As a campus employee, I was one of the few staff members who stayed on campus during the break. The highlight of the break certainly was dealing with the rolling electrical blackouts, or at best, “hiccups” in the power situation. Here we sit with flashlights in our offices and cell phones in our pockets wondering if we dare take the school elevators and risk getting stuck until spring.

Just in case you missed the crisis, don?t despair. It will be here for a while, plenty of time to get that extra job to pay for utility bills that will make your rent look cheap.

Due to lack of foresight on the part of California?s politicians, we will be forced to pay dearly for energy for quite some time. Now these same politicians who authorized deregulation are planning on stepping in and running the show?a kind of “shutting the barn door after the horse is gone” mentality.

Follow the logic ball please. The legislature pushed through deregulation and PG&E now thinks they have free reign to sell their power to the highest bidder while not keeping reserves for a “rainy day.” Responsibility to the citizens who are paying the utilities for a service apparently did not enter their minds. Now, all of a sudden, we have to turn off the lights and wait in the dark for solutions that may or may not come.

The effects were seen on campus as well. For winter intersession, students were combined into two buildings with back-up generators and numerous lights going on and off all over campus. And then there were the phone broadcasts continuously announcing the “stage three” alerts. The first week of school we will be huddled together in classrooms for warmth, and by finals week we will all be fanning each other to deal with the heat.

We should turn off the heat and power to those who brought us this bogus deal in the first place. Let?s see how they like reporting to work with wet heads or getting stuck in an elevator with an opposing party politician at the Capitol. How about this summer when the temperature hits 108 degrees, let?s prioritize and turn the air conditioners off at the Capitol. Who knows, maybe the guy who crashed through the side of the Capitol building had just received his latest energy bill.

Pay attention to this next thought. Why hasn?t anyone mentioned halting the state?s rapid growth while the utilities catch up with demand. Our electricity, gas and water supplies are in dire straits. We cannot accommodate further growth until the problem is solved.

Why should students care at all about this issue? In reality, the power shortage directly affects the institutions students attend, the fees they pay to go there, the apartments they rent and the employers they want a job from when they graduate. Our present and future economic situation in this state is at eminent risk. During the last election the college age group was virtually ignored by both parties. How about a voice being raised now by a potentially powerful group.

Diane Kauffman is the advertising manager of the State Hornet. She can be reached by email at [email protected].