The Butte County Grand Jury
report was released Friday, and for once there won’t be much controversy when
local governments are obligated to respond.
The Grand Jury, a panel of
19, works for an entire year investigating government agencies. When the annual
report is produced, those agencies are required to issue a written response
within 90 days.
Unfortunately, while the
Grand Jury has subpoena powers, its reports don’t carry nearly enough weight.
When government agencies get slammed by the Grand Jury, those agencies too
frequently issue a dismissive response. If often amounts to, if we may
summarize: “Regular citizens can’t possibly understand the complexity of
government jobs, so we’ll continue doing what we want.”
This year’s Grand Jury
report, though, will produce quite different responses. That’s because of the
body’s 11 reports — some of which amounted to little more than summaries of
field trips — nearly all were extraordinarily complimentary. Keep doing what
you’re doing, agencies were told time and again.
Maybe things are hunky-dory
in Butte County, or maybe the Grand Jury chose the wrong agencies to
investigate, but the reports had nary a discouraging word. They weren’t like
past reports that helped change things in agencies like the Chico Unified
School District, Feather River Recreation and Park District and, last year, the
city of Chico.
The most interesting and
forceful report was the chapter on the oil trains coming through the Feather
River Canyon and Oroville.
The Grand Jury found the same
thing we’ve learned — that Butte County is in the dark when it comes to what
the railroad is hauling in the canyon and when.
Since a railroad is involved,
we’ve said our federal legislators need to enact tighter restrictions and
mandate that the railroad fund training for emergency response and cleanup
teams. Progress on the matter has been glacial. Meanwhile, more rail shipments
then ever are coming from the Bakken oil fields in North Dakota and Montana and
coming through Butte County on the way to West Coast refineries.
We’ve been sounding the alarm
since November, when a train derailed in the canyon and 11 cars fell off the
tracks and toward the river. Fortunately they were only carrying corn.
The canyon is a treacherous
place, with rock slides, curves, bridges and tunnels. Yet it was track failure
— a broken rail — that caused this train to crash, proving it can happen
despite the best safety intentions. Therefore, it’s critical to be prepared.
The county and state are not.
Since then, we’ve learned
that the railroads share little about what they’re hauling. They say it’s a
matter of interstate commerce. It’s ridiculous that a volatile oil train can go
through the canyon and the city of Oroville, yet no emergency crews know a
thing until it’s rolling through town. It’s hard to be prepared for problems
when local emergency crews are left in the dark.
The Grand Jury investigated
and estimated that 3 million gallons of oil are shipped weekly through the
canyon.
While the Grand Jury can’t
make recommendations to the state and federal government — both of which seem
somnolent on the issue — it can make suggestions to the county. The report said
supervisors and county officials should push, along with Plumas County, for the
Feather River Canyon to receive more funding under Senate Bill 861 for disaster
preparedness.
The Grand Jury also said
supervisors should petition the California Public Utilities Commission to
inspect Butte County’s railroad bridges. The report said there is no
comprehensive inventory of railroad bridges in the state, though the state has
two inspectors.
If the
Grand Jury report helps the county keep the heat on the state and federal
governments on this critical issue, it will have done an important job.
June 23, 2015
Chico
Enterprise-Record
Editorial
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