notations on the issues filling two pages. The next day on 5/08/07 they were down to 4 major violations and no minor ones. On 5/09/07 they were down to 3 major violations. On 5/11/07 they finally achieved “compliance”. The restaurant has been open since April 8th.

But I have to wonder, compliance for how long? You have to wonder that when a restaurant runs a full page ad touting “compliance” given the visually dramatic stigma the building has attached to it maybe the owners don’t fully understand what they are up against. Like I said, everybody deserves a chance to succeed, but perhaps a different theme would be the way to do it in this case.

To be fair though, I’ll point out that the inspection reports show that Egg Roll King on Palmetto needed 4 attempts to reach compliance this year , as did Gen Kai on Pillsbury, and Big Al’s needed 4 last year and so did Rice Bowl this year, and so did Sin of Cortez. Thai House on Broadway needed 5 inspections this year.

The all time high was Happy Garden on Cohasset with six consecutive inspections required last year before compliance was acheieved.

This morning, I took my children out front, and we placed three flags in our front yard. Each child got one little flag on a wooden stick to plant in the front garden, while mommy and daddy got the big flag to hang from the porch.

After a little discussion on why we did this on Memorial Day,” to remember those who keep us free”, my son William remarked, “ok…can we wash the car now?” (that was our next project).

Well maybe it’s a little early at nearly 4, to install some patriotism. But later when William and I drove to the hardware store together he said “Daddy, how come those houses don’t have flags? We have flags”. It was then I realized we were the only house on our entire street displaying flags today.

Good question son, good question.

There’s an interesting thorn in the side of the recent planning commission approval of Meriam Park that nobody seems to have brought up or discussed. Maybe there are plans I’m not aware of, but given the issues being raised with a cell phone tower elsewhere in the city, it seems the issue would have been vocalized by now.

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My friends at coffee this morning got a huge laugh out of Chico Peace and Justice Center member Sherri Quammen’s claim in a vitriol filled letter to the editor that I’m the “real WMD”.

For somebody who professes “peace and justice”, she sure seems to have a lot of anger to vent. She’s sent letters to all three newspapers, the ER, Chico Beat, and you’ll see the same letter come Thursday at the Chico News and Review I’m sure. Lately, the message of “peace on earth” seems to have lost the accessory clause of “goodwill towards men”. Though its hard to tell through her rant just what she dislikes about me most, it appears that my views and research into climate change must be the main factor.

I sent her a nice note last week, offering to meet and get aquainted over coffee or tea someday, (since we’ve never met) after the letter appeared in the Chico Beat, so far no response.

But that’s OK, being a public person, criticism comes with the territory. It’s an occupational hazard. I guess I should be honored that my threat level has been elevated. Poor Al Gore takes all sorts of flak daily.

Sooo….since I’ve been labeled a WMD, I think that I’ll have to look over my shoulder a lot to make sure I’m not being followed by police officers intent on giving me a ticket in case I go off in the Chico city limits. That’s a $500 fine you know.

To make it easier for people to spot me, I think I’ll get a T-shirt that says simply “BOOM”.

I found the full page color advertisement on page 5E of the Sunday Enterprise Record quite interesting.

It lists a number of environmental reasons why the M&T Baldwin Gravel mine would be a good thing, not the least of which is the reduction of the number of truck miles traveled in Butte County due to trucking in building gravel from outside the county, and the reduction in gasoline burned and GHG’s avoided helping “Global Warming”.

And then there’s the angle that this mine pit will fill with water, and create an animal habitat just like the Teichert Ponds have done when it was used as a borrow pit to construct Highway 99 overpasses. There we have a clear example of how a lowly gravel mine got turned into a nature habitat, and there was no help or “kickstart” to nature as the M&T operators are proposing for their pits destined to be ponds.

It will be interesting to see how opponents argue against the project with these environmental assets it offers.

Here’s how Chico Creek Nature Center described the Teichert Ponds for a walking tour they sponsored of them:

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As I drove through Grass Valley today, the cell phone tower disguised as a pine tree reminded me that Tuesday night, the City Council will consider once again the cell phone tower proposal for the Chico Elks Lodge property.

I expect the usual suspects will be there, telling us all how “dangerous” the “radiation” from the proposed cell tower will be. Given the intenisty with which some will argue health issues, I expect some councilors will cave to the overly concerned. I don’t have a stake in this fight, except to say improved cell phone coverage in Upper Park will benefit everyone.

We’ll hear the old tired arguments about “dangerous radiation” emanating from cell towers, which I don’t see dangerous at all, I’d like to point out things around town that give off equal or greater amounts of “dangerous electromagnetic radiation” and the approximate relative field strengths to the proposed cell tower given its distance from the road.:

- Cell phones next to your head – 1000x greater
- Cell phone in the car you are riding in, – 100x greater
- Cell phones carried by people walking at the farmers market – 10x greater
- STL microwave link from radio station KZFR above city plaza to their transmitter – about the same
- WiFi router in your house 10x
- WiFi public hotspot in Has Beans 10x
- Channel 12/24 Live van around town, live at city plaza concert 100x
- Microwaving popcorn 1x
- Police radar traffic gun 10x (concentrated narrow beam)

So you see, “dangerous electromagnetic radiation” is everywhere. The fact is, its not dangerous at all, and I’d suggest those city councilors that don’t know their science, bone up. There really isn’t a leg for them to stand on when you look at the many other accepted electromagnetic radiation sources around town that emit equal or greater radio signal strengths.

Radio signal strength follows the inverse square law

That means that doubling the distance from a transmitter means that the power density of the radiated wave at that new location is reduced to one-quarter of its previous value.

Given the location of the proposed tower at the Elks Lodge is well set back from the road and building, and the park, I see no realistic issues of concern.