Welcome to Ray's First entry on Ray's first Blog!
First and foremost I would like to thank Mari Tamburo and the restless
spirit within her for this public opportunity to say, "Thank you, Mari – I
am proud to be your neighbor!"
Then, I would like to commence recalling certain events and writing them
here from time to time for reasons that escape me at the moment but which
seemed worthwhile a few moments ago.
My professional career - that is, the employment period with the savings
plan which provides a modest income in my retirement - lasted thirty one
years with the California Department of Transportation, commencing
December 1, 1960, when I believed that population growth and economic
development were good and should be encouraged, and that freeways were the
lubricant to a prosperous and happy future. I was foundering at the time
in an interlude of insanity.
My duties were in the Right of Way Department, which had the
responsibility to appraise, acquire and manage rights of way for roads,
freeways and bridges, and occasionally other public works - canals,
schools, and such. The manual plotted every inch of our course according
to good business practices. It was unassailably an All American
enterprise and institution.
In addition to the fundamentals of deeds and property descriptions, I
learned about (or at least I was taught about) land economics, income
streams, return rates, recapture rates, capitalization rates, discount
rates, physical depreciation (and that baffling phenomenon, economic
depreciation, where you lose money in order to keep it), economic
obsolescence, functional obsolescence, lump sums, the nine functions of
the dollar, contracts, orders for possession, severance damages,
consequential damages, non-compensable damages and tables and charts of
every ilk that will prove you right no matter what you say. There were
leases, credit checks, rents, delinquencies, forms to pay or quit and the
fun part, evictions, and your expense account must always agree with your
time sheet if you want to stay out of trouble.
I was already an honorably discharged veteran of the Korean War but my
real battle scars came in civil service. Not only had I been I marching to
the beat of a different drummer somewhere, I was reading my music from a
different score. But I blew my notes loud, and I was conspicuously, and
hopelessly, out of step.
Stay tuned.
RBC - December, 12, 2010
Homestead Valley
Mill Valley, California
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