[CQ-Contest] MINI-VISALIA POSTPONED

[Ken K6MR]

Thanks Steve.  I live in the way north part of the state and we’ve been not quite untouched, but not that serious.  This state is so big I can’t keep up with it all.

Ken K6MR

From: Steve<mailto:k0xp at k0xp.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 13, 2021 23:52
To: Ken K6MR<mailto:k6mr at outlook.com>; Jim Neiger<mailto:n6tj at sbcglobal.net>; m.weiss at yahoo.com<mailto:m.weiss at yahoo.com>; Chip Margelli<mailto:chipk7ja at hotmail.com>; Lloyd Cabral<mailto:KH6LC at hotmail.com>; cq-contest at contesting.com<mailto:cq-contest at contesting.com>
Subject: RE: [CQ-Contest] MINI-VISALIA POSTPONED

At 07:33 PM 2/13/2021, Ken K6MR wrote:

>Bummer!  I was sure looking forward to some real get togethers.  I
>didn't realize Tulare was having problems.

The whole California agricultural community has been hard-hit by
Covid just about since it first appeared in this state. There were a
large number of news reports last Spring discussing interviews with
agricultural workers, as well as meat-packing plant workers out east
in mid-America. The problem for the agricultural workers is similar
to that of meat packing plant workers: they must stand for hours on
end next to one another at their jobs, which doesn't promote social
distancing and is the main cause that both some meats and produce
became scarce or more expensive earlier this year (and indeed,
continues now, to some extent). The interviews pointed out that
almost all of these companies would not conduct surveys of infected
workers (just as Disneyland would not, late last autumn), and in most
cases, would not even allow many workers sick leave. Thus, at least
in the central valley, workers were forced to continue working even
after they became sick. I haven't seen anything on the subject for a
few months now so don't know what's going on today. But it certainly
didn't sound very good last Spring going into the summer. This is one
of the biggest reasons that the central California counties have been
listed red for many months long before the southern California
counties were. This is also likely the reason for the extra-tight
restrictions in Tulare and neighboring counties. Truth be told, after
reading about this, I wasn't really looking forward to going up there
for mini-Visalia due to the large number of cases in those counties.

But yes, thanks to Dick and Jim for trying to get this off the ground.

SteveH K0XP