On May 2 and 3, Cyclone Nargis ravaged the Southeast Asian country of Myanmar.

Over two weeks later, the cyclone’s effects are still strong. An estimated 1.6 to 2.5 million people have been affected, according to a United Nations press release. At least 78,000 have been killed by the cyclone and 56,000 people are still missing.

Jim Kang, a Davis resident and member of the Davis Korean Church, was on a mission trip with three others in Myanmar dispensing medicine, resources and faith to citizens when the storm hit, he said.

His group was staying on the western edge of a coastal city when a local policeman told them about the 15 to 20 foot tidal waves. Luckily, their bus driver had overslept, keeping them inside at least 45 minutes longer.

“I am confident that we would have been washed away and died had it not been for our sleepy bus driver,” Kang said.

After the storm, the Davis group was able to get back to Davis, after many days of blocked streets and food, water, electricity and fuel shortages.

Cyclone Nargis was a tropical cyclone, which is the same as a typhoon or hurricane, said Kyaw Tha Paw U, professor of atmospheric science at UC Davis’ department of land, air and water resources. The Indian Meteorological Agency warned the Burmese government about a category-3 storm, but the government did not tell the people.

Kyaw Tha Paw U is Burmese-American with relatives living in Myanmar. He has only received news about his family indirectly because of erratic phone contact, which is normal, but has been exacerbated after the storm, he said. His mother was able to contact a neighbor who reported that his relatives were safe.

Adding to the chaos of the cyclone, Myanmar, which is the name given by the military government despite locals who consider themselves Burmese, lacks government help and willingness to accept foreign aid. Myanmar has been a military dictatorship for over 30 years, said Benjamin Lawrance, assistant professor in the history department.

“It does not permit anyone to visit the country without a visa, and is very cautious about allowing people into the country unmonitored because its leaders want to control all images that circulate beyond its borders,” Lawrance said in an e-mail interview.

With this attitude, foreign aid is almost impossible to get to hard-hit and poorer regions further into the country. Kyaw Tha Paw U said he has heard that the government is starting to allow more Chinese and Indian aid and even some American aid. The American Red Cross has committed $1.25 million toward Myanmar relief efforts, according to an American Red Cross press release.

Supplies and aid are coming into the major city of Yangon and just sitting there, Kyaw Tha Paw U said. The aid needs to be sent closer to the Irrawaddy Delta where entire villages have been wiped out, he added.

Kang said he saw the lack of government help throughout the country. People were organizing themselves, conducting traffic and cleaning debris from the streets, he said.

“They don’t expect the government to help. They take matters into their own hands,” Kang said.

SASHA LEKACH can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com

The law of supply and demand: It is a basic tenet of economics that holds that more of a particular commodity drives down its price.

This may not be the case, however, in regard to the prices of Davis homes, according to a recent data analysis conducted jointly by Mayor Sue Greenwald and Mark Siegler, chair of the economics department at California State University, Sacramento.

Comparing median price data on homes in the city of Davis to homes in Sacramento County since 1994, the findings show that the two have almost perfect correlation in regard to their respective rises in price.

However, Davis homes have also been consistently higher in price than Sacramento County homes during this time period, a phenomenon known as the “Davis premium.”

This ratio, which divides the median price of Davis homes by Sacramento County homes, was then plotted against amounts representing the total number of residential building permits granted by the city over various years during the same time frame.

While the number of permits has fluctuated, the value of the Davis premium has more or less remained flat, indicating that building more or less homes in the city has had little influence on its relative price.

Greenwald said the data analysis is like a “little experiment,” and the study was conducted to explore the possibility that additional housing may actually decrease affordability, as championed by various government agencies including the Sacramento Area Council of Governments, an association of local governments in the Sacramento region.

While Greenwald conceded the data was preliminary and does not go back far enough or include all variables to be conclusive, she did say the data was indicative enough to influence the city’s growth policy.

“For ownership housing, I am not convinced that building more would lower prices,” she said. “Based on the law of supply and demand, housing would be cheaper in metropolitan areas because they build so many houses.”

Greenwald said the key factor which influences the Davis premium lies in external demand – people not living within the community are attracted to the city because of its quality of life – and drive up the price of homes. However, this phenomenon often prices out low- to middle-income individuals and families, as well as those with ties to the university.

“I would like to build a lot more housing that would attract more people to the university,” she said. “While I don’t think that would have the effect of lowering prices necessarily, smaller houses would provide more options for people that don’t have as much money.”

Solutions proposed by Greenwald include a housing development at the current PG&E site on L Street and price-controlled, limited equity housing built by the university at the 27-acre site formed by Toomey Field and the surrounding area. Both options would be attractive to students because of their proximity to downtown and campus, she said.

On the other hand, Greenwald said she was against “sprawling growth,” attractive to non-university oriented individuals.

“It’s just not essential to keep growing in that regard,” she said.

Other councilmembers either agreed with Greenwald’s assertions or moderately disagreed.

“I would say the data speaks for itself,” said Councilmember Lamar Heystek. “I don’t know if we can build enough houses to even make a dent in housing prices.”

Possible solutions proposed by Heystek included limiting the appreciation amount on homes and providing more ownership opportunities for the low- to middle-income class ranges. Heystek cited the Aggie Village development as an example of the latter possibility.

Heystek said that while the city has provided several opportunities for affordable rental housing, circulating more affordable ownership housing would increase the diversity of stock and force market rate homes to compete.

While Heystek said these owners would see a lower rate of return on their investment, the opportunity is a good tradeoff because of the reduced price. Still, the councilmember advocated against the idea that more houses mean lower prices.

“Building more houses just to build more houses doesn’t do anything, and we can’t build enough of these houses without impacts on quality of life,” he said.

Councilmember Stephen Souza said one flaw in the study is that it looks at the data in the aggregate. Categorically looking at various types of homes and in different price ranges might lead to different results, he said.

“I’m not an economist or real estate broker and she isn’t either,” he said. “You can make data say what you want it to say based on how you extrapolate it.”

Souza said the main problem with housing in Davis lies in the need for affordable housing that is not being met by the community.

The councilmember also cited the fact that the city’s homes have not been vastly affected by the recent United States housing market correction. Davis homes as a whole have seen a 3 percent drop in the value of homes compared to 20 percent or more in other regions, he said.

“[The low price drop] is very telling and it’s because of supply and demand,” he said. “One of the things we need to do is build more than the 44 permit houses that we did last year.”

In particular, Souza proposed that the city develop more small square footage homes designed primarily for the lower to middle income class.

Approved affordable housing projects in the city include one at Cassel Lane on the north end of Sycamore Lane which will provide five ownership units, one at Willowbank 10 in South Davis off Montgomery Avenue which will provide eight, and one at the Willowcreek Commons in south Davis on the north side of Albany Circle which will provide four.

CHINTAN DESAI can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com.

In an effort to make Davis greener and more environmentally friendly, Davis Waste Removal is offering free drop-off recycling for rigid plastics at its recycling center on at 2727 Second St.

“The recycling center offers free drop-off recycling 24/7 in order to make recycling easier for Davis residents,” said Jennifer Gilbert, the conservation coordinator for the city of Davis, in an e-mail. “This way, if you have more recycling than will fit in your recycling cart or if you have a lot of cardboard or scrap metal, you can drop it off any time.”

Davis Waste Removal first offered free recycling for rigid plastics #3, #5, #6 and #7 since May of last year. These types of recyclable items include plastic toys, laundry baskets, CD cases, clean PVC pipes, plastic medicine bottles, plastic furniture and other household items. The number under or inside the recyclable symbol designates what kind of plastic the product is made from.

“People drop off the rigid plastics, and when we have enough to run through the bailer, we bail it up and sell it to the broker,” said John Geisler, the operations manager of Davis Waste Removal.

Recycling rigid plastics may decrease the amount of material in the landfill, he added.

“[The recycling center] will increase the diversion rate, so there will be less material going to the landfill,” Geisler said.

Recycling rigid plastics has a good economical and environmental benefit, said Marissa Juhler, the Yolo County waste reduction and sustainability manager of the department of planning and public works.

“It gives the opportunity to recycle [rigid plastics] in the Yolo County recycling center without having to pay a tipping fee,” she said. “We can take the resource and make it into new products, which is good for the environment.”

It may also extend the life of the landfill if we recycle, Juhler said.

The city of Davis is also making an effort to conserve energy through several environmental programs.

“Davis has a lot of environmental programs in place already, and we are constantly expanding,” Gilbert said.

Davis offers programs and classes, such as the iBIN Recycling Program, the Compost Correspondence class and the Apartment Move-out Waste Reduction Program.

“These programs all aim to make Davis a more sustainable city, to reduce waste, conserve our natural resources and educate the citizens of Davis on various environmental issues,” Gilbert said.

In addition, the Yolo County Central Landfill offers free recycling of household hazardous waste, such as batteries, household cleaners, florescent light bulbs, electronics and used tires.

“All Yolo County residents are able to participate and bring their household hazardous waste to drop off during these events for free,” Gilbert said. “The events usually run the second Friday and Saturday of every month from 9 [a.m.] to 2 [p.m.]”

For those interested, the next household hazardous waste drop-off dates next month are June 13 and 14. During each drop-off event, reusable items are available for free.

JANET HUNG can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com.

On May 12 in an LA district court, Judge Audrey B. Collins awarded the popular social-networking website MySpace a $234 million anti-spam judgment, which is believed to be the largest award of its nature to date.

Judge Collins awarded MySpace with this hefty sum after spam defendants Sanford Wallace, a.k.a. “Spamford,” and Walter Rines neglected to show up for their day in court.

The two top-spammers, Wallace and Rines, were sued because of major violations of the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act).

According to the Federal Trade Commission, the CAN-SPAM Act “establishes requirements for those who send commercial e-mail, spells out penalties for spammers and companies whose products are advertised in spam if they violate the law and give consumers the right to ask e-mailers to stop spamming them.”

The law follows that a violation of any of the provisions is subject to fines of up to $11,000.

Despite this, MySpace may never collect its sizable award because the defendants did not show up for court, and there is no way to collect from them. The site hopes this judgment will act as a deterrent for other spammers.

“Anybody who’s been thinking about engaging in spam are going to say, ‘Wow, I better not go there,'” said MySpace chief security officer Hemanshu Nigam to the Associated Press. “Spammers don’t want to be prosecuted. They are there to make money. It’s our job to send a message to stop them.”

The presence of spam not only affects MySpace as a site, but it also contributes unnecessary stress to the lives of MySpace users.

“It’s a hassle trying to sort through junk mail from actual mail,” said UC Davis sophomore and MySpace user Kay Umeda. “If I don’t know the person, I tend not to click on the message in fear of getting a virus or something, but because of this, I’ve deleted important things like credit card checks.”

Not only does MySpace hope this decision will prevent spamming activities, Umeda shares the same sentiment.

“It would be nice not to get any spam,” Umeda said. “I’m kind of on the pessimistic side, though. There’s always people sending out spam and risking getting caught. It probably won’t stop spam completely from reeking havoc on people’s computers, but it might stop the bigger spam contributors.”

It was reported by the Associated Press that Nigam said Wallace and Rines created their own MySpace accounts or took over existing ones through “phishing” scams to distribute their spam to unsuspecting users.

According to an FTC Consumer Alert “How Not to Get Hooked by a ‘Phishing’ Scam,” “phishing involves Internet fraudsters who send spam or pop-up messages to lure personal information (credit card numbers, bank account information, Social Security number, passwords or other sensitive information) from unsuspecting victims.”

MySpace attempted to address user anxiety about the issue. “MySpace has zero tolerance for those who attempt to act illegally on our site,” Nigam said in a statement. “We remain committed to punishing those who violate the law and try to harm our members.”

ALEX BULLER can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com.

There will soon be new space for independent coffee downtown.

The owners of Mishka’s Cafe are currently negotiating the final terms of an agreement with the city of Davis to construct a new building on land to the west of the Varsity Theatre. The plan is to build a two-story, 5,000-square-foot building between the Varsity Theatre and the Dresbach-Hunt-Boyer Mansion on Second Street.

The final agreement is being worked out by attorneys, and the city council will ratify the agreement within the next few weeks, said Mishka’s owner Sinisa Novakovic.

“I’m having the first meeting with the architects tomorrow,” Novakovic said Sunday.

Mishka’s current lease for the 514 Second St. location expires in June 2009, he said, so construction of the new building will have to be completed before then.

The building will include a natural clay brick exterior, solar panels and basement storage. It will provide approximately 1,700 square feet of retail space downstairs, which is slightly larger than the 1,500 square feet of space Mishka’s currently occupies. The second story will be leased for office space.

“I’ll pour my soul and everything I have into it to make it a unique coffee shop that everyone will remember and want to come to for a long time,” Novakovic said.

That land where the new building is slated to be built is currently occupied by the Tank House, a structure built sometime between 1874 and 1888 to supply water for the adjacent Dresbach-Hunt-Boyer Mansion and its grounds. The Tank House was originally located south of the mansion but was moved to its current location in 1979 when the Mansion Square Development, which currently houses Zen Toro and Kaplan Educational Center, was built.

According to a city staff report, the Tank House was used as commercial space from 1979 until 1998, when it was condemned for being structurally unsound. It has not been used since.

The original proposal was to demolish the Tank House, but at a meeting on Nov. 27, the city council moved to negotiate an agreement that did not involve demolition. The Tank House will be moved again to a location where it can serve as a visitor information center. This motion was opposed by councilmembers Lamar Heystek and Stephen Souza.

Mayor Sue Greenwald has been a longtime supporter of the project, which she sees as important because it provides a unique touch to the city’s downtown.

“It’s been getting extremely hard for independent coffee shop owners to find locations downtown, particularly student-oriented, student-serving businesses,” Greenwald said. “That was another reason why [moving the Tank House] seemed worth the sacrifice to me.”

She said she supported the idea of “adaptive re-use” instead of demolition.

“Right now, the council’s inclination is to allow these types of things to be torn down and replaced with those big stucco buildings,” she said.

The Mishka’s project is an example of a recurring theme in decisions facing the Davis City Council: what to do about conflicts between redevelopment and historical landmarks. It has evolved into one of the larger issues in the current city council election.

“Adaptive re-use means that you take existing structures and adapt them to a new use,” said candidate Cecilia Escamilla-Greenwald in an e-mail. “A good example of this type of project would be Bistro 33, which incorporates the historic city hall.”

She said this strategy is the most appropriate way to preserve historic resources while preserving economic vitality.

Rob Roy, also a challenger in this election, said in an e-mail he would rather see the Tank House refurbished, and he’s not opposed to moving it so that Mishka’s can expand.

“It is important to keep our locally-owned independent businesses going strong and not allow corporate gentrification to take over our town,” he said.

JEREMY OGUL can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com.

The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors announced last week their intentions to proceed with plans to expand the Sacramento International Airport. In order to fund the construction, per passenger fees charged by airlines will be raised from $6 on average to $9.

The plan has been in development for nearly a decade and focuses on modernizing Terminal B. Designs show a new, multi-level structure with an “arrivals” floor with baggage claims, a “departures” floor for passenger check-in and a security checkpoint and a “transfers” floor, where passengers can be transported to where the gates will be located.

The plan also includes a hotel and a new parking garage.

The Terminal Modernization Plan carries a considerable price tag, projected at over $1 billion. While airport officials have sold hundreds of millions of dollars in bonds, the County Supervisors have unanimously decided to raise per passenger fees to the airlines to offset some of the cost.

It is a decision that has several airlines worried. United, Delta, Southwest, Alaska and Horizon Airlines all attended the Board of Supervisors meeting to voice their concerns.

“We are looking at record high fuel prices; the industry is in a great deal of turmoil. A lot of airlines are reducing service, a lot of airlines are merging,” said Marilee McInnis, a spokesperson for Southwest on Thursday, two days after the meeting. “We are always looking to find ways to make our airline more cost efficient, and we feel that the new [modernization] plan is not fiscally responsible.”

Airlines are currently charged landing fees on an average of $6 per passenger, but will see an increase in July to an average of $9 per passenger. The fee will continue to go up incrementally to over $13 in the year 2013, and then will gradually decrease.

If the new fees are put in effect, it would place the airport in the top four most expensive airports to which Southwest flies, McInnis said.

“If the fees increase, we might have to reduce our service to Sacramento International Airport.”

McInnis stressed that the airlines and the airport are not at odds with one another.

“We have a shared interest with the airport. We both want the same thing, which is a modern airport at a reasonable cost,” she said.

Despite the plans to move forward with the fee increase, Supervisor Don Nottoli said the Board of Supervisors is discussing a solution with the airlines.

“It is our goal to reach an agreement with the air carriers on the financing approach for the construction and renovation projects at Sacramento International,” Notoli said in an e-mail. “I remain hopeful that we can find common ground on this issue and in working together to meet the needs of the millions of people who travel through Sacramento International every year.”

The per passenger fee increase is expected to be ratified in the next couple weeks and will go into effect in July.

According to plans on the Sacramento International Airports website, construction on the project could start as soon as later this year, and the new terminal is planned to open in June 2011.

J. DANA STUSTER can be reached at city@californiaaggie.com.