When it rains it pours. Hope everyone is in a safe place for the day. The weather guessers are saying this is going to be a huge event. Some places might get 5 inches of rain (total). Everybody needs to stand by for flash floods and mudslides and lots of wrecks on the roads.

I hope most of the rain will have passed by Thursday. It seems the Castaic Area Town Council is gathering for a special meeting concerning its new bylaws and policy changes. I think everyone is Castaic Area should show up and comment. Now, it could get a little crowded, since the scheduled meeting is to be held at the Denny’s in Castaic. How about all of you folks in Val Verde and the Hasley Canyon areas? Can you make it to Denny’s this Thursday at 6 p.m.? Just how many people does the place hold?

Wouldn’t it be great if it fills to capacity? Wouldn’t it be better if there were folks standing and waiting for a place to sit? And can someone please explain to me what is so damned important about changing the policies and procedures of the Castaic Area Town Council when we all know that once the new members take office, those bylaws may be changed again.

Now maybe the lawyer hired previously for the Town Council explain to us how this is all necessary. Are there any other lawyers who might have an opinion about the proposed changes?

The folks on the Town Council are now in full-on CYA mode. They’ve got to keep the backside covered so they can attempt to hold on to a position few people in Castaic area know about and even fewer care about.

I’m going to attend, if for no other reason than to see what they are up to. I’d much rather go to a meeting of a homeowners association. At least an HOA has some actual power. The Castaic Area Town Council members think they do, and that, my friends, is almost dangerous to the community.

Subject change. Back to the missing Newhall Post Office: It has been found. It got transplanted to 25548 The Old Road over in Stevenson Ranch. Yes it is true that for the first time since the 1870s, Newhall does not have a post office. The announcement from the United States Postal Service states that P.O. Box numbers, ZIP codes and retail hours of operation will not be affected. No mention of the thousands of folks in Newhall who are affected. “We’re going to have everything we always had except for the loyal customers who came to the Newhall Post Office, so service shouldn’t change at all.” That is just about what they told the folks of Newhall.

I know. Maybe they can advertise the new location on one of those soon-to-be-upgraded to electronic billboards. Sorry. I had to slip that in. Sometimes one of my favorite languages comes out when I least expect it. Let me see, American English (California dialect), American sailor profanity and sarcasm. You should never see the middle language in print, but I usually strike a balance between the first and the last.

Been getting some email from folks who live along the proposed route of the High Speed Rail Boondoggle or HSR-B. I’m not sure how it was ever approved by anyone along the route. I hope to meet some of those who voted yes on HSR-B funding. They can’t all be in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Well, maybe Palmdale, too.

Quite a few are expressing the idea that once the construction starts, the drive to complete the HSR-B will keep the construction going. You know, I’d be pretty happy with maybe 30 miles of it constructed. We could name that section after our governor. Moonbeam Railway. Go from here to there for no reason at all.

Our representative to the State Assembly has submitted a bill that would redirect HSR-B funds to education needs. Hope it makes it out of committee. Brave man, our Assemblyman Scott Wilk. Call everyone you know up in Sacramento and make sure they vote for AB6. This is important.

I have high hopes that the folks in Congress will help us get rid of Cemex at last. We are closer than we’ve ever been. On this one subject there are “hands across the aisle,” and it really has a chance. Call everyone you know in Congress and tell them.

This is the result of years of work by our City Council, especially Laurene Weste and Bob Kellar. I wonder how Alan Ferdman would have wanted the vote on Cemex to go, considering he has stated his love of that pollution-filled mining project. I ask that only because of his own statements on the subject. Weren’t there some campaign funds from Cemex passed his way, too?

I know. Maybe Ferdman was going for a better deal on Cemex like he stated we could have gotten with the billboards. I’m really going to like to see many of the existing billboards upgraded to electronic-style signs. Not really. I’m just sad that we had a way to get rid of a lot of the old signs and nothing could be done to replace them.

That is about all I have for today. It is going to be wet. Streets are slick. Folks have forgotten how to drive in the wet. Please be careful.

Darryl Manzer grew up in the Pico Canyon oil town of Mentryville in the 1960s and attended Hart High School. After a career in the U.S. Navy he returned to live in the Santa Clarita Valley. He can be reached at dmanzer@scvhistory.com. His older commentaries are archived at DManzer.com; his newer commentaries can be accessed [here]. Watch his walking tour of Mentryville [here].