Here’s a special kind of ‘fire sale’ that will help heal Carrizo Plain | Opinion

Help charred areas of Carrizo Plain

A recent fire swept through a large portion of Carrizo Plain National Monument, burning much of the ridge of the Caliente Range there. This ridge includes the highest elevation in San Luis Obispo County at 5,106 feet and was vegetated with a thick cover of oak and juniper trees. Damage to this woodland and surrounding areas is still being assessed, but it is clear that some large-scale restoration efforts — erosion control, possible seeding in some areas and other conservation measures — will be needed.

To financially support this restoration effort, the Carrizo Plain Conservancy is partnering with the well known local art group SLOPE (San Luis Outdoor Painters for the Environment) to host an online art sale of Carrizo Plain themed landscape, which can be seen at this website: www.ArtforCarrizo.com

Artists from SLOPE and other local groups are offering their artwork for sale, with the pledge to donate 50% of proceeds to the restoration effort in the National Monument. The funds will be administered by Carrizo Plain Conservancy and will go to restoration projects.

Those interested in this effort are invited to visit the new website. If you find artwork you like, you can purchase directly from the artist. Details would be negotiated directly with the artist, and the donation value reported to the buyer for tax purposes.

The online art sale is underway and will run through at least mid-October. Enjoy viewing this artwork and supporting environmental restoration efforts in Carrizo Plain National Monument.

Neil Havlik, President

Carrizo Plain Conservancy

Acts of nature?

Thanks to our hardworking fire crews, there has not been significant loss of life or property from the Gifford Fire, but families have been forced to evacuate and firefighters have been injured.

Let this fire serve as a warning. If this had occurred during our typical Santa Lucia winds (only a month away), we might not have had such a good outcome.

These aren’t just “acts of nature.” They are the predictable result of hotter, drier conditions caused by climate change — made worse by political choices.

Wildfires don’t care about party lines — but the policies that make them worse are political. When leaders slash funding for disaster response and deny climate science, they are making choices that not only make it hard to afford home fire insurance, but also costs lives, property and livelihoods.

If we want a safer, more resilient SLO County, we must insist on more crews for prescribed burns and vegetation management, stronger building rules and more clean energy investment. Support solutions like rooftop solar, battery storage and offshore wind turbines.

Don Gaede and Eric Veium

SLO County Citizens’ Climate Education

Prayer is not a 4-letter word

After the recent shooting in a Catholic church, many politicians and media figures have disparaged prayer.

It appears lost on them that surviving children immediately afterward said they were praying for their friends, and that one of the children asked his surgeon to pray with him as he was taken to surgery. Do those politicians and news anchors want to know why this evil occurred? They need only look in the mirror.

For many years, politicians and media have ignored, excused and even praised attacks on Catholics. Churches have been vandalized, statues destroyed, attempts have been made at committing the ultimate sacrilege inside the churches — and nothing happens to the perpetrators. Prayer doesn’t exclude action. Catholic leaders pleaded with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz to share some of the $18 billion state surplus to help with school security and were denied.

Someday, those who mock prayer will face a serious illness or injury of someone they love — and I bet they will pray. If I hear of such tragedy in their lives, I will as well.

Colleen Annes

Atascadero

Wanted: one shopping cart

Where does one buy a shopping cart? I looked on Amazon. No luck. None on eBay. I even looked on Etsy and Facebook Marketplace. Nada.

Here’s what I don’t understand, every day I see numerous people pushing shopping carts filled to overflowing with God knows what. Sometimes one person will have two or three tied together like a shopping cart choo-choo.

Where do they get them? When I Googled “Where can I buy a shopping cart?” Google returned, “Buy??? Just take one from the nearest market. They just pass on the cost on suckers who pay for things.”

Mike Radakovich

San Luis Obispo

League’s stand on Prop 50

We have received numerous questions from community members asking where the League of Women Voters stands on Proposition 50, the mid-cycle redistricting measure on the Nov. 4 special election ballot. Voters may have received a mailer from “Protect Voters First” about the ballot initiative, which wrongly implies that the League of Women Voters endorses the information in the flyer.

Be clear, the League does not support this coalition or its message. Before the ballot language was written, the League, along with other good government groups, issued statements opposing mid-cycle redistricting as contrary to our long-standing positions on gerrymandering and fair representation. Since then, and on the heels of Texas’ decision to implement mid-cycle redistricting, Gov. Newsom and the legislature have moved to put Proposition 50 on the ballot for a special election in November.

We will not take a position on the ballot measure. On the proposed maps themselves, we believe it is now up to the people most affected by the proposed maps to decide if those maps are fair. We urge everyone, especially those in constituencies where the maps will change, to educate themselves about the maps, make sure they are registered, and vote on Nov. 4. We stand ready to provide the non-partisan, factual information voters need to cast an informed vote.

Janice Langley Joanne Schultz Wendy Brown Jacquie Canfield League of Women Voters of San Luis Obispo County

Diablo’s worth every cent

The two filings from organizations ideologically opposed to power from nuclear power plants such as Diablo Canyon are unsurprising, but without merit. Diablo Canyon’s power is an incredible bargain. The plant’s typical annual production is equal to five Hoover Dams. Dividing the cost of $723 million by the Diablo’s production of 42 terawatt-hours during 2 1/3 years yields a mere 1.743 cents per kilowatt-hour. (A terawatt-hour is a billion kilowatt-hours.)

Diablo also provides an essential grid reliability service, namely providing immense amounts of synchronous grid inertia (SGI), which can be considered the “heartbeat” of the California grid. The CPUC doesn’t permit economic rewards for providing this essential SGI. Search for the March 4, 2024 article title, “Why is Grid Inertia Important?” at Californians for Green Nuclear Power’s GreenNUKE Substack.

The government of Spain tried the experiment of attempting to run a modern society on solar and wind instead of nuclear. The laws of physics predicted the blackout. On Monday, April 28, 2025, shortly after 12:30 PM, Spain and Portugal suffered a huge blackout killing at least eleven people. See the July 8, 2025 GreenNUKE article, “The Spanish Version of the ‘Duck Curve’ is a real killer.”

Gene Nelson Californians for Green Nuclear Power, Inc.

This story was originally published September 7, 2025 at 10:00 AM.