The Tragedy of Shasta County

The tragedy of rural California.

(Record Searchlight January 2017).  

After three straight months of no movement, Shasta County's unemployment rate in December inched up to 6.7 percent, despite strong job gains in the private education and health services, and retail sectors, the state reported Friday.

The county's jobless rate had been stuck at 6.4 percent since September. The unemployment rate in December 2015 was 7.5 percent.

Sheila Stock, a state labor analyst based in Redding, said Shasta County has added 6,700 private sector jobs since December 2011. Government sector jobs have declined by 700 in that same time period.

Last month, there were an estimated 400 jobs added in private education and health services. Boosted by the holiday shopping season, retailers in Shasta County added an estimated 100 jobs in December.

“So more employers still felt the need to hire more people in the holiday season,” Stock said.

Stock considers September through December the retail hiring season, and this year the county added 500 jobs in the sector over those four months.

“In 2015, we added 300 jobs. But 2013 and 2014 both saw 600 job gains in that time period,” Stock said.

December’s 6.7 percent unemployment rate was the lowest for the month since 2006, when it also stood at 6.7 percent.

California's unemployment rate in December was 5 percent, unchanged from November. A year ago, the rate was 5.7 percent.

There were an estimated 200 fewer people working in the professional and business services sector  and 100 fewer individuals working in leisure and hospitality. The mining, logging and construction sector lost 200 jobs from November to December, though the estimated 3,000 people working in that sector last month was unchanged from a year ago.

A survey of help wanted ads in December showed demand high in Shasta County was high for registered nurses and truck drivers. Teacher assistants, retail workers and physical therapists also were wanted.

The unemployment rate in Siskiyou County in December was 9.2 in December, up from 7.8 percent in November. Tehama County’s unemployment rate last month 6.9 percent, up from 6.4 percent in November. The unemployment rate in Trinity County in December was 6.6 percent, up from 6.4 percent in November.

All numbers are not seasonally adjusted.

These figures do not lie...Shasta County like many inland counties in California lags way behind the more affluent and economic urban areas.  

And why is that?  I have argued for years against the conservative wave that hit rural California as part of the Reagan Revolution in the 1970s.  That Revolution has seen its ebb since the disastrous governorship of Pete Wilson, who foolishly tied the Republican Party to the xenophobia of immigration fear.  

Meanwhile the state got more and more diverse, leaving even Orange County voting Democratic.  

The irony here is Latinos, the target of most of the xenophobia, are by their Catholic roots, social conservatives.  It would have been easy for Republicans to appeal to them in the 1990s.  But no, Wilson foolishly tied the economic downturn of the George P. Bush era (which really was caused by Reagan’s tax cuts) to immigration from Mexico.  He profited personally, getting elected twice, but tied Republicans to a losing position and handed the state over to the Democrats, who decided to become the party of diversity both locally and nationally.

This is very ironic, considering that the Democrats were the segregationist party until 1970.  But Nixon changed all that, and his southern strategy won the south for the Republican Party, but lost California (the birthplace of the Reagan Revolution) for the foreseeable future.

The problem is many whites ran north and inland in their retirement.  They avoided the ethnic diversity that is still growing in the cities, and established conservative hegemony inland, unfortunately where nobody lived.  

The other effect, was economic.  The economy of California is truly a global one.  The digital economy thrives on world markets (Apple Computer, born in California, is a good example).  And the jobs have exploded in number, making California the sixth largest economy on earth.

Not so inland.  The conservatives, and they are relatively few, run inland counties.  And their repressive leadership, that seeks to keep minorities out, that is virulently anti-immigration, runs off entrepreneurs, discourages economic growth.  

Shasta County is a perfect example.  Right now the Bethel Church, a very conservative evangelical church, is in the process of taking over the City Council.  There is a State of Jefferson movement, seeking to link up with counties in Oregon to form a new, conservative led state.  It doesn’t have a chance, but it is a rallying point for a increasingly right wing agenda.

Meanwhile the young people are leaving.  I even left, a Redding native of many years, who raised my family there.  I left for other reasons of course, but political ones were up there.  

I could not stomach watching my hometown destroy itself.  The crushing blow was a two time failure to pass a small sales tax increase to rebuild the police force and fire departments; that had been decimated by the cutbacks of the Great Recession.  For a $2.50 per month average increase in sales tax, Redding conservatives have turned down twice a measure that would make their city safer and less prone to the fire that could destroy the whole town.  

You see Shasta County sits on a powder keg; the city sits bottom of foothills from three sides, that if the wind is right, will blow a fire right into the downtown.  And the fire protection has been cut.

Moreover young people are leaving in droves...the city is shrinking.

Redding was a model city once, its City Manager government was respected all over the state.  Now, with conservatives running the show, Redding is a laughing stock....

The latest is the opioid epidemic, that is killing Redding citizens and driving petty crime up (with little police protection; remember they voted down the police force renewal).  And the poverty rate grows.  And the schools shrink, or go to Charter Schools, that lessen educational quality all the time.

And the professionals are now beginning to abandon the town, doctors are leaving....

Then there is global warming, that pushes Redding temperatures to record levels every year.  This year, with the drought growing brush at record rates, we are headed into October, which is the fire month, with a tinder dry land and less firemen.  It is the perfect storm.

Meanwhile a Supervisor started a rant on Facebook about the Sanctuary City California just passed.  They are going nuts up there, which is interesting since “illegals” hardly exist up there (there is not work).

But they push out their chests and proclaim their hatred for Democrats and Liberals who they blame for all their misfortunes; which is interesting because conservatives have been running local governments and dominate state elected representative offices for the past forty years!  It seems to me they might start asking their representatives where is the “beef” as they slide further into poverty.  Fact is their representative are from the agricultural corporate world who represent their selfish interests and don’t give a rip about who elected them...and the people of Shasta County don’t get it.  

The blame?  It’s on the conservative short sighted leadership, that is continuing Wilson’s hate campaign and have of course hooked up with Trump’s Xenophobic lies.  And who do they blame.....the Democrats of course, who haven’t run the county for forty years!

I suppose if they get their dream of the State of Jefferson they will immediately build a wall along the Siskiyou Mountains...good luck because the ill conceived state will fail before the ink is dry on its Constitution.  

You see Shasta County is already one of the state’s poorest counties; it gets more aid per capital, Medical; etc, than almost every other county.  If they join the state of Jefferson Shasta County and others  will literally starve to death...seniors will die, children will die just from the Medical cuts alone...

You see Shasta County can be poor, and a sanctuary for scared white people who have fled the cities because “they” live there; precisely because of their political attitudes.  But the dirty little secret is this:  Seniors do not suffer from this.  They get their Medical, Medicaid, In Home Support Services, etc., etc...and all the opioids they can take....

The people who suffer are young people with families, who cannot find good jobs and are leaving in droves.  The people who will suffer is the death of Redding, Red Bluff and even Chico (more liberal) killed by the same idiocy that killed Detroit, Kansas; etc...