SAN LUIS OBISPO: Seeking Volunteers for July 2013 in SLO

*****UPDATE 7/1/2013 - Tonight is the first night of the overflow at UCC. We set up the church fellowship room to prepare it for our homeless guests, who shall arrive tonight - starting at 5pm. We received the sleeping cots and bedding from the previous church this morning, and got those all set up and ready to go. We will be at UCC at 5pm on 7/1 for the arrival of the clients. Thanks to all the volunteers who are making a difference in the lives of  up to 32 family members every night this month. As the saying goes, "If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem."

*****UPDATE 6/20/2013 -  Letter to Volunteers from United Church of Christ (Congregational) Overflow Team for the July 2013 Overflow. If you want to help, please contact Meg at the contact info blow. Thanks and Blessings.

June, 2013

Dear Volunteers,              

We thank you for your willingness to serve as United Church of Christ (Congregational) hosts the Homeless Shelter Overflow this July. As you know, there is limited space at the Maxine Lewis Memorial Shelter, so families and single women are transported each month to a host church to spend the night.

For each of July’s thirty-one nights, we will need two Overnight Hosts (7 pm- 7 am) to greet our guests and make them feel welcome. You are asked to bring a sleeping bag/bedding and reading material or laptop computer (UCC has WiFi), as well as a snack (refrigerator available). Hosts take turns sleeping (e.g. 10 pm – 2 am/2 am – 6 am) in a separate room from our guests, so that there is someone available to our guests at all times.

Overnight guests are screened and escorted nightly by CAPSLO (Community Action Partnership) Homeless Services staff, who provide 24 hour support. The Shelter starts bringing families and single women after dinner as early as 5:30 pm. A UCC Evening Coordinator comes around 5 pm to set up and stays until 8-9 pm. You are most welcome to come as early as 5 pm, especially if this is your first time.

We are not permitted to proselytize or pray with our guests, but witness through kindness and willingness to serve. We engage in casual conversation, if the guests so choose, play games or do crafts with the children, enjoy light snacks, and provide a relaxed and safe environment for our guests. Lights are out at 9 pm and turned on the next morning at 6 am, when Shelter staff and a UCC Morning Coordinator arrive. The guests eat breakfast, do assigned chores and are gone by 7 am. Overnight Hosts can leave once the UCC Morning Coordinator arrives.

We also are in need of donations (paper supplies, toiletries, snacks, funds) as well as your prayers, as we prepare to serve those in our community who have so little.

This is an opportunity to serve Christ as Jesus said “whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” (Mt 25: 40). We trust you will prayerfully consider this opportunity.

Please contact Meg Kuykendall (542-9559 or meg@velcrosworld.com) if you have any questions or concerns. We look forward to serving with you.

Blessings,

United Church of Christ (Congregational) Overflow Team

11245 Los Osos Valley Road

San Luis Obispo, CA 93405

805-544-1373

office@sloucc.org

http://uccslo.wordpress.com/

*****ORIGINAL ARTICLE: June 2013 - The UCC is seeking volunteers for the month of July 2013 to help with the local homeless shelter overflow. This program is managed by our wonderful local non-profit, the Community Action Partnership of San Luis Obispo. If you can help, please contact Tim (or Meg at the phone or email address below). We need evening volunteers and overnight volunteers for every day of the entire month. Thanks to my friends who have helped with this worthwhile effort to provide a safe, comfortable place for our local homeless population to stay. The UCC letter below has more information - please click to enlarge.

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GOVERNMENT: We Can't Afford This!

Federal, state and local governments got into fiscal trouble by increasing pay and benefits during good times, while leaving no real mechanism for reducing costs when the times grew tough, as in the recent "Great Recession". But do we learn from this? No, we go right back to baking pay, healthcare and retirements into the government employee compensation pie, with no way to ever remove the generous compensation costs. Let's Look at a few examples:

BART Employee Gets $330,000 for No Work, Plus $181,000 a Year in Pension - Inexcusable Waste of Taxpayer Money?
Ex-Bart Official Makes $330,000 (Huffington Post article)  in 2012 without working a single day! Sometimes the newspaper reporter does not get it right, but the readers make comments that are spot on, like this one:

"$181,000 a year pensions are obscene. Every city in the country should eliminate all pensions completely and go on a pay as you go budget. Policemen and firemen and teachers all should rely on social security and instead of pensions,pay them a little more and let them invest in an annuity if they wish. Why should a 20 year old entering the workforce now pay taxes for the next 40 years supporting someone else retiring today. The system isn't working,proof is the cities filing bankruptcy already."

From the paucity of comments on this BART compensation article, compared to other articles at the Huffington Post, nobody appears to be outraged. The reason? IMHO, because this goes on so frequently and people do not feel empowered to stop it. Meanwhile, unemployment and underemployment is still the rules of the day here in good old Cal-ee-forn-ee-uh. Sigh

Calif. State Workers to get 4.5% Pay Raises, But Can We Afford Them?

Governor Jerry Brown consorted with his largest public employee union to give them a 4.5% raise. But can we afford it? I believe that the state cannot afford it. Actions like these put us in danger of unsound financial footing, should the current feeble economic recovery falter. Read about this in the Tribune's article: State Workers to get Raises Under New Contract with Union. Decide for yourself.

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JUST FOR FUN: Arizona!

Whenever this site gets too serious, its time to post some plain old fun stuff, so here we go!

We recently completed a trip to Arizona and visited some amazing places, including the Overland Expo, Monument Valley, Dineh (Navajo) Reservation, Hopi Reservation, and more. Thanks Mark and Sharlene for letting us tag along with you on part of this trip. 

Land Rover built an awesome 4x4 course for the Expo, and various groups tried running it. Overland Expo put together this series of videos showing various makes of pop-up campers running the course.

You are invited to share a few of these experiences with the E. Clampus Waagus Crew in 2014: We hope to repeat the trip in May 2014, and we hope some of our friends can join us. Generally, I only post photos of me, and not my family and friends, because I am careful about what is posted to the internet, because it is out there forever. Enjoy these photos from our recent trip to Arizona (click to enlarge)!

ABOVE (click to enlarge): Playing with a Hopi child on the Hopi Reservation in Arizona. Mark and I met them at a nearby lake where Mom, Dad, Brother and Sister were fishing. I played with the kids for a while and had a lot of fun. The 2 kids were beautiful and tons of fun to play with. The girl had never had an "Airplane Ride" (pictured above) - photo by Mark.

NATION: US Economic Recovery is Feeble...

...That's right. Do NOT believe what you hear and read. Instead, go with the economic data. [Note: *** below indicates an update in this topic.

Labor Force Participation Rate: Did you notice that the media has stopped reporting the unemployment in California in the nation? When's the last time you saw an unemployment rate in the news or in a newspaper? A better statistic for employment is the Employment-to-Population-Ratio, which is currently lower than it should be. This statistic is also known as the Labor Force Participation rate, which currently stands at 63.4%, which is at or near the lowest it has been since 2003, when it averaged around 66.5%. 

***As Goldman notes in Barrons 6/24/13 edition on page 8, "the relevance of a falling jobless rate while labor force participation rates are at historic lows is dubious."

Unemployment Rate: May 2013 saw an increase in the national unemployment rate to 7.6%, primarily due to the fact that more people started looking for work. The fed has previously announced that it will continue to stimulate the economy with bond purchase until the unemployment rate hits 6.5%, which looks like it will not happen for a while. The California Unemployment rate stands at 9.0% as of May 17, 2013, according to the California EDD. The Calif. rate was extracted from a Federal Survey of 5,500 househoulds (generally, the most accurate source of unemployment data). 

***Tribune 6/22/13: The California unemployment rate now stands at 8.6% - its lowest level since Nov. 2008. It is now only 1% higher than the national average, and is down from the highs throughout 2010 of about 12.5%. Calif. still has the 6th highest state unemployment rate in the nation. These results can be deceiving, as all of this gain has come from the self-employed, and represents people with no job prospects opening up their own business in hopes of bring in some cash. 

***Our personal experience is that many folks who have lost jobs in SLO have done just that: opened a consulting "business" until they find another job. In the meantime, their consulting "business" keeps their resume from having a gap, and gives them something to do every day, whether they are making money or not.

Household Wealth Recovery: The average American household has only recovered about 63% of the wealth it lost to the so-called "Great Recession" of 2007. However, the nation as a whole has regained all of the wealth that was lost during the Great Recession, due to higher stock and real estate price appreciation of the wealthiest 10% of households. A few informative articles on the topic: 
US Households Have a Long Way to Go (Tribune, 6/7/2013).
US Gains Wealth - but Not Equally (Tribune, 6/6/2013).

Shrinking American Wages: Average American wages have been dropping over the last several years. Between Sept. 2011 and Sept. 2012, real wages have dropped 1.1% (the most recent data available). Since 1978, year-over-year wages have declined only 6 times, and 4 of those have occurred since 2009. Most economists attribute this drop to increased international attention. Similar decreases are occurring in other first world countries, such as Japan and Europe, as well. However, wages in third world countries such as China and Brazil have tripled in the last decade. Read more here:
The Incredible Shrinking American Wage (Tribune, 6/5/2013).

Entry Level Jobs: These are hard to come by in this economy, even for those with a college degree. I believe it is largely because the middle class, middle-aged workers have been downwardly mobile and have taken most of the entry level jobs, thus leaving nothing for those in their 20's. Many highly qualified recent college grads are working in job well below their skill levels, just to get by. We hope that this situation improves soon, as we have 1 son who will be graduating from UC Santa Barbara in 2 years, and will need one of those entry level jobs! 

Stock Market vs. Economy Myth: If the US stock market is doing well, then so is the economy, right? Wrong! You can read more here at About.com. The US stock market has performed well, despite a weak economic recovery. This is largely because large corporations (which make up the entire US stock market) have aggressively reigned in costs and maximized profits, thus driving the market higher, while at the same time, minimizing employment opportunities for the low and middle class worker. 

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