Rural broadband in the news as Affordable Connectivity Program comes to an end

I've been hearing a lot about rural folks in relation to broadband the last few weeks because a federal program, the Affordable Connectivity Program, is expiring.  Here are a smattering of stories that acknowledged the rural angle on this event. 

First, here is some CalMatters coverage, which explains lots of basics and also acknowledges the rural impact. 

On April 30, a popular and widely used government program began the process of shutting down due to congressional inaction. With its demise, closing the digital divide becomes considerably more difficult.

The federal government first launched a broadband subsidy program during the depths of COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, where internet connections became many peoples’ only window into the outside world. That effort, the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), was made permanent as part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. It offered a $30 monthly subsidy ($75 on tribal lands) to qualifying low-income households for broadband internet or cell phone bills. The program also offers up to $100 toward a computer or tablet.

However, it came with a major caveat: The $14.2 billion Congress allocated toward the program was a one-time thing. When the money ran out at some point in the future, Congress would have to infuse the program with more money or find a more permanent funding solution.

That future has officially arrived. More than 23 million American households, about 45% of all those eligible nationwide, will no longer receive the full subsidies that previously helped them get online. Two-thirds of those households had “inconsistent or zero connectivity prior to ACP enrollment,” a recent Federal Communications Commission survey revealed.

Partial subsidies of $14 ($35 for households on Tribal lands) will be available for some ISP customers for service in May, according to an FCC notice. But that will be the program’s last disbursement.

“Many recent press reports about the impending end of this program describe how ACP households across the country are now facing hard choices about what expenses they have to cut, including food and gas, to maintain their broadband access, with some households doubtful they can afford to keep their broadband service at all,” FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel wrote in an April letter to congressional leaders. “These press reports echo what the Commission has been hearing from ACP households directly, with many writing the agency to express their distress and fear that ending this program could lead them to lose access to the internet at home.”

Case in point: Alfredo Camacho, who lives in Guadalupe, California, told CalMatters that because he is no longer able to afford home internet service, he’s started taking his daughters to the parking lot outside a local library so the family can use the free wifi to do homework and look for jobs.

“This takes away grocery money,” said Camacho, who is one of around three million Golden State residents losing access to the subsidy. “Being a single father, $30 goes a long way.”

In anticipation of the shut-down, the program stopped accepting new sign-ups in early February. Participating households started receiving notifications about the program’s potential shuttering in January. After it ends, internet service providers are required to allow ACP-using households to cancel without termination fees.

The program has been an essential part of how millions of Americans get online, with nearly one-in-five U.S. households relying on the subsidy to keep their internet subscriptions active. Uptake has been especially strong in areas with high-poverty rates in both urban and rural areas.

Here is a Forbes story from May 6, 2024, with no acknowledgment of rural difference or disadvantage:

Congress first allocated $14.2 billion to the Affordable Connectivity Program in December of 2021, and that money—used to provide a $30 to $75 stipend toward internet bills per month and for a one-time discount toward the purchase of a laptop computer, desktop or tablet—is now running out.

The bill introduced to save the program would allocate $7 billion more to extend it through the end of the year and allow Congress to “work out the long-term changes that are needed for sustainable access,” according to Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.)

Before receiving the federal internet subsidy, almost 22% of program participants had no personal internet service and another 25% had only mobile internet, according to a 2023 survey by the Federal Communications Commission.

The same survey found that almost 77% of beneficiaries said they would need to make changes to their broadband plan if they stopped receiving the subsidy, with 30% saying they'd need to drop internet service altogether.

The New York Times reported on this pending wind-down in March.  

The program was tucked into the 2021 infrastructure law as a replacement for a pandemic-era program that provided certain households discounts on their internet bills. Although there is some bipartisan support to continue the subsidies, lawmakers have not passed an extension.

Interestingly, while it does not use the word "rural," it does include this somewhat counterintuitive quote from the Senator of South Dakota, a state popularly thought of as a rural place. 

But some Republicans have argued that the program is wasteful. In a December letter to the F.C.C., Senator John Thune of South Dakota and other Republican lawmakers raised concerns about the program subsidizing households that already had internet service. They have also pointed to findings from the F.C.C.’s Office of Inspector General, which has in recent months expressed concerns about some providers failing to comply with program rules and improperly claiming funds.

Finally, here's the Federal Communication Commission's webpage on the issue, which covers the basics, but/and also does not use the word "rural":  

The Affordable Connectivity Program stopped accepting new applications and enrollments on February 7, 2024. The last fully funded month of the program is April 2024.

All ACP households enrolled at the time of the enrollment freeze, February 7, 2024 at 11:59 PM ET, will be able to remain enrolled through the final month of ACP service if they are not required to be de-enrolled under FCC rules.

Households that are de-enrolled from the program, such as for failure to use their ACP-supported service, will not be able to re-apply or re-enroll in the ACP during the enrollment freeze.

ACP enrolled households are strongly encouraged to carefully review written notices from their internet company and from the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC), the ACP administrator, about the ACP wind-down.

Households are also encouraged to consult their internet company to learn more about how the end of the ACP will impact their internet service and bills.

I'm glad that at least some of these sources recognize the rural angle on the digital divide.  

Developers of proposed new Bay Area city gather enough signatures to get re-zoning on November ballot

Solano County, California (April, 2024)
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

The Associated Press reported last week that California Forever, the group associated with secretly buying up farm land in southeastern Solano County, California (population 453,000), on the periphery of the San Francisco Bay Area, has garnered sufficient signatures to have placed on the November ballot whether the land can be re-zoned urban to permit its development.  Read more of the background on this matter here, here, and here.  A short excerpt from the AP story follows:  

Rio Vista Youth and Community Hall
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

A wealthy Silicon Valley-backed campaign to build a green city for up to 400,000 people in the San Francisco Bay Area has submitted what it says are enough signatures to qualify the initiative for the November election.

The campaign submitted more than 20,000 signatures but would need only about 13,000 valid ones to qualify for the ballot. If verified by Solano County’s elections office, voters will decide in the fall whether to allow urban development on land currently zoned for agriculture. The land-use change would be necessary for the development to be built.

Child visitors to the sales office express
their desires for the new community 
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

Jan Sramek, a former Goldman Sachs trader who heads the company behind the campaign, California Forever, said at a news conference Tuesday that he heard from thousands of people who want careers and homes in the county where they grew up but can no longer afford because of high housing costs and a lack of nearby work.

I had the opportunity in early April to travel to the parts of Solano County that will be most affected if this new development moves forward.  Those areas include the town of Rio Vista (population 7,360), on the Sacramento River Delta, and along the Montezuma Hills.  I found Rio Vista to be a charming town with one of the most appealing (and highly utilized) small public libraries I've ever visited, among other amenities.  The town also has a pharmacy that isn't part of a national chain, which I thought was pretty cool.  Plus, there are small eateries and an auto body shop with a prime location on the waterfront.  

Poster in California Forever sales office, 
also featured in brochures
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

Though it was not well publicized and not on my car's GPS, I did find the California Forever office in downtown Rio Vista--having taken up residence in the city's old Vista Cinema on Main Street.  Two California Forever employees were there, one who self-identified as a salesman.   They are collecting wish lists for community amenities, and I took a few photos of those lists--including one from what visiting children wanted.  (I list some of these at the bottom of the post).  

The salesman chatted me up about the project, noting that many residents of Rio Vista support it because, currently, there is "nothing" for their grandkids job-wise and in terms of activities.   If the city is built, it will provide not only jobs, but also many amenities for Rio Vista residents.  The salesman said some amenities are currently available to residents of Liberty and Trilogy, two nearby planned communities, but that the new city will make facilities and amenities available to those living in nearby Rio Vista. 

I raised with the salesman the issue of the lawsuit California Forever brought against some area landowners who had refused to sell and been accused of price-fixing.  He said those sued by California Forever were not family farmers but instead were large corporate farms--basically "BigAg."  I disputed that based on my personal acquaintance with one of those land-owning families.

California Forever Sales Office in Rio vista
in former Vista Theatre
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

At the end of my visit, the salesman asked me if I was on board with the project, and I told him I was still undecided, but generally skeptical.  I'd already explained to him that I didn't live in Solano County and so could not vote on the anticipated ballot initiative.  

Here are some bullet points/highlights from the brochure I picked up at the California Forever sales office.  

Windborn Church,
Main Street
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt

The farmland in "East Solano County today" is "Rated among the worst for agriculture in all of Solano County." (I wonder about the quality of that farm land generally, in comparison to 

Auto Repair in Rio Vista
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

• The community California Forever wishes to build is a "new future for East Solano County, a new community for all of us." 
• "Middle-class neighborhoods.  Safe, walkable, and affordable.  $400 million in downpayment assistance for Solano County residents."
• "Good local new jobs.  15,000 new local jobs in manufacturing, services and technology paying $88,000 a year or more"
• "Parks and green space.  4,000 acres of park, trails and habitats.  The project affects less than 2% of Solano County's current agricultural production." 
• "Rio Vista Parkland.  A new 712-acre park between the new community and Rio Vista." 
• "Downtowns.  Major offices, entertainment, arts, shops, cafes, locally owned restaurants, apartment buildings and more"
• New Employers Zone.  New Manufacturing jobs and technology research labs in defense and other important industries.  A way to bring new employers and the good jobs of the future to Solan County."

Entrance to Marina
(c) L.R. Pruitt 2024

• Maker zones.  Workshops, art studios, and ohter light industrial spaces.  Also restaurants and entertainment, and loft-style homes."
• Open Space.  The plan requires at least 4,000 acres of parks and open spaces aligned with natural features, distributed across the new community, programmed with a variety of playgrounds, parks, and shared spaces for all ages and activities.
• Solar sheep are happy sheep.  Solar panels and grazing sheep make for great friends. The sheep happily eat the grass, greatly reducing wildfire hazards and  keeping weeks off the solar panels, as well as creating income for sheep farmers so they to rely less on meat sales.  The shade from the panels help the sheep stay cooler, rest more and experience less heat stress.  (This one incudes a reference:  New Scientist Magazine 2/1/2023)
• Solano Jobs Guarantee.  All new community growth beyond 50K residents is frozen, unless the new community creates at least 15K new jobs.  And each new job must be a good job, paying at least 125% of the average wage in Solano County (about $88K a year today).

Sign at Montezuma Hills area
along Highway 12
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

• Solano Homes for All.  We will provide $400 million to help Solano residents buy home sin the new community, and to build more affordable homes.  If $300 million is allocated to down payment assistance, that's enough to help 6K Solano families buy homes with a $50K each down payment grant.
• Solano Scholarships.  The new community will bring good new jobs.  To prepare, we will provide $70 million in funing to help Solano residents pay for vocational training, college, or to start or expand a small business.  

  

  Riverview Middle School
  Rio Vista, California
  Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

  
  
• Green Solano.  We are providing $80 million in community-benefits funding for public parks and trails, open space and natural habitats.  This funding will also help support Solano's agriculture economy, including family farms and workers.  We are exciting to work with the Solano community to help identify priorities for this funding, to nurture our county's strong connections to its lands.  
• Solano Downtowns.  We believe in investing in all areas of Solano--both in the new community in East Solano and in Solano's existing cities.  Why not just invest in existing cities?  We need more room for homes families can afford and for new industries.  We will provide $200 million in new investment in building and renovating homes, offices,  shops, and other mixed use projects in the downtown areas of Benicia, Dixon, Fairfield, Rio Vista, Suisun City, Vacaville, and Vallejo.  
• Smart Growth Guarantee.  Our initial commitments are to provide $500 million in community-benefits funding and $200 million for investments in Solano Downtowns over the build-out towards $50,000 residents.  But our commitment to Solano does not end there.  If our community grow beyond 50,000 residents, all of these financial commitments will continue to scale up in proportion to the growth of our community.  We are excited to grow with Solano, and be a good neighbor for generations to come. 

Downtown Rio Vista
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

Water Guarantee. Before a brick is laid, we guarantee to provide our water supplies through the highly regulated and state-mandated Water Supply Assessment and Water Supply Verification process.  Regulated closely by the State of California, this process requires us to prove we can deliver water to the new community for many decades going forward, including through drought periods. 

• Transportation Guarantee.  We will provide right of way for upgrades for Highway 12 and 113, including the Rio Vista and Dixon bypass, and we will pay above our proportionate share to fund these upgrades.  
• Schools Guarantee.  We are required to ensure that new schools are ready in our new community when first residents move in. That way parens and teachers an be sure that existing schools are not overly burdened with new students.  Our schools remain in the existing school districts, but we will ensure that new schools are ready by the time the first children move in. We want the new community to be a big win for public education in Solano County.
• Solano Taxpayer Guarantee.  We will pay our own way through the significant tax revenue we will generate as the new city gains residents.  The initiative guarantees no new cost to Solano taxpayers, except to those new residents who live in the new community. 

Wind turbines and gravel road running 
South from Highway 12 between I-80 & Rio Vista
area known as Montezuma Hills
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

A significant part of one 12-page brochure addresses nearby Travis Air Force Base and a buffer zone that will lie between it and the new community. 

Til this weekend, the only billboard I'd seen promoting California Forever was on eastbound I-80 in Solano County, and it touted the 15K jobs paying more than $88K.  Then, on May 5, traveling westbound on I-80 , I saw one touting the $400 million in downpayment assistance for Solano County residents.  

Among the items on the crowd-sourced list of amenities folks had written on giant note pads in the sales office   

• Music events, dining destinations, emphasis on nature in the community
• Affordable housing--not market rate
• Smart growth
• Movie theatres (good for teens)
• Let's re-create our normal!
• Medical Center
• Big Box retailers
• Preserve wetlands
• Widen Highway 12 from Suisun
• Satellite junior college campus
• Archeological recognition (Native Americans)
• Nightclub!!!
• Chain Hotel (Nice!)
• Elderly/Alzheimers dementia care facility (home) with 24/7 nurse on site
• Quality restaurants on the water front

On the kids list, one wrote, "If I had my own city, I would want a dirt bike track, a Walmart, and lots of houses."  The child included a drawing of this place, complete with a dirt bike track and a church, along with a Walmart and several houses. 

Crowd-sourced list of desired amenities
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

California Forever has three sales offices in addition to the one in Rio Vista; the others are in Vacaville, Vallejo, and Fairfield.  

Another law enforcement shortage, this one in California's rural-ish Central Valley

Melissa Gomez reports today for the Los Angeles Times reports today from Merced County, population 281,000 under the headline, "‘Folks, it’s bad’: Merced sheriff warns of public safety crisis as deputy vacancies mount."  Here's an excerpt referring to Sheriff Vern Warnke: 

Warnke said the vacancies have mounted in recent months and his pleas to the county Board of Supervisors to increase his budget and give him control over how funds are allocated have gone unheeded.

At this point, just four deputies patrol the county’s nearly 2,000 square miles during daytime shifts. A lieutenant and two sergeants are covering dispatch shifts. If someone calls in sick, colleagues are asked to work beyond their 12-hour shifts. One dispatcher clocked more than 700 hours of overtime over the course of a year.

In a video, Warnke says: 

Our correctional bureaus are understaffed and overworked. Our patrol deputies are understaffed and overworked. Our communication center with the dispatchers — it could be to the point when you dial 911, we have nobody who can answer it.  And that’s not a joke. It’s not a threat. It’s a fact.

* * * 

Merced County, known as the gateway to Yosemite, has a larger budget than many rural counties because it encompasses both farmland and cities such as Merced, population 90,000. The county’s annual budget for public safety has grown in recent years and makes about $93.4 million available for the sheriff’s office, according to county officials.

But Warnke said it hasn’t been enough to retain deputies, who are leaving for other counties despite Merced’s $10,000 signing bonuses. Top deputies in some neighboring counties make at least $102,000, while Merced pays its top deputies $90,000.

The sheriff acknowledged that the competition for salaries and bonuses creates a “vicious cycle.” The department went through similar shortages during his first term, and deputies received a 20% raise in 2017. But here he is facing the same problem.

Here's another quote from Warnke: 

The issue is that the county doesn’t seem to want to put any planning into the future. They’ll put a Band-Aid on something and think it’s gonna hold for a long time. And it doesn’t.

A prior post about the shortage of deputies in Tehama County is here.  This week, Capital Public Radio in Sacramento reported from Stockton, about an hour north of Merced, that the City of Stockton had hired ten new police officers.  Here's a story by the same journalist in 2017 when the city was looking to hire 50 new officers. 

Places where you can get a home for $150K in California are all rural, remote

Entering Trona from the Southwest
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024 (February)

The Los Angeles Times published a story last week on 10 California housing markets where the median home price is $150K or less.  The one that jumped out at me was Trona, California, in the Searles Valley, which I recently passed through en route to Death Valley National Park.  

Southwest of Trona, near
Searles Valley industrial
infrastructure
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

According to wikipedia, Trona is a town of 1900 residents in San Bernardino County.  Adjacent to it is a census-designated place also called Trona, in Inyo Couty, with a population of 18 and an economy centered on marijuana cultivation.   

The affordability ratio in places like Trona is noteworthy, as journalist Terry Castleman explains: 

The ratio of median home prices to household income is less than 2 to 1, compared to nearly 10 to 1 in the rest of the state.  

Trona, California 
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

In the Searles Valley, the median household income was $54,000 in 2022, well below the statewide average of $92,000, according to census data. The poverty rate, however, was nearly 20%, far exceeding California’s 12% overall rate.

Here's what Castleman wrote about recent housing market trends there:

Sonney Berri, a real estate agent in Trona, has seen an uptick in prices since the COVID-19 pandemic, a trend he attributes to homeowners who previously lived close to city centers and sold their homes to buy properties in this unincorporated community in San Bernardino County.

Trona Senior Center
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

Castleman also writes of the town's longer-term history: 

Old Guesthouse Museum, (c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

Trona, a “desolate area that was very much thriving back in the ’50s and ’60s,” was littered with abandoned homes after plants closed decades ago, said Berri, 49. Now, “people are fixing them up and making the community better,” he said.

Trona’s heyday was in the early 1900s, when it was a company town, established in 1914 and operated by the American Trona Corp. Early on, a central building housed many workers and all the town’s businesses, including a “pool hall, a barber shop, post office, library, grocery and department store,” according to the Searles Valley Historical Society.

Former dollar store is now
the Trona Food Bank
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024

The story features some rich quotes from residents, like that of 80-year-old Ann Epperly, who said she likes being able to "ride horses all over town."  

It also explains how Trona's star waned as its industrial importance lagged and as Ridgecrest, 25 miles away, grew.  

Ridgecrest is now home to the closest Walmart.  I noticed that even a dollar store had closed--and been reappropriated as the Trona Food Bank.  The former pharmacy was boarded up, as was a relatively new looking Shell station.  

On the other hand, the town boasted a spiffy new, but spartan, branch of the San Bernardino County Library.   The Senior Center looks robust; boxes of produce were stacked outside it when I passed through on a Saturday morning, when the center was closed.  San Bernardino County offices, including a court, were just a street or two off Highway 178, as was the U.S. post office.  

Here's what Castleman reports about the eight other California towns where median home values are in the $150K range:

Some of the state’s lowest median home values — as low as $114,000 —are located near the Oregon border, in the towns of Dorris, Macdoel and Tulelake. Each town is home to less than 1,000 people and set amid agricultural fields.

Herlong, located along the border with Nevada, 90 miles north of Lake Tahoe, is another town with a low median home value. It’s an army town named after a World War II-era captain and home to a military storage facility.

San Bernardino County Library, Trona Branch

In Southern California, five towns round out the group of nine: Boron, Yermo, Hinkley, Johannesburg and Trona. Surrounded by desert, most were built up around the mining industry and all have lost population in recent decades.

Sign near Mohave
(c) Lisa R. Pruitt 2024 (February)

The town of Boron is named for the element found in borax, and Hinkley is known for a groundwater contamination lawsuit that inspired the movie “Erin Brockovich.”

I look forward to opportunities to visit some of these other remote places with affordable housing.  I've been close to Johannesburg while en route to Trona and Death Valley.   And I've passed through Dorris and Macdoel when traveling between Weed on Interstate 5 in far northern California and the small city of Klamath Falls, Oregon.  Dorris is home of the Cedar Point Nursery, a strawberry nursery that was the origin of the 2021 U.S. Supreme Court case, Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid.  I've also driven through Tulelake, population just under 1,000, in the same region.  

According to wikipedia, Dorris, population 939, is home to 364 households and 414 housing units, of whom 248 are owner-occupied and 116 are renter-occupied.  Macdoel, population 86, has 43 housing units of whom 18 are owner-occupied and 23 are renter occupied.  The vacancy rate is 0%.   

California counties without nearby universities struggle to recruit teachers

Diana Lambert reported for Ed Source reported a few days ago.  Here's an excerpt: 

Nine rural California counties, most struggling with student achievement and teacher recruitment, are in teacher education deserts, according to a report released Tuesday from the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools.

Alpine, Del Norte, Imperial, Inyo, Lassen, Modoc, Mono, Sierra and Siskiyou counties do not have teacher preparation programs within 60 miles of their county offices of education, according to the report, “California’s Teacher Education Deserts: An Overlooked and Growing Equity Challenge.”

“We know that research suggests that teachers are more likely to complete their student teaching and also secure employment close to where they receive their teacher training,” said Kai Mathews, project director for the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools.

As a result, six of the nine counties have a higher percentage of underprepared teachers than the state average of 4% to 5%, according to the study. Of the nine counties, Modoc and Lassen have the highest percentage of underprepared teachers at 14% and 17% respectively.

* * * 

There could be many reasons teachers are hard to find in rural areas, including fewer nearby institutions of higher education, which leads to a lower than average percentage of residents with bachelor’s degrees and therefore a smaller pool of potential teacher candidates, according to the study.

Counties that border other states and countries also have significantly higher teacher vacancy rates compared with nonborder districts, said Hui Huang, a researcher on the project. All nine of the California counties classified as teacher education deserts are bordered by either Oregon, Nevada, Arizona or Mexico.

Here's a related post about the struggle to recruit K-12 teachers in Modoc County. 

Here's a CalMatters story about the needs rural California schools have for state assistance. 

Inside Higher Ed writes here about the economic returns of a rural education.  In it, Sara Weissman writes of a report arguing that "rural-serving institutions offer meaningful benefits to their students, including quicker times to degree and lower prices." 

Cal Poly Humboldt home to "nation's most entrenched protest"

Jonathan Wolfe reports today for the New York Times from Arcata, California, home of California Polytechnic Humboldt. Here's the lede: 

When university administrators across the nation worry about the potential fallout from campus protests, they may have Siemens Hall in mind.

The building at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, includes the campus president’s office and has been occupied for a week by pro-Palestinian protesters who barricaded themselves inside and fought off an early attempt by the police to remove them. Protesters have since tagged walls and renamed it “Intifada Hall” by ripping off most of the signage on the brick exterior.

Inside, they painted graffiti messages like “Time 2 Free Gaza,” “Pigs Not Allowed,” and “Land Back,” according to a video posted by the local news site Redheaded Blackbelt. They occupied and defaced the office of the president, Tom Jackson Jr., spraying “Blood On Your Hands” across one framed wall hanging and “I Will Live Free or Die Trying” on his door.

Here's how the New York Times described the university and region: 

To those outside Northern California, the show of force at Cal Poly Humboldt, in the college town of Arcata, has been a surprising turn in a region more typically associated with a hippie pacifism and marijuana farms. But beneath the good-vibes image, locals say, a culture of protest and resentment toward authority has percolated at the 6,000-student campus.

* * *  

The majestic redwoods in the region draw tourists from across the world; nearby, visitors can drive through a tree with a 21-foot diameter. The forests also have satisfied the thirst for lumber in the growing West as far back as the early Gold Rush days when San Francisco became a boomtown.

The natural beauty and the timber industry have long been at odds, however. The region was an early battleground in the “timber wars,” in which environmentalists fought against logging companies to prevent the destruction of old growth forests across the Pacific Northwest in the 1980s and 1990s. Perhaps the most famous protest of that era occurred in Humboldt County, where the activist Julia Butterfly Hill lived for 738 days in a California redwood that she named Luna.

The campus has been shut down through May 10, the day before commencement.  

I blogged about what is happening at Cal Poly Humboldt last week here, and the Lost Coast Outpost continues to provide daily updates on what's been happening there since students occupied Siemens Hall a week ago.  (This link is to coverage of what happened in the early hours this morning).  The Los Angeles Times has more coverage today, too.

Here's another NYT story illustrating the point that it's not just young people who are upset about the U.S. role in the Israeli-Palestinian War:  older residents of rural areas--like their urban counterparts--are agitated about the War and pressing their members of congress to get the Biden administration to change its  position.  

Postscript:  At 9 am on April 30, the Los Angeles Times reported that 25 students had been arrested at Cal Poly Humboldt.  Here's an excerpt from the story:

Ending a weeklong siege, police on Tuesday arrested at least 25 protesters at Cal Poly Humboldt, where Gaza war demonstrators had occupied buildings and forced the campus to close.

* * *

Shortly after 2 a.m. Tuesday, police moved in and made the arrests. The university said “those arrested faced a range of different charges depending on individual circumstances, including unlawful assembly, vandalism, conspiracy, assault of police officers and others. In addition, students could face discipline for conduct violations while any university employees arrested could face disciplinary action.”

Gluesenkamp Perez invokes rural and working-class folks in relation to stance on a secure border

A. Martinez of NPR's Morning Edition interviewed Congresswoman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez today regarding "centrist Democrats" stance on border security.  That is, they want the Biden administration to tighten it, partly because of the scourge of fentanyl and its consequences in districts like hers.  Twice during the interview she came across the phrase, "rural and working-class" communities.  In the latter mention she adds, "and the trades."   

This quote provides further context: 

GLUESENKAMP PEREZ:  You know, these policies like Title 42, I mean, I think it's been one of the fundamental mistakes around immigration, is to debate whether or not an immigration policy is, you know, motivated by racial animus. By the way, I think a lot of them are, but a lot of people in rural and working-class communities like mine, we come from communities that have been hollowed out by fentanyl, and so we're watching our cousins, our neighbors, our coworkers overdose and die, and we are demanding operational control of the southern border. That can't wait for a perfect immigration policy to come along.  (emphasis added)

MARTÍNEZ: Did you think that the way Donald Trump's administration used Title 42 was an effective way to stem immigration?

GLUESENKAMP PEREZ: I don't think it's a question of stemming immigration. I mean, immigration itself is not the problem. The problem is that the U.S. does not have operational control of the southern border, and so a lot of Americans, a lot of American politicians have had this real focus on the very visceral images of the humanitarian crisis of the southern border, but what they're not seeing is what it's like to live in a country that is being run by a cartel. And so Biden needs to exercise his existing authority under Remain in Mexico, and Congress needs to give him back the presidential expulsion authority under Title 42.

One of the interesting things about the first long quote is how she suggests that immigration policy is influenced by racial animus--but also that there are other considerations, like the devastation being wrought by fentanyl, which Gluesenkamp Perez suggests is coming across the Southern border.  In other words, we can hold both of these notions--perhaps both of these truths--simultaneously:  some people advocating greater control at the Southern border are acting on racial animus, but they also have legitimate concerns about what is happening at the border, including fentanyl that may be coming through that border.  

This duality is something I suggested in this recent publication regarding why many rural residents support Trump:  they may both experience economic distress and racist impulses.  It does not have to be an "either or."  Also, as I have suggested elsewhere, if we are going to use terms like "racial animus," we should define them--that is, we should develop a shared definition.  That has not happened.  In fact, I have not seen any media outlet--or any academic--take that task seriously.  (The closest would be John McWhorter, who has at least identified the challenge)

Prior posts featuring Congresswoman Gluesenkamp Perez are here, here, here, here, here and here.   More still are here (including those on right-to-repair).  

Meanwhile, here's a report on Americans' broad support for enforcement of the nation's immigration laws. 

Cross-posted to Working-Class Whites and the Law.   

On rurality as a double-edged sword: David McCormick, Republican Senate candidate, presents himself as "rural"

The New York Times published this story last week (before the Pennsylvania primary) under the headline, "This G.O.P. Senate Candidate Says He Grew Up on a Family Farm. Not Exactly."  Here's the lede: 

David McCormick’s origin story goes something like this: He grew up in rural Pennsylvania, southwest of Scranton. He baled hay, trimmed Christmas trees and otherwise worked on his family’s farm. And from those humble beginnings, he rose to achieve the American dream.

“I spent most of my life in Pennsylvania, growing up in Bloomsburg on my family’s farm,” Mr. McCormick, now a Republican candidate for Senate, told Pittsburgh Quarterly in 2022.

“I’ve truly lived the American dream,” he wrote in a fund-raising appeal in October. “My life’s journey — from growing up on a farm in Bloomsburg, to graduating from West Point and serving in the 82nd Airborne Division, growing a business in Pittsburgh, and serving at the highest levels of government — reflects that.”

In January, speaking at the Pennsylvania farm show, McCormick said: 

I grew up on a family farm from the time I was a kid.

The journalists reporting this story, however, who have conducted interviews, reviewed public records and news coverage, "suggest he has given a misleading impression about key aspects of his background."   

McCormick has also described his parents at school teachers. In fact, his father was president of Bloomsburg University, and he grew up mostly in the house provided by the University.  

All of the reminds me the recent assertion by Paul Waldman and Tom Schaller of what they claim is an unwritten rule that the media are hands off rural folks--that they are a group you can't criticize.  I don't agree with that (and have written lots in support of the contrary proposition).  That said, it's interesting that politicians like McCormick are (still) trying to present themselves as "regular Joe's" by saying they grew up rural and/or on a farm.  (Recall that George W. Bush was widely identified as incorporating a similar strategy).  

Farah Stockman of the New York Times on rural voters

Stockman, a member of the New York Times editorial board, has written twice recently--albeit briefly-- about rural voters.   Both entries seems to have been prompted by recent discussions of two books I've highlighted here in recent weeks, The Rural Voter and White Rural Rage.  Read prior posts here, here, here, here, and here.

Stockman's most recent entry, published yesterday, is titled, "Rural Voters are More Progressive Than Democratic Voters Think." Here are some excerpts: 

If you caught the scathing takedown of the book “White Rural Rage” in The Atlantic, then you’re aware of how intellectually dishonest it is to single out rural voters for special contempt. It’s also politically foolish, as a new poll by Rural Democracy Initiative, which will be released to the public in May, illustrates.

* * *

“It’s really clear that Democrats have a significant work to do to rebuild their brand in rural America, but that investment could pay dividends for Democrats, not just in the future but this year,” Patrick Toomey, a partner at Breakthrough Campaigns, which conducted the survey, told me.

In an election in which a few thousand votes could decide who wins the presidency or controls the Senate, it’s foolish to write off rural America.

The recent related entry is from March 1 and is titled "Rural Voters Aren't the Enemy."  Here's an excerpt that leads with a quote from Anthony Flaccavento, who ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for congress in southwest Virginia and now runs the Rural-Urban Bridge Initiative:

“That kind of the language — a book by that title — is absolutely the kiss of death for the efforts of so many of us in rural areas who have been working to rebuild trust and reverse some of the policies that have hollowed out rural America,” said Flaccavento, whose group has put out a report about what Democrats have to do to win in rural America. He also said he feared the book would serve as confirmation to liberals that it’s hopeless to invest politically in those parts of the country.

Shawn Sebastian, director of organizing at Rural Organizing, an Ohio-based group that supports progressive campaigns in rural areas nationwide, agreed that support for authoritarianism is a growing problem. He just published a survey of his group’s 75,000 members — more than 800 Democrats, most of whom live in Trump-supporting rural areas, filled it out — which found that 25 percent had experienced political violence or threats of political violence.

“That was chilling,” he told me. But he also said rural voters are part of the solution and that giving up on them will only make things worse.

Stockman concludes that entry: 

Rural people working together to save their hospitals, build a nursing home or establish a mobile food pantry are the antidote to the violent polarization that everyone is worried about.

Columbia, NYU, Berkeley--and Cal Poly Humboldt? "Rural" far northern California bursts into the spotlight amidst campus protests

When I went to bed last night, Columbia University and, to a lesser extent, NYU, were in the news in relation to student protests framed as "pro-Palestinian."  UC Berkeley has been in the news for several weeks in relation to the stances that students there have taken.   So, imagine my surprise when I awakened to news this morning that had humble and rural-ish Cal Poly Humboldt--until a few years ago even more humble Cal State Humboldt--in the news.  Here's what the California sun wrote this morning under "Developments Connected to the Israel-Hamas War":

Pro-Palestinian students began sit-ins at UC Berkeley and Cal Poly Humboldt on Monday. The Berkeley protesters pitched about 10 tents and demanded the university divest from companies linked to Israel. In Arcata, dozens of students barricaded themselves inside a building, drawing a heavy police response. Late Monday, campus leaders announced the cancellation of classes through Wednesday. Berkeleyside | Lost Coast Outpost

I have to admit I was pleased to see the Lost Coast Outpost, a little known news outlet, cited and quoted, though that is not terribly unusual with the California Sun, and it was parallel to Berkleyside, another informal news outlet.  

Later in the day, the Los Angeles Times reported under the headline, "Tensions grow at California universities as Gaza protests roil campuses from Berkeley to New York."  Though Humboldt was not mentioned in the headline, the lede was all about Cal Poly Humboldt: 

Officials shut down the campus of Cal Poly Humboldt on Monday night after masked pro-Palestinian protesters occupied an administrative building and barricaded the entrance as Gaza-related demonstrations roiled campuses across the nation.

Three students were arrested after law enforcement officers wearing helmets and riot shields descended on the public university in Arcata, in rural Northern California, and clashed with demonstrators who had set up tents inside Siemens Hall and erected a banner that said, “STOP THE GENOCIDE.”  (emphasis added)

“Free, Free Palestine,” supporters chanted outside the building. “Long Live Resistance!”

As sprawling pro-Palestinian protests and encampments escalate on university campuses across the United States, administrators are reacting with more forceful discipline as they try to balance pro-Palestinian students’ free speech rights with concerns for safety and other students’ counter claims of harassment and disruption.

Note the reference to Humboldt as "rural," while noting its location in Arcata.  That is arguably not precise given that Humboldt County, while sparsely populated, is metropolitan, with a population of 134,000.  Arcata, the city where the university is located, has a population of 18,000, but is part of the Eureka-Arcata-Fortuna micropolitan area.  That said, Humboldt County is sparsely populated, with 38 persons/per square mile, compared to about 94 per square mile in the United States. 

The story continues with more detail on what happened:  

Tensions flared quickly at Cal Poly Humboldt.

About 4:50 p.m. Monday, campus police received reports of dozens of students occupying the first and second floors of Siemens Hall, the university said in a statement. Classes in the building were canceled and students and faculty who were in the middle of classes were evacuated as protesters “began disrupting classes and vandalizing university property,” the university said.

According to the university, protesters blocked entrances and elevators with tents and in some locations shut doors using chains and zip ties, violating fire codes and “creating extreme safety hazards for those inside.”

After giving the protesters multiple warnings to exit the building voluntarily, campus spokesperson Aileen S. Yoo said the university contacted outside law enforcement agencies to assist in responding.

About 7:45 p.m., an officer told dispatchers that about 100 protesters remained near the building and police had attempted to take students into custody, but the crowd pulled them back, according to a report from Lost Coast Outpost. Another officer called for a pepper ball launcher.

Meanwhile, the New York Times mentioned Cal Poly Humboldt briefly, fairly deep in a story that featured NYU and Columbia prominently: 

At California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, students took over a campus building, and barricaded the exits with chairs and trash bins.

Here is a link to today's Washington Post coverage, which does not use word "rural" but says at the end of paragraph 3, after discussing the University of Minnesota: 

On the West Coast, California State Polytechnic University at Humboldt went into a lockdown after student protesters barricaded themselves inside a building.

Finally, here is a link to the Lost Coast Outpost news as of this morning.  

Postscript:  here is a link to the Lost Coast Outpost update from the afternoon of April 24, 2024.

This is from a New York Times update on April 24, 2024: 

• California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt in Arcata: Dozens of protesters were occupying an academic and administrative building on Wednesday morning, university officials said. The campus has remained closed since Monday after an attempt by the police to remove the protesters from the building turned violent, leading to three arrests. On Thursday, officials said that the campus would remain closed at least through Sunday.

The Lost Coast Outpost reported on April 25, 2024 that the faculty had voted no confidence in Cal Poly Humboldt's president, Tom Jackson. 

White Rural Rage authors push back; debate is a powerful illustration of Twain's "lies, damned lies, statistics"

Paul Waldman and Thomas Schaller wrote in The New Republic last week in response to recent critiques of their book, White Rural Rage.  Under the headline, "An Honest Assessment of Rural White Resentment is Long Overdue,"  they suggest that their critics, scholars like Nicholas Jacobs and Kal Munis, political scientists who have done some of the empirical work Waldman and Schaller cite, are being selective with the data they share.   What Waldman and Schaller don't acknowledge is their own cherry picking among the data from the political scientists who did the empirical investigation they reference.  Having reviewed both books and the flurry of commentary that has followed them, I'd say that Schaller and Waldman have been far more selective in their use of the data--and that they've done so in the service of supporting a sensational thesis:  white rural voters are the greatest threat to our democracy.  

Of course, that thesis is less sensational than it was even a decade ago because so many folks--at least in my coastal elite world--now believe it.  As Nicholas Jacobs wrote in one of his responses, Schaller and Waldman started with a thesis and then went looking for evidence to substantiate it.  That's where the cherry picking became necessary.   It's also where the phenomenon Mark Twain described as "lies, damned lies, statistics" came into play.  As a student with a degree in the hard sciences once told me, you can take most quantitative data sets and make them say whatever you want them to say. 

In their piece in The New Republic, Schaller and Waldman also make some interesting assertions about media protection of rural folks:   

[W]e have been surprised by the ferocity of the criticism we have received from scholars of rural politics. Their response has made clear that there are unspoken rules about criticizing certain Americans—rules that get to the heart of the very case we have tried to make about the deep geographic divisions in our politics at this fragile moment in our nation’s history.

* * * 

[I]f you dare to criticize the rural whites who are among Trump’s most devout followers, you’ll be met with an angry rebuke.

I find this assertion incredible--not least because it is so at odds with attitudes toward rural folks in my coastal elite world.   No, in my world, people are quite keen to "pile on" rural folks, seeing them as just the villains Schaller and Waldman selectively marshal data to depict.  

* * * 

Also published last weekend was this column by Eric Levitz in Vox, "Don’t sneer at white rural voters — or delude yourself about their politics."  Levitz asserts the debate between the authors of The Rural Voter and those of White Rural Rage can be boiled down to these five truths: 

1) Rural white people are more supportive of right-wing authoritarianism than are urban or suburban ones

2) Millions of rural white Americans support the Democratic Party

3) Rural white Republicans are not New Deal Democrats who got confused.

4) The economic challenges facing many rural areas are inherently difficult to solve.

5) Most people inherit the politics of their families and communities.

I agree for sure with numbers 2, 4, and 5 (though not necessarily that these are agreed upon in the two books).  As for the others, I'm not so sure given the findings of The Rural Voter and white rural people I know.  I also think that, regarding five, the politics people inherit are not necessarily the ones they stick with throughout their lives.  After all, many Obama voters migrated to Trump in 2016, and many more voters (third party or Democratic in 2016) migrated to Trump in 2020.  In other words, movement does happen.

Finally, Nick Jacobs and Daniel Shea recently published this essay in UnHerd, which got picked up in slightly amended form in the Washington Post.  Dee Davis published this in the Daily Yonder.