[BenIndy contributor Roger Straw: ‘Benicia Our Home’ at the Clocktower will be incredible – kind of a send-off for my sweetheart of 52 years, Benicia Poet Laureate Mary Susan Gast. Larnie Fox commented on Mary Susan’s poetry and leadership, “Mary Susan has been an amazing presence on the scene here, easing us through insurrections, mass shootings and COVID with compassion and insight.” As to the June 25 event, I can’t believe we ALSO have the California Poet Laureate Lee Herrick coming! And more – Constance Beutel’s song-video will bring Benicians together in an unprecedented way – such positivity as we’ve not seen in my time in Benicia… Mark your calendar now, and plan to attend!]
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BENICIA OUR HOME, JUNE 25 – Mark your calendar now!
Plan now to attend a festive historic event at Benicia’s Clocktower on June 25th at 3 PM. Benicians and friends will gather to celebrate our homeplace, to tell its story and join in song. This free event sponsored by the Benicia Public Library will feature a very special guest, California’s Poet Laureate Lee Herrick, and we will hear from our outgoing Poet Laureate, Mary Susan Gast. Visual artwork portraying life in Benicia will be on display, and we will hear “ZipOdes 94510,” short poems by Benician residents. A super highlight will be the premier showing of “Benicia Our Home,” a film portraying scenes of Benicia accompanied by over 200 Benicians in song. Don’t miss this!
Reserve the date – June 25 – and plan to meet at the Clock Tower at 3PM.
Benicia City Council to vote on boosting citizens’ petition to halt early-morning gunfire barrage during hunting season
By Nathalie Christian, May 22, 2023
On Tuesday, May 23, 2023, Benicia City Council will vote on whether or not to adopt a resolution in support of a citizens’ petition to California’s Fish & Game Commission (FGC) to prohibit duck hunting near Benicia’s residential shoreline.
According to the petition brought by Benicia resident Cathy Bennett and several community members, for the past two seasons duck hunters have been discharging their weapons within 150 yards of residential homes and parks. The barrage of gunfire has reportedly traumatized both residents and animals – including young children, pets, wildlife and adults – and potentially lowered the value of homes in the area.
However, the FGC has yet to place the matter on an upcoming agenda for consideration, effectively stalling the effort in its tracks.
To support the safety of residents as well as business interests in the area (considered prime waterfront real estate), Benicia City Council is seeking public input on whether adopt a resolution “to reinvigorate the urgency of the matter to the FGC with the goal of having the merits of the petition discussed at the August 2023 meeting.”
Show your support
Benicia residents are strongly encouraged to show support for our neighbors living on the shoreline who, for two hunting seasons now, have been awoken by loud gunfire early in the morning. The impact on human, wildlife and business interests in the area has been severe.
Take a stand with your Benicia neighbors by making a public comment telling our City Council that enough is enough – we have a right to safety, peace and quiet in our own homes.
Showing your support can be as easy as writing an email, but commenting in person is a great way to be heard.
How to write and email a public comment
Members of the public may provide public comment via email to the City Clerk by email at lwolfe@ci.benicia.ca.us. Any comment submitted to the City Clerk should indicate to which item of the agenda the comment relates (DUCK HUNTING IS ITEM 21.B).
– Comments received by 2:00 pm on the day of the meeting will be electronically forwarded to the City Council and posted on the City’s website.
– Comments received after 2:00 pm, but before the start time of the meeting will be electronically forwarded to the City Council but will not be posted on the City’s website.
In your email, put the item number in your subject line (e.g., “Public comment re. Item 21.B”).
In your email body, share why you support the resolution. You don’t have to write much. You can simply say, “I support a resolution to prohibit duck hunting near Benicia homes.”
The important thing is to send the email on time, ideally before 2 pm on Tuesday, May 23.
How to view the meeting and/or make a live public comment
You can participate in the meeting in one of four ways:
1) Attend in person at Council Chambers
2) Cable T.V. Broadcast – Check with your cable provider for your local government broadcast channel.
3) Livestream online at www.ci.benicia.ca.us/agendas.
4) Zoom Meeting (link below)
Use participant option to “raise hand” during the public comment period for the item you wish to speak on. Please note, your electronic device must have microphone capability. Once unmuted, you will have up to 5 minutes to speak.
Dial in with phone:
Before the start of the item you wish to comment on, call any of the numbers below. If one is busy, try the next one.
1 669 900 9128
1 346 248 7799
1 253 215 8782
1 646 558 8656
1 301 715 8592
1 312 626 6799
• Enter the meeting ID number: 885 0804 7557 (*please note this is an updated ID number*.)
Say the item you wish to speak on. (DUCK HUNTING IS ITEM 21. B)
Once unmuted, you will have up to 5 minutes to speak.
Enter password: 449303
When prompted for a Participant ID, press #.
Press *9 on your phone to “raise your hand” when the Mayor calls for public comment during the
Any member of the public who needs accommodations should email City Clerk Lisa Wolfe at lwolfe@ci.benicia.ca.us, who will use her best efforts to provide as much accessibility as possible while also maintaining public safety.
[BenIndy Contributor Nathalie Christian: Three refinery fires in three weeks! And the refineries involved are downplaying potential health impacts and insisting there is no danger to nearby communities. Sounds a lot like the Martinez refinery incident that occurred recently, where the refinery insisted that a shower of chemical dust that reached as far as Benicia wasn’t dangerous to residents . . . just before independent parties investigated and determined that this perfectly safe dust was actually highly toxic. So who can you trust after refinery incidents like these? It is essential that Benicia residents concerned about air quality and incident response at Benicia’s Valero Refinery attend the upcoming CAP public meeting this June 13 to learn more and ask questions about our own local refinery. – N.C. ]
‘Too toxic’: Refinery fires leave East Texas residents reeling
A motorcyclist rides past Valero’s West plant as black smoke billows from a fire at the refinery on Wednesday in Corpus Christi, Tex. (Angela Piazza/AP)
Three dangerous blazes in three weeks have struck refineries and a chemical plant, leaving one dead and over a dozen injured
First Shell, then Marathon, then Valero. In the last three weeks, major fires have broken out at these companies’ oil refineries and chemical plants in East Texas, leaving one dead and over a dozen injured.
The blazes in Deer Park, Galveston Bay and Corpus Christi follow a years-long string of explosions, fires and toxic releases in a region where oil refining and chemical production is highly concentrated, often close to residential neighborhoods. And while some residents have grown accustomed to the incidents, others are alarmed by how frequently they are hitting home.
“I have grown up here and watched neighborhoods near the refineries become too toxic to live in and people forced to leave their homes due to the toxicity,” Kristina Land, a resident of Corpus Christi, told The Washington Post.
On Wednesday, a fire broke out at the Valero West Refinery in Corpus Christi, sending smoke plumes into the sky and prompting emergency responders to mobilize. The cause of the fire is yet unknown.
Land, who is 45 years old, was in her home 20 miles from the refinery when she saw the black smoke on the horizon. She had to go on social media to find out what was happening.
She blames local officials for not encouraging more transparency.
“Our local government doesn’t ever want us to know how bad [the fires] really are, so we never truly know,” Land said. “They just sweep everything under the rug and never talk about it again.”
Refineries in the Lone Star State are regulated by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, which did not make officials available for an interview, but issued a statement.
Victoria Cann, a media specialist for TCEQ, said the three recent fires appear to be unrelated, “but investigations are underway into the cause, response, and clean up actions associated with each incident.”
She said the agency responded to each of them by deploying staff with monitoring equipment as appropriate and has “conducted surveillance to assess potential impacts to the local community.”
The first of the May refinery fires happened two weeks ago.
On May 5, heavy gas oil, gasoline and light gas oil ignited at Shell’s Deer Park chemicals facility in Deer Park, which sent 9 workers to the hospital. The plume from the fire, which occurred right outside of Houston, was visible for miles.
The fire, which started at 2:59 p.m., blazed on and off for days — after being reignited multiple times — before crews could completely neutralize it nearly three days later.
Emergency crews responded to the fire less than 19 hours after the TCEQ hosted a hearing to expand the Intercontinental Terminal Plant — a plant near Shell which blanketed the area with high levels of benzene, a chemical linked to cancer, in 2019.
Environmentalists say the accidents keep happening because the oil industry has little fear of penalties from regulators.
“Without a change from industry … communities are going to continue to feel the effects of these chemicals being spewed out by these facilities,” said Cassandra Casados, the communications coordinator at Air Alliance Houston.
A week after Shell’s fire was contained, a new plant fire erupted in Texas City, under 40 miles away, erupted. Galveston’s Marathon Petroleum confirmed that the fire caused the death of one employee and sent two others to the hospital. Emergency crews extinguished the fire — caused by a failed pump seal — in under four hours, according to city officials.
This is the second fatal incident to occur at Marathon’s Galveston Bay refinery this year. In March, a contract worker died after being electrocuted at the refinery.
Air monitoring at the state and facility level for all three sites is ongoing to determine the exposure risks to harmful levels of chemicals. Officials at the refineries and in nearby communities said the fires were not cause for concern:
“There is no danger to the nearby community,” Shell Deer Park said in a post following the incident.
Texas City Emergency Management stated that there was no need for a shelter in place following the fatal fire and that there was no threat to residents.
Valero’s west refinery did not warrant any “action from the community,” the city of Corpus Christi said in a news release.
Over the last several years, the Environmental Integrity Project — a D.C. based watchdog group — has monitored refinery fires and emissions, in East Texas and elsewhere. Too often, local officials minimize the impact of these incidents and issue “all is well statements,” said Eric Schaeffer, a former Environmental Protection Agency official who directs the watchdog group.
Black plume smoke is usually indicative that fine particulate matter — too small to see generally — is lingering in the air, according to Schaeffer. When refineries catch fire, the chemicals from the plumes aren’t contained to the site: They drift into residential areas.
“You’re going to have a lot of pollutants released,” Schaeffer said of these incidents. “That’s probably the biggest concern for the residents.”
Please – anyone can report Air Quality issues/events to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District: General Public Information: (415) 749-4900, or Air Quality Complaints: 1-800-334-ODOR (6367)
Benicia Public Works crews worked around the clock to repair water main line break near St. Dominic’s School
Benicia Public Works crews worked day and night to ensure St. Dominic’s School and the 800 and 900 blocks near East 5th Street have access to running water. | Uncredited image from Benicia City Government tweet.
Yesterday morning, a water main line break was detected on East 5th Street. City of Benicia Public Works crews worked around the clock to repair the line and restore water to affected residents this morning. Thank you to our dedicated crews!
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