The Cal Expo land is important - of first importance.
As land, it has intrinsic value, aside from any markets
that buy and sell such things. But, it isn't
wilderness either. If it were, we wouldn't be talking about
Cal Expo at all. We'd be talking about how to remove all evidence
of human occupation and putting things back exactly as they were -
one-hudrend or five-hundred or a thousand years ago.
In these pages of the CEAV website we will explore many aspects of
the relationships between the people and Cal-Expo - an alternate vision
of Cal-Expo that could be realized if our leadership has the will to
make it so. In these introductory remarks, we discuss the relationship
between place and people - the common ground upon which the purposes of
the people of California and those of the mission of Cal-Expo must meet
if the future of the California State Fair & Exposition is to have anything
at all to recommend it. We believe CEAVE, or some CEAV-like project, has
the best chance of creating that common ground. But if the people do not
agree, do not act to see that it becomes a reality, it isn't going to happen.
It is up to you, those reading these pages, to decide, for yourselves,
whether what we have proposed is worth the fight - for battle there will be,
that much is guaranteed.
The site is in the middle of a relatively large city. It has a mission
and a public purpose that has been defined for more than a hundred years,
to the benefit of the people of California. Though that mission and the site it
lives on may have fallen out of date and into considerable disrepair, neither
the mission nor the land are any less valuable to the people of California
than they were when the Fair first started or, when it relocated from downtown
to its present location.
While the staff and managment of Cal-Expo may talk about being "environmentally
conscious", insuring us that their facilities will be "green", in fact, their CX/NBA
plan essentially contradicts any claim to environmental sensitivity.
Sports-complexes, town-houses, shopping malls and the like pretty much place the intrinsic
worth of the land at zero. Under their plan, it has only market value; a value based entirely upon
the things that people put on the land. That value, the "market value" of the property,
may increase enormously, no matter how it is developed. But as something to be valued
for its own sake, or used as some demonstration of 'environmental soundness' in its
stewardship and managment - forget it, there is none. Even the public purpose - the
Fair and Exposition, stand to depreciate in value and eventually be subsumed into the
landscape of human occupation due to the pressure of increasing "market-value" that
tends to sweep anything and everything out of its way. In market terms, there is
no intrinsic worth to the environment.
Still, one stubborn fact remains. It is that Cal Expo, along with many other
enterprises, employ the language of 'environment' in the packaging and sale
of their plans. They are compelled to, even as they destroy it in pursuit of
their singularly focused "market values". The reason is simple. The people
that they are appointed to serve do recognize the value of both the mission and
the environment in terms that lie outside ordinary market calculus. We have
a place that is worth preserving, as 'place'. We also have a purpose that is
worth preserving, as 'purpose' - in this case, the mission of Cal Expo, itself,
"...to create a State Fair experience
reflecting California including its industries,
agriculture, diversity of its people, traditions
and trends shaping its future -- supported by year-round events."
Often these two elements, place and people, conflict in ways for which there is seemingly no way to reconcile.
However, in the case of what to do with/about Cal Expo - what its future might look
like in terms of these competing interests - there is something unique to both
the land and to its stated purpose that doesn't happen very often. Namely,
the mission to showcase the best of California, literally its future, appears
to be increasingly a future that is vitally and fundamentally engaged in preserving
its environment. Our commerce, our agriculture, our resource managment, our education
is all intensly engaged in re-addressing the long-standing imbalance between human
occupation and the task of finding places to occupy that will be fit for humans. In a very
short period of time, a couple of decades perhaps, the message has become the market. It
appears it will remain so for a very long time.
The uniqueness of Cal Expo is that it is situated precisely, in mission and environment,
in a circumstance to exploit that growing market for a healthy environment by serving
a mission, its stated mission, that will help make it so. I can think of no other
coincidence of intention and place on this earth quite so aligned as the current
position of the Cal-Expo mission and its site.
Yet, it is clear from the plan that Cal-Expo's Board and management have handed us,
the only plan they will even consider, that they completely fail to grasp this fact.
Instead, they would reach for the very solution that would simply exagerate the
imbalance, in keeping with the worst practices of the 20th century. Not only would
they destroy the environment in the process, but almost certainly destroy their
own mission as well. It would be a double tragedy which the people of California should
not permit to happen. This natural alignment of people and environment which, as CEAV
suggests, offers an ideal concept-ground for Cal-Expo's future, will not likely happen
again. We will either take advantage of this 'gift' or, pave over the opportunity
forever.
This is essentially what the CEAV Project is about. It makes of the environment and
the growing number of advanced products, technologies and practices that support it,
the very thing to be showcased; to express the industry, agriculture, traditions and
diversity of our people. Above all, to become the hub of a global showcase entirely
suited to the growing consciousness, invention and imagination of the people of
the 21st century that is sure to follow. There is nothing mysterious about it.
It is simply a 'perfect storm' of the best of California looking for a place to
demonstrate what we are capable of doing if we really put our minds and imagination
to the task.
For the moment, however, the people of California have yet to be heard. Cal Expo, it seems,
is determined to see that we will not be heard. Instead, they would turn a deaf ear to
anyone who is not smitten by their idea of putting a huge parking lot with baskeball court; another neighborhood and shopping mall;
a giant, football-field sized, warehouse for commercial exhibits (any kind of exhibits,
as long as they pay the rent); and, a few ancillary amusements on the side; all in the midst of our city.
In this section of our website, then, we will be taking a look at the people
side of things; who we are, what we really want and how a CEAV-like project
might enhance our own missions - missions which our children and their children
will inherit.