Trees and leaves

There is fossil evidence that the redwoods existed 180 million years ago during the time of dinosaurs. Individual trees may live more than 3,000 years. They survive.

They do so by using virtually every element of their environment to nurture new growth and sustain continuing old growth. In return, they provide for the life around them, whether other plants and trees or animals and insects.

The only real threat to them has been us.

We have cut them down. One tree, now the Big Stump, was used as a dance floor and a two-lane bowling alley. Another tree was stripped entirely of its bark so that it could be reassembled and put on display around the country and Europe. Another had its bark stripped by “ambitious speculators.” Bark and wood were collected for pincushions, candle holders, carved animals and insulation.

Most of this happened in the 1800s and early 1900s and it is easy to view these activities as befitting the distinctive avarice of the time, when nature was trumpeted as a gift from God for man to exploit.

Of course, that is a perspective of convenience made possible only by the passage of time. What activity of ours, routinely and widely accepted by the distinctive avarice of our times, will be looked upon 100 years from now with similar disdain?

It could be in the recent news story — shocking, hardly surprising — about the massive, decadeslong efforts by American real estate and insurance companies to avoid liability in cases of lead poisoning in drinking water, which compromised the health of hundreds of thousands of children. This is mutated interconnectivity.

We all sense something has gone wrong.

The latest U.S. census data shows 27,000 people have left San Mateo County — a decline of 3.2%, the fourth largest decline in the country behind only Manhattan, San Francisco and Calcasieu Parish in southwestern Louisiana. New York City and San Francisco are highly urbanized, expensive places. Calcasieu Parish is rural and poor, with a per capita income of $29,866.

San Mateo is not any of these things. Although, it certainly is expensive, which, undoubtedly will be one guess as to why these people left. The speculation over this out-migration undoubtedly will be extensive and earnest, tinged with alarm by some, pleasure by others. It can include the workplace changes wrought by COVID, the increasingly urbanized environment of this once-quintessential suburb, better jobs, corporate migration, and better living, which is defined, apparently, as cheaper.

San Mateo County remains a miraculous place to live — 20 minutes to the beach, 20 minutes to the coastal redwoods and an environment of tolerance and intellectual stimulation.

Clearly, however, for some people, San Mateo County is a banquet they are allowed to see, but not attend.

Perhaps the question is not why people are leaving, but how we are driving them away.

The most common answer is likely to be the cost of living here, specifically of ensuring that the roof over your head is not a highway overpass. Yes, housing, which is an unsolvable problem of the 21st century.

Unsolvable, because resisting new housing helps no one, while building as much as we possibly can will never be enough.

The answer is to pay people better. Not high-end professionals and tech workers, who are able to fend for themselves, but the workers in the service industry and, yes, teachers, whose value we hold high as long as it remains on a metaphysical plane.

It is nice, even admirable, that most of the cities on the Peninsula adopted increased minimum wage rates. Meanwhile, a local school district is struggling to give teachers a 2% annual raise. Neither is sufficient.

Studies show that consumer attitudes are most affected by gas and grocery prices and this tends to drive opinions about the state of the economy. This, in turn, drives the public’s willingness to approve new taxes.

It is antithetical that it takes a 55% vote to approve taxes for new school facilities, but a two-thirds vote to pay teachers more. We are building rich and teacher poor. Ultimately, we starve our students.

It is an irreconcilable inconsistency in an interconnected, interdependent community.

Mark Simon is a veteran journalist, whose career included 15 years as an executive at SamTrans and Caltrain. He can be reached at marksimon@smdailyjournal.com.