Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

I like to surf the web for local news no matter where I am, including in The Union.

On Wednesday afternoon (Grass Valley time), I cliked on the article “Nevada Union students ‘spin’ Charlotte’s Web,’” a fun article.

What was next to it? An online ad for http://www.green215.com for providing Medical Health Evaluations (AKA medical marijuana ads).

Didn’t the high-school administrators just come out strongly against the idea of marijuana dispensaries in town? The DA already has.

What kind of message does this send? Most newspapers have ad policies about where certain ads run. Bizarre.

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Tea Party Patriot leader and local resident Mark Meckler has sent an email to area TPP’ers seeking personal donations, stating “my family has come to the end of the financial rope” working on the cause.

“Since last February, I have worked as a full time volunteer, spending my family’s savings, and borrowing to keep going,” according to the email. “In order to continue our mission, we need your financial support.”

As the co-founder of and National Coordinator of the Tea Party Patriots, the California co-coordinator, and the Sacramento co-coordinator, Meckler stated, “I am left with little time to earn a living. So today, I am taking the personally difficult step of reaching out to each of you for your financial support.”

The email provides information for donating $25 to $500 per month via Pay Pal or a one-time donation. Or it states you can make a check payable to Mark Meckler and send it to a P.O. Box in Chicago Park, indicating “gift” in the memo section.

The work cited was: “We stopped Proposition 1A in California, cap & trade, the takeover of our health care system (so far), and independent tea partiers across the nation helped the right candidates in NY23, Virginia, New Jersey and in the Massachusetts Miracle. (And) locally, you’ve burst onto the political scene with a gusto never seen before.”

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My first newspaper job at the Fort Launderdale Sun-Sentinel back in 1982 taught me how the private garbage business works. It’s the same for municipalities across the country.

Firms such as Waste Management land a municipal garbage contract that calls for raising rates a little bit each year, recession or not. The cities let themselves get locked in, and Grass Valley (which approved a 3 percent hike on Tuesday night) is just the latest case in point. The council goes along and there are rarely enough “community watchdogs” to call it out when the deal is being negotiated. (Waste Management advertises in all the local papers, and the garbage business is “boring” and “complicated” for them to write about).

The firms work the p.r., too. In the season premier of CBS’ “Undercover boss,” the president of Waste Management worked alongside his staff, for example. “We’re green” is often the mantra for local communities.

It’s a good business model, that’s for sure.

Here’s what stock analysts are saying about Waste Management.

“The private carting industry is highly lucrative, especially for Waste Management, with $8.8 billion in sales during the first nine months of 2009. The company’s strong cash flow (though it carries a debt load of $8.2 billion) allows it to pay a $1.16 per-share dividend, up from $0.75 in 2004, according to Morningstar analyst Bradley Meeks,” as investor site Minyanville reports.

“Meeks recently raised his fair value estimate for Waste Management shares to $34. Wall Street analysts expect the company to report earnings of $0.48 per share next week.”

If the county winds up outsourcing the McCourtney Road Transfer Station to a private firm, let’s hope it uses the recession to strike a contract that’s beneficial for its residents.

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Telephone carriers are subsidizing the newly launched Apple iPads in Austria, just like old-fashioned cell phone contracts.

It comes as pre-orders for the iPad are booming in Europe, prompting some countries to stop accepting them for now.

This is the old “razor and razor blade” business school adage, where you get a discount on the “razor” to keep paying for the “blades.”

In Austria, when you sign up for a 30 Euro, 5 GB monthly contract with Hutchison Telecom, you’ll get a 333 Euro markdown on the iPad (about $450). The price of the iPad in Europe is still not known, however.

There’s a string attached, too: It requires the same 3G modem that a laptop user gets, an inconvenience to firing up “anytime, anywhere.”

Some Austrian phone carriers also have subsidized iPhones like this.

Other carriers are expected to follow suit with the iPad deal.

Apple typically is not thrilled with such arrangements.

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My son has been an earlier riser here in Europe as he struggles with jet lag. He’s about got it licked, though.

He asked me if we could watch some cartoons together early this morning while his mom slept, so we turned on the TV. We turned on the set and what did we see? Four topless women sitting on the floor playing “spin the bottle.”

My son looked a little confused while I quickly changed the channel. Europeans, you will recall, are a little more expressive in their “free: television programming that in the states.

We eventually found Caillou. Our son enjoyed listening to it in German.

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Nevada City will have to slash its budget by $178,000 to cope with a continuing revenue shortfall, according to its finance director.

A mid-year adjustment for sales tax receipts is being reduced 19 percent or $183,000, down from $962,000 to $779,000. The city also saw an 8 percent, or $60,000, decline in its January payment.

“The city continues to struggle with an extreme tightening in cash flow,” according to the report in this week’s agenda packet.

In addition, a loan for the fiscal year 2009-2010 for $1 million is due and payable to the county in June.

The details are here.

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