The town of Sciotia California is for sale from a timber company

[Peggy Day]

http://www.rawstory.com/showarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Ffinance.myway.com%2Fjsp%2Fnw%2Fnwdt_rt.jsp%3Fsection%3Dnews%26feed%3Dap%26src%3D601%26news_id%3Dap-d8mc0klg0%26date%3D20061231
Wouldn't it be great if we could buy it instead of a company or other country?

[SoCalDem]

1. Looks like an opportunity for retirement living. Lack of jobs seems to be a factor

so people who don;t "need' to work, might be the answer./.

or some high tech company that can operate from anyplace..

or tourism?

The "scruffy" town nearby sounds like they are afraid of "Stepford in the Woods" :)

[Peggy Day]

2. alternative energy companies? People could live there too

just a new years' dream. I think it would be great.
I like your kitties!

[nosmokes]

3. there's another town, much smaller, just down the road a piece, that's also

for sale. or was a year ago. fernbridge? this is some of the most beautiful country on the planet. if you've never seen the coastal redwoods it's a sight that you will never forget. and around scotia is the largest tract of them left. when julia was doing her sit ai was priveleged to live in the area and to help out just a bit, though i was workingmostly on the other side of the side of the county w/ different folks, we did have some interaction.when people first drive into the area they mistake the douglas firs for the redwoods because the biggest doug firs i've ever seen grow in the miles around the redwoods. and the firs are magnificient, but they pale next to the redwoods, a tree so grand and majestic that you wish sooo much that it could talk to you so you could listen to it's stories, learn it's lessons.

but the good news is that maxxam and hurwitz are no longer gonna be in control of that land! because the only thing he wanted to do was clear-cut as much of it as he could as fast as he could so he could pay back the loans he bought kaiser steel and palco with which were floated on junk bonds. not a week went by that palco wasn't cited for violsting california or fed logging regs. and that's no exaggeration. hopefully a deal can be put together that will allow the workers to buy the company and give them all a stake in continuing what had been the long tradition of palco before hurwitz, when it was family owned, a tradition of logging responsibly, with respect for the forest and your neighbors because you live there too. you have an interest in keeping the streams clean because you and your kids fish 'em in thw fall and winter when it's too wet to fall timber. and the compaany puts in bridges at no cost for the rainy season because it's their neighbors on the other side of the river that they're saving an hour and a half each way to get the kids to school when the rivers rise and palco has the heavy equipment to do it. that's what i hope can happen in scotia.

[Eurobabe]

4. How much is it? Saw no price...

Cool old houses!

[Raine]

5. They're very hostile

up there toward environmentalists. I was there a few years back it's pretty and quaint but the signs and bumperstickers you see there are so hateful. x(

[SoCalDem]

6. Considering how their bosses provided for them in a very paternalistic way

that's understandable. That place sounds like Stepford on steroids.. And of course if your income and your housing flows from your boss, you could hardly buck the system.

What do you want to bet that none of these people can afford to "buy" the house they have lived in for so long?

[nosmokes]

7. there's hostility from some that buy into the party line,

but others know the deal. now realize, when hurwitz first bought palco the first thing he did was major layoffs. so almost everyone in south humboldt county was affected. lots of the smaller mills were closed and a whole bunch of the timber fallers, riggers and truck drivers were outta work. there wasn't any economic reason for this, but hurwitz knew that if he ascared the shit out of these people he could work 'em harder for less$ and there would be a certain amount of loyalty because at least they were employed. but these guys aren't stupid and once they saw hurwitz's plan was clearcutting all this old growth there were a lot of guys who worked in the woods who knew this meant the beginning of the end. of course there were/are others that stand solidly behind that, and the issue has split the town and families. but as an activist in humboldt county i had a number of encounters with loggers, some acrimonious, many quite cordial. but there is a significant number of folks that realise the glory days of *working in the woods* is past and the future is in sustainable harvest, but there is a future there. and it doesn't lie in clear cutting burns and old/first growth. and it certainly doesn't lie in people like charles hurwitz having a damn thing to do with it.